Exploring the Barriers towards the Adoption of Credit Cards Usage in Pakistan

Credit card is a widely used financial instrument in consumer financing, facilitating consumers to full fill their number of desires. The purpose of this research is to present an explanatory perception into the current and non-users of credit card. The aim is to recognize the diverse factors that becomes the basis of low adoption and usage rate of credit card among the Pakistani population. Moreover, this paper also aims to highlight the barriers responsible in the diminutive growth of a potential credit card market in Pakistan. This research is explanatory in nature wherein structured questionnaire was used to collect the data. Moreover, non-probability convenience sampling method was adopted as a sampling technique. Furthermore, structured questionnaire was adapted from the base study and distributed among 302 current and non-credit card users. The research indicates that, to create and tap a large market credit card financial institutions should focus on cost and improve the security of credit cards. Findings further reveals that religious belief has a huge impact towards the decline of credit card usage. Consumer bankers dealing with credit card proposition should focus on aggressive brand promotion which will end up in changing the consumer perception. Furthermore, cost/financial charges are highly correlated with the usage of credit card and thus barrier in credit card usage. Therefore, credit cards issuers should keep the stated factors in mind for easy penetration. This research will be instrumental for credit card issuers, advertising agencies responsible for developing the content of credit card communication and can be used in academics to understand this area from both micro and macro perspective. Keywords: Credit Card, Adaptation, Consumer Finance

Benzodiazepine use in medical out-patient clinics: a study from a developing country

Objective: To estimate the prevalence of Benzodiazepine use in the outpatient setting of general medicine clinics at a single tertiary care centre. Methods: The prospective prevalence study was conducted in the outpatient setting of Internal Medicine Clinics at Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, from November to December 2009. All subjects were interviewed after informed consent and variables were recorded on a specially-designed proforma. Apart from basic demographics and comorbid conditions, duration, frequency and route of benzodiazepine use, as well as the reason and who initiated it was noted. Chi-square test and t test was applied to see the association of socio demographic or clinical factors with the use of benzodiazepine. Results: Of the 355 patients, 129 (36.33%) reported using the drug. The majority (n=86; 24.2%) were taking it on a daily basis. The highest numbers of patients using the drug were suffering from cardiovascular problems, 32 (25%) followed by 22 (17%) from endocrinology. Diazepam equivalent dose was around 7.04+4, with a inter-quartile range of 3-96 weeks. Alprazolam (9%) was the most frequently prescribed Benzodiazepine. CONCLUSION: Benzodiazepine use is alarmingly high in the outpatient clinics of General Internal Medicine Department. There is no implementation of law to prevent its hazardous sale. In this regard all concerned should work collectively for awareness and irrational drug sale and use

Comparative study of Internet Protocol

In today's generation, most of today's Internet is using IPv4, Now twenty years old. IPv4 is now uploading with the Problem of meeting growing Internet requirements and it is a shortage of IPv4 addresses, which are necessary for all new the machines added to the Internet.IPv6, fixes a series of problems In IPv4 addresses. It also adds many improvements to IPv4 and provides a better network. IPv6 is expected to gradually replace IPv4, with the two coexisting for several years during a transition period. As the population is increasing day by day, similarly the Internet isAlso growing and expanding more and more and more and more,Government, scientists and universities are looking for new waysTo send information quickly and powerfully The two new InternetsDevelop new and faster technologies to improve research andCommunication, and both projects are expected toEventually improve the current commercial Internet. A big advantage of IPv6 is that it simplifies and solves the problem. The scarcity of IP addresses. In today's Internet technology, Controls in the United States 74% of the 4 million IP addresses, while the amount that China has is equal only to the University California, but its share of 80 million users. This is the main reason Asian countries, especially China, Japan and South Korea, Show interest in IPv6 version technology

Green Computing for Wireless Body Area Networks: Energy Efficient Link Aware Medical Data Dissemination Approach

Recent technological advancement- in wireless communication has invented Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs), a cutting edge technology in healthcare applications. WBANs interconnect with intelligent and miniaturized biomedical sensor nodes placed on human body to un-attendant monitoring of physiological parameter of the patient. These sensors are equipped with limited resources in terms of computation, storage and battery power. The data communication in WBANs is a resource hungry process especially in terms of energy. One of the most significant challenges in this network is to design energy aware next-hop link selection framework. Towards this end, this paper presents a Green computing framework for WBANs focusing on Energy efficient Link aware approach (G-WEL). Firstly, a link efficiency oriented network model is presented considering beaconing information and network initialization process. Secondly, a path cost calculation model is derived focusing on energy aware link efficiency. A complete operational framework G-WEL is developed considering energy aware next hop link selection by utilizing the network and path cost model. The comparative performance evaluation attests the energy oriented benefit of the proposed framework as compared to the state-of-the-art techniques. It reveals a significant enhancement in body area networking in terms of various energy oriented metrics under medical environments

Clinical characteristics and outcomes of traumatic brain injury patients admitted to tertiary level surgical intensive care unit of Kashmir, India

Background: Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a leading cause of mortality, morbidity, disability, and socioeconomic losses in the Indian subcontinent. For policy making, there is a lack of reliable and larger data regarding traumatic brain injuries in our setting. Aim: In our study an attempt was made to analyze and assess the clinical characteristics of patients with traumatic brain injuries admitted in Surgical Intensive Care Unit of SMHS hospital Srinagar. Materials and Methods: In this observational study, 89 patients of TBI admitted in SICU during study period were enrolled, after obtaining ethical clearance from institutional ethical clearancecommittee. All the study patients were followed up in SICU on daily basis. All thedata required for study was recorded from the patient’s clinical notes as per studyprotocol. Outcome of patients was assessed in terms of survival at discharge from SICU. Results: Majority of the TBI patients requiring ICU admission had Severe TBI (64%). Allthe patients required CT Brain on arrival to hospital and brain contusions (65.2%) were the most common findings on CT brain. Check CT brain was required in53.9% of patients. There was need for neurosurgical intervention in 49.4% ofpatients and 21.3% required blood transfusions

Advancing oncology drug therapies for sub-Saharan Africa.

Cancer incidence is rising across sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), and is often characterized by late-stage presentation, early age of onset and poor survival. While a number of oncology drugs are now improving the length and quality of life for cancer patients in high-income countries, significant disparities in access to a range of oncology therapeutics exist for SSA. A number of challenges to drug access such as drug costs, lack of infrastructure and trained personnel must be urgently addressed to advance oncology therapies for SSA. We present a review of selected oncology drug therapies that are likely to benefit cancer patients with a focus on common malignancies in SSA. We collate available data from seminal clinical trials in high-income countries to highlight the potential for these therapeutics to improve cancer outcomes. In addition, we discuss the need to ensure access to drugs within the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines and highlight therapeutics that require consideration. Available and active oncology clinical trials in the region is tabulated, demonstrating the significant gaps in access to oncology drug trials across much of the region. We issue an urgent call to action to address drug access due to the predicted rise in cancer burden in the region in coming years