Author: Admin

Descriptive analysis of international deportations caused by irresponsible traveller behaviour

Authors: Ryan M Mangan, Gerard T Flaherty.

ABSTRACT

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic focused public attention on the importance of responsible
tourism. The purpose of this study was to characterise irresponsible tourist behaviour leading to deportation from the destination country.

Methods: A web-based search of media reports relating to deportations of tourists was conducted.

Results: The most common reasons for deportation were related to indecent exposure or physical damage to sacred monuments and violations of COVID-19-related national public health rules. Other incidents resulted from social media posts and breach of environmental regulations.

Conclusions: The results of this study may inform future research efforts and targeted public awareness campaigns.

Keywords: responsible travel; deportation; COVID-19; cultural sensitivity; sustainable travel

Citations: IeJSME 2022 16 (3): 07-11

DOI: https://doi.org/10.56026/imu.16.3.7

Pre-travel Health Advice and Medical Services by Healthcare Professionals – A Literature Review

Author: Pei Kuan Lai

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Travel medicine is an emerging branch of medicine concerned with the well-beings of travellers before, during, and after travel. Pre-travel health advice and medical services are important to keep travellers healthy and ensure a safe and pleasant journey by minimising impact of illness and accidents.

Objective: This paper serves as a literature review paper on the pre-travel health advice seeking behaviours amongst travellers as well as the pre-travel health advice and medical services provided by the health professionals.

Methodology: An extensive online literature search using the search terms of “pre-travel”, “health advice”, “medical services”, and “health professionals” was done on electronic bibliographic databases including PubMed and Scopus supplemented by Google Scholar.

Results: Twenty original studies as retrieved from the online databases which fulfilled the inclusion criteria were included in the review. Prevalence of pre-travel advice seeking behaviour is reportedly low in Malaysia (36.8% – 40.5%). Studies done amongst pharmacists in Malaysia revealed that the Malaysian
pharmacists have been actively involved in providing pre-travel health advice and medical services (76.6% – 85%). High percentages of healthcare professionals in Europe and American (68% – 94.7%) provide pre-travel advice and medical services, followed by 79.5% in Saudi and 44.7% in Qatar. The top 5 topics of health advice most frequently cited were on malaria, travel insurance, sexually transmitted disease/HIV, vaccinations and first aid kit. The average duration spent for pre-travel consultation range from 5 to 30 minutes.

Conclusion: Travellers should be educated on the importance of seeking pre-travel advice and vaccinations to raise their awareness. Healthcare practitioners should be well-trained and informed to
provide good pre-travel advice and services.

Keywords: Pre-travel, health advice, medical services, travellers.

Citations: IeJSME 2022 16 (3): 12-21

DOI: https://doi.org/10.56026/imu.16.3.12

Multiple Hepatic Haemangiomas: A Case Report

Authors: S T Kew, Wei Yen Lim

ABSTRACT

A healthy 30-year-old woman underwent health screening, and was incidentally found to have a well-defined echogenic lesion in Segment VI of her liver, measuring 4.2 X 1.8cm in her ultrasound scan. She was asymptomatic, has no cutaneous lesions, nor stigmata of chronic liver disease. She has no hepatomegaly. CT scan of her abdomen found multiple liver haemangiomas, varying in size from 21 X 28mm to sub-centimeter lesions.

Diagnosis of hepatic haemangioma in this patient is based on typical appearance on contrast imaging. Their appearance is important to recognise as they do not need intervention and attempts at instrumentation for diagnosis or surgery may result in more harm than good.

Keywords: Hepatic haemangioma (HH), Benign tumour of the liver, Conventional ultrasonography (US), Computer tomography (CT).

Citations: IeJSME 2022 16 (3): 22-24

DOI: https://doi.org/10.56026/imu.16.3.22

 

Comparison of altmetrics with conventional bibliometrics in the surgical literature

Authors: Shashank R Thyarala, Gerard T Flaherty.

ABSTRACT

Background: The impact of a research publication has traditionally been quantified by its citation count. Newer bibliometric indices such as Altmetric Attention Score (AAS) and article page views are emerging as supplementary measures to quantify the academic influence of research.

Objective: The aim of the current study was to interrogate the relationship between novel and traditional bibliometric indices for research published in a leading surgical journal and evaluate the role
of these newer indices in measuring the impact of surgical research.

Methods: All articles published in JAMA Surgery between 1 January 2019 and 1 September 2021 were
examined. The literature database PubMed was used to identify all articles published within the specified time period. Cumulative citation count (Web of Science), AAS and article page views were retrieved from the journal website. Statistical analysis using the Spearman rank correlation coefficient (r) was performed on Minitab 19.

Results: A total of 1,071 articles were retrieved for further analysis. The correlation (95% CI) between ranks for all articles was 0.635 (0.594-0.673) for AAS and citation scores, 0.680 (0.642-0.714) for citations and article page views, and 0.813 (0.788-0.835) for AAS and article page views.

Conclusions: We demonstrated a strong correlation between citations and AAS for articles published in a leading surgical journal. The inter-year correlation between 2019 and 2021 was similar, suggesting that AAS could be predictive of future citations. AAS may be useful in evaluating the wider societal impact of the surgical literature and could serve to promote greater public engagement in surgical research.

Keywords: Altmetrics; Bibliometrics; Surgical Research; Citations; Social Media; Citations.

Citations: IEJSME 2022 16 (2): 6-8

DOI: https://doi.org/10.56026/imu.16.2.6

Challenges in the diagnosis and management of post-covid-19 organizing pneumonia: A clinician’s perspective

Authors: Kok Wei Poh, Shobhana Sivandan, Kwee Choy Koh.

ABSTRACT

COVID-19 caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection can result in multiple complications such as long COVID syndrome, pulmonary fibrosis, and organizing pneumonia (OP). Although OP is a well-known complication of COVID-19, several challenges remain; from suspecting and confirming the diagnosis to its management. These challenges are aggravated further in patients who are critically ill and when surgical biopsy is not feasible. Post-COVID-19 OP is a subset of secondary organizing pneumonia that shares similar clinical and radiological characteristics and similar computerized tomography (CT) scan features with OP of various etiologies. In this review, we propose a clinical approach based on current available evidence for the management of COVID-19 patients with suspected OP. Typical CT findings such as consolidations, perilobular opacity, reversed halo sign and ground-glass opacities are highly suggestive of OP, but are not pathognomonic. Confirmation by histopathology should be done but when not possible, a trial of corticosteroid therapy may be considered. However, biopsy should be done if corticosteroid therapy fails or when there is clinical deterioration and worsening of hypoxia while on corticosteroid therapy especially if the onset of the symptoms is longer than two weeks.

Keywords: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; organizing pneumonia; corticosteroid; computerized tomography scan

Citations: IEJSME 2022 16 (2): 9-27

DOI: https://doi.org/10.56026/imu.16.2.9

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