No abstract

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are the most common cause of death and disability worldwide. Saudi Arabia, one of the middle-income countries has a proportional CVD mortality rate of 37%. Knowledge about CVD and its modifiable risk factors is a vital pre-requisite to change the health attitudes, behaviors, and lifestyle practices of individuals. Therefore, we intended to assess the employee knowledge about risk of CVD, symptoms of heart attacks, and stroke, and to calculate their future 10-years CVD risk. An epidemiological, cross-sectional, community-facility based study was conducted. The women aged ≥40 years who are employees of Taibah University, Al-Madinah Al-Munawarah were recruited. A screening self-administrative questionnaire was distributed to the women to exclude those who are not eligible. In total, 222 women met the inclusion criteria and were invited for the next step for the determination of CVD risk factors by using WHO STEPS questionnaire: It is used for the surveillance of non-communicable disease risk factor, such as CVD. In addition, the anthropometric measurements and biochemical measurements were done. Based on the identified atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) risk factors and laboratory testing results, risk calculated used the Framingham Study Cardiovascular Disease (10-year) Risk Assessment. Data were analyzed using GraphPad Prism 7 software (GraphPad Software, CA, USA). The result showed the mean age of study sample was 55.6 ± 9.0 years. There was elevated percentage of obesity and rise in abdominal circumference among the women. Hypertension (HTN) was a considerable chronic disease among the participants where more than half of the sample had it, i.e., 53%. According to the ASCVD risk estimator, the study participants were distributed into four groups: 63.1% at low risk, 20.2% at borderline risk, 13.5% at intermediate risk, and 3.2% at high risk. A comparison between these categories based on the CVD 10-year risk estimator indicated that there were significant variations between the low-risk group and the intermediate and high-risk groups (P = 0.02 and P = 0.001, respectively). The multivariate analysis detected factors related to CVD risk for women who have an intermediate or high risk of CVD, such as age, smoking, body mass index (BMI), unhealthy diet, blood pressure (BP) measurements, and family history of CVD (P < 0.05). The present study reports limited knowledge and awareness of CVD was 8.6 that is considered as low knowledge. In conclusion, the present study among the university sample in Madinah reported limited knowledge and awareness of CVD risk. These findings support the need for an educational program to enhance the awareness of risk factors and prevention of CVD.

It is an essential to evaluate the potential biomarkers affecting the progression of disease in COVID-19 patients.Therefore, we investigated the relationship between Ferritin levels and hematological parameters and severity of COVID-19 to explore its role in predicting the severity of COVID-19. This retrospective study was conducted in different Hospitals at Madinah region, Saudi Arabia. In the present study, a total of 112 cases of COVID-19 patients. The patient records included the clinical and laboratory data that was used for analysis by using the GraphPad Prism Software. Data presented as mean (SD), all differences were statistically significant at the level of P≤0.05 or ≤0.001. There were significantly increased levels of ferritin, neutrophil and leukocyte counts in severe COVID-19 cases (1857 (50.9), 9.9 (2.8), 9.9 (2.8) respectively) compared with non-sever cases. Additionally, there were significantly reduction in lymphocytes counts in COVID-19 patients (1.3 (9.5), P=0.001). There were also strong correlations between elevation of ferritin levels or reduction of lymphocytes and the severity COVID-19 infection (r=0.53, OR: 5.88 and r=-0.55, OR: 3.98 respectively). The results demonstrate that high values for neutrophil, leukocyte counts and Ferritin levels, and low values for lymphocyte counts may have diagnostic properties concerning COVID-19 in severe cases.

Background: Studying the violence act on women lives help us to understand the magnitude of problem and influence us to find a solution to help every woman how suffer in her life from any type of abuse that affect her life and family. Objectives: To determine the frequency of violence act on women lives, list the different types of violence experienced by woman and identify risk factors contributing to the existence of violence among Saudi women attending primary health care centers (PHCCs). Subjects and Methods: All Saudi Arabian women aged 18 to 60 years who are visiting the PHC during the study period. Norway Abuse Questionnaire (NORAQ) questionnaire was used for collection of data from volunteers. Results: A total of 186 Saudi Arabian women were recruited out of 200, the response rate from this study is 93%. The ages of women included in the study between 18 and 60 with a mean of 30.7 (SD 9.6) years (SD 7.65). The prevalence of ever abused among them was 42.5%. The result prevalence rates of emotional abuse, physical abuse and sexual abuse in orders were 36%, 25.3% and 5.9%. Risk factors for becoming victim or abusers included younger age, low education, low socio-

The increased consumption of energy drinks by adolescents and young adults globally is a public concern due to the high amount of caffeine and sugar in them, which may affect consumers' health. Only one study was found in Madinah that measure the prevalence of energy drink consumption, but it was conducted with female students of secondary school. The prevalence of energy drink consumption is high and there is evidence of affecting health of the population. The objective of this study was to determine the patterns of consumption of energy drinks among college students in Madinah, Saudi Arabia. The study was conducted at Taibah university in Madinah. The sample included 380 students of the main branch of Taibah university in Madinah, which contains 29153 students. Data were collected using a self-administered questionnaire consisting of 20 questions relating to students' sociodemographic characteristics, personal habits, total fluid intake, energy drink-related knowledge, and habits. Of the 380 students surveyed, 127 (33.4%) student were regularly consuming energy drinks. The mean age and standard deviation were 21.24 ± 1.77. Pearson chi-square test was done and it showed statistically significant association between energy drinks and smoking (13.522) with P value 0.0002. A majority of surveyed students had good knowledge regarding energy drinks. Future studies are needed to determine harmful side effects of energy drinks.