School-based intervention to promote healthy nutrition in Sousse, Tunisia

Introduction: Obesity among children is a major risk factor for chronic diseases. School interventions programs can represent a mean to implement healthy nutrition attitudes at early ages. Our objective was to evaluate the effects of a school intervention program to promote healthy nutrition among adolescents, in terms of knowledge, behaviors and intention. Methods: Quasi experimental study among urban students in Sousse, Tunisia with 2 groups, intervention and control. The intervention group had an interactive program integrated with school courses that promoted healthy nutrition habits. Both groups had a pre post evaluation. Results: 2200 students aged from 12 to 16 participated to the pre post evaluation. In the intervention group, there were significant changes form pre to post test in knowledge, intentions, and behaviors. In the control group, almost no significant changes were observed. Conclusion: School intervention programs can represent an interesting approach to promote healthy nutrition habits among adolescent

Assessment of the validity of self-reported smoking status among schoolchildren in Sousse, Tunisia

Introduction: Tobacco use, which begins in adolescence and childhood and continues in later life, is the major avoidable risk for non-communicable diseases and death in the world. Self-reports have frequently been used to estimate smoking prevalence and health consequences. This study explores the validity of self-reports of smoking behavior among schoolchildren in Tunisia. Materials and methods: This study was conducted in March 2014 among a sample of 147 schoolchildren randomly selected. Data concerning the smoking habit were collected by a questionnaire designed for the purposes of this work. Then, exhaled CO, a biochemical marker of smoke exposure, was measured using piCO+ Smokerlyzer® breath CO monitor among participants. Sensitivity and specificity of self-reports were calculated. Results: The prevalence of reported smoking was 9.5% with 16.7% and 1.7% respectively among boys and girls. Their mean age was 14.5±1.28 years old. When considering 4 ppm as the cut-off level of breath CO, sensitivity and specificity of self-reports were 100% and 93.7%, respectively. But at a breath CO cut-off of 3 ppm, self-reporting was 62.5% sensitive and 93.5% specific. Conclusion: According to our findings, we suggest that self-reports can be considered as a good tool to be used with a reasonable confidence to assess the smoking status

School-based intervention to promote healthy nutrition in Sousse, Tunisia

Abstract Introduction: Obesity among children is a major risk factor for chronic diseases. School interventions programs can represent a mean to implement healthy nutrition attitudes at early ages. Our objective was to evaluate the effects of a school intervention program to promote healthy nutrition among adolescents, in terms of knowledge, behaviors and intention. Methods: Quasi experimental study among urban students in Sousse, Tunisia with 2 groups, intervention and control. The intervention group had an interactive program integrated with school courses that promoted healthy nutrition habits. Both groups had a pre post evaluation. Results: 2200 students aged from 12 to 16 participated to the pre post evaluation. In the intervention group, there were significant changes form pre to post test in knowledge, intentions, and behaviors. In the control group, almost no significant changes were observed. Conclusion: School intervention programs can represent an interesting approach to promote healthy nutrition habits among adolescents.</jats:p

Qualité de la rédaction de l'ordonnance médicale dans les structures de médecine générale (Sousse, Tunisie)

Contexte : L'ordonnance médicale est un document médico-légal dont la rédaction soigneuse permet de réduire beaucoup d'erreurs thérapeutiques. Objectif : L'objectif de ce travail est d'évaluer la qualité de rédaction des ordonnances dans les structures de première ligne de la région de Sousse en Tunisie. Méthodes : Il s'agit d'une étude descriptive transversale ayant porté sur 2586 ordonnances médicales. La qualité de rédaction de l'ordonnance a été évaluée à travers deux paramètres : sa lisibilité et les informations qu'elle contenait. Résultats : Parmi les principaux résultats, 36 % des ordonnances renfermaient au moins 50 % des items retenus, 25 % des ordonnances étaient totalement illisibles, et la qualité de rédaction a été considérée bonne dans seulement 14 % des cas. Discussion : Il s'avère ainsi que l'ordonnance manuellement écrite en première ligne est loin d'être conforme aux exigences médico-légales. Le renforcement de l'enseignement de la technique de rédaction de l'ordonnance et son informatisation seraient indispensables pour l'amélioration de la qualité des prescriptions médicales

Second hand smoking among schoolchildren in the region of Sousse

Background Secondhand smoke (SHS) contains an estimated 4000 toxic chemicals and is a serious health hazard to non-smokers. Exposure to tobacco smoke causes extremely serious damages, placing exposed persons at increased risk of a number of adverse health outcomes, such as asthma, lung cancer and cardiovascular diseases. In this context, this work was carried out in order to evaluate exposure to smoking among schoolchildren in the region of Sousse. Methods We conducted a cross sectional design study among a representative sample of students from all colleges in the delegation of Sousse Jawhra and Sousse Erriadh. We used an Arabic, pre tested and self administered questionnaire to collect data about Socio -demographic characteristics and student's smoking behavior. Results Our population was composed of 2170 students. Girls accounted for 1100 (51.3%) and 1070 (48.7%) boys. The mean age of our population was 13.23±(1,19). The prevalence of smoking in our population was 4.8%. In the month preceding our study 75% of our population was exposed to a second-hand smoking. 36.7 % was exposed at home and almost one third (27.3%) at school. But second hand smoking was affecting smoking and non smoking students. We noticed that 74.5% of non smoker were exposed to secondhand smoking despite the that the majority (92.0 %) knew that second hand smoking is dangerous . We highlighted also that non-smokers were significantly more in favor of implementing tobacco control laws (94.6% vs 94% of smokers ; p=0.02). Conclusions Exposure to an involuntary smoke is an urgent issue, because there is no safe level of SHS exposure, even minimal exposure is harmful. And as we noticed the Second hand smoking is very high among students in the Sousse region. Therefore there is an urgent need for a program to prevent and control this scourge of active and passive smoking among schoolchildren