Effects of a community-based health education intervention on eye health literacy of adults in Vietnam

Health education interventions are more commonly evaluated in hospitals or schools but rarely in the community. The purpose of this study was to assess the effects of a community-based eye health education intervention on the eye health literacy in an adult Vietnamese population. Four hundred households from two districts of Ba Ria-Vung Tau province were selected by multistage systematic random sampling. A pretested questionnaire was administered at baseline and re-administered, after an eye health education intervention in two of the four communes. The other two communes acted as controls. The intervention included eye health education through community presentation, brochures, posters and loudspeaker. Fisher’s exact test and logistic regression were used for statistical analysis. A total of 400 adults (mean age: 51.5 ± 14.5 years; range, 30–90 years) participated in the baseline survey and the repeat survey. Participants in the intervention group showed significantly greater awareness and knowledge of red eye preventive measures (Odds ratio range 2.1 to 4.1, p = 0.03 to 0.001) compared to control group. Participants in the intervention group were more than twice as likely to have heard of cataract (OR 2.3, p = 0.008), and more than three times as likely to be aware of cataract surgery (OR 3.1, p = 0.003) and know that the cataract blindness is reversible (OR 3.3, p = 0.002), than the control group. Multiple logistic regression showed that location, education, and eyeglasses ownership were the major factors associated with disease awareness. The eye health education intervention successfully increased awareness and knowledge of red eye and cataract in the intervention community

Poverty and Eye Health

Abstract Poverty and eye health, including vision disability from vision impairment and blindness, are believed to be interrelated. The relationship between poverty and eye health can be interpreted as being two-fold, in the sense that poverty may be a cause of poor eye health and poor eye health may lead to or deepen poverty. Evidence shows that the burden of vision impairment is high in poor people and vision impairment and poverty are linked to each other. However the empirical evidence to answer the questions-Does poverty perpetuate poor eye health? How and why? Does poor eye health deepen poverty?-is sparse globally; especially from low and middle income countries (LMICs). This article therefore aims to examine published information and other secondary data sources that provide insight on the relationship between poverty and eye health, including eye disability caused from vision impairment and blindness. The article provides a conceptual understanding of poverty related attributes that contribute to eye disability from vision impairment and blindness, using evidence sourced from poverty and eye health research studies. The article interrogates general theories and beliefs that have been conceptualised in relation to the impact that the vicious cycle of poverty has on eye health and the contribution of poor eye health on an individual's poverty status. The major outcomes of this article include: 1) identifying gaps in linking poverty and eye health, 2) establishing key issues that will assist in the development of a theoretical framework, and 3) preparing more appropriately for further investigation on the association between poverty and eye health

IMI impact of myopia

The global burden of myopia is growing. Myopia affected nearly 30% of the world population in 2020 and this number is expected to rise to 50% by 2050. This review aims to analyze the impact of myopia on individuals and society; summarizing the evidence for recent research on the prevalence of myopia and high myopia, lifetime pathological manifestations of myopia, direct health expenditure, and indirect costs such as lost productivity and reduced quality of life (QOL). The principal trends are a rising prevalence of myopia and high myopia, with a disproportionately greater increase in the prevalence of high myopia. This forecasts a future increase in vision loss due to uncorrected myopia as well as high myopia-related complications such as myopic macular degeneration. QOL is affected for those with uncorrected myopia, high myopia, or complications of high myopia. Overall the current global cost estimates related to direct health expenditure and lost productivity are in the billions. Health expenditure is greater in adults, reflecting the added costs due to myopia-related complications. Unless the current trajectory for the rising prevalence of myopia and high myopia change, the costs will continue to grow. The past few decades have seen the emergence of several novel approaches to prevent and slow myopia. Further work is needed to understand the life-long impact of myopia on an individual and the cost-effectiveness of the various novel approaches in reducing the burden

The Effects Of Pomegranate (Punica Granatum) Peel Extract As Antibacterial Agent Against Escherichia Coli In Vitro

Escherichia coli awalnya adalah salah satu flora normal yang tidak berbahaya pada manusia. Namun, beberapa jenis E. coli dapat menjadi patogen atau bahkan membunuh manusia. Antibiotik ditemukan dan dikembangkan untuk memberantas penyakit yang disebabkan oleh E. coli tetapi dalam perjalanan waktu strain bakteri berkembang dan menjadi resisten terhadap antibiotik. Senyawa aktif dalam kulit delima (Punica granatum) seperti flavonoid, saponin, tanin, dan terpenoid menjadikannya sebagai pengganti antibiotik yang lebih baik terhadap Escherichia coli. Tujuan dari penelitian ini adalah untuk memverifikasi efek antimikroba dari ekstrak kulit buah delima etanol terhadap pertumbuhan bakteri Escherichia coli secara in vitro menggunakan metode sumuran. Ekstrak kulit buah delima dengan konsentrasi 5%, 10%, 20%, 30%, 40%, 50% dan 100% diuji pada empat isolat Escherichia coli yang berbeda. Zona inhibisi yang terbentuk di sekitar sumur diukur untuk mendeteksi efek antimikroba dari ekstrak. One-way ANOVA digunakan untuk menganalisis data yang dikumpulkan yang mengungkapkan perbedaan yang signifikan antara konsentrasi ekstrak dan pertumbuhan E. coli di mana p <0,05. Uji korelasi Spearman menunjukkan korelasi yang kuat antara konsentrasi ekstrak dan zona hambatan dengan memberikan nilai p <0,05 dan r = 0,858. Berdasarkan hasil penelitian ini, disimpulkan bahwa ekstrak kulit buah delima memiliki efek antibakteri terhadap Escherichia coli secara in vitro dengan menggunakan metode sumuran

Associated factors for age-related maculopathy in the adult population in southern India: the Andhra Pradesh eye disease study

Background: To assess prevalence, potential risk factors and population attributable risk percentage (PAR) for age-related maculopathy (ARM) in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. Methods: A population-based study, cross-sectional epidemiological study was conducted in the state of Andhra Pradesh in India during 1996 and 2000. Participants from 94 clusters in one urban and three rural areas representative of the population of Andhra Pradesh underwent a detailed interview and a detailed dilated ocular evaluation by trained professionals. This report presents the prevalence estimates of ARM and examines the association of ARM with potential risk factors in persons aged 40-102 years (n=3723). ARM was defined as per the international classification and grading system. Results: ARM was present in 327 subjects, an age-gender-area-adjusted prevalence of 8.9% (95% confidence interval (CI), 8.1% to 9.9%). Multivariate analysis showed that, the adjusted prevalence of ARM was significantly higher in those 70 years of age or older (adjusted odds ratio (OR), 3.65; 95% CI 2.24 to 5.94) and in subjects with hypertension OR 1.30 (95% CI 1.02 to 1.65). The presence of any cataract and urban residence were significantly associated with increased prevalence of ARM (OR 1.67; 95% CI 1.27 to 2.21 and 2.30; 95% CI 1.79 to 2.96) respectively. Increased intraocular pressure (IOP) and increased cup-to-disc ratio (CDR) were also significantly associated with increased prevalence of ARM (OR 1.03; 95% CI 1.002 to 1.06 and 2.25; 95% CI 1.10 to 4.67) respectively. The PAR for hypertension and any cataract was 12% and 18% respectively in this population. Conclusion: The prevalence of ARM in this south Indian population is similar to those reported from other developed countries. Increased age, increased IOP and increased CDR were significantly associated with the increased risk of ARM

Health shock and preference instability: assessing health-state dependency of willingness-to-pay for corrective eyeglasses

Background: Differences in contingent valuation (CV) estimates for identical healthcare goods can cast considerable doubt on the true economic measures of consumer preferences. Hypothetical nature of CV methods can potentially depend on the salience, context and perceived relevance of the good or service under consideration. Thus, the high demand elasticity for healthcare goods warrants careful selection of study population as the contexts of valuation significantly changes after experiencing health shock. Methods: In this study, using triple-bounded dichotomous choice (TBDC) experiments, we test how negative health shock (namely, being diagnosed with refractive errors), can alter preference over a common health good (namely, corrective eyeglasses). We compared elicited WTP of diagnosed patients with a synthetically constructed comparable cohort without the same health shock, controlling for the possible self-selection using a number of matching techniques based on the observable socio-demographic characteristics. Results: The consumers diagnosed with vision problems exhibit a rightward shift in their demand curve compared to observationally identical consumers without such problems resulting in about 17% higher consumer surplus. The consumers without the health shock are willing to pay about BDT 762.4 [95% CI: BDT 709.9 - BDT 814.9] for corrective eyeglasses, which gets 15-30% higher for the matched with-health-shock consumers. Multivariable analyses suggest more educated and wealthier individuals are willing to pay respectively BDT 208 and BDT 119 more for corrective eyeglasses. We have tested the models for different matching protocols. Our results are fairly robust to alternate specifications and various matching techniques. Conclusion: The preferences for healthcare goods, such as eyeglasses, can significantly depend upon the respondent being diagnosed with refractive errors. Our findings have implications for general cost-benefit analyses often relying on WTP, which can vary depending on the contexts. There are also increasing interests in cost recovery models, which require understanding the demand for healthcare goods and services. We find eliciting the demand needs to consider the health status of the population from which the respondents are sampled