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Background: Various nail manifestations have been reported with COVID‑19; mostly in the form of isolated reports. Objective: This cross‑sectional study was carried out to assess nail changes in hospitalized patients with moderate to severe COVID‑19. Methods: Nail findings in 43 adults being treated for COVID‑19, were evaluated after obtaining informed written consent. Nail changes involving fingernails and toenails were documented as new‑onset or pre‑existing changes. Disease status, hematological and biochemical tests, inflammatory markers, treatment administered and outcomes were also recorded. The frequency of changes in fingernails and toenails were statistically compared. Results: The red half‑moon sign (32.5%) and nail bed erythema (34.8%) were the commonest changes seen in fingernails; while apparent leukonychia (46.5%) and distal brown discoloration (51.1%) were commonest changes in toenails. The difference in frequency of changes seen between fingernails and toenails was statistically significant (p < 0.05). Nail changes correlated with systemic involvement in these patients. Limitations: Single‑center evaluation in a limited number of patients, without using augmented examination techniques like onychoscopy, nail fold capillaroscopy, or fluoroscence. Those with less severe disease or with rapid fatality could not be studied. Conclusion: Nail changes in COVID‑19 are common and reflect the systemic nature of illness, being a harbinger of underlying complications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Nail changes are always a cause of physical handicap and psychological stress in this era where utmost importance is given to cosmetic appearance. Other than trauma and infections, Papulosquamous disorders are major contributor to nail changes. Thorough knowledge of their patterns will aid in early detection and treatment before irreversible damage to nails occurs. Aim: To observe the clinical patterns of nail changes in various papulosquamous disorders. Materials and Methods: This observational descriptive crosssectional study was conducted in a tertiary care set up at Government Coimbatore Medical College, Coimbatore from June 2016 to June 2017. The study group comprised of 104 cases of various papulosquamous disorders. The type of papulosquamous disorder, presence of nail changes, their onset, duration, various patterns and associated comorbidities were noted in detail. The observed data were entered in Microsoft Excel and data analysis was done in Epi- info system. Results: Out of the 104 cases taken for study 71 (68%) had nail changes. Majority of them were in 31-45 years age group (n=29; 41%). More of males (n=38, 54%) had nail changes than the females (n=33, 46%). Psoriasis (n=47; 66%) was the most common papulosquamous disorder with nail changes followed by lichen planus (n=9; 13%) and pityriasis rubrapilaris (n=7; 10%). Pitting of nails was the most common nail pattern (n=44; 62%), followed by sub-ungual hyperkeratosis (n=24; 34%), thickened nail plate and longitudinal striations (both n=19; 27%). Finger nails were more affected than toe nails. Psoriasis and pityriasis rubrapilaris had 100% nail involvement. The patterns of nail changes were maximum in psoriasis and lichen planus. Beaus lines was observed in most of the papulosquamous disorders except Lichen nitidus and Lichen striatus. The time gap for onset of nail changes was longer for Psoriasis (4.2 years) and shorter for pityriasisrosea (2 months). In lichen striatus and lichen nitidus, nails were involved only in children. Minimal nail changes were observed in para psoriasis and pityriasis lichenoides. More number of co-morbidities like diabetes, hypertension, atopy and arthritis were seen in psoriasis. Conclusion: In this study, it was observed that the nail changes were more common in psoriasis, lichen planus and pityriasis rubra pilaris among the papulosquamous disorders. The highly frequent nail patterns were pitting and subungual hyperkeratosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

E-waste is a popular name for electronic products nearing the end of their favorable life. Which ensuing in increased dangers of digital waste normally acknowledged as e-waste. Present study was aimed to find out the soil quality, air pollution and its relation to human health risk. Therefore, two study sites (SI and SII) were choised on the basis of various activities. PM2.5 air samples had been gathered with the help of RDS after which were analyzed to heavy metals through ICP-MS. Objectives of the study, was to generate baseline data at the quantity of heavy metal cognizance in soil from two test sites. In rise, we measured the heavy metallic concentrations in scalp hair and fingernails to discover if there exists any relation among organic publicity and environmental. Hypertension, Hypoxemia and Asthma had been additionally decided for the evaluation of fitness parameters among the take a look at population. For this purpose, investigation also involved the collection of fingernails and scalp hair for heavy metal analysis (ICP-MS) from human subjects of two study sites. Results indicated that, except SI, SII had significant level of PM2.5 and its heavy metal content. All soil indices which were employed to determine the level of pollution, indicates extreme level of metals at all the study sites. Therefore, local residents as well as workers, who were engaged in e-waste burning and industrial activities also had various levels of toxic metal concentrations in their scalp hair and fingernails. We concluded that the high levels of air pollution, containing toxic metal pollutants such as Pb, Zn, Cu and Ni released from e-waste burning activities, resulted in significant health risks for the exposed human population. It is recommended that environment of Moradabad City should be closely monitored by government agencies on routine basis. It was concluded that the toxic metal contamination imposed a negative influence on the environment, soil and human health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Onychomycosis refers to fungal nail infection. Despite a clearly diseased appearance, it is often deemed a merely cosmetic problem of relatively minor importance. However, it may result in much psychological or occupational turmoil, diminished self-esteem and resulting reluctance for public interaction. A wide number of factors determine the treatment outcome and its prevalence varies greatly. Our study was conducted between January 2011 and December 2014 in northeast India. Of 243 patients presenting with nail abnormalities, 158 (65%) were positively diagnosed by either direct microscopy or culture or both. A distal lateral subungual infection was the most predominant clinical pattern observed, and the most frequent aetiological agents were dermatophytes, of which Trichophyton rubrum was predominant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blood haemoglobin concentration is a vital physiological parameter for assessing disease conditions, such as Anaemia in the human body. Anaemia is one of the most common diseases that affects billions of people worldwide. Especially, in developing countries, like India, the prevalence is quite high according to WHO statistics. Traditional invasive process for screening of anaemia is exorbitant and is hard to orchestrate in a resource-poor environment which raises the demand for cost-effective, reliable, portable, non-invasive solution. Hence, in this work, we aim to design a solution for non-invasive screening of anaemia by combining the cutting-edge Artificial-Intelligence techniques with the conventional practises for rough assessment of anaemia by observing pallor in the finger-nail of hand of a human subject. The proposed method first induces color changes in nail-bed by application of suitable amount of pressure and release thereafter through a customized hardware device. Finally, the captured video by a smartphone camera is analysed to measure the rate of change of color to quantify the blood haemoglobin level after correlating with the clinically determined value of blood haemoglobin. The proposed model with a fusion-based prediction approach outperforms the state-of-the-art solutions, ensuring a mean RMSE and MSE error of 0.63 and 0.61 and standard deviation ± 0.46 g dL−1 and ± 0.73 g dL−1 respectively as compared to clinically tested haemoglobin level for a total of 220 subjects. • The proposed system is built to be a highly customized system that can efficiently materialize the age-old technique of assessing blood haemoglobin level by observing color changes in nail-bed. • The proposed system is capable to successfully harness the inherent potential of such age-old practise further empowered with the huge potential of cutting-age Artificial Intelligence techniques thereby establishing it as an effective non-invasive anaemia-care system. • The proposed system considers video data of nail pallor that provides a more comprehensive and dynamic evidence of blood flows in the nail-bed tissues correlating the changes in blood haemoglobin level. This distinctive contribution makes it unique while ensuring better performance. • Significant contribution has been made in the customized design of the hardware device to ensure uniform pressure application across the entire nail-bed while flexibly and comfortably accommodating finger nail of varying sizes of different individuals under a fixed lighting illumination condition. • Realization of a novel ensemble-based frameworks by combining the state-of-the-art regression models and Multi-Layer Perceptron has considerably enhanced the prediction accuracy of haemoglobin level estimation. • The efficient design of the prediction modules provides approximated haemoglobin level closely matching the clinical value, even in a resource-poor environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents case study of a 17-year-old woman who was presented to a hospital for examination of her thickening fingernails and toenails since early infancy, resulting to painful plantar keratoderma, oral leukokeratosis, cysts and follicular hyperkeratosis. The patient then underwent treatment for its keratoderma and diagnose with pachyonychia congenita. The article also discusses the features of pachyonychia congenita and KRT6A mutations.

Context: The worldwide incidence of onychomycosis is increasing and it continues to spread and persist. Knowledge of the epidemiological and mycological characteristics is an important tool for control of this infection. Aims: This study seeks to improve knowledge of onychomycosis epidemiology and mycological features. Settings and Design: Over a period of five years (Jan 2000 - Dec 2005) samples from 400 patients with clinical suspected fungal nail infections, who attended dermatology out patient department at a tertiary care hospital, were obtained. Materials and Methods: 400 nail specimens of suspected onychomycosis were evaluated clinically, KOH examination and fungal culture was done. Results: Onychomycosis was present in 218 (54.5%) by culture and /or direct examination. Fingernails and toenails were infected in 65% and 32% respectively and remaining 3% had both. Conclusions: This study demonstrated that dermatophytes were main agents causing onychomycosis in our region, as well as the importance of performing direct examination and culture in diagnosis of onychomycosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Specific elements are bioconcentrated in human hair and nails, which have unique advantages of application in population monitoring studies thereby, recognized as biological tools for disease diagnosis and prevention. However, investigations are meager for relative element profile in hair and nails of same subjects. In this study, hair and nails were analyzed to find effects of age, sex, smoking habit, diet, urban and rural exposure gradients, occupation, and health on element levels. Scalp hair and fingernails were sampled along with a questionnaire from urban and rural subjects of New Delhi; patients of hypertension, coronary heart disease, and diabetes were identified clinically. Cadmium, chromium, copper, nickel, lead and zinc concentrations were determined by AAS in both the samples; CRM (human hair powder) analysis showed acceptable precision and accuracy in element measurement. In comparison to controls, Cr–H and Zn–H levels were lower respectively in female hypertensive and total hypertensive subjects, whereas, Zn–N and Cu–N were lower respectively in total CHD and diabetic subjects, and hypertensive and CHD urban subjects. Cd concentrations were higher in both the samples of tobacco smoking rural subjects than that of non-smokers. Farmers had lower Pb–H than rural businessmen did. Cr, Cu, Ni, and Zn concentrations were different due to rural and urban gradient but not to the influence of age, sex, and diet. Pb value was alone correlated between the paired samples. Thus, higher Cd levels in the smokers and lower Cr, Cu and Zn levels in the patients were observed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]