COVID-19, caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, is spreading rapidly worldwide, with devastating consequences for patients, healthcare workers, health systems, and economies. As it reaches low-and middle-income countries, the pandemic puts healthcare workers at high risk and challenges the abilities of healthcare systems to respond to the crisis. This study measured levels of knowledge and preparedness regarding COVID-19 among physicians and nurses. A cross-sectional survey was conducted among healthcare workers in Libya between February 26 and March 10, 2020. We obtained 1,572 valid responses of a possible 2,000 (78.6%) participants from 21 hospitals, of which 65.1% were from physicians and 34.9% from nurses. The majority of participants (70%) used social media as a source of information. A total of 47.3% of doctors and 54.7% of nurses received adequate training on how to effectively use personal protective equipment. Low confidence in managing suspected COVID-19 patients was reported by 83.8% of participants. Furthermore, 43.2% of healthcare workers were aware of proper hand hygiene techniques. Less than 7% of participants received training on how to manage COVID-19 cases, whereas 20.6% of doctors and 26.3% of nurses felt that they were personally prepared for the outbreak. Awareness and preparedness for the pandemic were low among frontline workers during the study. Therefore, an effective educational training program should be implemented to ensure maintenance of appropriate practices during the COVID-19 pandemic.

BackgroundHealth care workers (HCWs) are essential for the delivery of health care services in conflict areas and in rebuilding health systems post-conflict. ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to systematically identify and map the published evidence on HCWs in conflict and post-conflict settings. Our ultimate aim is to inform researchers and funders on research gap on this subject and support relevant stakeholders by providing them with a comprehensive resource of evidence about HCWs in conflict and post-conflict settings on a global scale. MethodsWe conducted a systematic mapping of the literature. We included a wide range of study designs, addressing any type of personnel providing health services in either conflict or post-conflict settings. We conducted a descriptive analysis of the general characteristics of the included papers and built two interactive systematic maps organized by country, study design and theme. ResultsOut of 13,863 identified citations, we included a total of 474 studies: 304 on conflict settings, 149 on post-conflict settings, and 21 on both conflict and post-conflict settings. For conflict settings, the most studied counties were Iraq (15%), Syria (15%), Israel (10%), and the

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Background: The objective of this scoping review is to identify and map the published evidence on death, dying and end of life experiences among refugees worldwide. This scoping review will also inform areas for potential future research in the field. Methods: We included papers that satisfied the following inclusion criteria: 1) Population of interest: Refugees worldwide and populations/individuals who were internally or externally displaced due to wars, conflicts, non-natural disasters, or emergencies 2) Setting of interest: The phase of end of life, dying and death that takes place following the refuge or displacement reported after the year 1980 3) Study design: Any study design, including but not limited to: news, editorials, commentaries, opinion pieces, technical reports, primary studies, narrative reviews, systematic reviews, and policy briefs. We excluded papers that were not published in the English language; papers representing statistics of mortalities and papers focusing on the causes of death among refugees. We also excluded books and book reviews. We searched the following electronic databases:

Aim: Poor adherence to chronic disease therapy is a critical global problem that negatively effects the long-term therapy for chronic diseases, resulting in negative population health and economic effects. The WHO multidimensional model proposed a systems-based approach for improving adherence to chronic disease therapy. Patients & methods: In the current study, the WHO five-dimension framework was used to evaluate factors among, chronic-disease patients in the United Arab Emirates. Results: We show that patient’s understanding of disease, involvement in treatment decision, age more than 40 years, time spent with physician and fear of how patients were perceived by others were the most predictive factors associated with a high ability to self-manage a chronic disease. Conclusion: Sociocultural factors have an indirect impact on disease self-management.