Post exposure prophylaxis among Ugandan nurses accidents do happen

Purpose: In 2009 we conducted a study to explore Ugandan nurses’ practice of universal precautions while caring for persons living with HIV. During our interviews about universal precautions, nurses’ also shared their experience with post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) following needle-stick injuries. We present findings related to nurses’ understanding of PEP and their experience with, and reporting of, needle stick injuries. Background: Nurses have high rates of exposure to blood-borne pathogens. Although there is minimal risk of the transmission of blood-borne pathogens from health care workers (HCWs) to patients and vice versa, post-exposure prophylaxis, has become routine following the occupational exposure of HCWs to HIV. Methods: Focused ethnography was used to guide the data collection and in-depth interviews were used to collect the data between October and November 2009. Results: Sixteen nurses from a variety of units in a large teaching hospital participated. Needle-stick injuries were a fairly common occurrence, but written policies were frequently inaccessible to nurses and they did not have adequate knowledge of PEP. Some nurses were reluctant to report injuries and avoided following PEP procedures due to lack of knowledge about PEP, concerns about anti-retroviral side effects and the stigma associated with PEP. Participants were aware of PEP however there was a wide variation in their understanding of the procedure to follow after a needle-stick injury. Conclusion: Employers have a responsibility to update PEP guidelines and to orientate HCWs to these. Educators must ensure that undergraduate nurses have a comprehensive understanding of universal precautions and current practice for PEP

Effect of biotic and abiotic factors on composition and foraging intensity of subterranean termites

Elucidating the influence of ecological factors on composition and foraging intensity of subterranean termites is critical in development of sustainable termite management strategies. Our aim was therefore to analyze the effect of selected biotic and abiotic factors on composition and foraging intensity of termites. We used principal component and canonical correspondence analysis to select appropriate factors and to model relationships respectively. Macrotermes species occurred in sites where the quantity of litter was generally above the mean. However, Macrotermes herus (Rambur) and Macrotermes spp.4 occurred in sites where the litter quantity was below the mean. Trinervitermes oeconomous (Tragardh) and Odontoremes spp.1 were noted to occur in the direction of increasing quantity of biomass. Generally, most species occurred in sites where soil pH was above or slightly below the mean (4.8). Majority of the species were also noted to occur in sites where bulk density was below or slightly above the mean (1.55 g/cm3). Highest bait consumption (95%) occurred within a range of 55 to 60% basal cover beyond which the amount of bait consumed reduced. Litter and biomass quantity, pH and bulk density were noted as the most influential environmental variables determining composition of termites while basal cover was the major determinant of foraging intensity.Key words: Rangelands, Macrotermes, rangelands, vegetation, litter, biomass, basal-cover

Pregnancy outcome among adolescents and non-adolescents delivering at Kiambu Country Hospital, Kenya

Objective: To determine the pregnancy outcome among adolescents and non-adolescents.Design: A retrospective cross sectional study.Setting: Kiambu County Hospital, Kenya.Subjects: Three hundred and thirty six patients who delivered at Kiambu County Hospital.Main outcome measures: Maternal and foetal morbidity and mortality.Results: More adolescent were single and of lower level of education than the nonadolescents with a statistical significance of 0.025 and 0.031 respectively. Anaemia occurred in 16.0% of adolescents compared to 2.4% among the non-adolescents with a statistical significance of p(<0.001). Cepholopelvic Disproportion (CPD) occurred in 8% of the adolescents vs.1.6% among the non-adolescents vs. 1.6% among the non –adolescents with a statistical significance (P<0.018). Preterm deliveries occurred in 5.6% of the adolescents compared to 0.8% with a statistical significance of 0.031. Postpartum haemorrhage occurred in 7.2% of the adolescents compared to 0.8% of the non-adolescents with a statistical significance of P<O.O1. Puerperal sepsis occurred in 7.2% of the adolescent vs 1.6% among the non-adolescents (P<0.031). The mean birthweight of the adolescents was 2.9 kgs compared to 3.1 kgs with the difference being statistically significant with a P-value of 0.015.Conclusion: Socio-economic status was worse among the adolescents. Intra-partum complications like malpresentation, cephalopelvic disproportion and preterm deliveries were more common among the adolescents than the non-adolescents. Mean birth weight was lower for the adolescents. Post-partum complications like haemorrhage and sepsis were also more common in the group. Adolescent pregnancy is high risk and should be prevented but if it occurs, comprehensive antenatal follow-up is mandator

Analysis of a Novel SPS Configuration Enabled by Lunar ISRU

Architectures for space-based solar power using in situ resource utilization (ISRU) of space materials can greatly reduce earth launch mass and can enable geometric capacity growth. These two factors allow the potential for low cost power generation after development of an in-space infrastructure. A collection of extraction and processing methods designed for lunar operation provides for large volumes of low cost solar panels. With abundant panels a novel configuration for solar power satellites (SPS) is possible which avoids many of the challenges of existing designs. The so-called "tin can" SPS has no moving parts. It includes integral thermal radiators. Station-keeping requirements are minimal. Structural integrity is designed-in so that balance of plant mass is minimal. In this work the architecture and infrastructure supporting the tin can SPS is developed to support rapid construction and deployment. Performance estimates for the SPS are provided regarding heat and energy balance, and specific mass requirements

Exposure of Kenyan population to aflatoxins in foods with special reference to Nandi and Makueni counties

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Natural Enemies Associated with Arthropod Pests of Pigeonpea in Eastern Africa

Common arthropod pests and beneficial species were surveyed on pigeon peas in Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania and Uganda, during 1995-96. Three pest groups were found: pod-boring Lepidoptera (Helicoverpa armigera, Maruca vitrata and Etiella zinckenella), pod-sucking bugs (mainly Clavigralla tomentosicollis) and pod fly (Melanagromyza chalcosoma). Natural enemies included Coleoptera, Hymenoptera, Diptera and Hemiptera and were found more frequently in Kenya than in the other countries

Standalone vertex finding in the ATLAS muon spectrometer

A dedicated reconstruction algorithm to find decay vertices in the ATLAS muon spectrometer is presented. The algorithm searches the region just upstream of or inside the muon spectrometer volume for multi-particle vertices that originate from the decay of particles with long decay paths. The performance of the algorithm is evaluated using both a sample of simulated Higgs boson events, in which the Higgs boson decays to long-lived neutral particles that in turn decay to bbar b final states, and pp collision data at √s = 7 TeV collected with the ATLAS detector at the LHC during 2011

Measurements of Higgs boson production and couplings in diboson final states with the ATLAS detector at the LHC

Measurements are presented of production properties and couplings of the recently discovered Higgs boson using the decays into boson pairs, H →γ γ, H → Z Z∗ →4l and H →W W∗ →lνlν. The results are based on the complete pp collision data sample recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider at centre-of-mass energies of √s = 7 TeV and √s = 8 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of about 25 fb−1. Evidence for Higgs boson production through vector-boson fusion is reported. Results of combined fits probing Higgs boson couplings to fermions and bosons, as well as anomalous contributions to loop-induced production and decay modes, are presented. All measurements are consistent with expectations for the Standard Model Higgs boson

Measurement of the top quark-pair production cross section with ATLAS in pp collisions at \sqrt{s}=7\TeV

A measurement of the production cross-section for top quark pairs(\ttbar) in $pp$ collisions at \sqrt{s}=7 \TeV is presented using data recorded with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. Events are selected in two different topologies: single lepton (electron $e$ or muon $\mu$) with large missing transverse energy and at least four jets, and dilepton ($ee$, $\mu\mu$ or $e\mu$) with large missing transverse energy and at least two jets. In a data sample of 2.9 pb-1, 37 candidate events are observed in the single-lepton topology and 9 events in the dilepton topology. The corresponding expected backgrounds from non-\ttbar Standard Model processes are estimated using data-driven methods and determined to be $12.2 \pm 3.9$ events and $2.5 \pm 0.6$ events, respectively. The kinematic properties of the selected events are consistent with SM \ttbar production. The inclusive top quark pair production cross-section is measured to be \sigmattbar=145 \pm 31 ^{+42}_{-27} pb where the first uncertainty is statistical and the second systematic. The measurement agrees with perturbative QCD calculations.Comment: 30 pages plus author list (50 pages total), 9 figures, 11 tables, CERN-PH number and final journal adde