Understanding the antepartum depressive symptoms and its risk factors among the pregnant women visiting public health facilities of Nepal

© 2019 Joshi et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Introduction Antepartum depression is a contributing factor for adverse maternal and perinatal outcome. The study aimed to assess the antepartum depressive symptoms in selected public health facilities of Nepal. Methodology This is a mixed-method cross-sectional study that included 143 pregnant women attending the antenatal checkup in four public health facilities of Kathmandu. Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) tool with cut-off score > = 10 was used to assess the antepartum depressive symptoms. Bivariate and multivariable analysis was carried out to identify factors associated with the depressive symptoms. Further semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 pregnant women identified with the depressive symptoms. Result Of the total 143 pregnant women, 26 (18%, CI at 95% 12.6–25.5) reported depressive symptoms. Multivariable analysis reported higher odds of antepartum depressive-symptoms with health problem, early gestational age, sex preference, and spousal alcohol intake. Thematic analysis of qualitative data further revealed participants’ apprehension on; birth outcome, a family expectation of male child, inadequate support from the family/husband and disturbed family environment. Conclusion Notable proportion of pregnant women were reported with antepartum depressive symptoms. Women’s perception on patriarchal values for childbirth was revealed to be important factor for the depressive symptoms. The study draws an attention to a need for screening for antepartum depression into primary health care system. Strengthening ongoing efforts on gender equity could contribute the psychological well-being of pregnant women

Soil Chemical Properties Under Conservation Agriculture and Cereal-Based Cropping System in Eastern Tarai of Nepal

Field experiments were conducted for four years (2014-2017) at five locations namely Salbani, Bhokraha, Simariya, Bhaluwa and Kaptanganj of Sunsari district to assess the changes in soil chemical properties under conservation agriculture (CA)-based practices in two cropping systems namely rice-kidney bean-maize at Salbani and rice-wheat at rest of the locations. In rice-wheat cropping system, there were four treatments: (1) conventional tillage (CT) for rice transplantation and subsequent wheat sowing, (2) conventional tillage rice transplantation followed by zero tillage (ZT) wheat, (3) unpuddled rice transplantation followed by zero tillage wheat, (4) zero tillage in both rice and wheat. Similarly, in rice-kidney bean-maize cropping system, there were four treatments; (1) conventional tillage for rice transplantation and sowing of both kidney bean and maize, (2) conventional tillage rice transplantation followed by zero tillage in both kidney bean and maize, (3) unpuddled rice transplantation followed by zero tillage in both kidney bean and maize, (4) zero tillage in all three crops. Soil samples were taken at initial and every year after rice harvest.The soil samples were analyzed for total nitrogen, available phosphorus, available potassium, pH and soil organic matter.Total nitrogen (N) showed a slightly decreasing trend in the first three years and showed a slight increase at the end of experiment under ZT in all locations. The total N under ZT changed from 0.12 to 0.13%, 0.05 to 0.06%, 0.10 to 0.12%, 0.11 to 0.08% and 0.09 to 0.13% in Salbani, Bhokraha, Simariya, Bhaluwa and Kaptanganj, respectively.  All locations showed the positive values of available potassium; Salbani  revealing considerable change of 64.3 to 78.5 mg/kg in CT while 68.4 to 73.3 mg/kg in ZT condition. The treatment where rice was transplanted in unpuddled condition and zero tilled to wheat, had a mean value of available phosphorus and potassium as 87.3 and 81.9 mg/kg respectively. Soil pH ranged from 4.8 to 7.1 in CT while it was 5.2 to 6.8 in ZT across the locations. The change in soil organic matter in CT of all locations except Salbani was narrower as compared to ZT

Latin America and East Asia in the Context of an Insurance Model of Currency Crises

This paper focuses on the 1995 Latin American and 1997 East Asian crises using an insurance-based model of financial crises. First the model of Dooley (forthcoming) is described. Second, some empirical evidence for an insurance model is presented. The key variables in this approach include the ratio of foreign exchange reserves to bank loans (domestic credit) extended to the private sector, the ability of the private sector to appropriate government assets, and appropriation as measured by capital flight. We argue that the insurance model is consistent with the observed evolution of these variables in the recent crises in Latin America and Asia. Finally, we examine the statistical evidence in favor of the model using panel regressions. We find that the econometric results are consistent with the insurance model, and tend to support this approach over some competing explanations.

Correlated bosons in a one-dimensional optical lattice: Effects of the trapping potential and of quasiperiodic disorder

We investigate the effect of the trapping potential on the quantum phases of strongly correlated ultracold bosons in one-dimensional periodic and quasiperiodic optical lattices. By means of a decoupling meanfield approach, we characterize the ground state of the system and its behavior under variation of the harmonic trapping, as a function of the total number of atoms. For a small atom number the system shows an incompressible Mott-insulating phase, as the size of the cloud remains unaffected when the trapping potential is varied. When the quasiperiodic potential is added the system develops a metastable-disordered phase which is neither compressible nor Mott insulating. This state is characteristic of quasidisorder in the presence of a strong trapping potential.Comment: Accepted for publication in PR