Healthcare professionals are one of the most vulnerable groups subjected to verbal and physical violence daily while carrying out their duties; such violence is a worldwide concern. This study aimed to explore the awareness of a violence reporting system among healthcare providers and the impact of the new Ministry of Health (MOH) violence regulations at one of the Eastern Region hospitals in Saudi Arabia. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted from January to February 2020. The study included 210 healthcare providers from different specialties working in critical care units. A sample of 137 healthcare providers was selected randomly, and a self-administered questionnaire was distributed accordingly. Results: In this study, 31.4% of participants were not aware of whether they had a specific system for reporting violent incidents, while 68.6% had no training on these systems. Experiences of violence among the staff decreased from 78.6% before the MOH regulations to almost 20% after the MOH regulations. Conclusion: The majority of victims did not report incidents because there is a lack of system privacy, and the workers felt that the incidents of violence were a part of their daily jobs. In addition, this study revealed that the majority of healthcare workers did not receive training on the reporting system, which explains their lack of knowledge about the formal reporting system. Finally, the MOH initiative and penalties for controlling workplace violence have resulted in a significant drop in the prevalence of violence among healthcare workers.

This study aims to describe the impact of COVID-19 on internship activities at health organizations in Saudi Arabia. The study is a secondary analysis of data set that was collected from 101 health science interns from different health organizations. The majority of interns were trained or started their internships at public health organizations (64.29%), while 6.12% and 29.59% were at private and other health organizations, respectively. During the COVID-19 pandemic, most health organizations chose to continue the internships (76.53%), while others (23.47%) decided to suspend trainings. Health organizations have taken different actions to overcome the internship issues during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Pediatric dental caries is the most common chronic disease among children. Above 40% of the U.S. children aged 2–11 years have dental caries; more than 50% of them come from low-income families. Under dental services of the Medicaid program, children enrolled in Medicaid must receive preventive dental services. However, only 1/5 of them utilize preventive dental services. The purpose of this overview is to measure the impact of Medicaid dental benefits on reducing oral health disparities among Medicaid-eligible children. This paper explains the importance of preventive dental care, children at high risk of dental caries, Medicaid dental benefits, utilization of dental preventive services by Medicaid-eligible children, dental utilization influencing factors, and outcome evaluation of Medicaid in preventing dental caries among children. In conclusion, despite the recent increase of children enrolled in Medicaid, utilizing preventive dental care is still a real challenge that faces Medicaid.

Background: To prevent the spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), the Saudi Arabian government introduced a number of measures in different phases (e.g. social distancing, curfew and lockdown). Aims: This study describes the distribution of COVID-19 in Saudi Arabia during different phases of prevention strategies and assesses their effect on controlling the spread of the disease. Methods: This cross-sectional study used COVID-19 data for 2 March–5 July 2020 from the Ministry of Health website. The period was divided into five phases based on prevention strategies implemented to control the infection. The incidence rate, point prevalence, case fatality rate, overall mortality rate and recovered rate for COVID-19 infection were assessed at the national, regional and city levels. Results: At the end of phase 5 on 5 July 2020, the nationwide incidence of COVID-19 was 11%, total recovered rate 70%, case fatality rate 0.9% and adjusted case fatality rate 1.4% (adjusted for time lag for mortality). The COVID-19 point prevalence increased from phase 1 (2.1/100 000 population) to phase 5 (178.2/100 000 population). A high recovered rate (68.7%) was seen in phase 4 accompanied with lower overall mortality and incidence in phase 5. The eastern region of Saudi Arabia had the highest point prevalence of COVID-19 infection (450.5 per 100 000 population), while Jeddah and Mecca had the highest overall mortality.

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