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.

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Background: Chronic anal fissure is a common painful benign anorectal case. Surgical operations like lateral internal sphincterotomy or manual anal dilatation are effective for healing most cases within a few weeks. However, as a side effect, permanent impaired anal.continence is likely to occur Aim: This article aims to evaluate whether the pharmacological can be the first-line option for.the treatment of chronic anal fissure Patients and Methods: 60 patients are enrolled with a chronic anal fissure in this work. The cases were chosen randomly from Kirkuk general hospital during the period from February 2017 to October 2018. As a first-line therapy, all patients treated with diltiazem 2% cream for.6 weeks Results: As a result of adverse drug reaction and uncooperative patients, 10 patients were unable to complete medical treatment, while 50 patients were able to complete it. Furthermore, 40 patients (out of 50) achieved complete recovery with 25 males and 15 females. Nevertheless, 10 patients (7 males and 3 females) were failed to reach complete recovery, which makes undergoing sphincterotomy as a second-line option. Complete recovery is achieved in (n=45) 90% of patients within 5-6 weeks from the start of diltiazem 2% cream. Whereas, 10% of them (n=5) recovered with complete 6 weeks administration of .the cream Conclusions: For majority patients with a chronic anal fissure, diltiazem 2% cream with a course of six weeks was the first-line choice therapy