Methods: The cross-sectional study was conducted from August 2019 to November 2019. The community pharmacies, clinical and academic settings in Karachi were approached for gathering the responses of pharmacists towards BSMs and interchangeable products using a 30-item survey form. Pearson correlation and independent sample t-test were used to identify the relationship among independent variables and the responses, considering p values <0.05 as statistically significant.
Results: Overall, there were 305 survey forms used with a response rate of 87.14%. More than 80% of the respondents have good knowledge about the definition, characteristics, safety and efficacy, compatibility, cost issues, and utilization of BSMs. Around half of the respondents (48.9%, [95% CI 46.6-51.2]) were confident in using BSMs in clinical practice. However, they were concerned about the BSM's safety profile (45.2%, [95% CI 42.1-48.3]), quality (30.2%, [95% CI 28.3-32.1]), and efficacy issues (32.3%, [95% CI 31.2-37.5]).
Conclusion: The findings revealed that pharmacists were well informed about the BSMs. However, some of the responses to the attitude demonstrated a lack of understanding of the application of that knowledge. The respondents persuaded that advanced patterns of diseases, product marketing stipulations, and need for better patient care drives higher demand for developing BSMs and were enthusiastic about gaining more insight to integrate BSMs into routine clinical practice.
BACKGROUND: COPD is a major cause of mortality and morbidity and is associated with considerable economic burden on the individual and society. It limits the daily activities and working ability of the patients.
METHODOLOGY: We conducted a systematic search of PUBMED, SCIENCE DIRECT, Cochrane CENTRAL, SCOPUS, Google Scholar and SAGE Premier Databases to find scientific research articles evaluating the cost of COPD management from patient and societal perspective.
RESULTS: Estimated per patient per year direct cost in Norway, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Greece, Belgium, and Serbia was €10,701, €9580, €7847, €7448, €7045, €2896, €1963, and €2047, respectively. Annual per patient cost of work productivity loss was highest in Germany as €5735 and lowest in Greece as €998. It was estimated as €4824, €2033 and €1298 in Bulgaria, Denmark and Sweden, respectively. Several factors found associated with increasing cost of COPD management that include but not limited to late diagnosis, severity of disease, frequency of exacerbation, hospital readmissions, non-adherence to the therapy and exposure to COPD risk factors.
CONCLUSION: Minimizing the COPD exacerbations and controlling the worsening of symptoms may potentially reduce the cost of COPD management at any stage.
Materials and Methods: The synthesis was accomplished by the reaction of 2,3-dihydro-1,4-benzodioxin-6-amine (1) with 4-methylbenzenesulfonyl chloride (2) using 10% aqueous Na2CO3 to afford N-(2,3-dihydro-1,4-benzodioxin-6-yl)-4-methylbenzenesulfonamide (3). Further the parent molecule 3 was reacted with different alkyl/aralkyl halides (4a-e) to achieve N-(alkyl/aralkyl)-N-(2,3-dihydro-1,4-benzodioxin-6-yl)-4-methylbenzenesulfonamides (5a-e), using polar aprotic solvent; N,N-dimethylformamide (DMF) and catalytic amount of lithium hydride as base. The characterization of synthesized compounds was conducted by contemporary spectral techniques e.g., IR, 1H-NMR and EI-MS. Then these molecules were subjected to screening against various bacterial strains and their inhibitory potential against Lipoxygenase was also ascertained.
Results: The screening results against various Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacterial strains revealed that N-(2,3-dihydro-1,4-benzodioxin-6-yl)-4-methylbenzenesulfonamide (3), N-(2-bromoethyl)-N-(2,3-dihydro-1,4-benzodioxin-6-yl)-4-methylbenzenesulfonamide (5a) and N-(2-phenethyl)-N-(2,3-dihydro-1,4-benzodioxin-6-yl)-4-methylbenzenesulfonamide (5b) showed good inhibitory activity as compared to standard Ciprofloxacin. Moreover, N-(3-phenylpropyl)-N-(2,3-dihydro-1,4-benzodioxin-6-yl)-4-methylbenzenesulfonamide (5c) and N-(4-chlorobenzyl)-N-(2,3-dihydro-1,4-benzodioxin-6-yl)-4-methylbenzenesulfon-amide (5e) displayed decent inhibition against lipoxygenase enzyme relative to standard Baicalein.
Conclusion: On the basis of results obtained it can be concluded that the synthesized sulfonamides may provide an overall indispensable basis to introduce new drug candidates for the cure of inflammatory and other associated diseases.
OBJECTIVE: To develop a Malaysian version of St George's respiratory COPD specific questionnaire (SGRQ-CM), to evaluate the full spectrum of psychometric properties (reliability, validity and responsiveness), to test the factor structure and to assess minimum clinically important difference for the SGRQ-CM, to be used in population of Malaysia.
METHODOLOGY: SGRQ-C was translated to Bahasa Malaysia using a standard protocol. 240 COPD patients were included in the study. All patients were followed-up for six months. Construct validity, internal consistency, item convergent validity, test-retest ability, responsiveness, factor analysis and MCID of the Malaysian version of SGRQ-C to be used in population of Malaysia were evaluated.
RESULTS: The Cronbach alpha coefficient and intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) for SGRQ-CM were reported as 0.87, and 0.88 respectively. Correlation of SGRQ-CM with CAT, EQ-5D-5 L, mMRC dyspnea scales and FEV1%predicted were reported as 0.86, - 0.82, 0.72 and - 0.42 respectively. Correlation coefficient between the subscales and other clinical and health status measures ranged from r = - 0.35 to r = - 0.87. The MCID was reported as 5.07 (- 2.54-12.67).
CONCLUSION: The Malaysian version of SGRQ-C has a good psychometric property comparable to those of the original version and has a strong evidence of validity, reliability and responsiveness towards disease severity in Malaysian COPD patients. It can be recommended as a reliable quality of life measure for future research.