Acceptability of human papilloma virus vaccine and cervical cancer screening among female health-care workers in Enugu, Southeast Nigeria

Background: Cervical cancer, a leading cause of cancer deaths in women in developing countries can be prevented primarily by vaccinating  adolescent girls and women against infection by the human papillomavirus (HPV) before their first sexual exposure, and secondarily through screening and treatment of identified precancerous lesions.Aim: To determine the awareness and acceptability of the HPV vaccine and screening for cervical cancer among female health-care workers in Enugu, southeastern Nigeria.Materials and Methods: Questionnaires were administered to a cross-section of 177 female health-care workers selected systematically from the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH), Enugu, Nigeria. Statistical analysis was both descriptive and inferential at 95% confidence level using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) computer software version 16. A P value of less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant.Results: The awareness of screening for cervical cancer (91%) was significantly higher than that of the HPV vaccine (62.7%) [odds ratio (OR): 0.17; 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.09–0.30]. However, the acceptability rate of the HPV vaccine (91.0%) was significantly higher than that of cervical screening (71.4%) (OR: 4.04;95% CI: 1.94–8.42)]. Only25 (14.1%) of the health-care workers had done cervical screening, but 30 (49.2%) of the 61respondents with adolescent daughters had immunized their daughters with the HPV vaccine. Although no reason was given for the low participation in cervical screening, cost and availability of HPV vaccine was a major deterrent for the latter.Conclusion: With more public enlightenment, available and affordable HPV vaccine appears to hold the key for prevention of cervical cancer in developing countries where the burden is high.Key words: Acceptability, health workers, HPV vaccine, Nigeri

Utilization of insecticide treated nets among pregnant women in Enugu, South Eastern Nigeria

Background: The goal of roll back malaria partnership is to achieve universal coverage for all populations at risk using appropriate interventions for prevention and case management.Objective: The objective of this study is to determine the use of insecticide treated nets (ITNs) and other anti-vector measures among pregnant women in an area hyper-endemic for malaria.Materials and Methods: Questionnaires were administered to a cross-section of 832 consecutive pregnant women attending antenatal care in three hospitals in Enugu, Nigeria that have high client flow for maternity services. Data collected were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics by means of the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 16. P-value of less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant.Results: The mean age of the women was 33.2 ± 2.9 (range: 15-45) years. Three hundred and fifty nine (43.1%) women owned insecticide treated nets (ITNs), however 325(90.5%) slept under the nets during the index pregnancies; equivalent to 39.1% utilization rate among the 832 women studied. Out of the 325 (39.1%) women that used ITNs; 236 (28.4%) used it singly, while 89 (10.7%) used it in combination with other anti-vector measures. Educational status and social class of the women had strong association with the use of ITNs (P < 0.0001). Women who used ITNs were significantly less likely to have acute malaria, anaemia and babies with low birth weight than women who did not use ITNs (P < 0.05).Conclusion: The use of ITNs is poor among pregnant women in Enugu, but associated with favorable maternal and feto-neonatal outcome. Future measures to increase its use should consider improvement in educational level and social class of our women.Key words: Insecticide treated nets, Malaria, Nigeria, pregnanc

Accuracy of clinical and ultrasound estimation of fetal weight in predicting actual birth weight in Enugu, Southeastern Nigeria

Background: Estimation of fetal weight is important for antenatal and intrapartum management of pregnant women. Sonographic methods are not readily accessible in under.resourced settings, it is therefore necessary to study the accuracy of a clinical method of estimating fetal weight where this limitation (unavailability of ultrasound) exists.Objective: To compare the accuracy of clinical and ultrasound methods of fetal weight estimation at term.Materials and Methods: Clinical and ultrasound fetal weights were  estimated on 200 consecutive term pregnancies (37 completed weeks of gestation . 41 weeks and 6 days) at the University of Nigeria Teaching  Hospital, Enugu, Nigeria from 1st April to 30th November 2012. Accuracy was determined using percentage error, absolute percentage error, and proportion of estimates within 10% of actual birth weight.Results: Actual birth weight had strong positive correlation with both clinical and ultrasound estimated fetal weights (r = 0.71, P < 0.001 and r = 0.69, P < 0.001, respectively). Overall, both the clinical and ultrasound methods systematically overestimated the actual birth weight. The proportion of the clinical estimated weights that were within 10% of the actual birth weight was significantly lower than that of ultrasound method for babies of all birth weights (35.0 vs. 67.5%; P < 0.001) and for macrosomic babies (76 vs 100%, P = 0.009). For babies with normal birth weights (2.5-3.9 kg), ultrasound method error values were significantly lower than those of  clinical method for both the mean % error (5.4 vs 19.6%; P < 0.001) and the mean absolute % error (9.97 vs 20.6%; P < 0.001).Conclusion: The ultrasound method is generally a better predictor of the actual birth weight than the clinical method, and thus should be used in estimating the actual birth weight when accessible.Key words: Birth weight, clinical estimation, Nigeria, ultrasound estimatio

Maternal risk factors for abnormal placental growth: The national collaborative perinatal project

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Previous studies of maternal risk factors for abnormal placental growth have focused on placental weight and placental ratio as measures of placental growth. We sought to identify maternal risk factors for placental weight and two neglected dimensions of placental growth: placental thickness and chorionic plate area.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We conducted an analysis of 24,135 mother-placenta pairs enrolled in the National Collaborative Perinatal Project, a prospective cohort study of pregnancy and child health. We defined growth restriction as < 10^thpercentile and hypertrophy as > 90^thpercentile for three placental growth dimensions: placental weight, placental thickness and chorionic plate area. We constructed parallel multinomial logistic regression analyses to identify (a) predictors of restricted growth (vs. normal) and (b) predictors of hypertrophic growth (vs. normal).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Black race was associated with an increased likelihood of growth restriction for placental weight, thickness and chorionic plate area, but was associated with a reduced likelihood of hypertrophy for these three placental growth dimensions. We observed an increased likelihood of growth restriction for placental weight and chorionic plate area among mothers with hypertensive disease at 24 weeks or beyond. Anemia was associated with a reduced likelihood of growth restriction for placental weight and chorionic plate area. Pre-pregnancy BMI and pregnancy weight gain were associated with a reduced likelihood of growth restriction and an increased likelihood of hypertrophy for all three dimensions of placental growth.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Maternal risk factors are either associated with placental growth restriction or placental hypertrophy not both. Our findings suggest that the placenta may have compensatory responses to certain maternal risk factors suggesting different underlying biological mechanisms.</p

Humic substances in a soil treated with household compost under two tillage practices

Household-derived compost at the rate of 0, 20, 40, 60 t/ha, 30 t/ha + 20 t/ha ash, and NPK fertilizer at 112kg/ha were applied to tilled and untilled soils at Awka, South-East Nigeria in 2001 and 2002. The soil was grown to cowpea. At the end of 2002 the relative proportions of humic carbon, humic acid and fulvic acid were determined. Tillage (hoeing) significantly enhanced the formation of humic substances (HS) in the soil. Formation of humic substance (HS) was not favoured by fertilizer application which gave lower % HS than the control. Fulvic acid fraction was higher in compost amended soil. Nigerian Journal of Soil Science Vol. 15 2005: 86-8

Tillage and kitchen wastes effect on Peri-Urban soil properties and vegetable cowpea (

No Abstract. Nigerian Journal of Soil Science Vol. 16 (1) 2006: pp. 140-14

Mycotoxins as potential weapons of mass destruction: a review

No Abstract.Journal of Health and Visual Sciences Vol. 8 (2) 2006: pp. 90-9