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Introduction: Phenomena such as a pandemic can cause many medical, psychological, and sociological problems, including increased alcohol use, which was noticed among healthy people and patients with long-term diseases. The aim of the study was to evaluate alcohol consumption in adult patients with rheumatic diseases, who completed participation in a phase 3 clinical trial for biologic drugs or treatment under a drug program, and consented to participate in the study. Material and methods: 128 patients between the ages of 18 and 77 years (M = 46.88, SD = 13.80) with disease duration of 1-46 years (M = 12.30, SD = 8.53) participated in the study. In the research group, more than half (57.8%) were women, most of the subjects (60.2%) were economically active, 74.2% of the subjects are not addicted to tobacco, 61.7% of the subjects were in a relationship, 52.3% of the patients were participating in a drug program at the time of the study, and 23.4% of the subjects had completed participation in clinical trials. The Baltimore questionnaire and AUDIT-4 were used in the study. Results: Regarding the norms set by the authors of the Baltimore test, it was recognised that 24 people (18.8%) had an alcohol problem, medium risk of disease applied to 6 people (4.7%), low risk of disease applied to 12 people (9.4%), and no alcohol problem applied to 86 people (67.2%). Conclusions: Alcohol drinking is a serious problem among patients treated in drug programs and clinical trials. Smoking is significantly associated with alcohol abuse and drinking patterns. It is necessary to control with alcohol drinking questionnaires during treatment with expensive drugs, to identify alcohol abuse or risky drinking patterns as a factor that may reduce compliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Actinic keratosis (AK) is a disease characterized by hyperkeratotic lesions on skin damaged by ultraviolet. radiation. These lesions may progress to squamous cell or basal cell carcinoma. Currently pharmacotherapy and different surgical procedures are used in AK therapy. The most common treatment options are 5-fluorouracil, imiquimod, diclofenac, ingenol mebutate, and first and third generation retinoids (retinol, adapalene, tazarotene). Furthermore, research is being carried out in order to test new medications including nicotinamide, resiquimod, piroxicam, potassium dobesilate and oleogel based on a triterpene extract (betulin, betulinic acid). Recently, the preventive effect of acetylsalicylic acid and celecoxib has also been investigated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

New therapeutic alternatives, such as innovative medical devices, are frequently the only treatment options left for patients when other efficient medical modalities are lacking or insufficient. Development of novel devices, which are safe and effective, requires understanding of complex premarket and postmarket provisions, including characteristics of clinical trials. Speeding up patient access to new technologies may imply the need to make choices in terms of extent and robustness of clinical evaluation without losing the patient safety perspective. In such situations, some challenges can readily arise due to existing methodological solutions and aspects of current legislation in the field. In this context, some challenges, occurring at various stages of the device lifecycle, will be presented in order to observe the changes and hopefully to contribute to better knowledge and improvements in the area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]