A comparative analysis of contraceptive use in Africa: evidence from DHS

The aim of this article is to show a comparative analysis of contraceptive use in areas of traditionally high fertility that have gone through profound changes. Data have been taken from the latest Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS). Logistic regression models were adopted for four selected representative countries, namely Egypt, Mali, Namibia and Niger. There were two selection criteria: data should be recent, and selected countries should have high (Egypt 57.4%; Namibia 46.4%) or low (Mali 7.5%; Niger 10.0%) contraceptive use. The probability of using contraception when a woman has had one to four children is 2.4 times higher than when they have had no children. Contraception data are always gathered at a point of time, but crosssectional data are not sufficient to understand all the mechanisms hidden behind contraceptive use. Different contraceptive behaviours need good estimation tools to develop specific family planning programmes.Web of Scienc

Task shifting in maternal and newborn care: a non-inferiority study examining delegation of antenatal counseling to lay nurse aides supported by job aids in Benin

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Shifting the role of counseling to less skilled workers may improve efficiency and coverage of health services, but evidence is needed on the impact of substitution on quality of care. This research explored the influence of delegating maternal and newborn counseling responsibilities to clinic-based lay nurse aides on the quality of counseling provided as part of a task shifting initiative to expand their role.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Nurse-midwives and lay nurse aides in seven public maternities were trained to use job aids to improve counseling in maternal and newborn care. Quality of counseling and maternal knowledge were assessed using direct observation of antenatal consultations and patient exit interviews. Both provider types were interviewed to examine perceptions regarding the task shift. To compare provider performance levels, non-inferiority analyses were conducted where non-inferiority was demonstrated if the lower confidence limit of the performance difference did not exceed a margin of 10 percentage points.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Mean percent of recommended messages provided by lay nurse aides was non-inferior to counseling by nurse-midwives in adjusted analyses for birth preparedness (β = -0.0, 95% CI: -9.0, 9.1), danger sign recognition (β = 4.7, 95% CI: -5.1, 14.6), and clean delivery (β = 1.4, 95% CI: -9.4, 12.3). Lay nurse aides demonstrated superior performance for communication on general prenatal care (β = 15.7, 95% CI: 7.0, 24.4), although non-inferiority was not achieved for newborn care counseling (β = -7.3, 95% CI: -23.1, 8.4). The proportion of women with correct knowledge was significantly higher among those counseled by lay nurse aides as compared to nurse-midwives in general prenatal care (β = 23.8, 95% CI: 15.7, 32.0), birth preparedness (β = 12.7, 95% CI: 5.2, 20.1), and danger sign recognition (β = 8.6, 95% CI: 3.3, 13.9). Both cadres had positive opinions regarding task shifting, although several preferred 'task sharing' over full delegation.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Lay nurse aides can provide effective antenatal counseling in maternal and newborn care in facility-based settings, provided they receive adequate training and support. Efforts are needed to improve management of human resources to ensure that effective mechanisms for regulating and financing task shifting are sustained.</p

Hardware/Software Co-Synthesis: Modelling and Synthesis of Interfaces Using Interpreted Petri Nets

International audienceWhen designing a system using software and hardware components, communication modelling and synthesis are key points, since, for instance, communications cost drive hardware/software partitioning. In this chapter we present a method for communication interface synthesis based on a multi-level modelling of communication. By using a specific synthesis tool for each description level, and libraries of protocols and synthesised modules, reuse possibilities are enhanced. Petri Nets are used to model protocol behaviours and evaluate communication capabilities, leading partitioning

Mapping Tree Height in Burkina Faso Parklands with TanDEM-X

Mapping of tree height is of great importance for management, planning, and research related to agroforestry parklands in Africa. In this paper, we investigate the potential of spotlight-mode data from the interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) satellite system TanDEM-X (TDM) for mapping of tree height in Sapone, Burkina Faso, a test site characterised by a low average canopy cover (similar to 15%) and a mean tree height of 9.0 m. Seven TDM acquisitions from January-April 2018 are used jointly to create high-resolution (similar to 3 m) maps of interferometric phase height and mean canopy elevation, the latter derived using a new, model-based processing approach compensating for some effects of the side-looking geometry of SAR. Compared with phase height, mean canopy elevation provides a more accurate representation of tree height variations, a better tree positioning accuracy, and better tree height estimation performance when assessed using 915 trees inventoried in situ and representing 15 different species/genera. We observe and discuss two bias effects, and we use empirical models to compensate for these effects. The best-performing model using only TDM data provides tree height estimates with a standard error (SE) of 2.8 m (31% of the average height) and a correlation coefficient of 75%. The estimation performance is further improved when TDM height data are combined with in situ measurements; this is a promising result in view of future synergies with other remote sensing techniques or ground measurement-supported monitoring of well-known trees.Funding Agencies|Swedish National Space Agency [112/16]</p

Structure design of distributed systems using interpreted Petri nets

Communication a : Proceedings 10th International conference on application and theory of Petri nets, Bonn (RFA), June 1989Available at INIST (FR), Document Supply Service, under shelf-number : RP 10724 / INIST-CNRS - Institut de l'Information Scientifique et TechniqueSIGLEFRFranc

Structure design of distributed systems using interpreted Petri nets

Communication a : Proceedings tirteenth IEEE conference COMPSAC (Computer software of applications conference), Orlando (Florida, USA), September 1989SIGLEAvailable at INIST (FR), Document Supply Service, under shelf-number : RP 10787 / INIST-CNRS - Institut de l'Information Scientifique et TechniqueFRFranc

PETRI-S Un simulateur de systemes de production automatises decrits a l'aide de reseaux de Petri interpretes colores

In : R.A.I.R.O APII, 25(1):1-30, 1991SIGLEAvailable at INIST (FR), Document Supply Service, under shelf-number : RP 11520 / INIST-CNRS - Institut de l'Information Scientifique et TechniqueFRFranc