Patterns, facilitators and barriers to physical activity among Nigerian pregnant women

Introduction: pregnancy is associated with sedentary behaviors and/or low levels of physical activity (PA). This study aimed to assess patterns, barriers, and facilitators of PA among pregnant women. Methods: a convergent parallel mixed method design study involving a concurrent collection of quantitative (n=198) and qualitative (n=36) data was carried out. Respondents were drawn from five selected health care facilities in Ile-Ife, Osun state, South-West, Nigeria. Physical activity was assessed using the pregnancy physical activity questionnaire. Focus group discussions were used to qualitatively explore barriers and facilitators of PA. Quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics, while qualitative data were analyzed using thematic content analysis. Results: the mean total PA score for the population was 118.663±81.522 mets-min/wk. While it was 118.743±92.062 mets-min/wk, 113.861±72.854 mets-min/wk, and 25.429±87.766 mets-min/wk for the first, second, and third trimester respectively. The respondents engaged more in moderate (44.27±37.07) than vigorous (13.89±18.87) intensity PA. Respondents in the third trimester had the highest and the least scores for household-related PA (45.7±33.0) and vigorous-intensity PA (10.0±14.0) respectively. Major themes that emerged on enablers and barriers of PA engagement during pregnancy were related to intrapersonal, interpersonal, availability of specialized health personnel and policy for PA, good built environment/neighborhood factors, and pervading cultural beliefs and myths about pregnancy. Conclusion: moderate intensity and household-related PA were most common among Nigerian pregnant women. Contextual facilitators and barriers to PA during pregnancy were largely related to intrapersonal, interpersonal, environmental or organizational, policy, and cultural factors

Infant-carrying techniques: which is a preferred mother-friendly method?

Infant carrying is still trendy among African mothers than in other climes, however, carrying techniques vary mostly along cultural divides. Using a pretest–posttest quasi-experimental design, the authors evaluated the effect of three types of infant-carrying techniques on cardiopulmonary function, metabolic expenditure, fatigue demand, and locomotion. Front wrap infant-carrying technique led to a marginally higher cardiopulmonary demand. Hip sling technique resulted in greater metabolic expenditure and oxygen consumption with high rate of perceived exertion, while back wrap technique did not significantly decrease locomotion parameters. The authors recommend back wrap infant carrying technique based on its slightly lower effects on cardiopulmonary function, metabolic expenditure, fatigue demand, and locomotion

Optimization of oil extraction from Pitanga (Eugenia Uniflora L) leaves using Simplex Centroid Design (SCD)

Simplex centroid design (SCD) was employed to optimize the mixing of petroleum ether, n-hexane, methanol and ethanol for the extraction of oil (PLO) from Pitanga (Eugenia uniflora L.) leaves, via Soxhlet extraction. The highest yield (54%) of Pitanga leaf oil (PLO) was obtained with 100% ethanol and the lowest yield (16%) from the mixture of methanol (33.3%)/hexane (33.3%)/ethanol (33.3%). The coefficient of determination (R2) of the model equation obtained was 0.91, while the adjusted R2 and predicted R2 were 0.8729 and 0.951, respectively. The saponification value (S.V.), iodine value, acid value and free fatty acid (FFA) are 35.34 mgKOH/g, 72.97 mgI2/g oil, 32.41 and 16.30 mgKOH/g, respectively