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Background: Polypharmacy is the use of four or more medications in one prescription or implies the prescription of too many medications for an individual. Concerns about polypharmacy include increase adverse drug reactions, drug interactions, prescribing cascade and higher cost. Objectives: To conduct a prescription survey of polypharmacy in tertiary care hospital at Belagavi. Methodology: The study was conducted in the Medicine outpatient department of a tertiary care hospital, Belagavi, after obtaining approval and clearance from the Institutional Ethics Committee. Total 83 patients were selected by Simple Random Sampling and the data were collected prospectively by direct observation in specially designed proforma containing relevant patient details like registration number, age, gender and diagnosis, disease data and drug data. Results: Out of the total sample population (N=83), 56.62% had prescriptions falling under major polypharmacy(>6 drugs), 43.37% had prescriptions categorized as minor polypharmacy(3-5 drugs). The most common age group of patients receiving prescriptions with polypharmacy was between 41 to 60 years accounting for 38.55%. Majority of the patients receiving prescriptions with polypharmacy in our study were females (59.03%) as compared to males ( 40.96%). Major polypharmacy is more prevalent in patients receiving treatment for Hypertension (60.24%) followed by patients with diabetes (23.67%). Conclusion: Our prescription survey portrays polypharmacy to be widely prevalent in a tertiary care setting. Specific treatment goals with certainty are the essential need for curing diseases rather than polypharmacy, which could be a possible threat of more harm than good.

Introduction The study was carried out to quantify the changes induced by the pandemic in plastic surgery practice and training and to study the impact of the webinars on plastic surgery education from a residents’ perspective. Methods In this multicentric study, the number and type of surgeries, cause of injuries, and their regional variation during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) period (February–September 2020) were compared with pre–COVID-19 time. An online survey on the impact of webinars was conducted for plastic surgery trainees across the country. Results There was a significant reduction in total number of surgeries (p = 0.003). The procedures for hand (p = 0.156), faciomaxillary injuries (p = 0.25), and replantations (p = 0.46) were comparable; there was a significant reduction in combined orthopedic-plastic-surgical procedures (p = 0.009) during the pandemic. There was a significant reduction in road accidents (p = 0.007) and suicidal injuries (p = 0.002) and increase in assault (p = 0.03) and domestic accidents (p = 0.01) during the COVID-19 period.A usefulness score of >8 was given for the webinars by 68.7% residents. There was no significant difference in perception of utility when correlated with the academic program at their institutes (p = 0.109); 92% opined webinars should continue in post-COVID times. Conclusion There was a drastic reduction in number of elective and emergency procedures during the COVID-19 time, negatively affecting resident training program. Majority of residents felt that webinars could prove a useful adjunct to training in formal training program in post-COVID-19 scenario.

Background: Congenital deafness is usually seen to be associated with number of heart diseases. Screening congenitally deaf children with ECG can give us an insight on unidentified congenitally associated heart disease. Aim and objective: To study the ECG changes in congenitally deaf children and compare with normal children of the same age group. Materials and methods: We conducted a community based cross sectional analytical study with a sample size of 120 subjects out of which 60 were children from deaf school as cases and 60 were children from normal school with normal hearing as controls. Both the groups had 30 males and 30 females. 12 lead ECG was taken, studied and compared among the two groups. Results: Deaf children showed significant ECG changes like long QTc (16.7%), left axis deviation (3.3%), right axis deviation (1.6%), clockwise rotation (8.33%), anticlockwise rotation (5%), QRS complex abnormalities (45%), T wave inversions (45%). Conclusion: Our study was able to pick up numerous changes in ECG of deaf children. Yet the findings are inconclusive. Further genetic and thorough cardiac evaluation is necessary to comprehensively establish the relation between co-occurrence of ECG changes and congenital sensorineural deafness.