Diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) is a life-threatening complication of diabetes that can lead to cerebral edema, organ failure, and even death. Traditional diagnosis depends on clinical assessment and laboratory tests, which may delay recognition and overlap with other conditions. Recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI), particularly machine learning (ML), present opportunities to improve early diagnosis, risk stratification, and management of DKA. Various ML models—such as Random Forest, K-Nearest Neighbors, XGBoost, and Long Short-Term Memory networks—have demonstrated high predictive accuracy for assessing DKA severity, prognosis, and mortality. However, many of these studies are limited by small, single-center cohorts and lack external validation. Although AI shows strong potential to transform DKA care, further standardization, validation across diverse populations, and integration into clinical workflows are required before routine adoption.

The Gaza Strip, a small territory home to 2.2 million, faces an escalating healthcare crisis amidst the ongoing conflict and severe socio-economic challenges previously. This review sheds light on the current cardiovascular health situation in Gaza, emphasizing the impact of stress, hypertension, myocardial infarction, and cardiomyopathy. The dire state of healthcare infrastructure, limited access to medical care, and disruption of essential services, particularly in the northern region, exacerbate the crisis. Stress hormones, which are elevated by chronic conflict, further contribute to cardiovascular risks. The prevalence of hypertension and cardiovascular disease is alarming, with inadequate access to medications and healthcare resources. Urgent international intervention is crucial to address immediate healthcare needs, provide medication, and ensure the well-being of the population of Gaza.

The use of data for healthcare decision-making has numerous benefits, including increasing knowledge of user demographics and needs, enabling adequate planning of healthcare resources and services, and providing a roadmap of decisions made to ensure stakeholder accountability. Despite these clear benefits, frameworks and theories guiding decision making in healthcare remain under-utilised. This paper presents three decision-making theories that focus on data. Classical Decision Theory and its modern iterations emphasize the decision-making process and the use of data in this process. The Ottawa Decision Support Framework is employed when the decision relates to new diagnoses or treatments or when extensive deliberation is needed in uncertain circumstances. Lastly, Bayesian Decision Theory considers existing knowledge and cost functions in decision-making. The context in which these theories were developed and applied is discussed, and their future applications in healthcare decision-making are explored.

Introduction In order to attain Sustainable Development Goal 2 (SDG-II) of eradicating malnutrition among children by 2030, Pakistan has initiated a Community-based Management of Severely Acute Malnutrition (CMAM) program. This program has been established at the public level to detect and treat uncomplicated Severely Acute Malnourished (SAM) children at an early stage. However, during the outbreak of COVID-19, very poor compliance with the CMAM program was observed. Consequently, the nutritional quality of children’s diets has deteriorated, with malnutrition rates expected to rise. Therefore, this study has been set up to evaluate the effect of the COVID-19 lockdown on the health of SAM children and compliance with the CMAM program. Methodology This study used a multicenter cross-sectional design in District Dera Ghazi Khan’s rural areas located in the Southern Province of Punjab. Data were collected from the parents/guardians of SAM children through the researcher-administrated questionnaire. The sample size was 196, and data were analyzed through SPSS version 25. Results The majority of the children enrolled were males (52.5%), had fathers aged between 41 and 50 years (52.0%), mothers aged between 21 and 30 years (52.5%), had illiterate fathers (40.1%), illiterate mothers (73.8%) and had a monthly household income of PKR <15,000 (91.1%). All of the respondents mentioned that COVID-19 affected them in one way or the other (100.0%), with a majority of them did not visit the hospital during COVID-19 for their SAM child (52.5%) as they were afraid of COVID-19 (63.2%) and/or they lacked access to transport for visiting a hospital (93.4%). Bivariate analysis revealed that the father’s age (P = 0.02) and income (P = 0.00) is associated with the perceived effect of COVID-19 on income. In contrast, only the gender of the child (P = 0.00) is related to the visit to the hospital, and the gender of the child (P = 0.01) and mother’s literacy (P = 0.00) is associated with the choice of treatment from any other setup, including Hakeem and Peer. Conclusion This study concludes that health emergencies like the COVID-19 pandemic pose a significant barrier to access to healthcare services and subject a more vulnerable state to already vulnerable groups like SAM children. To lessen their vulnerability, initiatives like mobile health care services should be introduced, especially for socially disadvantaged communities, localities, and groups on regular basis and for future emergencies.

Background: Hepatitis infections, particularly hepatitis B and C, threaten public health to a great extent. They can be directly transferred from pregnant women to their fetuses, either in utero or postpartum. In Saudi Arabia, there is a variation in the prevalence of both infections among women throughout the country’s regions. Thus, it is necessary to examine women for probable infections by any of these types of hepatitis to prevent hepatitis transmission. Objective: To assess the prevalence of hepatitis B and hepatitis C infections among women in Ha’il, Saudi Arabia during 2016-2020. Methods: A retrospective cohort study was performed on the cumulative sero-prevalence of hepatitis B and C among 23,462 women who attended the maternity hospital in Ha’il, Kingdom Saudi Arabia (KSA), from the period of 2016-2020. Results: The analysis revealed that the hepatitis B infection (sero-prevalence 0.27%; 64 cases) is more prevalent than hepatitis C infection (sero-prevalence 0.077%, 18 cases) among women. Both infections were higher among Saudi compared to non-Saudi nationals. Moreover, hepatitis B sero-prevalence increases with women’s age, while HCVAb was higher in the group 40 – <50 years old. The data also showed no trends throughout months, seasons, and years for HCVAb and HBsAg cases. Conclusion: The results show a dramatic decline in both types of hepatitis (B and C) among the investigated women compared to previous and recent reports from other regions in the country and a further decrease in the prevalence during the study period. These results imply that the hepatitis B vaccination program implemented in Ha’il over the last 30 years has been successful for females. Therefore, surveillance, improved diagnostic facilities, and vaccination efforts should be continued in Ha’il, KSA.

As the COVID-19 pandemic persists, the public health interventions reported that many individuals during this pandemic situation experience different circumstances that lead to their poor mental health performance, such as isolation stress, anxiety, depression, anger, confusion, and unemployment. The aim of this study is to examine the existing literature in a comprehensive manner and to explore the impact of COVID-19 on the mental health of UAE health workers. This study also examined the psychological factors that influence workers’ mental health due to the pandemic of COVID-19. An online questionnaire was administered to answer the research question. The results proved that the pandemic has affected both physical and mental health of UAE health workers. Consequently, the adoption of preventive actions at the governmental, organizational, and individual levels is highly recommended. In this research, the implementation of effective communication and the application of adequate psychological services have been suggested. To this end, the role of policy makers to be involved in placing governmental initiatives that prevent the spread of the virus and protect the mental health of workers has been highlighted.

Background Worldwide, office employees have experienced two novel phenomena during the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown: working from home and reductions in their salaries. These phenomena have majorly impacted the lives of individuals as well as their families. The present study aims to measure the perceived stress levels among employees during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown in Pakistan. Methodology A cross-sectional approach was used to collect data from a sample of 385 employees working in three different IT-oriented private organizations. A semi-structured, Likert-scale questionnaire was used, containing the 10-item inventory from the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS). A sociodemographic profile, working parameters, and frequency of PSS inventory were presented in the descriptive analysis. Binary logistic regression analysis was made to compare the stress levels of the two groups resulting from their workloads and reductions in salary. Results An elevated perceived stress level (50.9%) was observed among the employees, showing a significant relationship with salary reduction and home work engagement (p<0.005). A strong negative correlation was observed (-0.860) for the salary reduction with PSS. Conclusion Working from home and reductions in salary caused increased perceived stress levels of the employees working in private organizations. Salary reductions proved to be a strong stressor, causing economic disruption and inability to cope with financial burdens during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Fever with a rash is a common case scenario that clinicians encounter in their practice. The ubiquity of the presentation is proportional to the magnitude of the physician’s dilemma due to its numerous causes. The diagnosis varies from infectious diseases to non-infectious, life threatening diseases including the current COVID-19 pandemic. Here we present a case of a 31-year-old male, who presented to the Emergency Department with fever and rash and was initially diagnosed and managed as a case of COVID-19 which on further evaluation proved to be brucellosis. This is a case of brucellosis with cutaneous manifestations which had been masquerading as COVID-19.