While social distancing was crucial to slow the COVID-19 virus, it also contributed to social isolation and emotional strain. This pilot study evaluated the impact of stand-alone psychoeducational group sessions designed to build social connectedness and space for people to learn about mental health during the pandemic. The study examined if offering the stand-alone group sessions increased uptake of and receptivity to additional mental health services. People had access to free, online group psychoeducational sessions offered by a digital mental health platform company. Sessions were offered to (1) employees who had mental health benefits offered through their employer, and to (2) members of the general public. Session formats included discussions, didactic lectures, and workshops, were facilitated by a mental health provider, and used live video conference technology. Topics included race and identity, stress management, coping with political events, relationship issues, and self-compassion. First-time session registrations were tracked from June 2020 to July 2021 on 6723 participants (3717 benefits-eligible employees and 3006 from the general public). Among the employee subsample, 49.5% attended a group session as their first use of any available service on the platform; 52.5% of these employees sought additional services after their first session. In anonymous post-session surveys of employees and members of the general public, 86% of respondents endorsed knowledge increases, 79.5% reported improved understanding of their mental health, 80.3% endorsed gaining actionable steps to improve mental health, 76.5% said that they would consider group sessions in addition to therapy, and 43.5% said that they would consider group sessions instead of therapy. These results suggest that scalable, brief group psychoeducational sessions are a useful conduit to mental health care and have potential to reach people who may not otherwise access available mental health services.

Total-body PET/CT allows simultaneous acquisition of all body parts at a single bed position during the radiotracer uptake phase. Dynamic imaging protocols using total-body PET might demonstrate findings that may not have been previously visualized or described using conventional PET/CT scanners. We examined the characteristics of blanching defects-areas of markedly reduced (partial defect) or absent (complete defect) radiotracer uptake seen at the skin and subcutaneous tissues opposite the bony prominences at pressure points. Methods: In this observational study, 77 participants underwent dynamic total-body PET/CT imaging using 18

Conventional whole-body18F-FDG PET imaging provides a semi-quantitative evaluation of overall glucose metabolism without gaining insight into the specific transport and metabolic steps. Here we demonstrate the ability of total-body multiparametric18F-FDG PET to quantitatively evaluate glucose metabolism using macroparametric quantification and assess specific glucose delivery and phosphorylation processes using microparametric quantification for studying recovery from coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Methods: The study included thirteen healthy subjects and twelve recovering COVID-19 subjects within eight weeks of confirmed diagnosis. Each subject had a dynamic18F-FDG scan on the uEXPLORER total-body PET/CT system for one hour. Semiquantitative standardized uptake value (SUV) and SUV ratio relative to blood (SUVR) were calculated for regions of interest (ROIs) in different organs to measure glucose utilization. Tracer kinetic modeling was performed to quantify microparametric rate constants K1and k3that characterize18F-FDG blood-to-tissue delivery and intracellular phosphorylation, respectively, and a macroparameter Kithat represents18F-FDG net influx rate. Statistical tests were performed to examine differences between the healthy controls and recovering COVID-19 subjects. Impact of COVID-19 vaccination was investigated. We further generated parametric images to confirm the ROI-based analysis. Results: We detected no significant difference in lung SUV but significantly higher lung SUVR and Kiin the recovering COVID-19 subjects, indicating an improved sensitivity of kinetic quantification for detecting the difference in glucose metabolism. A significant difference was also observed in the lungs with the phosphorylation rate k3, but not with the delivery rate K1, which suggests it is glucose phosphorylation, not glucose delivery, that drives the observed difference of glucose metabolism in the lungs. Meanwhile, there was no or little difference in bone marrow metabolism measured with SUV, SUVR and Ki, but a significant increase in bone-marrow18F-FDG delivery rate K1in the COVID-19 group (p<0.05), revealing a difference of glucose delivery in this immune-related organ. The observed differences were lower or similar in vaccinated COVID-19 subjects as compared to unvaccinated ones. The organ ROI-based findings were further supported by parametric images. Conclusions: Higher lung glucose metabolism and bone-marrow glucose delivery were observed with total-body multiparametric18F-FDG PET in recovering COVID-19 subjects as compared to healthy subjects, which suggests continued inflammation due to COVID-19 during the early stages of recovery. Total-body multiparametric PET of18F-FDG delivery and metabolism can provide a more sensitive tool and more insights than conventional static whole-body18F-FDG imaging to evaluate metabolic changes in systemic diseases such as COVID-19.