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Vaccine-induced immune thrombotic thrombocytopenia (VITT) is a rare but serious adverse syndrome occurring 5-30 days after adenoviral vector COVID-19 vaccination. Therefore, a practical evaluation of clinical assessments and laboratory testing for VITT is needed to prevent significant adverse outcomes as the global use of adenoviral vector vaccines continues. We received the clinical information and blood samples of 156 patient samples with a suspected diagnosis of VITT between April to July 2021 in Canada. The performance characteristics of various diagnostic laboratory tests were evaluated against the PF4-SRA including a commercial anti-PF4/heparin IgG/A/M enzyme immunoassay (EIA, PF4 Enhanced; Immucor), in-house IgG-specific anti-PF4 and anti-PF4/heparin-EIAs, the standard SRA, and the PF4/heparin-SRA. Of those, 43 (27.6%) had serologically confirmed VITT based on a positive PF4-SRA result and 113 (72.4%) were negative. The commercial anti-PF4/heparin EIA, the in-house anti-PF4-EIA, and anti-PF4/heparin-EIA were positive for all 43 VITT-confirmed samples (100% sensitivity) with a few false-positive results (mean specificity 95.6%). These immunoassays had specificities of 95.6% [95% confidence interval (CI) 90.0-98.6], 96.5% (95% CI 91.2-99.0), and 97.4% (95% CI 92.4-99.5), respectively. Functional tests, including the standard SRA and PF4/heparin-SRA, had high specificities (100%), but poor sensitivities for VITT [16.7% (95% CI 7.0-31.4); and 46.2% (95% CI 26.6-66.6), respectively]. These findings suggest EIA assays that can directly detect antibodies to PF4 or PF4/heparin have excellent performance characteristics and may be useful as a diagnostic test if the PF4-SRA is unavailable.

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Background: Cervical Cancer is one such a disease that remains with high mortality unless prevented or detected early and managed. It is one of the most common cancers of the child bearing age between 20 and 45 years world over. It is rated as the second most prevalent cancer among women. There is high consensus among various scholars that high quality screening, effective treatment and routine follow-up care are cardinal in helping women. The main objective of the study was to identify the factors influencing cervical cancer screening in Kitwe District, Zambia. Methods: An analytical crosssectional study design was employed that included the use of a researcheradministered questionnaire. Simple random sampling was used to sample 210 participants. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 25 and chi-square test was used to determine associations among variables. Binary logistic regression was used for multivariate analysis. Statistical significance was set at p < 0.05 and 95% confidence interval. Results: The age of the women enrolled in the study ranged from 20 to 59 years, with a mean age of 30.4 years (SD: 8.36). Majority (46.2%) of the women were aged between 25 to 34 years and the mean age reported for sexual debut among respondents was 19.7 (SD: 4.01) years ranging from 12 to 31 years at first sexual encounter. Almost all (99%) the women were Christians and 42.9% had attained secondary school education. Fifty nine (59%) of the respondents were married and 77.