Mineral Prospecting Potentials Of Osun State.

It has been discovered that Nigeria is endowed with a lot of mineral resources widely distributed in virtually all the states in the country. In Osun State almost all the local governments has more than one mineral resource that can be obtained from them. Despite the occurrence of mineral resources in the state, not all are of economic quantity and this is the main problem this study seeks to solve. In this study, minerals that are of economic quantity are separated from the minerals that are not of economic quantity through the use of scientific method. The mineral resources that are found in Osun State were hypothesized, the estimated reserve of each mineral resources that are of economic quantity were also analyzed. The findings at end of this study proved that only the following minerals are of economic quantity in Osun Slate: Gold, Talc, Granite, Tinstone, Feldspar, Kaolin, Columbite, and Clay. Keywords: Mineral Prospecting   Potentials Resources Economic quantit

Transforaminal epidural steroid injections for the treatment of lumbosacral radicular pain in a Nigeria tertiary hospital: observational study

Background: Lumbosacral radicular pain is a common cause of chronic low back pain. Despite published reports of effectiveness of transforaminal epidural steroid for lumbosacral radicular pain, it is underutilised in many tertiary hospitals in sub-Saharan Africa. This study assessed the clinical effects of transforaminal epidural steroid injections in patients with lumbosacral radicular pain at a major tertiary health facility in Nigeria.Methods: This is a prospective observational study carried out between March 2012 and February 2016. Under fluoroscopy, the epidural space was accessed through the neuroforamen using 22G spinal needles in 47 adult patients with lumbosacral radicular pain; and a mixture of 10 mg triamcinolone acetonide and 0.25% plain bupivacaine (2 mLs per level) was injected. Pain intensity and functional impairment were assessed with the Numeric Pain Rating Scale (NPRS) and the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) scores respectively at three and six months.Results: The pain and ODI scores at baseline and at six months’ follow-up improved significantly; 8.49 ± 1.28 vs. 3.6 ± 1.5 (p = 0.002) and 45.1 ± 11.5 vs. 32.4 ± 11.5 (p = 0.001) respectively.Conclusion: Transforaminal epidural steroid injections provided significant pain relief and improved function in patients with lumbar radicular pain due to intervertebral disc herniations.Keywords: herniated intervertebral disc, lumbosacral radicular pain, Nigeria, pain relief, transforaminal epidural steroid injectio

Ethics and Responsible Conduct of Research: Workshop Report

The Center for Population and Reproductive Health, College of Medicine, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria , with support from its NIH Planning Grant organized a two Day workshop on “Ethics and Responsible Conduct of Research” at the University of Ibadan Centre for Sustainable Development (CESDEV). There were 8 facilitators and 78 participants. The workshop concluded that responsible conduct of research (RCR) is the practice of scientific investigation or research with integrity involving but not limited to the awareness and application of established professional norms and ethical principles in the performance of all activities related to scientific research

Prevalence, predictors, and perceived susceptibility to placental malaria parasitemia among pregnant women in a tertiary hospital in South-Western Nigeria

Objective: Is to determine the prevalence and predictors of placental malaria among pregnant women.Methodology: The study was cross-sectional in design. It was carried out over six months. We administered Pretested questionnaire to 300 eligible subjects. The researchers took maternal peripheral blood for malaria parasites while cord and placental blood sample at delivery for neonatal packed cell volume (PCV) and Malaria parasite. Data were analyzed using STATA 10.Result: One hundred and forty-four (48%) participants had placental malaria parasitemia, while 173 (57.7%) had peripheral malaria parasitemia. Maternal age less than 20 years (P=0.008), low parity, and hemoglobin type AA (P=0.002) were significantly associated with a higher prevalence of placental parasitemia. Maternal secondary and tertiary education (P=0.013), perceived susceptibility to placental malaria and IPT use (p=0.014) were significantly associated with lower prevalence.Conclusion: This study has shown that placental parasitemia is a significant problem in pregnancy as it is strongly associated with certain maternal factors. There is the need to intensify control efforts aimed at reducing malaria in pregnancy in Nigeria, and mothers with increased risk factors should receive more focused attention. Keywords: Prevalence, risk factors, placental malaria, pregnanc

Evaluation of an accelerated Ponseti protocol for the treatment of talipesequinovarus in Nigeria

Background: The commonest congenital musculoskeletal deformity worldwide is talipes equino varus (CTEV). Of the various treatment methods available, the most acceptable treatment currently for CTEV worldwide is serial manipulation and casting using the Ponseti technique. The Ponseti technique consists of weekly manipulation and casting for an average of six to eight weeks followed by bracing of the feet till school age. Some studies have shown evidence that more frequent casts may have similar outcomes with weekly casts using the Ponseti method. This study compared the efficacy of management of idiopathic CTEV using an accelerated protocol of twice weekly casts, with the standard weekly Ponseti protocol.Methods: The study was a randomized case control study with a group of patients undergoing an accelerated casting protocol involving twice weekly casts compared with another group who went through the normal weekly Ponseti protocol.Results: A total of 45 feet in 28 patients were studied. The study showed a significantly shorter treatment period in the accelerated protocol (39 days) compared with the standard protocol (52 days); with no significant increase in the number of casts needed for treatment.Conclusions: A twice weekly Ponseti casting protocol enables completion of the casting period earlier than the standard Ponseti method.Keywords: Talipes equinovarus; Ponseti treatment; Accelerated Ponseti Protocol; Serial Castin

Anemia prevalence in women of reproductive age in low- and middle-income countries between 2000 and 2018

Anemia is a globally widespread condition in women and is associated with reduced economic productivity and increased mortality worldwide. Here we map annual 2000–2018 geospatial estimates of anemia prevalence in women of reproductive age (15–49 years) across 82 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), stratify anemia by severity and aggregate results to policy-relevant administrative and national levels. Additionally, we provide subnational disparity analyses to provide a comprehensive overview of anemia prevalence inequalities within these countries and predict progress toward the World Health Organization’s Global Nutrition Target (WHO GNT) to reduce anemia by half by 2030. Our results demonstrate widespread moderate improvements in overall anemia prevalence but identify only three LMICs with a high probability of achieving the WHO GNT by 2030 at a national scale, and no LMIC is expected to achieve the target in all their subnational administrative units. Our maps show where large within-country disparities occur, as well as areas likely to fall short of the WHO GNT, offering precision public health tools so that adequate resource allocation and subsequent interventions can be targeted to the most vulnerable populations.Peer reviewe

A Survey of Pre-clerkship Medical Students' Perspectives on their Educational Exposure to Operating Theatre in Two Nigerian Universities.

Surgery is an essential part of undergraduate pre-clerkship medical student training. Quality training and exposure will boost the future surgical manpower especially in developing country when there is dearth of manpower and infrastructure. This study is an audit of the impact of traditional theatre sessions as done in two Nigeria university medical schools. The result shows that there is a need to re-evaluate and re-invigorate the traditional theatre sessions by the undergraduate students with simulations and audiovisuals to have more impact in their training.Keywords: Survey, pre-clerkship, medical students, perspectives, operating theatre, universities

Linear discriminant analysis based hidden Markov model for detection of Mysticetes’ vocalisations

Mysticetes’ produce distinctive vocalisations which are used for echolocation, communication, and other marine functions. These cryptic vocalisations are studied by marine scientist to determine the behavioural patterns and movement of this suborder of cetaceans within their ecosystem. In practice, these vocalisations are gathered using passive acoustic monitoring over days, weeks, months, and even years. Therefore, it is complex to study these sounds using traditional visual inspection techniques because the gathered datasets are huge. Machine learning (ML) tools such as Gaussian mixture models (GMMs), support vector machines (SVMs), and hidden Markov models (HMMs) have been adopted in recent times to proffer analytic solutions to automatically detect and study these cryptic vocalisations. Notwithstanding, the feature extraction techniques employed play a vital role in determining the performance of these ML tools. In most cases, the performance of the feature extraction technique is directly proportional to the performance of the ML tools. Thus, the method of linear discriminant analysis (LDA) is introduced in this article as a feature extraction technique that can be adapted with the HMMs (LDA-HMM) to seamlessly detect the vocalisations of Mysticetes. The performance of the proposed LDA-HMM detector is compared with other recent detectors for Mysticetes’ vocalisations in the literature using two different species: Humpback whale songs and Bryde’s whale pulses. Experimental results show that the developed LDA-HMM detector is a performance-efficient alternative in comparison to the recent detection techniques studied in this article. Besides, the LDA-HMM detector offers less computational time complexity; as such, it is more suitable for real-time applications

Characterization and kinetic parameters of endo-1,4-β-d-glucanase of ultraviolet mutated Aspergillus niger and Penicillium citrinum

Mutagenic agents had been used to enhance production of enzymes in microorganisms, but the effects of the agents on the kinetic parameters and catalytic efficiency of the produced enzymes had not been critically evaluated. A study was conducted to assess the effects of ultraviolet (UV) mutagenesis on the kinetic parameters and catalytic efficiency of endo-1,4-β-D-glucanase enzyme obtained from wild and mutated strains of Aspergillus niger and Penicillium citrinum obtained from decaying wood wastes modified by ultraviolet radiation. The endo-1, 4-β-Dglucanase from both wild and mutant strains of the fungi were purified by centrifugation, ammonium sulfa-te precipitation and anion exchange chromatography using Sephadex A25-120 and Whatman DE-52 resins. The kinetic parameters determined from Lineweaver-Burk plot, using the velocity or reaction rates at varying concentrations of carboxymethyl cellulose substrate ranging from 0 - 20 mg/mL were validated by Hanes-Woolf plots for convergence, as the Michaelis-Menten kinetic equation is non-linear. The Michaelis-Menten constant (Km) and maximum velocity (Vmax) for the wild A. niger were 15.31 g/L and 4.67 g/L respectively, while values for corresponding mutated strain were 7.9 g/L and 3.39 g/L respectively. The Km and Vmax for wild P. citrinum were 7.94g/L and 6.81g/L respectively, while the values for the mutated strain were 6.60 g/L and 6.84 g/L respectively. Catalytic efficiency of endoglucanase of wild and mutated strains of A. niger were 0.305 and 0.42 M-1s-1 respectively, while the values for endoglucanase of wild and mutated strains of P. citrinum were 0.858 and 1.036 M-1s-1 respectively. Mutagenesis using ultraviolet radiation therefore enhanced the catalytic efficiency of endoglucanase enzyme.Keywords: Endo-1,4-β-D-glucanase, Aspergillus niger, Penicillium citrinum, UV Mutagenesis, Michaelis-Menten Kinetic Equation, Lineweaver-Burk Plot, Hanes Woolf Plot, Catalytic Efficienc