BackgroundThere are several definitions of the quality of healthcare services. It may be defined as a level of value provided by any health care resource, as determined by some measurement. Scientists use a variety of quality measures to attempt to determine health care quality. They use special indicators or based on a patients' or healthcare professional's perception. This article aims to provide a short review of the available data on the quality of healthcare services in selected European countries during the COVID-19 pandemic.MethodologyThe research was done by the use of online databases such as PubMed, Google Scholar, and Science Direct. All the studies focused on the quality of healthcare services, yet the studies used different methods to measure this quality. In addition, the results of the authors' survey on the assessment of the quality of healthcare services before and during the COVID-19 pandemic were presented.ResultsAmong twelve studies, four were from the United Kingdom and one each of Catalonia, Italy, Sweden, Poland, Netherlands, France, Germany, Belgium. Patients in the United Kingdom felt that the quality of services was good during the pandemic, whereas the quality declined in the other studies cited. The results of our research also revealed a decrease in the quality of healthcare services provided.ConclusionsNevertheless the development of telemedicine has had a positive impact on the quality of healthcare services. The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly affected most European countries' quality of healthcare services.

The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in unprecedented changes in the functioning of the health care system, which were connected with the occurrence of new challenges for both the health care system’s employees and for the patients. The purpose of the present article is to analyze the needs of persons with oncological diseases. Taking into account the multiple aspects of the term health, psychological, social, and existential needs of the patients were analyzed. This article is directed mainly at persons who remain in a direct therapeutic relation with a patient. It is to facilitate recognizing the needs of ill people and to increase sensitivity to the issue of maintaining or improving the well-being of patients which requires paying special attention to their psychological, social, and existential needs during the period of hindered access to the health care system. This systematic review takes advantage of quantitative and qualitative methods of text analysis with phenomenological analysis factored in. The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in the appearance of new problems in the population of oncological patients or it made the existing problems more severe. As a consequence, it made it significantly more difficult to meet their needs on various levels and sometimes it even made it impossible. It seems necessary to determine and introduce strategies to ensure that patients with oncological diseases have access to psychological and spiritual support in the period of the pandemic.

Mammalian oocyte maturation is achieved when oocytes reach metaphase II (MII) stage, and accumulate mRNA and proteins in the cytoplasm following fertilization. It has been shown that oocytes investigated before and after in vitro maturation (IVM) differ significantly in transcriptomic and proteomic profiles. Additionally, folliculogenesis and oogenesis is accompanied by morphogenetic changes, which significantly influence further zygote formation and embryo growth. This study aimed to determine new transcriptomic markers of porcine oocyte morphogenesis that are associated with cell maturation competence. An Affymetrix microarray assay was performed on an RNA template isolated from porcine oocytes before (n = 150) and after (n = 150) IVM. The brilliant cresyl blue (BCB) staining test was used for identification of cells with the highest developmental capacity. DAVID (Database for Annotation, Visualization, and Integrated Discovery) software was used for the extraction of the genes belonging to a cell morphogenesis Gene Ontology group. The control group consisted of freshly isolated oocytes. In total, 12,000 different transcripts were analysed, from which 379 genes were downregulated and 40 were upregulated in oocytes following IVM. We found five genes, SOX9, MAP1B, DAB2, FN1, and CXCL12, that were significantly upregulated in oocytes after IVM (in vitro group) compared with oocytes analysed before IVM (in vivo group). In conclusion, we found new transcriptomic markers of oocyte morphogenesis, which may be also recognized as significant mediators of cellular maturation capacity in pigs. Genes SOX9, MAP1B, DAB2, FN1, and CXCL12 may be involved in the regulation of the MII stage oocyte formation and several other processes that are crucial for porcine reproductive competence.

Background: Vinyasa yoga practice improves body fitness and potentially positively affects practitioners’ well-being and health. Due to the diverse intensity of practice and positions customized to the practitioner’s needs, it can also support cancer patients. Undertaking physical activity that has a potentially positive effect on well-being and health was particularly important during the self-isolation that followed the COVID-19 pandemic. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of three-month mild and moderate intensity vinyasa yoga practice on breast-cancer patients’ stress perception, self-confidence, and sleep quality during COVID-19 induced self-isolation. Methods: Female breast-cancer patients participated in twelve-weeks of online vinyasa practice during the COVID-19 induced self-isolation period. Meetings were held once a week, where 60-min vinyasa yoga sequences were followed by 15 min of relaxation. Patients completed pre- and post-intervention surveys to evaluate changes in the following outcomes: stress perception, self-confidence, and sleep quality. Forty-one female patients enrolled in the Vinyasa course completed the pre-intervention survey, while 13 attended all the meetings and completed the post-intervention survey. Results: The effect of the twelve-week yoga and relaxation practice significantly reduced sleep problems and stress of oncological patients. The participants also declared an improvement in their general well-being and self-acceptance. Conclusion: Dynamic forms of yoga combined with mindfulness techniques can be applied to patients treated for oncological diseases. It contributes to improving their well-being. However, in-depth studies are needed to analyze the complexity of this effect.

Modern science is becoming increasingly committed to environmentally friendly solutions, mitigating the impact of the developing human civilisation on the environment. One of the leading fields aimed at sustainable agriculture is in vitro meat production. Cellular agriculture aims to provide a source of animal-free meat products, which would decrease worldwide nutritional dependency on animal husbandry, thereby reducing the significant impact of this industry on Earth’s climate. However, while some studies successfully produced lab-based meat on a small scale, scalability of this approach requires significant optimisation of the methodology in order to ensure its viability on an industrial scale. One of the methodological promises of in vitro meat production is the application of cell suspension-based bioreactors. Hence, this study focused on a complex transcriptomic comparison of adherent undifferentiated, differentiated and suspension-cultured myosatellite cells, aiming to determine the effects of different culture methods on their transcriptome. Modern next-generation sequencing (RNAseq) was used to determine the levels of transcripts in the cultures’ cell samples. Then, differential expression and pathway analyses were performed using bionformatical methods. The significantly regulated pathways included: EIF2, mTOR, GP6, integrin and HIFα signalling. Differential regulation of gene expression, as well as significant enrichment and modulation of pathway activity, suggest that suspension culture potentially promotes the ex vivo-associated loss of physiological characteristics and gain of plasticity. Therefore, it seems that suspension cultures, often considered the desired method for in vitro meat production, require further investigation to fully elucidate their effect on myosatellite cells and, therefore, possibly enable their easier scalability to ensure suitability for industrial application.