The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic affected the entire world and contributed to severe health and economic consequences. A safe and effective vaccine is a tool allowing the pandemic to be controlled. Hence, we aimed to conduct a survey on vaccinations against seasonal influenza and COVID-19 in Poland, Lithuania, and Ukraine. We also evaluated societal attitudes towards influenza and COVID-19 vaccinations. Materials and methods: We conducted the study between December 2020 and May 2021. At the time, the countries subject to the research were between the second and third waves of the COVID-19 pandemic. We used an anonymous and self-designed questionnaire comprised of eleven closed-ended questions and a short socio-demographic section. The questionnaire was administered by direct contact or mainly (due to the COVID-19 pandemic) by e-mail or Facebook. Finally, we included 2753 answers from Poland, 1852 from Ukraine, and 213 from Lithuania. Results: Between 61% (Poland) and 72.9% (Ukraine) of the study participants have never been vaccinated against influenza (p < 0.05). Totals of 67.6% of the respondents in Poland, 73.71% in Lithuania, and 29.5% in Ukraine responded that they want to be vaccinated against COVID-19 (p < 0.05). Vaccine hesitancy was mainly related to worries about its side effects. There were also vaccine non-adopters in the study. In Ukraine, 67% of the respondents were clearly opposed to mandatory COVID-19 vaccines, compared to 41.7% in Poland and 30.99% in Lithuania (p < 0.05). Conclusions: There are still many people who present vaccine hesitancy or are opposed to vaccines. Thus, societal education about vaccination and the pandemic is crucial. Vaccine hesitancy or refusal might be related to vaccine origin. Shortages of influenza vaccines made it impossible to vaccinate those who were determined to be vaccinated. There is room for discussion of mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations.
As members of a public trust profession, pharmacists are the most accessible medical team members. Therefore, every pharmacist must know the scope of their professional roles (PR) and professional functions (PF). The study aimed to detail the major PR into a pooled set of PF. The research materials were the provisions of the World Health Organization, the International Pharmaceutical Federation, and scientific works on the PR of pharmacists. Methods of critical analysis, concretization, functional decomposition, and scientific generalization were used. As a result of detailing the 10 main PR according to the “ten-star pharmacist” concept for each, a combined set of partial PFs of the pharmacist was obtained. The decomposition takes into account the principle of complexity limitation, which allowed three to six partial PF for the respective PR to be obtained, namely: three PFs for a life-long-learner, five PFs for a caregiver, a decision-maker, a teacher, a leader, a researcher, an entrepreneur, and an agent of positive change, six PFs for a communicator and a manager. Thus, due to the decomposition of each of the 10 main PR of the pharmacist into three or six corresponding partial PFs, we received a multifunctional verbal model of difficult to organize, professional activities, which is identified by a total of 50 PFs. The importance of using this model in formulating professional competencies and learning outcomes of educational programs for pharmacists is emphasized.
Due to the Russian invasion, which started on 24 February 2022, the Ukrainian healthcare system is facing multiple challenges. A great number of healthcare facilities have been destroyed, while availability of other ones is often limited due to a lack of qualified medical staff. Certain services, e.g. cancer therapies, have been seriously disrupted. Moreover, millions of Ukrainians with chronic conditions are also suffering as due to war-related problems with execution of their long-term therapies. Availability of drugs is particularly limited in the occupied regions. According to the national statistics, as of 18 August 2022, about 505 pharmacies were damaged in Eastern Ukraine and 47 completely ruined. Moreover, the invaders have been blocking humanitarian aid provided to these territories by the Ukrainian government or other countries. Fortunately, in the areas controlled by the Government of Ukraine, the acute shortage of medicines, observed at the beginning of the war, has already been eliminated. Nevertheless, not all drugs are now fully available, even in the areas where no military attacks occur. The economic availability of drugs is also profoundly influenced by the significant increase in the cost of medications and the fall in average salaries. The Government of Ukraine is trying to minimise the impact of these war-related challenges by adopting a new legislation. This includes, among others, simplification of procedures for licensing, quality control and import of medicinal products to Ukraine. Other measures involve securing displaced people with the option of benefiting from local healthcare facilities, broadening the scope of the ePrescription system, authorizing primary care doctors to issue prescriptions to refugees, increasing the number of drugs reimbursed for long-term therapies, etc. These solutions, however, cannot balance all the harmful consequences the war in Ukraine brings in terms of maintenance of long-term therapies. Therefore, in order to minimise this negative impact, Ukraine still needs urgent international support in this area.
This review aims to analyze Mentha piperita L. as a potential raw material for the development of new health promoting products (nutraceuticals, cosmetics, and pharmaceutical products). A lot of scientific publications were retrieved from the Scopus, PubMed, and Google Scholar databases which enable the study and generalization of the extraction procedures, key biologically active compounds of essential oil and extracts, biological properties, and therapeutic potential of M. piperita, along with perspectives on the development of its dosage forms, including combinations of synthetic active substances and herbal preparations of M. piperita. The results of this review indicate that M. piperita is a source rich in phytoconstituents of different chemical nature and can be regarded as a source of active substances to enhance health and to develop medicinal products for complementary therapy of various conditions, especially those related with oxidant stress, inflammation, and moderate infections. Essential oil has a broad spectrum of activities. Depending on the test and concentration, this essential oil has both anti- and prooxidant properties. Gram-positive bacteria are more sensitive to the essential oil of M. piperita than Gram-negative ones. This review also considered some facets of the standardization of essential oil and extracts of M. piperita. Among the identified phenolics of extracts were caffeic acid, rosmarinic acid, eriocitrin, luteolin derivates (luteolin-7-O-rutinoside, luteolin-7-O-glucoronide), and hesperidin. The concentration of these phenolics depends on the solvent used. This review also considered the relationships between the chemical component and biological activity. The results showed that the essential oil and extracts reduced inflammation in vitro by inhibiting the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines, such as tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) and interleukin-6 (IL-6), and in vivo by reducing the paw edema induced using carrageenan injection in rats. Therefore, herbal preparations of M. piperita are promising medicinal and cosmetic preparations for their usage in skincare and oral cavity care products with antimicrobial, antiinflammatory, and wound-healing properties. This plant can also be regarded as a platform for the development of antibacterial preparations and combined anti-inflammatory and cardioprotective medicinal products (synthetic active substances plus herbal preparations). This review could be considered for the justification of the composition of some medicinal products during their pharmaceutical development for writing a registration dossier in the format of Common Technical Document.
Засіб у формі гелевої композиції для лікування запальних та дистрофічно-запальних захворювань тканин пародонта, який містить як активний компонент бензидаміну гідрохлорид, який відрізняється тим, що містить бензидаміну гідрохлорид у формі розтертої до порошкоподібного стану таблетки Т-септ та додатково містить як активний компонент протефлазід у складі гелевої основи, що містить альгінат натрію, ніпагін та воду для ін'єкцій, при наступному співвідношенні компонентів, мас. %: альгінат натрію 5,0 ніпагін 0,15 бензидаміну гідрохлорид, що відповідає вмісту 1 розтертої до порошкоподібного стану таблетки Т-септу 0,03 протефлазід 15,0 вода для ін'єкцій 79,82.