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Background and aims Health care workers (HCWs) are at increased risk of getting infected with Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and suboptimal preventive practices have been identified as an important risk factor in this regard. This study was done to evaluate the preventive practices being followed by health care workers and identify reasons for suboptimal compliance. Methods A cross-sectional survey was done in HCWs belonging to various occupational roles and socio-cultural backgrounds across India through online platforms and telephonic interviews from July 30, 2020 to August 30, 2020. A scientifically designed and pre-validated questionnaire with good validity (CVR = 0.87, S-CVI/Av = 0.978) and internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha coefficient = 0.85) was used. Results The responses of 956 participants were analysed. Various suboptimal practices like touching outer surface of masks, lack of social distancing in cafeteria and duty rooms, inability to wash hands for adequate duration and properly follow steps of hand hygiene, inability to don and doff PPE properly, carrying PPE to duty rooms before completely doffing, use of personal mobile phones during duty and improper sleep were identified. Lack of knowledge, long duty hours, shortage of PPE, high patient workload, and casual attitude regarding own safety were identified as important barriers. Resident doctors and paramedical staff in the age group 18–30 years reported lower adherence. Conclusions Suboptimal compliance in preventive practices like handling PPE, distancing in cafeteria/duty rooms and hand hygiene is not uncommon in HCWs. Certain barriers are identified which should be addressed to ensure adequate safety of HCWs against COVID-19.

Objective. To investigate association between maternofoetal complications and the amount of proteinuria measured by spot urine protein creatinine ratio in patients with preeclampsia. Methods. 200 consecutive patients with preeclampsia were recruited in the study. The complications like first episode of severe hypertension, renal insufficiency, raised level of aspartate transaminase, signs of neurological involvement, thrombocytopenia, eclampsia, and need to shift in intensive care units were studied. The maternal outcome was studied in terms of type of labour, outcome of pregnancy, mode of delivery, indication of cesarean section, and maternal mortality. The foetal complications and outcome parameters were birth weight, Apgar score at the time of birth and at five minutes, need of high dependency unit care, and perinatal mortality. Result. The frequency of various maternal and foetal complications was between 14–53% and 22–92%, respectively. Maternal mortality was 3%, whereas perinatal mortality was 23%. Statistically significant association was found between the frequencies of various complications in mother and newborn and spot UPCR. Conclusion. The rate of various maternofoetal complications in preeclampsia is higher in developing countries than in developed world. Maternofoetal complications and outcome correlate with maternal spot UPCR.

This study was conducted to assess the traumatic impact of the second wave of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on depression, anxiety, stress, sleep quality, mental well-being, and resilience among the general population of India.

Objectives COVID-19 has infected millions of people across the globe, leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths. Currently, there are no vaccines available for COVID-19, and the most effective way to curb its spread is to follow preventive practices. The present study aimed to assess the extent of adoption of preventive practices among the general population in India. Methods A web-based cross-sectional survey was carried out recruiting 964 participants from all over India through purposive sampling. A pre-validated questionnaire consisting of 37 questions was used to collect data. Items 1A to 18A covered various preventive practices and items 1B to 19B covered reasons for not following those preventive practices. Descriptive statistics, chi-square tests, t-tests and one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) were conducted. Results Most participants reported taking precautions such as wearing masks (91.80%), covering both nose and mouth (79.14%) and avoiding hand shaking (83.40%). However, practices like following social distancing in public places (51.76%) and workplace (51.04%), frequent hand washing/sanitising (63.59%) and washing hands for at least 20 seconds (45.44%) were less commonly observed. Participants failed to follow social distancing because of overcrowding and lack of space. They also found it cumbersome to wash hands multiple times. Female participants and people residing in metropolitan and small cities were fairly doing well in following preventive practices. Conclusion The study helped in identifying the glitches in following various preventive practices against COVID-19 during unlock phase and reasons for the failure to perform these practices.