With the cessation of non-urgent clinical office visits due to the coronavirus, there has been a rapid shift to telephone and other virtual visits in outpatient practice. We conducted a survey to evaluate patients' perspective of telephone visits during the COVID-19 pandemic. Patients receiving a scheduled telephone call as a virtual visit from urologists at our clinic were asked to participate in a three-minute, self-administered, online questionnaire. After verbal permission was obtained, the survey was emailed to each participant. The outcomes evaluated were telephone visit satisfaction and preference for type of appointment. Non-parametric tests were used to analyze the results. The study was approved by the Sunnybrook Research Ethics Board. A total of 102 participants were included; 96% of participants assessed the telephone visit as a positive experience in every survey question, while 45% expressed no preference. In those who expressed a preference, this was evenly divided between in-office visitcounters in urology. The North Lisbon University Hospital Center was activated for referral of SARS-CoV-2 infected patients on the 11th March 2020. The aim of this study is to describe the experience at the Department of Pediatrics in the approach and the clinical outcomes of infected children. A descriptive observational study was performed. Children and adolescents (0 to 18 years) with SARS-CoV-2 infection, diagnosed in the emergency room or admitted to the Department of Pediatrics between March 11th and June 18th, were included. Hospital records and Trace COVID-19 platform were reviewed and patient caregivers were interviewed to assess follow up. Among 103 diagnosed children, 83% had a known previous contact with an infected patient, 43% presented fever and 42% presented respiratory symptoms. Ten percent had risk factors and 21% were aged under one year old. Ten percent were hospitalised, one needing intensive care, with paediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome. Blood tests were performed in 9% and chest radiograph in 7%. No children required ventilation, antiviral therapy or underwent thoracic computed tomography scan. Eight percent of children returned to the emergency room and one child was hospitalised. The clinical outcome is known in 101 patients and is favourable in all. Most children had an epidemiological link and little clinical repercussion, even during the first year of life. The expected mild severity in children justified the use of established clinical criteria and recommendations for similar conditions, regarding tests and hospitalizations. No antiviral treatments were given due to lack of evidence of its benefits. This strategy contributed to a low consumption of hospital resources and proved safe in this series. This strategy contributed to a low consumption of hospital resources and proved safe in this series.We evaluated effectiveness of personal protective measures against severe acute respiratory disease coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection. Our case-control study included 211 cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) and 839 controls in Thailand. Cases were defined as asymptomatic contacts of COVID-19 patients who later tested positive for SARS-CoV-2; controls were asymptomatic contacts who never tested positive. Wearing masks all the time during contact was independently associated with lower risk for SARS-CoV-2 infection compared with not wearing masks; wearing a mask sometimes during contact did not lower infection risk. We found the type of mask worn was not independently associated with infection and that contacts who always wore masks were more likely to practice social distancing. Maintaining >1 m distance from a person with COVID-19, having close contact for less then 15 minutes, and frequent handwashing were independently associated with lower risk for infection. https://www.selleckchem.com/products/liraglutide.html Our findings support consistent wearing of masks, handwashing, and social distancing to protect against COVID-19. This study is the first to examine the influence of e-cigarette emission phrasing on perceived harm of secondhand exposure, and whether harm perception was associated with support for a tobacco-free campus policy. In the fall 2018 and spring 2019 semesters, 52 sections of a college English course (N = 791 students) were cluster randomized to one of three conditions ("vapor," "aerosol," or "chemicals") assessing harm of secondhand exposure to e-cigarette emissions. Regression models adjusted for demographic characteristics, tobacco use, and other potential confounders. Compared to the "vapor" condition, "chemicals" and "aerosol" conditions were associated with increased odds of perceiving secondhand exposure to e-cigarettes to be harmful/very harmful (AOR = 2.0,  < 0.01). Greater perceived harm of secondhand e-cigarette exposure was associated with increased odds of supporting a tobacco-free campus policy (AOR = 2.22,  < 0.001). Health campaigns should use accurate terminology to descriicy (AOR = 2.22, p  less then  0.001). Conclusions Health campaigns should use accurate terminology to describe e-cigarette emissions, rather than jargon that conveys lower risk.Obesity is a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases, diabetes and cancer. In theory, the obesity problem could be solved by the adherence to a calorie-restricted diet, but that is not generally achieved in practice. An alternative is a pharmacological approach, using compounds that trigger the same metabolic changes associated with calorie restriction. Here, I expand in the pharmacological direction by identifying compounds that induce liver gene signature profiles that mimic those induced by calorie restriction. Using gene expression profiles from mice and rat, I identify corticosteroids, PPAR agonists and some antibacterial/antifungal as candidate compounds mimicking the response to calorie restriction in the liver gene signatures.Since ancient days, human fasting has been performed for religious or political reasons. More recently, fasting has been employed as an effective therapy for weight reduction by obese people, and numerous studies have investigated the physiology of fasting by obese subjects. Well-established fasting markers (butyrates, BCAAs and carnitines) were considered essential energy substitutes after glycogen storage depletion. However, a recently developed metabolomic approach has unravelled previously unappreciated aspects of fasting. Surprisingly, one-third (44) of 120 metabolites investigated increase during 58 h of fasting, including antioxidative metabolites (carnosine, ophthalmic acid, ergothioneine and urates) and metabolites of entire pathways, such as the pentose phosphate pathway. Signalling metabolites (3-hydroxybutyrate and 2-oxoglutarate) and purines/pyrimidines may also serve as transcriptional modulators. Thus, prolonged fasting activates both global catabolism and anabolism, reprogramming metabolic homeostasis.