A survey of headache among nursing students in a Nigerian university

Objectives: Headache is a common neurological disorder associated with a significant disease burden particularly among young people. Data on headache among undergraduate students in Nigeria are still scanty. The main objectives were to determine the 1-year prevalence of headache and headache subtypes among a cohort of nursing undergraduate students, to identify trigger factors and assess mode of treatment of acute attacks among the affected students.Methods: This was a cross– sectional descriptive study carried out over a 2-month period from September to October 2011 among nursing students of the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Osogbo Nigeria, who had recurrent headaches (unrelated to febrile illness or any underlying disease) in the past one year. Data were collected using a self – administered questionnaire. Demographic variables, age of onset of headache, past medical, family and social histories were obtained.Results: A total of 213 out of 289 nursing students returned completed questionnaires giving a participation rate of 73.7%. Headache was reported by 90 students (42.3%) with higher prevalence in men (44.8%) compared to women (41.8%). Migraine headache was the commonest headache subtype constituting 26.8% .Common triggers of headache attacks included sleep deprivation (65.6%), physical and mental fatigue (53.3%). Only 8.9% of students affected by headache sought medical assistance during acute attack.Conclusions: Our study found a relatively high proportion of migraine headache among nursing students with headache in this Nigerian University. Awareness of appropriate prophylactic and therapeutic medications was dismally low.Keywords: Prevalence, Headache, Nursing students & trigger factor

Assessment of Activity concentrations of radioactive elements in selected groundwater samples of Kwara State Polytechnic and its environs, North Central Nigeria

A NaI (TI) indicator was used to quantify the activity concentrations level of Uranium (U-238), Thorium (Th-232) & Potassium (K-40) in forty (40) groundwater samples collected across the premises of Kwara state polytechnic and its environs in order to determine the health hazard due intake of drinking water which has its origin from the subsurface. This investigation became necessary as a result of an outbreak of water borne diseases reported by the medical personnels in the clinics around the area. The results obtained from this measurement shows a range of values from 1.01 ± 0.02 to 8.21 ± 1.73, a mean of 3.88 ± 0.609 Bq.l−1 for U-238, 0.97 ± 0.01 to 14.81 ± 2.79, a mean value of 7.02 ± 0.99 Bq.l−1 Th-232 & 4.44 ± 0.12 to 147.33 ± 6.59 Bq.l−1, a mean of 48.08 ± 2.513 Bq.l−1 for K-40. The mean of these Radionuclides (U-238, Th-232 and K-40) are higher than the Universal value 10 Bq.l−1 for K-40 and 1 Bq.l−1 for U-238 and Th-232 as the permissible level for drinking water (United Nations Scientific Committee on Effects of Atomic radiation recommended (UNSCEAR)). In addition, most of the average values of the calculated radiological indices are within the recommended allowable tolerable boundary, although higher values were obtained in some within the study area. These results shows that U-238, Th-232 and K-40 concentrations and radiological parameters in the samples are high and low in values but might take a Probabilistic effect on the residents in the near futur

The risk of obstructive sleep apnea and its association with indices of general and abdominal obesity in a Nigerian family practice clinic: a cross-sectional study

Introduction: Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is associated with considerable morbidity and mortality. This study assessed the prevalence of high risk of OSA and investigated which anthropometric measure best predicts the OSA risk among patients attending a family practice clinic in a tertiary hospital. Methods: We conducted a descriptive cross-sectional study of 362 consecutive patients (64% females; median age of 54 years). OSA risk was assessed by the Berlin Questionnaire and the patients were divided into two groups according to OSA risk: high and low risk. Anthropometric measurements were conducted as stated in the protocol established in the 3rd National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Results: Out of 362 participants, 84 [23.2% (95% CI 19.0%, 28.0%)] had high risk of OSA. Subjects with a high risk of OSA had significantly higher body mass index, waist circumference, hip circumference, and waist-to-height ratio (24.9 vs 23.8, p = 0.002; 89.0 vs 84.0, p < 0.001; 95.0 vs 91.0, p < 0.001; 0.56 vs 0.52, p < 0.001, respectively). Body mass index, waist circumference, hip circumference, and waist-to-height ratio performed similarly in predicting high risk of OSA with Area Under the Curve (AUC) of 0.661, 95% CI (0.592,0.730); 0.659, 95% CI (0.596,0.723); 0.668, 95% CI (0.604,0.733); 0.659 95% CI (0.592,0.725) respectively. The AUCs were similar when the analysis was restricted to those who were overweight. Conclusion: High risk of OSA is moderately prevalent in this population, with measures of central and abdominal adiposity equally predicting the risk

Identifying patients at high risk for obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome in Nigeria: A multicentre observational study

Background: Obstructive sleep apnoea is associated with significant health consequences. A significant proportion of hospitalized patients at risk for obstructive sleep apnoea were never identified and referred for polysomnography for diagnosis. The objective of this study was to determine the factors associated with high risk for obstructive sleep apnoea and use it to identify patients at risk for the condition in tertiary hospitals in Nigeria.Methods: This was a multicentre observational study of adult patients hospitalized in three selected hospitals from 15th January to 17th March 2015. Berlin questionnaire and Epworth sleepiness scale were used to assess for obstructive sleep apnoea risk and excessive daytime sleepiness respectively. Additional questions on traditional risk factors for obstructive sleep apnoea were also obtained.Results: Nine hundred and twenty-six patients were recruited into the study. Respondents’ mean age was 44.3 years ± 15.2years, 486 (52.5%) were females and 556 (60.0%) had one or more medical co-morbidity and none of the patients had a previous diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnoea. Factors that were independently associated with high risk for obstructive sleep apnoea include systemic hypertension(aOR-10.33;95%: CI 6.42-16.61), obesity(aOR-7.87;95% CI: 4.33-14.29); excessive daytime sleepiness (aOR-3.77;95% CI:2.28-6.22), tobacco smoking (aOR-2.99;95% CI: 1.76-5.07), snoring in a first-degree relative (aOR-1.83;95% CI: 1.19-2.81); and the use of sedative (aOR-1.82;95% CI: 1.06-3.15).Conclusions: This study shows that patients with systemic hypertension, obesity, excessive daytime sleepiness, history of smoking, snoring in a firstdegree relative and use of sedatives are at high risk of obstructive sleep apnoea. None of the patients at high risk had a previous diagnosis of sleep apnoea by a physician, highlighting the diagnostic challenges of this condition. The results of this study will assist health care professionals in early identification of individuals at risk of obstructive sleep apnoea and subsequent referral for a sleep study

A Simulation Study of Functional Electrical Stimulation for An Upper Limb Rehabilitation Robot using Iterative Learning Control (ILC) and Linear models

A proportional iterative learning control (P-ILC) for linear models of an existing hybrid stroke rehabilitation scheme is implemented for elbow extension/flexion during a rehabilitative task. Owing to transient error growth problem of P-ILC, a learning derivative constraint controller was included to ensure that the controlled system does not exceed a predefined velocity limit at every trial. To achieve this, linear transfer function models of the robot end-effector interaction with a stroke subject (plant) and muscle response to stimulation controllers were developed. A straight-line point-point trajectory of 0 - 0.3 m range served as the reference task space trajectory for the plant, feedforward, and feedback stimulation controllers. At each trial, a SAT-based bounded error derivative ILC algorithm served as the learning constraint controller. Three control configurations were developed and simulated. The system performance was evaluated using the root means square error (RMSE) and normalized RMSE. At different ILC gains over 16 iterations, a displacement error of 0.0060 m was obtained when control configurations were combined.Comment: 15 pages, 16 Figure

Prevalence, awareness and reporting of symptoms of obstructive sleep apnoea among hospitalized adult patients in Nigeria: A multicenter study

Background: Obstructive sleep apnoea is the most common form of sleep- disordered breathing in adults and children. It is associated with many adverse  health consequences. The objectives this study were to determine the prevalence, awareness and reporting of symptoms of obstructive sleep apnoea among  hospitalized adult patients in Nigeria.Methods: This was a multicenter cross-sectional study involving 1420 adult patients admitted to general medical and surgical wards of selected hospitals from March to April 2013. A questionnaire embedded with Berlin questionnaire, Epworth sleepiness scale and questions on level of awareness and reporting of symptoms of sleep apnoea was used for data collection.Results: One-third of the patients (33.4%) reported snoring, 16.3% had excessive daytime sleepiness, 10.0% experienced daytime fatigue, and 8.0% experienced  drowsy driving. Approximately 5% reported witnessed apnoea and 18.0% had high risks for obstructive sleep apnoea. The frequency of high risk for sleep apnoea  increased with age and declined after 65 years and also increased with the body  mass index. Snoring, excessive daytime sleepiness and high risk for obstructive  sleep apnoea were more common in patients with chronic medical conditions and  who were admitted to the urban hospitals. The majority were not aware that snoring (77.3%) and excessive daytime sleepiness (65.8%) constitute a medical problem, and only 4.5% reported these symptoms to their doctors.Conclusions: The level of awareness and under-reporting of sleep apnoea symptoms are poor. The high prevalence of obstructive sleep apnoea symptoms from this study should form the basis for screening hospitalized patients with chronic medical condition across the country.Keywords: Obstructive sleep apnoea, Nigeria, Snoring, Prevalence, Awareness, Under-reportin

Heat-reflux processing of black peppercorn into bioactive antioxidant oleoresins:a three-functioned Taguchi-based grey relational grading

The focus of this research is to identify the best set of factors that influence the heat-reflux recovery of total phenolic content and antioxidant activities under multiple quality characteristics. Parametric Taguchi L9 orthogonal design and grey relational analysis technique were used to investigate the effect of three variables—reflux duration, particle size, and feed-to-solvent ratio on the multiple responses of total phenolic contents, DPPH, and H2O2 activities. According to the grey relational grades response table, the ideal number of criteria for the heat reflux results were 120 min of reflux duration, 0.2 mm of particle size, and a feed-solvent ratio of 1:16. The total phenolic content, DPPH, and H2O2 scavenging activities were measured as 35.23 ± 0.004 mgGAE/g d.w, 107.57 ± 0.04 g/mL, and 87.78 ± 0.32 g/mL, respectively. Moreover, with the Levenberg–Marquardt (LM) neural network architecture, the trained network has a mean square error (MSE) of 3.7646E−07 and an R2 of 0.9500 as the training function outcome, indicating a significant predicted endpoint. The confirmatory experimental results show a 41.9 per cent improvement in relation to the predicted values. The results of this study indicated that, optimising the heat reflux process would be an innovative and beneficial approach for preparing bioactive compounds from functional plants, resulting in cost savings while increasing antioxidant capacity and overall phenolic recovery

Heat-reflux processing of black peppercorn into bioactive antioxidant oleoresins:a three-functioned Taguchi-based grey relational grading

The focus of this research is to identify the best set of factors that influence the heat-reflux recovery of total phenolic content and antioxidant activities under multiple quality characteristics. Parametric Taguchi L9 orthogonal design and grey relational analysis technique were used to investigate the effect of three variables—reflux duration, particle size, and feed-to-solvent ratio on the multiple responses of total phenolic contents, DPPH, and H2O2 activities. According to the grey relational grades response table, the ideal number of criteria for the heat reflux results were 120 min of reflux duration, 0.2 mm of particle size, and a feed-solvent ratio of 1:16. The total phenolic content, DPPH, and H2O2 scavenging activities were measured as 35.23 ± 0.004 mgGAE/g d.w, 107.57 ± 0.04 g/mL, and 87.78 ± 0.32 g/mL, respectively. Moreover, with the Levenberg–Marquardt (LM) neural network architecture, the trained network has a mean square error (MSE) of 3.7646E−07 and an R2 of 0.9500 as the training function outcome, indicating a significant predicted endpoint. The confirmatory experimental results show a 41.9 per cent improvement in relation to the predicted values. The results of this study indicated that, optimising the heat reflux process would be an innovative and beneficial approach for preparing bioactive compounds from functional plants, resulting in cost savings while increasing antioxidant capacity and overall phenolic recovery

Epidemiology of Epilepsy in Nigeria: A Community-Based Study From 3 Sites

BACKGROUND: We determined the prevalence, incidence, and risk factors for epilepsy in Nigeria. METHODS: We conducted a door-to-door survey to identify cases of epilepsy in 3 regions. We estimated age-standardized prevalence adjusted for nonresponse and sensitivity and the 1-year retrospective incidence for active epilepsy. To assess potential risk factors, we conducted a case-control study by collecting sociodemographic and risk factor data. We estimated odds ratios using logistic regression analysis and corresponding population attributable fractions (PAFs). RESULTS: We screened 42,427 persons (age ≥6 years), of whom 254 had confirmed active epilepsy. The pooled prevalence of active epilepsy per 1,000 was 9.8 (95% confidence interval [CI] 8.6-11.1), 17.7 (14.2-20.6) in Gwandu, 4.8 (3.4-6.6) in Afikpo, and 3.3 (2.0-5.1) in Ijebu-Jesa. The pooled incidence per 100,000 was 101.3 (95% CI 57.9-167.6), 201.2 (105.0-358.9) in Gwandu, 27.6 (3.3-128.0) in Afikpo, and 23.9 (3.2-157.0) in Ijebu-Jesa. Children's significant risk factors included febrile seizures, meningitis, poor perinatal care, open defecation, measles, and family history in first-degree relatives. In adults, head injury, poor perinatal care, febrile seizures, family history in second-degree relatives, and consanguinity were significant. Gwandu had more significant risk factors. The PAF for the important factors in children was 74.0% (71.0%-76.0%) and in adults was 79.0% (75.0%-81.0%). CONCLUSION: This work suggests varied epidemiologic numbers, which may be explained by differences in risk factors and population structure in the different regions. These variations should differentially determine and drive prevention and health care responses

Targeted next-generation sequencing identifies novel variants in candidate genes for Parkinson’s disease in Black South African and Nigerian patients

Background: The prevalence of Parkinson’s disease (PD) is increasing in sub-Saharan Africa, but little is known about the genetics of PD in these populations. Due to their unique ancestry and diversity, sub-Saharan African populations have the potential to reveal novel insights into the pathobiology of PD. In this study, we aimed to characterise the genetic variation in known and novel PD genes in a group of Black South African and Nigerian patients. Methods: We recruited 33 Black South African and 14 Nigerian PD patients, and screened them for sequence variants in 751 genes using an Ion AmpliSeq™ Neurological Research panel. We used bcftools to filter variants and annovar software for the annotation. Rare variants were prioritised using MetaLR and MetaSVM prediction scores. The effect of a variant on ATP13A2’s protein structure was investigated by molecular modelling. Results: We identified 14,655 rare variants with a minor allele frequency ≤ 0.01, which included 2448 missense variants. Notably, no common pathogenic mutations were identified in these patients. Also, none of the known PD-associated mutations were found highlighting the need for more studies in African populations. Altogether, 54 rare variants in 42 genes were considered deleterious and were prioritized, based on MetaLR and MetaSVM scores, for follow-up studies. Protein modelling showed that the S1004R variant in ATP13A2 possibly alters the conformation of the protein. Conclusions: We identified several rare variants predicted to be deleterious in sub-Saharan Africa PD patients; however, further studies are required to determine the biological effects of these variants and their possible role in PD. Studies such as these are important to elucidate the genetic aetiology of this disorder in patients of African ancestry