Contribution of Primary Education Development Program to Access and Quality of Primary Education”. The Case Study of Arusha City

This study analyzed the contribution of PEDP to access and quality of primary education in Arusha, with the following specific objectives, evaluate the effect of PEDP on teaching and learning environments, the effect of PEDP on performance of Pupils and also determine the impacts of PEDP on enrollment of class one pupils.The study was conducted in Arusha District and included eight primary schools. The study employed qualitative approach to answer research questions; interview,questionnaires observation and documentary review were used to collect data.Qualitative data were processed through thematic analysis and presented in tables,pie charts and graphs indicating frequencies and percentages. The study involved two hundred and thirty six (236) respondents from eight primary schools in Arusha city.It included thirty two (32) males and two hundred and four (204) females. Among the respondents are eight (8) head teachers and two hundred and nineteen (219) classroom teachers and nine (9) members of school committee. Findings revealed that PEDP has both negative and positive impacts Positive impacts includes improvements of school infrastructures which influences conducive environment,improvement of academic performance, the sufficient numbers of qualified teachers. Negative impacts involves an increase of the number of enrolment especially in standard one, an increase of the enrolment is an obstacles in learning which goes together with overcrowded classrooms. The study came out with the following recommendations; The Government should establish a long continuous Education development program to address the problems facing the sector, also involve all stakeholders and lastly the school management committees should find other sources of fund to supplement that provided from the central Government

Table ronde sur le financement de la santé en République Démocratique du Congo Politique de santé

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is among the worst countries in term of health financing. During the last 10 years (2006-2015), the total health expenditures per capita up from US$19 to US$ 21.9, far to ensure the provision of and access to quality of services. The out-of-pocket is the most used mechanism by the population (more than 90 percent) and makes health services unaffordable for many.This roundtable aims to getting more inclusivity of the main stakeholders in the national health financing dialog and a better financing organization and access to quality health care services in the country.During facilitation's session, main stakeholders from public sector (Government, National Assembly), civil society and academic institutions, private sector will engage into productive dialog in providing their insights on specific financing related questions beforehand shared.This session will result in a country reflection/document on the better conditions to access quality health services.In country's ownership efforts, this document will cross a serial of validation process prior its implementation. La République Démocratique du Congo (RDC) figure parmi les derniers pays en matière de financement des services médio-sanitaires. Ses différents efforts ont permis d‟élever la dépense totale de santé de 19 USD per capita en 2006 à 21,91 $ en 2015. Dans plus de 90% des cas, l‟accès aux soins se fait par le paiement direct et exclut une bonne proportion de la population du système de santé.La présente Table Ronde contribuera à une plus grande inclusivité de différentes parties prenantes à la problématique du financement de la santé et à une meilleure organisation financière de l‟accès aux soins de santé de qualité en RDC.Conduits par une facilitation, des représentants du pouvoir public (Gouvernement, Assemblée Nationale), de la Société civile, des universités, du secteur privé débattront du sujet en réponse aux questions spécifiques leur soumises plusieurs semaines à l‟avance avec les termes de référence de la table ronde.La production d‟une ébauche de document qui décrit les conditions de meilleur accès aux services de santé de qualité à valider par les différentes sphères de la société est le principal résultat attendu.La RDC s‟appropriera ce document dans une cascade de validation progressive en vue de sa mise en oeuvre

L2 learners' knowledge of verb form-function relationships at different stages in the acquisition of English as a second language : a study of college learners' interlanguage in Zaire.

Available from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:D97832 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreSIGLEGBUnited Kingdo

The role of cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) in the diagnosis of cardiomyopathy: A systematic review

BackgroundMyocardial pathologies are significant causes of morbidity and mortality in patients worldwide. Ischemic and non-ischemic cardiomyopathies have become a worldwide epidemic of the 21st century with an increasing impact on health care systems. The 2012 European Society of Cardiology and 2013 American College of Cardiology Foundation/American Heart Association guidelines provide current therapy guidance to reduce mortality and morbidity.MethodsThis was a systematic review involving cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) studies for the diagnosis of cardiomyopathy from January 2013 to April 2017. Out of 62 reviewed studies, only 12 were included in our study.ResultsThe average sensitivity and specificity of CMR in the diagnosis of cardiomyopathy was 86.75% (95% confidence interval [CI], 70.30% to 92.58%) and 81.75% (95% CI, 73.0% to 87.6%), respectively, and the positive predictive and negative predictive values were 80.17% and 86.75%, respectively.ConclusionDespite some limitations, our study shows that CMR has high sensitivity, specificity, and positive predictive value in diagnosing different types of cardiomyopathy. CMR may be used to differentiate types of cardiomyopathy, accurately quantify the chamber dimensions, volumes, and cardiac function, which make it useful for prognosis as well

Medical Image Segmentation: Thresholding and Minimum Spanning Trees

I bildesegmentering deles et bilde i separate objekter eller regioner. Det er et essensielt skritt i bildebehandling for å definere interesseområder for videre behandling eller analyse. Oppdelingsprosessen reduserer kompleksiteten til et bilde for å forenkle analysen av attributtene oppnådd etter segmentering. Det forandrer representasjonen av informasjonen i det opprinnelige bildet og presenterer pikslene på en måte som er mer meningsfull og lettere å forstå. Bildesegmentering har forskjellige anvendelser. For medisinske bilder tar segmenteringsprosessen sikte på å trekke ut bildedatasettet for å identifisere områder av anatomien som er relevante for en bestemt studie eller diagnose av pasienten. For eksempel kan man lokalisere berørte eller anormale deler av kroppen. Segmentering av oppfølgingsdata og baseline lesjonssegmentering er også svært viktig for å vurdere behandlingsresponsen. Det er forskjellige metoder som blir brukt for bildesegmentering. De kan klassifiseres basert på hvordan de er formulert og hvordan segmenteringsprosessen utføres. Metodene inkluderer de som er baserte på terskelverdier, graf-baserte, kant-baserte, klynge-baserte, modell-baserte og hybride metoder, og metoder basert på maskinlæring og dyp læring. Andre metoder er baserte på å utvide, splitte og legge sammen regioner, å finne diskontinuiteter i randen, vannskille segmentering, aktive kontuter og graf-baserte metoder. I denne avhandlingen har vi utviklet metoder for å segmentere forskjellige typer medisinske bilder. Vi testet metodene på datasett for hvite blodceller (WBCs) og magnetiske resonansbilder (MRI). De utviklede metodene og analysen som er utført på bildedatasettet er presentert i tre artikler. I artikkel A (Paper A) foreslo vi en metode for segmentering av nukleuser og cytoplasma fra hvite blodceller. Metodene estimerer terskelen for segmentering av nukleuser automatisk basert på lokale minima. Metoden segmenterer WBC-ene før segmentering av cytoplasma avhengig av kompleksiteten til objektene i bildet. For bilder der WBC-ene er godt skilt fra røde blodlegemer (RBC), er WBC-ene segmentert ved å ta gjennomsnittet av $n$ bilder som allerede var filtrert med en terskelverdi. For bilder der RBC-er overlapper WBC-ene, er hele WBC-ene segmentert ved hjelp av enkle lineære iterative klynger (SLIC) og vannskillemetoder. Cytoplasmaet oppnås ved å trekke den segmenterte nukleusen fra den segmenterte WBC-en. Metoden testes på to forskjellige offentlig tilgjengelige datasett, og resultatene sammenlignes med toppmoderne metoder. I artikkel B (Paper B) foreslo vi en metode for segmentering av hjernesvulster basert på minste dekkende tre-konsepter (minimum spanning tree, MST). Metoden utfører interaktiv segmentering basert på MST. I denne artikkelen er bildet lastet inn i et interaktivt vindu for segmentering av svulsten. Fokusregion og bakgrunn skilles ved å klikke for å dele MST i to trær. Ett av disse trærne representerer fokusregionen og det andre representerer bakgrunnen. Den foreslåtte metoden ble testet ved å segmentere to forskjellige 2D-hjerne T1 vektede magnetisk resonans bildedatasett. Metoden er enkel å implementere og resultatene indikerer at den er nøyaktig og effektiv. I artikkel C (Paper C) foreslår vi en metode som behandler et 3D MRI-volum og deler det i hjernen, ikke-hjernevev og bakgrunnsegmenter. Det er en grafbasert metode som bruker MST til å skille 3D MRI inn i de tre regiontypene. Grafen lages av et forhåndsbehandlet 3D MRI-volum etterfulgt av konstrueringen av MST-en. Segmenteringsprosessen gir tre merkede, sammenkoblende komponenter som omformes tilbake til 3D MRI-form. Etikettene brukes til å segmentere hjernen, ikke-hjernevev og bakgrunn. Metoden ble testet på tre forskjellige offentlig tilgjengelige datasett og resultatene ble sammenlignet med ulike toppmoderne metoder.In image segmentation, an image is divided into separate objects or regions. It is an essential step in image processing to define areas of interest for further processing or analysis. The segmentation process reduces the complexity of an image to simplify the analysis of the attributes obtained after segmentation. It changes the representation of the information in the original image and presents the pixels in a way that is more meaningful and easier to understand. Image segmentation has various applications. For medical images, the segmentation process aims to extract the image data set to identify areas of the anatomy relevant to a particular study or diagnosis of the patient. For example, one can locate affected or abnormal parts of the body. Segmentation of follow-up data and baseline lesion segmentation is also very important to assess the treatment response. There are different methods used for image segmentation. They can be classified based on how they are formulated and how the segmentation process is performed. The methods include those based on threshold values, edge-based, cluster-based, model-based and hybrid methods, and methods based on machine learning and deep learning. Other methods are based on growing, splitting and merging regions, finding discontinuities in the edge, watershed segmentation, active contours and graph-based methods. In this thesis, we have developed methods for segmenting different types of medical images. We tested the methods on datasets for white blood cells (WBCs) and magnetic resonance images (MRI). The developed methods and the analysis performed on the image data set are presented in three articles. In Paper A we proposed a method for segmenting nuclei and cytoplasm from white blood cells. The method estimates the threshold for segmentation of nuclei automatically based on local minima. The method segments the WBCs before segmenting the cytoplasm depending on the complexity of the objects in the image. For images where the WBCs are well separated from red blood cells (RBCs), the WBCs are segmented by taking the average of $n$ images that were already filtered with a threshold value. For images where RBCs overlap the WBCs, the entire WBCs are segmented using simple linear iterative clustering (SLIC) and watershed methods. The cytoplasm is obtained by subtracting the segmented nucleus from the segmented WBC. The method is tested on two different publicly available datasets, and the results are compared with state of the art methods. In Paper B, we proposed a method for segmenting brain tumors based on minimum spanning tree (MST) concepts. The method performs interactive segmentation based on the MST. In this paper, the image is loaded in an interactive window for segmenting the tumor. The region of interest and the background are selected by clicking to split the MST into two trees. One of these trees represents the region of interest and the other represents the background. The proposed method was tested by segmenting two different 2D brain T1-weighted magnetic resonance image data sets. The method is simple to implement and the results indicate that it is accurate and efficient. In Paper C, we propose a method that processes a 3D MRI volume and partitions it into brain, non-brain tissues, and background segments. It is a graph-based method that uses MST to separate the 3D MRI into the brain, non-brain, and background regions. The graph is made from a preprocessed 3D MRI volume followed by constructing the MST. The segmentation process produces three labeled connected components which are reshaped back to the shape of the 3D MRI. The labels are used to segment the brain, non-brain tissues, and the background. The method was tested on three different publicly available data sets and the results were compared to different state of the art methods.Doktorgradsavhandlin

Prevalence of HIV Infection among Trauma Patients Admitted to\ud Bugando Medical Centre, Mwanza, Tanzania and its\ud Influence on Outcome

HIV infection, a major health problem worldwide, has been reported to be prevalent in trauma patients, thus presents an occupational hazard to health care workers who care for these patients. The purpose of this study was to establish the prevalence of HIV among trauma patients in our setting and to compare the outcome of these patients who are HIV positive with those who are HIV negative. This was a descriptive cross sectional study involving trauma patients aged 11 years and above, admitted to the surgical wards of Bugando Medical Centre in Mwanza, Tanzania over a six-month period from October 2008 to March 2009. All eligible patients were consecutively enrolled in the study. Data were collected using a pre-tested, coded questionnaire and analyzed using SPSS computer software. A total of 250 trauma patients were recruited and studied. The mean age of the study population was 36.37±15.35. Males accounted for the majority (N=202; 80.8%) of the study population. The prevalence of HIV among trauma patients was 11.6%. Among the HIV positive patients, 26 (89.7%) were males and majority aged 31-40 years. Seventy two percent of HIV positive patients had CD4+ count of ≥ 200 cells/μl. Overall length of hospital stays (LOS) ranged from 1 - 90 days with mean of 19.11 ± 15.84 days. Using multivariate logistic regression, injury severity score (ISS) (P=0.0026), revised trauma scores (RTS) (P= 0.002,), HIV seropositivity (P= 0.0012) and CD4+ count (P= 0.001) were significantly found to be associated with increased LOS. Mortality rate was 10.8% and was significantly associated with; the body region injured (P < 0.05), ISS (P = 0.026), RTS (P = 0.001), PTS (P= 0.01), HIV positivity (P= 0.0001) and CD4+ count (P= 0.035). HIV is prevalent among trauma patients in our setting. A substantial risk of exposure to HIV exists in health workers who care for these patients. Thus, all trauma health care workers in this region need to practice universal barrier precautions in order to reduce the risk of exposure to HIV infection. HIV positive patients with CD4+ count ≥200cells/μl have similar prognosis as HIV negative patients and therefore should be treated the same way

Threshold estimation based on local minima for nucleus and cytoplasm segmentation

Background Image segmentation is the process of partitioning an image into separate objects or regions. It is an essential step in image processing to segment the regions of interest for further processing. We propose a method for segmenting the nuclei and cytoplasms from white blood cells (WBCs). Methods Initially, the method computes an initial value based on the minimum and maximum values of the input image. Then, a histogram of the input image is computed and approximated to obtain function values. The method searches for the first local maximum and local minimum from the approximated function values in the order of increasing of knots sequence. We approximate the required threshold from the first local minimum and the computed initial value based on defined conditions. The threshold is applied to the input image to binarize it, and then post-processing is performed to obtain the final segmented nucleus. We segment the whole WBC before segmenting the cytoplasm depending on the complexity of the objects in the image. For WBCs that are well separated from red blood cells (RBCs), n thresholds are generated and then produce n thresholded images. Then, a standard Otsu method is used to binarize the average of the produced images. Morphological operations are applied on the binarized image, and then a single-pixel point from the segmented nucleus is used to segment the WBC. For images in which RBCs touch the WBCs, we segment the whole WBC using SLIC and watershed methods. The cytoplasm is obtained by subtracting the segmented nucleus from the segmented WBC. Results The method is tested on two different public data sets and the results are compared to the state of art methods. The performance analysis shows that the proposed method segments the nucleus and cytoplasm well. Conclusion We propose a method for nucleus and cytoplasm segmentation based on the local minima of the approximated function values from the image’s histogram. The method has demonstrated its utility in segmenting nuclei, WBCs, and cytoplasm, and the results are satisfactory.publishedVersio

The Eigen-chromatic Ratio of Classes of Graphs: Asymptotes, Areas and Molecular Stability

In this paper, we present a new ratio associated with classes of graphs, called the eigen-chromatic ratio, by combining the two graph theoretical concepts of energy and chromatic number. The energy of a graph, the sum of the absolute values of the eigenvalues of the adjacency matrix of a graph, arose historically as a result of the energy of the benzene ring being identical to that of the sum of the absolute values of the eigenvalues of the adjacency matrix of the cycle graph on n vertices (see [18]). The chromatic number of a graph is the smallest number of colour classes that we can partition the vertices of a graph such that each edge of the graph has ends that do not belong to the same colour class, and applications to the real world abound (see [30]). Applying this idea to molecular graph theory, for example, the water molecule would have its two hydrogen atoms coloured with the same colour different to that of the oxygen molecule. Ratios involving graph theoretical concepts form a large subset of graph theoretical research (see [3], [16], [48]). The eigen-chromatic ratio of a class of graph provides a form of energy distribution among the colour classes determined by the chromatic number of such a class of graphs. The asymptote associated with this eigen-chromatic ratio allows for the behavioural analysis in terms of stability of molecules in molecular graph theory where a large number of atoms are involved. This asymptote can be associated with the concept of graphs being hyper- or hypo- energetic (see [48])

The Contribution of Poultry keeping to Household Poverty Reduction.

The aim of this study was to examine the contribution of poultry keeping to household poverty reduction in Ilemela municipality. This study assessed the contribution of poultry keeping to socio-economic purposes to the people of Ilemela. The study employed purposive sampling technique to select sample of 100 respondents, where 85 were farmers and 15 were experts (extension officers) and street leaders who were aware of residents who kept poultry at their areas. Primary data were collected by using questionnaires and interviews. Data from questionnaires were analyzed by Excel. Descriptive statistics namely frequencies and percentage were computed. Spearman Regression and Regression coefficients were used to determine relationship between two variables and give outcomes of -0.2 and -0.14 respectively. This showed that there were negative relationship between poultry kept and the returns at a given area. Moreover, the study observed that there are different challenges facing farmers like diseases, feeds and theft. But the main challenge was diseases like Newcastle Disease (ND), cholera, typhoid and calcium deficiency. The study showed that there was a large number of women who were participating in poultry keeping than men. Apart from that, products from poultry were highly demanded by the society and people were highly invited to venture into poultry keeping. The study focused on poultry farming and its effectiveness in Ilemela District Council from some selected wards. However, other studies may be performed in the same direction in other industries such as education, health and others. Keywords: Poultry keeping, Poultry, Poverty, Alleviation

Foraminiferal Biostratigraphy and Depositional Environment of the Early Cretaceous Drilled Succession in Durban Basin, East Coast, South Africa

>Magister Scientiae - MScDurban Basin located on the eastern coast of South Africa has been a focus of interest for Petroleum Exploration for the last few decades. Only four exploratory wells have been drilled in this offshore basin without success. During the initial stage of its creation, the basin suffered major tectonic disturbance as evident from the presence extensional faults followed by intense igneous activities. This was followed by marine sedimentation in the late Mesozoic (late Jurassic-early Cretaceous). An attempt has been made in this work to understand the distribution of the rock in space and time for the early Cretaceous sediments considered most prospective for hydrocarbon exploration in Southern Africa. Temporal distribution of planktonic foraminifera helps in identification of the three early Cretaceous (Barremian to Albian) stages within the drilled intervals. Foraminiferal biostratigraphic studies integrated with sedimentology, log motif analysis and seismic data analysis helps to predict paleodepth and depositional environment during early Cretaceous in this research. The integrated analysis reveals that during the Barremian-early Aptian stages graben filled sediments were deposited in a marine shelf in the northern part of the studied area (site Jc-D1) whereas, in the central and southern part finer clastics were deposited in middle slope (site Jc-B1 and Jc-C1). The thick claystone section and presence of minor limestone lenses and their benthic foraminifera assemblage in late Aptian-Albian stage in the northern area indicates possibility of submarine fan. Overlying succession dated between late Aptian to Albian and early part of Cenomanian interval in the three studied exploratory wells shows serrated log signatures. The dominant claystone lithology with intermittent siltstone/sandstone units and the benthic foraminifera indicates fluctuating distal marine slope environment with periodic shallowness in the entire area