21 research outputs found

    Reliability of Community Health Worker Collected Data for Planning and Policy in a Peri-Urban Area of Kisumu, Kenya

    Get PDF
    A general introduction of this article is as follows: Reliable and timely health information is an essential foundation of public health action and health systems strengthening, both nationally and internationally (Aqil et al. in Health Policy Plan 24(3): 217–228, 2009; Bradshaw et al. in initial burden of disease estimates for South Africa, 2000. South African Medical Research Council, Cape Town, 2003). The need for sound information is especially urgent in the case of emergent diseases and other acute health threats, where rapid awareness, investigation and response can save lives and prevent broader national outbreaks and even global pandemics (Aqil et al. in Health Policy Plan 24(3): 217–228, 2009). The government of Kenya, through the ministry of public health and sanitation has rolled out the community health strategy as a way of improving health care at the household level. This involves community health workers collecting health status data at the household level, which is then used for dialogue at all the levels to inform decisions and actions towards improvement in health status. A lot of health interventions have involved the community health workers in reaching out to the community, hence successfully implementing these health interventions. Large scale involvement of community health workers in government initiatives and most especially to collect health data for use in the health systems has been minimal due to the assumption that the data may not be useful to the government, because its quality is uncertain. It was therefore necessary that the validity and reliability of the data collected by community health workers be determined, and whether this kind of data can be used for planning and policy formulation for the communities from which it is collected. This would go a long way to settle speculation on whether the data collected by these workers is valid and reliable for use in determining the health status, its causes and distribution, of a community. Our general objective of this article is to investigate the validity and reliability of Community Based Information, and we deal with research question “What is the reliability of data collected at the Community level by Community health workers?”. The methods which we use to find an reliable answer to this question is “Ten percent of all households visited by CHWs for data collection were recollected by a technically trained team. Test/retest method was applied to the data to establish reliability. The Kappa score, sensitivity, specificity and positive predictive values were also used to measure reliability”. Finally our findings are as follows: Latrine availability and Antenatal care presented good correspondence between the two sets of data. This was also true for exclusive breast feeding indicator. Measles immunization coverage showed less consistency than the rest of the child health indicators. At last we conclude and recommend that CHWs can accurately and reliably collect household data which can be used for health decisions and actions especially in resource poor settings where other approaches to population based data are too expensive

    Comprehensive transcriptome of the maize stalk borer, Busseola fusca, from multiple tissue types, developmental stages, and parasitoid wasp exposures

    Get PDF
    International audienc

    Some relationships between body weight and body measurements of goats

    No full text
    Five body measurements were compared to body weights in goats of different ages and in various locations. Formulae included for calculating average body weight from body measurements

    Abundance and identity of red spider mite species on Brachiaria grass in Kenya and its worldwide comparative phylogeny

    No full text
    Brachiaria grass in Kenya offers a vigorous and nutrient rich-forage option. Invasion of introduced Brachiaria grass in Kenya by red spider mite (RSM) indicates considerable damage during the dry season. A survey on the level of mite infestation and identification on various Brachiaria grass cultivars was carried out in August and October in 2016 in coastal lowlands, eastern, central, and western regions of Kenya. DNA-based identification was carried out using universal primers of internal transcribed spacer (ITS2) and cytochrome oxidase I (COI) gene regions. The abundance and damage by RSM were severe in eastern and western areas of the country with cvs. Marandu and Mulato II showing the highest level of infestation. BLAST results from the NCBI database revealed the red spider mite species damaging Brachiaria grass to be Tetranychus urticae (Koch.). The countrywide sequence samples did not show a much intraspecific genetic difference on COI region from the local populations but a marked wide phylogeny difference from the similar ITS2 region. The large divergence difference (> 0.10) calls for a repeat of the work in future to ascertain species delineation

    Effect of breed and Diacylglycerol acyltransferase 1 gene polymorphism on milk production traits in Beninese White Fulani and Borgou cows

    No full text
    Diacylglycerol acyltransferase 1 (DGAT1) is a potential candidate gene with a non-conservative substitution of lysine by alanine (K232A) in exon 8 having a major effect on milk production traits in cattle. The aim of this study was to analyze the allele and genotype frequency, and investigate the association of the DGAT1 K232A polymorphism with milk production traits in indigenous White Fulani and Borgou cattle breeds in Benin. In total, 103 White Fulani and 103 Borgou were genotyped by Polymerase Chain Reaction-Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphisms and validated by Sanger sequencing. The genotypic frequencies of KK, KA and AA in White Fulani and Borgou breeds were 0.83, 0.16, 0.01 and 0.57, 0.39, 0.04 respectively. Frequencies of K and A alleles were 0.91 and 0.09, and 0.77 and 0.23 in White Fulani and Borgou breeds respectively. The White Fulani cows showed higher daily milk yield (P< 0.01), lactose content (P<0.001), protein yield (P< 0.01) and fat yield (P<0.01) compared to Borgou. The DGAT1 KK genotype was significantly (P<0.05) associated with higher fat yield in White Fulani. Therefore, the DGAT1 locus could serve as a genetic marker for selection of fat yield in indigenous White Fulani Cows. Further studies would be needed to investigate the effect of DGAT1 gene on milk fatty acids variation between the two breeds
    corecore