Background: Previous research shows nurses' experiences of caring for patients with Covid-19. Nurses's described a complex care including scared patients. Nurses' experiences insecurity due to lack of knowledge, resulting in redices quality of care and deprioritized nursing care. Nurses emphasized patients' need for emotional support. With this knowledge, it is important to get a description of the patients' experiences. Aim: To describe patients' experiences of recieved Covid-19 care. Method: A literature review eith descriptive synthesis. Result: The result revealed two themes and six subthemes. The first theme was patient's experiences of gratitude with subthemes: Appreciationg healtcare staff, The importance of support from family and Finding appreciation in a changed existance. The second theme was patients' experience of despair with subthemes: The experiences of social challenges, Fear of dying and Feeling guilty. Conclution: Patients' had positive and negativa experiences of care for Covid-19. The social challanges Covid-19 brought resulted in despair, loneliness and anxiety. Fear of death was also described. Feelings of guilt arose when patients' worried about infecting others. Despite this, patients found appreciation in the changes existence that lead to personal development. Support from healt care staff and family was appreciated.Keywords: Covid-19, pandemic, patients' experiences, qualitative litterature study.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Adventure tourism is a fast-growing niche sector within tourism. This study aims to identify the primary motivations and constraints for individuals participating in adventure tourism. Emphasis was put on adventure participants' travel pattern behaviors (local residents/ tourists) and the new factor of COVID-19. Only some studies have examined constraints within adventure tourism, including motivations, travel, and COVID-19. A total of 240 individual's participated in a 10-15-minute survey that focused on 37 motivations and constraints pulled from previous literature. The findings highlighted personal improvement and destination experience as the key motivators to participate in adventure tourism, while traveler anxiety was the key constraint holding participants back. It also gave insight into how adventure tourism continues to be popular despite the pandemic.

The Coronavirus pandemic changed the normal lives across the country as strategies for mitigating the spread of the virus were put in place. Daily life was moved to a virtual setting as much as possible and typical mobility purposes changed or were eliminated. Shared transportation ridership declined dramatically in response to the pandemic, with reported drops of up to 90% across the United States. Mobility providers were tasked with determining strategies to encourage ridership during the risky time. The main research question that was explored in this study was, "What is the impact of the Coronavirus pandemic on public transit and micromobility ridership?" The study aimed to determine important factors that potential riders considered and emphasized in their decision making. The research approach was to use a custom-developed stated preference survey. The survey collected opinions about public transit and micromobility ridership during and emerging from the Coronavirus pandemic. The study focused on Blacksburg, VA as it has both public transit and micromobility services. Personal characteristics and stated important factors that influenced potential rider decisions were determined to understand what is most important to potential riders. Mobility providers can use these findings to better address rider concerns and make informed decisions on provided service. Therefore, encouraging an increase in shared transportation ridership. / Master of Science / The Coronavirus pandemic changed the normal lives across the country as strategies for mitigating the spread of the virus were put in place. Daily life was moved to a virtual setting as much as possible and typical mobility purposes changed or were eliminated. Shared transportation ridership declined dramatically in response to the pandemic, with reported drops of up to 90% across the United States. Mobility providers were tasked with determining strategies to encourage ridership during the risky time. The main research question that was explored in this study was, "What is the impact of the Coronavirus pandemic on public transit and micromobility ridership?" The study aimed to determine important factors that potential riders considered and emphasized in their decision making. The research approach was to use a custom developed stated preference survey. The survey collected opinions about public transit and micromobility ridership during and emerging from the Coronavirus pandemic. The study focused on Blacksburg, VA as it has both public transit and micromobility services. Factors that influenced potential rider decisions were determined. Mobility providers can use these factors to better address rider concerns and make informed decisions on provided service.

Thèse ou mémoire avec insertion d'articles / La pandémie de COVID-19 a suscité d'intenses efforts de vaccination pour neutraliser le SRAS-CoV-2 en réduisant la transmission et la mortalité. Cependant, la variabilité génétique de la cible vaccinale a conduit à l'émergence de variants échappant à la protection vaccinale. Des vaccins novateurs ciblant des régions virales conservées sont cruciaux pour une protection élargie. Plutôt qu'être axée sur la neutralisation, cette stratégie pourrait immédiatement contrôler l'inflammation, la maladie grave et la mortalité liées aux variants. En réponse à ce besoin, nous avons développé le vaccin PapMV-N en couplant la protéine N hautement conservée du SRAS-CoV-2 à la plateforme des nanoparticules de PapMV. PapMV-N vise à induire une réponse protectrice à spectre élargi via la stimulation des lymphocytes T cytotoxiques de type Th1. Nous avons comparé PapMV-N à deux autres formulations générant des réponses Th1 (CpG-N) et Th2 (Alum-N). Après deux injections chez la souris, PapMV-N a induit les titres d'anticorps associés à Th1 les plus élevés, tandis qu'Alum-N a induit les titres d'anticorps associés à Th2 les plus élevés. De plus, CpG-N a entraîné la fréquence la plus élevée de cellules T sécrétrices d'IFN-γ spécifiques de l'antigène. Nous avons évalué les effets protecteurs chez des souris transgéniques K18-hACE2 après deux doses, suivies d'une exposition au SRAS-CoV-2 ancestral. Toutes les formulations contenant l'antigène N ont réduit l'inflammation et les cytokines pro-inflammatoires dans les poumons. Une tendance distincte est apparue dans le cerveau : les vaccins de type Th1 ont entraîné des titres viraux réduits et une réduction des symptômes, tandis que les souris vaccinées avec Alum-N de type Th2 ont présenté des titres cérébraux élevés et des symptômes graves. L'étude souligne la protéine N comme cible hautement immunogène et PapMV-N comme vaccin prometteur. De plus, elle éclaire l'importance du profil immunitaire Th1/Th2 induit par le vaccin dans la protection contre le SRAS-CoV-2. / The COVID-19 pandemic prompted intensive vaccine efforts to neutralize the SARS-CoV-2 virus, reducing transmission and mortality. However, the genetic variability of the vaccines' target has led to the emergence of variants that evade vaccine protection. Innovative vaccines targeting conserved viral regions are crucial for broader variant protection. This strategy, rather than focusing on neutralization, could serve as an immediate tool to control inflammation, severe disease and death until strain-specific vaccines are available. To address this, we developed the PapMV-N vaccine by coupling the highly conserved SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid (N) protein to the PapMV nanoparticle vaccine platform. PapMV-N aims at inducing a broad protective Th1-type cytotoxic T lymphocyte response. We compared PapMV-N's performance in mice immunogenicity tests to two vaccine formulations generating Th1 (CpG-N) and Th2 (Alum-N) responses. After two injections, PapMV-N yielded the highest Th1-associated antibody titers, while Alum-N induced the highest Th2-associated antibody titers. Additionally, CpG-N prompted the highest frequency of IFN-γ-producing antigen-specific T cells. We assessed protective effects in transgenic K18-hACE2 mice after two doses, followed by exposure to ancestral SARS-CoV-2. All N antigen-containing formulations reduced inflammation and pro-inflammatory cytokine levels in the lungs. Interestingly, a distinct trend emerged in the brain: Th1-type vaccines resulted in reduced viral titers and absence of symptoms, whereas Th2-type Alum-N vaccinated mice exhibited elevated brain titers and severe symptoms. This study highlights the N protein as a highly immunogenic vaccine target and positions PapMV-N as a promising vaccine candidate. Moreover, this study sheds light on the significance of the vaccine-induced Th1/Th2 immune response profile in SARS-CoV-2 protection.

The covid-19 pandemic broke out in Sweden in March 2020 and what followed were economic uncertainty, restrictions and social distancing. This study is inspired by two publications regarding the subject of auditing during the covid-19 pandemic. The first one is a report published by the Financial Reporting Council (2020) and the other is a scientific publication by Albitar et al. (2021). Using these publications, seven areas have in this study been created. These are, evaluation of risk, materiality, going concern, auditing evidence, the work process, human capital and, audit fees and working hours. The purpose of the study is to use the different areas as benchmarks to examine how the covid-19 pandemic has affected the auditors, whether they’ve had to change part of their work and whether these changes could mean any implications for the future of auditing. The study is qualitative and interviews with ten auditors from different big-four companies have been conducted. The study shows that the digitization process that had started a few years prior was helpful for the auditors. Especially with regards to collection of audit evidence. The auditors were prepared whilst not knowing what to be prepared for. However, the study also shows that creating team spirit, building client and colleague relationships and training of new employees have been more difficult during the pandemic. From the study we project that the digitalization and working-from-home approach will have a sustained impact on the future of the profession. Time efficient digital meetings will be implemented to a higher degree and the flexibility of from where employees can work will increase. / Covid-19 pandemin bröt ut ordentligt i Sverige under mars 2020 och med detta följde bland annat restriktioner, social distansering och ekonomisk osäkerhet. Denna studie utgår från en rapport av Financial Reporting Council som publicerades i mars 2020 och en vetenskaplig artikel av Albitar et al. (2021). Med utgångspunkt i dessa två publikationer har sju områden skapats.  Dessa är riskbedömning, väsentlighet, fortsatt drift, revisionsbevis, arbetsprocessen, det mänskliga kapitalet samt arvoden och arbetstimmar. Syftet med denna studie är att utifrån dessa sju områden undersöka hur covid-19 pandemin har påverkat revisorerna, om deras arbetssätt har behövt förändras och vilka implikationer dessa förändringar kan ha för framtiden.  Studien är av kvalitativt slag där semistrukturerade intervjuer har genomförts med tio olika svenska revisorer från big four bolag. Utifrån studiens resultat kan det konstateras att den digitaliseringsprocess som inletts under tidigare år, speciellt med hänsyn till insamling av revisionsbevis var till stor hjälp. Revisorerna var förberedda utan att veta vad som skulle förberedas och utifrån förutsättningarna har revisionskvaliteten till stor grad kunnat bibehållits. Studien visar dock på att lagsammanhållning och byggandet av kundrelationer har varit svårt att bevara när allt skett på distans och utbildning av nyanställda har varit tuffare. Utifrån studien tros digitaliseringen och distansarbetet som covid-19 pandemin medfört ha en inverkan på yrket i framtiden. Mer tidseffektiva digitala möten kommer implementeras och flexibiliteten i var arbetet kan utföras kommer öka.

<p>  </p> <p>While evidence suggests that the mental health consequences of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) can persist for several months following infection, little is known about the longer-term mental health consequences and whether certain sociodemographic groups may be particularly impacted. The study objectives were to characterize the longer-term mental health consequences of COVID-19 infection and examine whether such consequences are more pronounced in Black people and people with lower socioeconomic status. 277 Black and White adults (age ≥ 30 years) with a history of COVID-19 (cases; tested positive ≥ 6 months prior to participation) or no history of COVID-19 infection (controls) completed a 45-minute online questionnaire battery. Unadjusted <em>t</em>-tests revealed that cases had greater depressive (<em>d</em> = 0.24), anxiety (<em>d</em> = 0.34), PTSD (<em>d</em> = 0.32), and insomnia (<em>d</em> = 0.31) symptoms than controls. These differences remained significant for symptoms of anxiety, PTSD, and insomnia after adjusting for age, sex, race, education, income, and smoking status. No case-control differences were detected for perceived stress and general psychopathology. Cases had more than double the odds of clinically significant symptoms of anxiety (<em>OR</em> = 2.22) and PTSD (<em>OR</em> = 2.40). Case-control status was more strongly and positively associated with depressive, anxiety, PTSD, perceived stress, and general psychopathology symptoms at lower education levels. Race and income were not moderators of the relationships. The mental health consequences of COVID-19 may be significant, widespread, and persist for at least 6 months after infection, and people with lower education levels may face a greater burden of these consequences.</p>

Bakgrund: SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemin spreds globalt och påträffades under 2020 i Sverige. Hälso- och sjukvården utmanades med omställningar för att vårda patienterna som insjuknande med olika vårdbehov. Patienterna som vårdades inom sjukhusmiljö var i behov av vård och sjuksköterskorna ansvarade för att tillgodose patienterna med adekvat omvårdnad utifrån individuella behov. Syfte: Att beskriva sjuksköterskors upplevelser av att vårda Covid-19 patienter inom sjukhusmiljö. Metod: En litteraturstudie med beskrivande design inkluderande 12 kvalitativa vetenskapliga artiklar i resultatet. Artiklarna söktes fram via databaserna CINAHL och PubMed. Huvudresultat: Sjuksköterskorna beskrev ett yrkesansvar och en yrkesstolthet att hantera omvårdnaden för patienterna, med stöd som skapade en styrka, samtidigt som stödet inte upplevdes fullständigt. Omvårdnadsmiljön bidrog med möjligheter att genomföra omvårdnaden för patienterna, samtidigt som det utmanade sjuksköterskorna och rädslor för att bidra i smittspridningen förelåg. Skyddsutrustningen möjliggjorde vårdandet med en trygghetskänsla, samtidigt som det fysiskt hämmade och försvårade bemötandet till patienterna. Patienternas situation skapade empatiska upplevelser och emotionell påverkan bland sjuksköterskorna. Slutsats: Resultatet beskrev att utmaningar förekom i omvårdnadsmiljön och sjuksköterskorna kämpade för att tillgodose patienterna med adekvat omvårdnad. Förbättrat stöd till sjuksköterskorna kan förbättra arbetssituationen inför framtida pandemier och liknande kriser för att bidra med en god omvårdnad till patienterna / Background: The SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic spread globally and was discovered in Sweden year 2020. The healthcare system was challenged with changes to care for patients who fell ill with different care needs. The patients who were cared for in a hospital environment needed care and the nurses were responsible for providing the patients with adequate care based on their individual needs. Aim: To describe nurses' experiences of caring for Covid-19 patients in a hospital environment. Method: A literature study with descriptive design including 12 qualitative scientific articles in the result. The articles were searched via the databases CINAHL and PubMed. Main results: The nurses described a professional responsibility and professional pride to manage the care for the patients, with the support that created a strength, while the support was not experienced completely. The nursing environment contributed to opportunities to carry out nursing care for the patients, while it challenged the nurses and there were fears of contributing to the spread of infection. The protective equipment enabled care with a sense of security, while physically inhibiting and making it difficult to treat patients. The patients' situation created empathy experiences and emotional impact among the nurses. Conclusion: The result described that challenges existed in the nursing environment and the nurses struggled to provide the patients with adequate care. Improved support for the nurses can improve the working situation in future pandemics and similar crises to contribute to good nursing care for patients.

The intent of this study was to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the well-being and subjective cognition in college students. The purpose of this study as well was to investigate if those who had tested positive for COVID-19 in the past had lower levels of subjective cognitive health and if students who were affected more during the pandemic experienced more disruptions to their wellbeing. Participants (N = 105) were recruited online via the Prolific platform and took part in an online survey administered on Qualtrics. A correlational analysis was performed to examine the effects of the pandemic, and broadly on wellbeing and subjective cognition. Results illustrated that students who endorsed more education-related COVID impacts (e.g., inability to join a club on campus) endorsed higher scores on the Perceived Stress Scale (r = 0.48, p < .001), lower scores on the PROMIS subjective cognition measure (r = -.40, p < .001), higher technostress scores on the communication overload subscale (r = .30, p = .005), and lower scores on the academic performance subscale (r = -.26, p = 0.011). This study found no significant difference in perceived stress scale scores amongst those who had and had not tested positive for COVID-19. The results highlight the need for interventions to support students' mental health and cognitive functioning during pandemics, focusing on reducing communication overload and enhancing academic performance. Furthermore, the findings may be useful in informing educational policies that prioritize student well-being during times of crisis.

This paper examines the use of convolutional neural networks to classify Covid-19 in chest radiographs. Three network architectures are compared: VGG16, ResNet-50, and DenseNet-121 along with preprocessing methods which include contrast limited adaptive histogram equalization and non-local means denoising. Chest radiographs from patients with healthy lungs, lung cancer, non-Covid pneumonia, tuberculosis, and Covid-19 were used for training and testing. Networks trained using radiographs that were preprocessed using contrast limited adaptive histogram equalization and non-local means denoising performed better than those trained on the original radiographs. DenseNet-121 performed slightly better in terms of accuracy, performance, and F1 score than all other networks but was not found to be statistically better performing than VGG16.

HausärztInnen sind für die Primärversorgung von PatientInnen mit COVID-19 zuständig. Zum Zeitpunkt der Planung und Durchführung dieser Studie ließen sie kaum Untersuchungen zu den Erfahrungen von HausärztInnen während der ersten Pandemiewelle finden. Das Ziel der Arbeit war, durch eine qualitative Datenerhebung Einblicke zu gewinnen, wie HausärztInnen die ersten Monate der COVID-19-Pandemie erlebt haben. Die Untersuchung war Teil einer übergeordneten Querschnittsstudie, in der Erhebungen mit strukturierten Fragebögen und qualitativen Befragungen stattfanden. Für den qualitativen Abschnitt wurden semistrukturierte Interviews mit 22 HausärztInnen aus vier Bundesländern durchgeführt. Die Einladung zur Teilnahme erfolgte mit der Aussendung von Fragebögen im Rahmen der quantitativen Datenerhebung. Die Daten wurden anhand der inhaltlich strukturierenden qualitativen Inhaltsanalyse nach Kuckartz ausgewertet. In der Studie zeigte sich, dass HausärztInnen ihr Praxismanagement und ihre PatientInnenversorgung in der Pandemie rasch umstrukturieren mussten. Mangel an Schutzmaterialien, die Trennung infektiöser PatientInnen und schnell wechselnde Vorgaben wurden als große Herausforderungen identifiziert. In den Interviews wurden außerdem Bedenken über die Folgen der sozialen Distanzierung auf die therapeutische Beziehung geäußert. Teamarbeit in der Praxis und kollegialer Austausch in Gemeinschaftspraxen stellten besonders wichtige Faktoren dar, um die zahlreichen Herausforderungen zu überwinden. Die Teilnehmenden nahmen sich selbst als Vorbilder mit einer hohen Verantwortung für die Gesundheit ihrer PatientInnen wahr.. Sie betonten die Relevanz von klaren und konsistenten Regelungen durch den öffentlichen Gesundheitsdienst sowie von zuverlässigen Informationen. Um die hausärztliche Versorgung in zukünftigen Pandemien zu unterstützen, sollten bürokratische Hürden so weit wie möglich reduziert und verständliche Informationen bereitgestellt werden. Da HausärztInnen eine zentrale Rolle in der Beratung und Therapie von PatientInnen mit COVID-19 spielten, erscheint deren konsistente Einbeziehung in Entscheidungsprozesse durch Institutionen des öffentlichen Gesundheitsdienstes von besonderer Wichtigkeit. / General practitioners (GPs) are responsible for providing primary care for patients with COVID-19. At the time of planning and conducting this study, little was known about the experiences of GPs during the first wave of the pandemic. In this qualitative study, the aim was to gain insight into GPs’ experiences of the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic. The investigation was part of a cross-sectional study, using questionnaires and qualitative interviews. In the qualitative study, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 22 GPs from four federal states. The participants were invited to participate by sending out the quantitative surveys. Data was analysed using Kuckartz’s qualitative structuring content analysis. The study showed that GPs had to quickly restructure their practice routines and patient care during the pandemic. Lack of personal protective equipment, separation of infectious patients and rapidly changing guidelines were identified as major barriers. In the interviews, GPs expressed concerns about how social distancing might affect the therapeutic relationship. Teamwork in the practice and collegial exchange were important factors in overcoming numerous challenges. The participants perceived themselves as role models with a high responsibility for the health of their patients. They stressed the relevance of clear and consistent guidance by health authorities and reliable information. To support primary care in future health crises, bureaucratic hurdles should be reduced as much as possible and clear information should be provided. As GPs played a key role in providing care for patients with COVID-19, their consistent involvement in decision-making processes from health authorities seems particularly important.