Study on the knowledge of school girls regarding menstrual and reproductive health and their perceptions about family life education program

Background: The doctors of The Obstetric and Gynecological Society of Bhopal and the department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Gandhi Medical College, Bhopal have been imparting Family Life Education to school girls and aganwadis as part of their school health program. This project was designed to evaluate the effect of school health programs and to gain an insight into the perceptions of the school girls regarding menstruation, hygiene, nutrition, marriage and the program.Methods: The study was conducted in five schools in which 537 girls participated. A questionnaire was provided to the school girls to know their knowledge and perception regarding menstruation, reproduction, nutrition and their views on the quality and usefulness of the Family life skills sessions.Results: The study showed that most of the girls gained information about menstruation from their mothers. Menstruation is still considered as something shameful and young girls face many restrictions. Knowledge regarding menstruation, reproduction, contraception and diet is still lacking among the school girls. Family life skill sessions address these issues very effectively. Most of the girls enjoyed the sessions and were ready for more.Conclusions: The Family Life sessions provide age appropriate, uniform skilled advice on nutrition, prevention of anemia, hygiene (menstrual), problems of growing years, career counseling, safe sex, contraception, teenage pregnancy and exclusive breastfeeding. Imparting family life skills to school girls provides a welcome platform for them to interact with doctors and counsellors, increasing their knowledge on health issues like menstruation, hygiene and nutrition

Unicornuate uterus with rudimentary horn, gynaecological and reproductive outcome

Congenital malformations of the female genital tract occur in about 8-10% of all women. The unicornuate uterus is a result of partial or complete agenesis of one of the paired Mullerian ducts. It could be a true unicornuate uterus or along with a rudimentary horn, which may be functional. When the rudimentary functional horn is non-communicating, most patients become symptomatic after menarche or present with pregnancy related problems. Three clinical presentations of unicornuate uterus with non-communicating rudimentary horn encountered in last one year are described. The first case was of unruptured rudimentary horn pregnancy of 11-12 weeks. Second case had rudimentary horn removed as an adolescent due to intractable pain, but later main uterus harboured an uneventful pregnancy. Case three had two early abortions, followed by term caesarean section for fetal distress. With advent of ultrasonography and other imaging techniques, the diagnosis and management of unicornuate uterus and its variations is possible. The functional rudimentary horn if symptomatic must be removed along with ipsilateral tube. A unicornuate uterus is associated with obstetric problems and such women should be considered as high risk pregnancy

Analytical study of adolescent pregnancies at a tertiary care centre

Background: According to World Health Organization, about 16 million girls aged 15 to 19 and some 1 million girls under the age of 15 give birth every year. Teenage pregnancies have shown association with higher risks of prematurity, low birth weight, preeclampsia and anaemia as compared to adult pregnancies. The present study was analytical study of pregnant adolescent girls and feto-maternal outcome at a tertiary care centre.Methods: Girls between 10 to19 years, who attended the antenatal clinic and/or who were admitted in the hospital while pregnant or during labour were included in the study. A questionnaire along with detailed history and examination were done. Adolescents who were admitted for confinement, details of labour and mode of delivery were noted. The newborn was assessed in context of prematurity, IUGR or any other complications and referral to NICU.Results: Of the 1870 adolescent girls attending the OPD, 1234 (65.98%) were pregnant. There were 429 (4.02%) teenage deliveries in the institute during the study period. The girls were mostly married, older teenagers and primigravidas. The use of contraception was poor and awareness regarding antenatal care was lacking. The most common risk factor was anemia. The other risk factors included HDP, preterm labor, PROM, IUGR, hemorrhage and previous LSCS.Conclusions: Early childbearing increases the risks for both mothers and their newborns.  A delay in marriage givesadolescents opportunities for higher education, thus empowers them. Sex education should be a part of the school curriculum. Good antenatal care may reduce complications of teenage pregnancy

Challenges in utilisation of small family norm

Background: India is the most populous country in the world, sustaining 17.5% of the world’s population on 2.4% of the world’s surface area. Despite of India being the first country to formulate a National Family Planning Programme in 1952, the population of India continues to rise. Therefore a basic question arises, as to why do couple have a third child? For stabilization of population every couple must on an average have 2.2 children, but how far our family planning programmes having an impact on the beneficiaries, in terms of their ideologies and utilisation of the programme. To get answers to the above question the present study was undertaken with the following aims and objectives to determine the views about ideal family size and ideal spacing, to determine the degree of knowledge about various contraceptive methods, to know the family size amongst population not adopting small family norm and to know the reason for non-acceptance of family planning methods.Methods: This was a hospital based case control study. Cases were women with two live children and not practicing family planning. Controls included women who opted for family planning methods and adopted the two child norm. Both cases and controls were asked to fill up a questionnaire.Results: Most people practicing small family norm view ideal number of issues ≤ 2 i.e. 88% of males and 91% of females. 59.8% couples not practicing family planning, think ideal spacing ≤ 2 years. 100% controls had the concept of contraception.Conclusions: Desire for a male child in 30.6% cases is the most common reason for couples not following the 2 child norm

INTEND OF ELEGANT ANTI ROBBERY SYSTEM FOR VEHICLE REFUGE WITH IOT TECHNOLOGY

Finger print sensing unit records the finger print pictures, matches the diversity of every print checked out through the sensing unit and also contrasts it to the only kept in its component or neighbourhood tool data source. An auto surveillance gadget that functions making use of GPS and also GSM generation, so one can be the least expensive supply of lorry surveillance and also it could art work as an anti-theft device. It is an ingrained gadget this is utilized for monitoring as well as positioning of any type of vehicle using utilizing Global Positioning System and also global maker for cell interaction. It will constantly show a moving car. This system has single board ingrained tool that is prepared with GPS as well as GSM modems combined with ARM cpu which is connected to the automobile. After pushing the emergency situation type in situation of a trouble, SMS is sent out to the web server using SMS utilizing AT command. The taken cars and truck might be tracked making use of a GPS tracker which is similarly being linked. The certain layers of safety and security specified is managed using making use of an ARM 7 based controller acting due to the appropriate node. The full equipment was analyzed utilizing an examination instalment with the help of resembling the car door, vehicle immobilizer and so forth. With equivalent vehicles while Fingerprint documents come to be gotten from Matlab based completely definitely GUI energy. The speculative impacts confirmed the performance of the anti-robbery gadget in the functioning environments

`Zwicky's Nonet': a compact merging ensemble of nine galaxies and 4C 35.06, a peculiar radio galaxy with dancing radio jets

We report the results of our radio, optical and infra-red studies of a peculiar radio source 4C~35.06, an extended radio-loud AGN at the center of galaxy cluster Abell 407 ($z=0.047$). The central region of this cluster hosts a remarkably tight ensemble of nine galaxies, the spectra of which resemble those of passive red ellipticals, embedded within a diffuse stellar halo of $\sim$1~arcmin size. This system (named the `Zwicky's Nonet') provides unique and compelling evidence for a multiple-nucleus cD galaxy precursor. Multifrequency radio observations of 4C~35.06 with the Giant Meterwave Radio Telescope (GMRT) at 610, 235 and 150 MHz reveal a system of 400~kpc scale helically twisted and kinked radio jets and outer diffuse lobes. The outer extremities of jets contain extremely steep spectrum (spectral index -1.7 to -2.5) relic/fossil radio plasma with a spectral age of a few$\,\times (10^7 - 10^8)$ yr. Such ultra-steep spectrum relic radio lobes without definitive hot-spots are rare, and they provide an opportunity to understand the life-cycle of relativistic jets and physics of black hole mergers in dense environments. We interpret our observations of this radio source in the context of the growth of its central black hole, triggering of its AGN activity and jet precession, all possibly caused by galaxy mergers in this dense galactic system. A slow conical precession of the jet axis due to gravitational perturbation between interacting black holes is invoked to explain the unusual jet morphology.Comment: Published in MNRAS | No. of pages 12, 10 figures and 4 tables. Comments are welcom

Cross-continental collaboration for understanding postpartum major depression with psychotic features

Purpose Assess postpartum depression and psychotic symptoms from three continents. Methods Compare numbers of women with depression and psychotic symptoms, mania with or without psychotic features, or transient non-affective psychosis and medication choice. Results The prevalence of postpartum depression and psychosis and treatment choice differed at each site. Conclusions Best treatment for postpartum depression with psychotic features has not been established yet. Cross-continental collaboration with similar assessments holds promise to develop best practices for these high risk mother-infant dyads

Activation of JNK Signaling Mediates Amyloid-ß-Dependent Cell Death

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is an age related progressive neurodegenerative disorder. One of the reasons for Alzheimer's neuropathology is the generation of large aggregates of Aß42 that are toxic in nature and induce oxidative stress, aberrant signaling and many other cellular alterations that trigger neuronal cell death. However, the exact mechanisms leading to cell death are not clearly understood.We employed a Drosophila eye model of AD to study how Aß42 causes cell death. Misexpression of higher levels of Aß42 in the differentiating photoreceptors of fly retina rapidly induced aberrant cellular phenotypes and cell death. We found that blocking caspase-dependent cell death initially blocked cell death but did not lead to a significant rescue in the adult eye. However, blocking the levels of c-Jun NH(2)-terminal kinase (JNK) signaling pathway significantly rescued the neurodegeneration phenotype of Aß42 misexpression both in eye imaginal disc as well as the adult eye. Misexpression of Aß42 induced transcriptional upregulation of puckered (puc), a downstream target and functional read out of JNK signaling. Moreover, a three-fold increase in phospho-Jun (activated Jun) protein levels was seen in Aß42 retina as compared to the wild-type retina. When we blocked both caspases and JNK signaling simultaneously in the fly retina, the rescue of the neurodegenerative phenotype is comparable to that caused by blocking JNK signaling pathway alone.Our data suggests that (i) accumulation of Aß42 plaques induces JNK signaling in neurons and (ii) induction of JNK contributes to Aß42 mediated cell death. Therefore, inappropriate JNK activation may indeed be relevant to the AD neuropathology, thus making JNK a key target for AD therapies

Neurodevelopmental disorders in children aged 2-9 years: Population-based burden estimates across five regions in India.

BACKGROUND: Neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs) compromise the development and attainment of full social and economic potential at individual, family, community, and country levels. Paucity of data on NDDs slows down policy and programmatic action in most developing countries despite perceived high burden. METHODS AND FINDINGS: We assessed 3,964 children (with almost equal number of boys and girls distributed in 2-<6 and 6-9 year age categories) identified from five geographically diverse populations in India using cluster sampling technique (probability proportionate to population size). These were from the North-Central, i.e., Palwal (N = 998; all rural, 16.4% non-Hindu, 25.3% from scheduled caste/tribe [SC-ST] [these are considered underserved communities who are eligible for affirmative action]); North, i.e., Kangra (N = 997; 91.6% rural, 3.7% non-Hindu, 25.3% SC-ST); East, i.e., Dhenkanal (N = 981; 89.8% rural, 1.2% non-Hindu, 38.0% SC-ST); South, i.e., Hyderabad (N = 495; all urban, 25.7% non-Hindu, 27.3% SC-ST) and West, i.e., North Goa (N = 493; 68.0% rural, 11.4% non-Hindu, 18.5% SC-ST). All children were assessed for vision impairment (VI), epilepsy (Epi), neuromotor impairments including cerebral palsy (NMI-CP), hearing impairment (HI), speech and language disorders, autism spectrum disorders (ASDs), and intellectual disability (ID). Furthermore, 6-9-year-old children were also assessed for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and learning disorders (LDs). We standardized sample characteristics as per Census of India 2011 to arrive at district level and all-sites-pooled estimates. Site-specific prevalence of any of seven NDDs in 2-<6 year olds ranged from 2.9% (95% CI 1.6-5.5) to 18.7% (95% CI 14.7-23.6), and for any of nine NDDs in the 6-9-year-old children, from 6.5% (95% CI 4.6-9.1) to 18.5% (95% CI 15.3-22.3). Two or more NDDs were present in 0.4% (95% CI 0.1-1.7) to 4.3% (95% CI 2.2-8.2) in the younger age category and 0.7% (95% CI 0.2-2.0) to 5.3% (95% CI 3.3-8.2) in the older age category. All-site-pooled estimates for NDDs were 9.2% (95% CI 7.5-11.2) and 13.6% (95% CI 11.3-16.2) in children of 2-<6 and 6-9 year age categories, respectively, without significant difference according to gender, rural/urban residence, or religion; almost one-fifth of these children had more than one NDD. The pooled estimates for prevalence increased by up to three percentage points when these were adjusted for national rates of stunting or low birth weight (LBW). HI, ID, speech and language disorders, Epi, and LDs were the common NDDs across sites. Upon risk modelling, noninstitutional delivery, history of perinatal asphyxia, neonatal illness, postnatal neurological/brain infections, stunting, LBW/prematurity, and older age category (6-9 year) were significantly associated with NDDs. The study sample was underrepresentative of stunting and LBW and had a 15.6% refusal. These factors could be contributing to underestimation of the true NDD burden in our population. CONCLUSIONS: The study identifies NDDs in children aged 2-9 years as a significant public health burden for India. HI was higher than and ASD prevalence comparable to the published global literature. Most risk factors of NDDs were modifiable and amenable to public health interventions