Key Points • Fifty-two percent of patients with iMCD treated with siltuximab with/without corticosteroids achieved response.• Corticosteroids alone are not effective in iMCD symptom management.

Abstract The aim of this study was to examine the seroprevalence of Leptospira spp. in dogs and red foxes in the entity of the Republic of Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina, after heavy rainfall and floods in 2014 and for the two years thereafter. The seroepidemiological study involved testing serum samples from dogs (n = 98) and foxes (n = 112) using MAT (microscopic agglutination test). Antibodies to at least one Leptospira spp. serovar were found in 52.04% of the tested dogs. The dog seroprevalence in 2014 (81.25%) was significantly higher than in 2015 (51.42% p <0.0001) and 2016 (22.5% p<0.05). The highest seroprevalences were for serovars Australis (76.47%), Bratislava (70.58%), Sejroe (66.67%) and Autumnalis (45.09%). Antibodies to at least one Leptospira spp. serovar were detected in 34.82% of the examined red foxes. In 2015, the fox seroprevalence was significantly higher (52.94%) than in 2016 (6.82%) (p <0.0001). The highest seroprevalences were for serovars Sejroe (64.10%), Bratislava (48.72%), Australis (43.59%) and Bataviae (25.64%). The high seroprevalence of Leptospira spp. in dogs and foxes determined during this study indicates the importance of these carnivores in maintaining leptospirosis in the study area, and the potential risk of infection for humans and other animal species that come into contact with these canids. The results obtained indicate that heavy rainfall and intense floods can result in increased Leptospira spp. infection in these canids.

Objective: The main objective of this research is to determine the prevalence and characteristics of neurological manifestations in hospitalized patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted. 572 hospitalized patients at the COVID Department of Pulmonology of the Mostar University Clinical Hospital in the six-month period from October 31, 2020, to April 30, 2021, were included. We analyzed the incidence of neurological manifestations and the influence of comorbidities and metabolic syndrome on stroke incidence in COVID-19 patients. We analyzed hospital length of stay and mortality in patients with and without neurological manifestations. The research was conducted with respect to all the determinants of the Helsinki Declaration. Results: 572 patients, 351 men (61.4%), and 221 women (38.6%) were included. A fatal outcome was present in a quarter of patients (25.3%). Neurological manifestations were found in 163 patients (28.5%). Myalgia was the most common (16.1%). The following were reported: headache (9.6%), loss of taste (7.34%), loss of smell (6.8%), and vertigo (2.5%). There was a significant difference regarding loss of smell between males and females (p=0.04). The cerebrovascular incident was present in 2.97% of patients and was more frequent in the group of patients with metabolic syndrome. Patients with neurological manifestations had a longer hospital stay, but it was not statistically significant (p=0.9319). The presence of neurological manifestations in general did not influence the mortality rate. Conclusion: Patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection can present with neurologic findings such as myalgia, headache, loss of smell or taste, vertigo, as well as cerebrovascular incidents. Patients with neurological manifestations had longer hospital stays, but the presence of neurological manifestations in general did not influence the mortality rate.

Vehicular ad hoc network (VANETs) improves road safety and efficiency by organizing vehicles and infrastructure to provide a platform for application deployment. The availability of vehicles and infrastructure is critical to the operation of applications. Accurate failure detector (FD) has been one of the fundamental components for maintaining high availability in VANETs. However, it is hard to find the vehicle failure accurately and timely due to the dynamic nature of VANETs caused by the high mobility of vehicles and communications link failures. Therefore, it is important to achieve an accurate FD which can cope with the high mobility of VANETs. In this paper, we propose a dead reckoning based FD, called DR-FD. It can predict the mobility of vehicle accurately and avoid the impact of link failures on the detection results by the cooperation between vehicles. Experimental results are provided to confirm that the proposed DR-FD method can achieve at most 20% reduction in detection time, 30% improvement in mistake rate and 20% improvement in overhead.

Small cell lung cancer (SCLC) is a highly aggressive malignancy with a poor outcome. We present the case of a 57-year-old male patient with extensive-stage (ES-SCLC) treated with chemotherapy and atezolizumab. A complete response was achieved with a long remission of ∼three years. Comprehensive genomic profiling (CGP) of the tumor revealed high tumor mutation burden (13 mutations/Mb) and mutations of TP53, RB1 and ERCC4 genes. This case study confirms that a complete response to chemoimmunotherapy may be achieved in the case of ES-SCLC. It further provides the additional value of CGP and predictive testing in the management of ES-SCLC.

Background: In December of 2019, SARS-CoV-2, a new type of coronavirus, appeared, and it turned into an international epidemic. The consequences of the pandemic, especially the isolation measures, fear of infection and bad economic trends, as a result of the crisis, threaten people's basic psychological needs. Objective: The objective of this research was to assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health and perceived social support of persons with disabilities in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Methods: The research included a total sample of 232 respondents with different types of disabilities. The Symptom Checklist (SCL-90) was used to verify the research objective, which assessed three dimensions: somatization, depression and anxiety. Also, in order to verify the research objective, the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support was applied, which consists of 12 statements that measure the perceived social support of family, friends and other people. The research data was processed with descriptive and inferential statistics. The basic statistical parameters were calculated, while the t-test was used for an independent sample of respondents to verify the set objective. Results: The results of the research showed that persons with disabilities, who were infected with the SARS-Cov-2 virus, had a significantly higher level of somatization, anxiety and depression compared to those who were not infected with the virus. The results in relation to social support did not prove to be statistically significant. Conclusion: The obtained results lead to the conclusion that, in the future, interventions by experts of various profiles must be planned to preserve the mental health of persons with disabilities, which is why it is important to invest in the emotional, psychological, social, physical and spiritual well-being of the individual.

BACKGROUND Global rise in antibiotics utilization has been strongly associated with the resistance of bacteria to antibiotics. The COVID-19 saw an increase in the use of antibiotics in some countries. The aim of this study was to evaluate antibiotics utilization from 2006 to 2021 in the Republic of Serbia. METHODS Data on antibiotic use were retrieved from the national annual reports on the official website of the Medicines and Medical Devices Agency of Serbia (ALIMS) during the period 2006-2021. To evaluate trends in the use of antibiotics in Serbia, linear and joint regression analyzes were performed. RESULTS The analysis of the antibiotics use over a sixteen-year period included a total of 50 antibiotics. A significant increase during the COVID-19 pandemic was observed for glycylcyclines i.e. new generation tetracyclines (tigecycline), third generation cephalosporins (ceftazidime, ceftriaxone, and cefixime), respiratory fluoroquinolones (levofloxacin and moxifloxacin), carbapenems (ertapenem) and oxazolidinones (linezolid) utilization. Moreover, an almost negligible use of new β-lactam/β-lactamase inhibitors during the pre-pandemic period increased significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic period. CONCLUSION A significant increasing trend in the use of specific antibiotics classified as the "Watch" and "Reserve" antibiotics during the pandemic period was observed.

Cilj: Prikazati najčešće razloge odbijanja potencijalnih darivatelja krvi po spolu i usporediti ih između gradova Osijeka i Zagreba. Ispitanici i metode: Istraživanje je provedeno po principu retrospektivne studije tijekom 2021. godine iz baze podataka Hrvatskog zavoda za transfuzijsku medicinu u Zagrebu i Kliničkom zavodu za transfuzijsku medicinu u Osijeku. Korišten je χ2-test, dok je statistička analiza napravljena pomoću programskog sustava MedCalc (inačica 14.12.0, MedCalcSoftware) uz razinu značajnosti od P < 0,05. Rezultati: Hrvatski zavod za transfuzijsku medicinu u Zagrebu kao najčešći razlog odbijanja potencijalnih darivatelja krvi navodi sniženu koncentraciju hemoglobina zbog koje je odbijeno 7 119, od kojih 2 583 (36 %) muškarca i 4 536 (64 %) žena. Također, Klinički zavod za transfuzijsku medicinu u Osijeku odbio je najviše potencijalnih darivatelja krvi zbog snižene koncentracije hemoglobina, njih 660, od kojih 235 (36 %) muškaraca i 425 (64 %) žena. Nakon obrade podataka nema statistički značajne razlike u odbijanju potencijalnih darivatelja krvi zbog hemoglobina u Zagrebu i Osijeku uspoređujući ih po spolu (P = 0,729). Zbog krvnog tlaka odbijenih potencijalnih darivatelja krvi u Zagrebu bilo je 3 855, 2 375 (62 %) muškaraca i 1 480 (38 %) žena. Odbijenih potencijalnih darivatelja krvi zbog krvnog tlaka u Osijeku je bilo 369, 141 (38 %) muškarac i 228 (62 %) žena. Statistički značajna razlika u odbijanju potencijalnih darivatelja krvi zbog krvnog tlaka u gradovima po spolu postoji (P < 0,001). Zaključak: Najčešći razlozi odbijanja dobrovoljnih darivatelja krvi tijekom 2021. godini u Hrvatskom zavodu za transfuzijsku medicinu u Zagrebu i Kliničkom zavodu za transfuzijsku medicinu u Osijeku jesu snižena koncentracija hemoglobina te krvni tlak kod obaju spolova.

At the beginning of 2020, few people could imagine that the new coronavirus, COVID-19, would impact that many aspects of our lives and change the content, structure, and teaching methods we knew before. Many language teachers (LT) worldwide who had been effectively implementing face-to-face instruction had to make an abrupt transition to online education, something they were not trained for or had experience with. The present study aims to discover whether LT successfully delivered online instruction and whether online teaching during the first online period impacted students’ learning habits. Using a specifically designed questionnaire, students who study at several public universities from Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H), the Republic of North Macedonia (RNM), and Türkiye (TUR) were asked to evaluate their teachers’ professional adaptation and success during the first “emergency online teaching semester”, and to reflect on their learning habits during this period and the changes they personally experienced. The results of the study revealed that students in the three countries approached and evaluated their teachers’ pedagogical skills as appropriate for online teaching in the first COVID-19 period in remarkably similar ways. However, the impact on students’ learning habits is, to a certain extent, different in these countries. The findings of the study might provide relevant input to rethink the teaching profession in terms of competencies, means of instruction, and strategies for coping with processes that affect teaching. Education will not be the same in a post-pandemic world, we must use the knowledge we have gained, and the suggestions made by our students to enhance our educational systems.

In the H2020 European project ASHVIN “Assistants for Healthy, Safe, and Productive Virtual Construction Design, Operation & Maintenance using a Digital Twin”, a set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and Performance Indicators (PIs) to plan and control productive, resource efficient, and safe maintenance are being developed for transport infrastructure. This paper is presenting PIs and KPIs for the assessment and monitoring of the following aspects: Productivity, Resource Efficiency, Cost, Health & Safety during the operational life cycle stage, which is mainly focusing on the inspection and maintenance planning. Quantifiable and measurable PIs and KPIs are proposed and applied on two demonstration projects, highway bridge in Spain and airport runway in Croatia, as part of transportation infrastructure. Proposed PIs and KPIs are integrated into digital twins of the analyzed assets and into decision making tools for risk based maintenance planning. This paper presents the overview of the proposed digital PIs and KPIs applied on two demonstration projects and the integration into decision support tools for efficient and sustainable maintenance planning.

Highlights • Microarray analysis of dorsal root ganglia from mice subjected to collagen antibody-induced arthritis (CAIA) and controls revealed that arthritis leads to differential expression of 120 circular RNA genes.• Bioinformatical analysis indicates that altered levels of circRNAs in DRG is associated with sensitization-related processes.• Microarray or RT-qPCR analysis showed increased levels of circVps13 and circMicall1 in the inflammatory phase and circNufip1 the late “post-inflammatory” phase in DRG from mice subjected to CAIA.