Gender Based Within-Household Inequality in Childhood Immunization in India: Changes over Time and across Regions

Background and Objectives: Despite India’s substantial economic growth in the past two decades, girls in India are discriminated against in access to preventive healthcare including immunizations. Surprisingly, no study has assessed the contribution of gender based within-household discrimination to the overall inequality in immunization status of Indian children. This study therefore has two objectives: to estimate the gender based within-household inequality (GWHI) in immunization status of Indian children and to examine the inter-regional and inter-temporal variations in the GWHI. Data and Methods: The present study used households with a pair of male-female siblings (aged 1–5 years) from two rounds of National Family Health Survey (NFHS, 1992–93 and 2005–06). The overall inequality in the immunization status (after controlling for age and birth order) of children was decomposed into within-households and between-households components using Mean log deviation to obtain the GWHI component. The analysis was conducted at the all-India level as well as for six specified geographical regions and at two time points (1992–93 and 2005–06). Household fixed-effects models for immunization status of children were also estimated. Results and Conclusions: Findings from household fixed effects analysis indicated that the immunization scores of girls were significantly lower than that of boys. The inequality decompositions revealed that, at the all-India level, the absolute level of GWHI in immunization status decreased from 0.035 in 1992–93 to 0.023 in 2005–06. However, as a percentage o

Effect of Mn doping on structural, optical and magnetic properties of SnO2 nanoparticles

The Mn doped SnO2 nanoparticles synthesized by cost effective chemical co-precipitation method has been investigated in the present work. The main focus of the work is to explore the structural, optical and magnetic properties of the SnO2 nanostructures. The crystallite size decreases with increase in Mn doping to SnO2 matrix. The optical band gap of doped SnO2 nanoparticles continuously decreases with increasing Mn ion doping concentration. All the doped SnO2 nanoparticles show paramagnetic behavior at room temperature. SnO2 exhibits ferromagnetic behavior in the range of low external applied magnetic field due to the presence of oxygen vacancies (V (o) (+) ) and defects. The undoped SnO2 nanoparticles are spherical in shape while Mn doped SnO2 nanoparticles show the segregation of the spherically shaped nanoparticles. Mn ions only enhance the paramagnetic ordering and degrade the ferromagnetism already present in the SnO2 nanoparticle

In vivo measurement of trabecular meshwork stiffness in a corticosteroid-induced ocular hypertensive mouse model

Ocular corticosteroids are commonly used clinically. Unfortunately, their administration frequently leads to ocular hypertension, i.e., elevated intraocular pressure (IOP), which, in turn, can progress to a form of glaucoma known as steroid-induced glaucoma. The pathophysiology of this condition is poorly understood yet shares similarities with the most common form of glaucoma. Using nanotechnology, we created a mouse model of corticosteroid-induced ocular hypertension. This model functionally and morphologically resembles human ocular hypertension, having titratable, robust, and sustained IOPs caused by increased resistance to aqueous humor outflow. Using this model, we then interrogated the biomechanical properties of the trabecular meshwork (TM), including the inner wall of Schlemm’s canal (SC), tissues known to strongly influence IOP and to be altered in other forms of glaucoma. Specifically, using spectral domain optical coherence tomography, we observed that SC in corticosteroid-treated mice was more resistant to collapse at elevated IOPs, reflecting increased TM stiffness determined by inverse finite element modeling. Our noninvasive approach to monitoring TM stiffness in vivo is applicable to other forms of glaucoma and has significant potential to monitor TM function and thus positively affect the clinical care of glaucoma, the leading cause of irreversible blindness worldwide