Assessment of Examination Related Anxiety among Students in a Medical College at Kolkata, India: A Cross-sectional Study

Introduction: Medical education is considered to be one of the most academically and emotionally demanding training programmes out of any profession. Stress causes a negative effect on the students’ psychosocial well-being. Students having anxiety can experience intense feeling of fear or panic and also impairs concentration and working memory. Aim: To estimate the examination related anxiety levels among medical students. Also, to find out its association with different lifestyle and behavioural factors. Materials and Methods: This institution-based cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted among 365 medical students of Calcutta National Medical College, Kolkata, West Bengal, India, from February 2022 to March 2022. The study used predesigned, pretested, and semi-structured questionnaire. To assess anxiety level, the 10-item Westside Test Anxiety Scale was used. The scale consists of 10 questions which are answered based on a 5-point scale. Data was analysed in Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 16.0. Results: Out of 365, 108 (29.6%) students suffered from moderately-high test anxiety during exams in both first and second professional MBBS year. Only 8.2% students had comfortably-low test anxiety, whereas, 11.2% had extremelyhigh test anxiety. Among the first year students 37.5% male and 19.5% female had moderately high to extremely high level of test anxiety. In second year students 34.6% male and 20.6% female had moderately high to extremely high level of test anxiety. Male gender, addiction to smoking, addiction to alcohol, virtual gaming habit, coming from a nuclear family, and staying at home during exams had greater odds of having high anxiety than their counterparts. Addiction to smoking had adjusted odds of 1.52 and was found to be statistically significant. Students who resided in their homes had 2.34 times more chances of having high test anxiety and this association was found to be statistically significant. The practice of yoga was found to be protective with adjusted odds of 0.31 and this was also statistically significant. Conclusion: Male gender, addiction to smoking and alcohol, virtual gaming habit, coming from a nuclear family and staying at home during examination time had greater impact on anxiety level than their counterparts. The practice of yoga was found to be protective. Involving students in different extra-curricular activities like outdoor games, yoga, playing music may be helpful in alleviating anxiety level

Prolificacy and Its Relationship with Age, Body Weight, Parity, Previous Litter Size and Body Linear Type Traits in Meat-type Goats

Data on age and body weight at breeding, parity, previous litter size, days open and some descriptive body linear traits from 389 meat-type, prolific Black Bengal goats in Tripura State of India, were collected for 3 and 1/2 years (2007 to 2010) and analyzed using logistic regression model. The objectives of the study were i) to evaluate the effect of age and body weight at breeding, parity, previous litter size and days open on litter size of does; and ii) to investigate if body linear type traits influenced litter size in meat-type, prolific goats. The incidence of 68.39% multiple births with a prolificacy rate of 175.07% was recorded. Higher age (>2.69 year), higher parity order (>2.31), more body weight at breeding (>20.5 kg) and larger previous litter size (>1.65) showed an increase likelihood of multiple litter size when compared to single litter size. There was a strong, positive relationship between litter size and various body linear type traits like neck length (>22.78 cm), body length (>54.86 cm), withers height (>48.85 cm), croup height (>50.67 cm), distance between tuber coxae bones (>11.38 cm) and distance between tuber ischii bones (>4.56 cm) for discriminating the goats bearing multiple fetuses from those bearing a single fetus

Quality of life among geriatric population in a rural area of West Bengal: A cross-sectional study

Introduction: Aging is associated with gradual accumulation of a wide variety of molecular and cellular damage resulting in different types of morbidities in geriatric population, especially in rural areas in India where health infrastructure is insufficient. Aims: The aim of the study was to assess sociodemographic profile and quality of life (QOL) of geriatric population in Memari-I block of East Burdwan district, West Bengal. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional observational study was done among 436 rural geriatric population from October to December 2020 at Memari-I block in West Bengal, and multistage proportionate population sampling was done. Data were collected through house-to-house survey by pretested, predesigned, structured schedule and data analyzed with the help of IBM SPSS v16. Results: Among the study population, 263 (60.3%) were male and 272 (62.4%) were in the age group of 60–69. Nearly one-third of the population (37.8%) was underweight and half of them belonged to lower socioeconomic group (51.6%). Their QOL was significantly influenced by age, caste, family type, addiction, body mass index (BMI), dependency on others, socioeconomic status, and the presence of hypertension or diabetes. Conclusion: From the present study, it can be concluded that geriatric population from the Memari block was underweight and belonged to lower socioeconomic group. Significant association of QOL was found with age, caste, family type, addiction, BMI, dependency on others, socioeconomic status, and the presence of hypertension or diabetes

Body linear traits for identifying prolific goats

Aim: The present study was conducted on prolific goat breed to identify body linear type traits that might be associated with prolificacy trait in goats. Materials and Methods: Two-stage stratified random sample survey based data were collected from 1427 non-pregnant goats with the history of single, twin and triplet litter sizes (LZ) between January 2008 to February 2011 for 3 years in 68 villages located in East and North East India. Data on sixteen body linear traits were analyzed using logistic regression model to do the step-wise selection for identifying the body linear traits that could determine LZ. An average value for each identified body linear trait was determined for classifying the goats into three categories: Goats having the history of single LZ, goats having the history of twin LZ and goats having the history of triplet LZ. Results: The LZ proportions for single, twin and triplet, were 29.50, 59.14 and 11.36%, respectively, with the prolificacy rate of 181.85% in Indian Black Bengal goats. A total of eight body linear traits that could determine LZ in prolific goats were identified. Heart girth (HG) measurement (>60.90 cm), paunch girth (PG) (>70.22 cm), wither height (WH) (>49.75 cm), neck length (>21.45 cm), ear length (>12.80 cm) and distance between trochanter major (DTM) bones (>12.28 cm), pelvic triangle area (PTA) (>572.25 cm2) and clearance at udder (CU) (>23.16 cm) showed an increase likelihood of multiple LZ when compared to single LZ. Further, HG measurement (>62.29 cm), WH (>50.54 cm), PG (>71.85 cm) and ear length (>13.00 cm), neck length (>22.01 cm), PTA (>589.64 cm2), CU (>23.20 cm) and DTM bones (>12.47 cm) were associated with increased likelihood of triplet LZ, when compared with that of twin LZ. Conclusion: HG measurement was the best discriminating factor, while PG, neck length, DTM bones, CU, PTA, WH and ear length measurements were other important factors that could be used for identifying prolific goats to achieve economic benefit out of prolificacy trait

Adverse drug reaction profile of nanoparticle versus conventional formulation of paclitaxel: An observational study

Objectives : Conventional polyethoxylated castor oil (PCO)-based paclitaxel is associated with major adverse drug reactions (ADRs). Nanoxel, a nanoparticle-based formulation, may improve its tolerability by removing the need for PCO vehicle, and also permit its use in a higher dose. We conducted intensive monitoring of the ADR profile of Nanoxel in comparison with conventional paclitaxel in a public tertiary care set-up. Materials and Methods : ADR data were collected from 10 patients receiving Nanoxel and 10 age-matched controls receiving conventional paclitaxel in this longitudinal observational study, conducted in a medical oncology ward over 18 months. Severity was graded as per US National Cancer Institute Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events. Results : The groups had comparable demography at baseline. The median disease duration and per cycle median dose of paclitaxel were greater in the Nanoxel arm. Total 119 ADRs were noted with Nanoxel and 123 with conventional paclitaxel. Of these, 25 (21.0%, 95% CI 13.69-28.33%) in the Nanoxel and 20 (16.2%, 95% CI 9.74-22.78%) in paclitaxel group were of grade 3/4 severity. Common events included myalgia, nausea, anemia, paresthesia, alopecia, diarrhea, and vomiting with Nanoxel, and paresthesia, anemia, myalgia, anorexia, alopecia, vomiting, diarrhea, stomatitis, and nausea with paclitaxel. Of the less common events (<5%), grade 2 or 3 arthralgia was seen exclusively with Nanoxel while motor neuropathy with muscular weakness was more frequent and severe with conventional paclitaxel. Hypersensitivity reactions were not encountered in either arm, although no antiallergy premedication was employed for Nanoxel. Conclusions : Despite its ADR profile being statistically comparable to conventional paclitaxel, this observational study suggests that Nanoxel tolerability could be better, considering that a significantly higher dose was employed. This hypothesis needs confirmation through an interventional study