Abstract Background: The novel coronavirus 2 (SARS?CoV?2) pandemic is a pulmonary disease, which leads to cardiac, hematologic, and renal complications. Anticoagulants are used for COVID-19 infected patients because the infection increases the risk of thrombosis. The world health organization (WHO), recommend prophylaxis dose of anticoagulants: (Enoxaparin or unfractionated Heparin for hospitalized patients with COVID-19 disease. This has created an urgent need to identify effective medications for COVID-19 prevention and treatment. The value of COVID-19 treatments is affected by cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) to inform relative value and how to best maximize social welfare through evidence-based pricing decisions. Objective: compare the clinical outcome and the costs of two anticoagulants (heparin and (enoxaparin)) used to treat hospitalized patients with COVID-19 infection. Patients and method: The study was a retrospective review of medical records of adult, non-pregnant, COVID-19 infected hospitalized patients who had baseline and last outcome measurements at Alamal Epidemiology Center, Al-Najaf city from (Augast 2020 to June 2021). The outcome measures included D-dimer, length of stay (LOS), and mortality rate. Only the cost of the medical treatment was considered in the analysis. The pharmacoeconomics analysis was done in three different cost-effectiveness analysis methods. Microsoft Excel spreadsheet and Statistical Package for the Social Sciences software (SPSS), was used to conduct statistical analysis. Kaplan Meier test was used to compare the mortality rate. T-TEST was used to compare the outcomes of the two groups. Results and discussion: two groups were compared, the first group consists of 72 patients who received heparin, and the second group consists of 72 patients who received enoxaparin. COVID-19 infected patients had a higher abnormal average D-dimer (2534.675 ng/dl). No significant differences between both genders with regards to the basal average D-dimer (males= 2649.95 ng/dl, females= 2374.1mg/dl, P-value>0.05). There was a significant difference between patient's ages 60 years and patients <60. (3177.33 ng/dl, 1763.06 ng/dl, P-value <0.05). It seems that, higher D-dimer levels were associated with a higher mortality rate (died=3166.263 ng/dl, survived= 1729.94 ng/dl, P-value <0.05). Heparin was more effective in decreasing D-dimer levels than enoxaparin which inversely increased the D-dimer levels (-24.4 ng/dl/day, +154.701 ng/dl/day, P-value <0.05). Additionally, heparin was more effective in increasing the survival rate compared to enoxaparin (55% vs, 35%, P-value<0.05). Heparin was associated with a longer duration of stay in hospital than enoxaparin but with no significant difference (13.7 days, 12.3 days, P-value >0.05). Concerning the cost, treatment with heparin cost less than enoxaparin (2.08 U.S $, 9.44 U.S $)/per patient/per day. Conclusion: Originator heparin was a more cost-effective anticoagulant therapy compared to originator enoxaparin, it was associated with a lower cost and better effect, treatment with Heparin resulted in positive INB= 11.3, where a positive result means that heparin is more cost-effective than Enoxaparin. All three methods of pharmacoeconomic analysis decide that heparin was more cost-effective than enoxaparin in treating COVID-19 infected patients.
Heuristic approaches are traditionally applied to find the optimal size and optimal location of Flexible AC Transmission Systems (FACTS) devices in power systems. Genetic Algorithm (GA) technique has been applied to solve power engineering optimization problems giving better results than classical methods. This paper shows the application of GA for optimal sizing and allocation of a Static Compensator (STATCOM) in a power system. STATCOM devices used to increase transmission systems capacity and enhance voltage stability by regulate the voltages at its terminal by controlling the amount of reactive power injected into or absorbed from the power system. IEEE 5-bus standard system is used as an example to illustrate the te
... Show MoreA novel demountable shear connector for precast steel-concrete composite bridges is presented. The connector uses high-strength steel bolts, which are fastened to the top flange of the steel beam with the aid of a special locking nut configuration that prevents bolts from slipping within their holes. Moreover, the connector promotes accelerated construction and overcomes the typical construction tolerance issues of precast structures. Most importantly, the connector allows bridge disassembly. Therefore, it can address different bridge deterioration scenarios with minimum disturbance to traffic flow including the following: (1) precast deck panels can be rapidly uplifted and replaced; (2) connectors can be rapidly removed and replaced; and (
... Show MoreCorncob is an agricultural biomass waste that was widely investigated as an adsorbent of contaminants after transforming it into activated carbon. In this research carbonization and chemical activation processes were achieved to synthesize corncob-activated carbon (CAC). Many pretreatment steps including crushing, grinding, and drying to obtain corncob powder were performed before the carbonization step. The carbonization of corncob powder has occurred in the absence of air at a temperature of 500 °C. The chemical activation was accomplished by using HCl as an acidic activation agent. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) facilitate
... Show MoreImage segmentation using bi-level thresholds works well for straightforward scenarios; however, dealing with complex images that contain multiple objects or colors presents considerable computational difficulties. Multi-level thresholding is crucial for these situations, but it also introduces a challenging optimization problem. This paper presents an improved Reptile Search Algorithm (RSA) that includes a Gbest operator to enhance its performance. The proposed method determines optimal threshold values for both grayscale and color images, utilizing entropy-based objective functions derived from the Otsu and Kapur techniques. Experiments were carried out on 16 benchmark images, which inclu
The aim of this work is to detect the best operating conditions that effect on the removal of Cu2+, Zn2+, and Ni2+ ions from aqueous solution using date pits in the batch adsorption experiments. The results have shown that the Al-zahdi Iraqi date pits demonstrated more efficient at certain values of operating conditions of adsorbent doses of 0.12 g/ml of aqueous solution, adsorption time 72 h, pH solution 5.5 ±0.2, shaking speed 300 rpm, and smallest adsorbent particle size needed for removal of metals. At the same time the particle size of date pits has a little effect on the adsorption at low initial concentration of heavy metals. The adsorption of metals increases with increas
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