Occupational hazard perception and safety practices among workers of small-scale industries in Kano, Nigeria

Work-related injuries present a major public health problem resulting in serious social and economic consequences that could be prevented by adopting appropriate occupational health and safety measures Objective: This study assessed occupational hazard perception, safety practices and associated factors among workers of small scale industries in Kano. Method: A descriptive cross-sectional design was used to study 187 randomly selected workers of Small Scale Industries. Data was collected using interviewer administered semi-structured questionnaire and analyzed with IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, version 22. Results: The mean age of the workers was 24.41 ± 6.20 years with a range of 15 to 52 years. A thirdof the workers (35.3%) had at least secondary school education and most (88.3%) had worked for 10 years or less. Overall, 95.7% of the workers have good perception about occupational hazards and safety and 92.0% believed that exposure to hazards of work may affect their health. Up to 67.9% of the respondents reported being caught-up in at least one form of occupational accident, most common were dislocation (39.4%) and burns (19.7%). Most of the workers (97.3%) reported that their industries do not have any policy on health and safety and 73.8% had never been trained or advised on safety procedures. Only 49(26.2%) reported having safety measure(s) against specific accidents in their workplaces. Conclusion: Most SSIs in Kano do not have policy on health and safety. Factory inspectors should ensure effective compliance monitoring and enforcementof safety guidelines in these industries

A Dynamic Partial Computation Offloading for the Metaverse in In-Network Computing

The In-Network Computing (COIN) paradigm is a promising solution that leverages unused network resources to perform some tasks to meet up with computation-demanding applications, such as metaverse. In this vein, we consider the metaverse partial computation offloading problem for multiple subtasks in a COIN environment to minimise energy consumption and delay while dynamically adjusting the offloading policy based on the changing computation resources status. We prove that the problem is NP and thus transformed it into two subproblems: task splitting problem (TSP) on the user side and task offloading problem (TOP) on the COIN side. We modelled the TSP as an ordinal potential game (OPG) and proposed a decentralised algorithm to obtain its Nash Equilibrium (NE). Then, we model the TOP as Markov Decision Process (MDP) proposed double deep Q-network (DDQN) to solve for the optimal offloading policy. Unlike the conventional DDQN algorithm, where intelligent agents sample offloading decisions randomly within a certain probability, our COIN agent explores the NE of the TSP and the deep neural network. Finally, simulation results show that our proposed model approach allows the COIN agent to update its policies and make more informed decisions, leading to improved performance over time compared to the traditional baseline.Comment: 14 pages, 9 figure

Knowledge of hospital waste, and safe management practices among healthcare workers in aminu kano teaching hospital, Northwest Nigeria

Management of healthcare waste (HCW) has continued to generate increasing public health interest due to the health problems associated with exposure of human beings to wastes, arising from healthcare services. Objective: This study assessed knowledge of hospital waste, and safe management practices among healthcare workers in Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, Northwest Nigeria. Method: Descriptive cross-sectional study design was used to study 152 healthcare workers in Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital. Data was collected using semistructured self-administered questionnaire and analyzed using IBM SPSS version 22. Results: The mean age of the respondents was 35.3±6.4 years with about one-half 77(50.7%) within the age range of ≥35 years. Majority 108(71.1%) of the healthcare workers were males and 145(95.4%) had tertiary education. Doctors constituted 44(28.9%) with up to 105(69.1%) respondents employed less than 10 years ago. Majority of the respondents 123(80.9%) versus 120(78.9%) had satisfactory knowledge and safe hospital waste management practices respectively. Statistically significant association was found between attending training on hospital waste management and having satisfactory knowledge of hospital waste management (χ²=11.8, p-value=0.001) with those who had previous training on hospital waste management to been 4 times more likely to have satisfactory knowledge of hospital waste management than those with no previous training on hospital waste management {AOR=3.7, 95%CI=(1.3-10.8)}. Satisfactory knowledge of hospital waste was found to be statistically associated with correct hospital waste management practices (χ²=30.4, p-value<0.001), healthcare workers with satisfactory knowledge had many folds likelihood of safe hospital waste management practice {AOR=9,95%CI= (2.9- 28.4)}.Conclusions:Knowledge of hospital waste and safe waste management practices were encouraging and associated with formal training on hospital waste management. Therefore, Hospital management should ensure regular training and re-training of healthcare workers

Incidence of vulvovaginal candidiasis associated with Candida albicans among pregnant women attending Gombe State Specialist Hospital, Gombe, Nigeria

Vulvovaginal candidiasis (VVC) is a common cause of vaginitis during pregnancy. It is a source of great physical and psychological discomfort as well as suffering. Samples of endocervical and high vaginal swab were collected from 150 women attending Gombe specialist hospital and were inoculated on Saboraud Dextrose Agar (SDA) incorporated with  Chloramphenicol to rid the culture of bacterial contaminants. Gram’s staining technique and Germ tube test were employed for the identification, as, Candida albicans is positive for both. The gram positive ones were 132 (88%) and were also subjected to germ tube test. 18 (12%) were found to be gram negative. Of the gram positive ones, 120 (91%) were also positive for germ tube test; confirming the presence of Candidaalbicans. Antifungal susceptibility testing revealed that Ketoconazole was more effective at concentrations of 20, 50 and 100ìg/disc with zones of inhibitions of 18.50, 23.50 and 35.50mm respectively, than Griseofulvin (Fulcin) with only 26.00mm zone of inhibition at 100ìg/disc concentration.Keywords: Vulvovaginal, Endocervical, High vaginal swab, Antifungal susceptibility, Candida albicans

Barriers and facilitators to human immunodeficiency virus sero-status disclosure in a tertiary health facility in Kano, Nigeria

Disclosure of Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) sero-status to sexual partners, family and friends is essential in preventing HIV transmission. An array of benefits has been associated with disclosure; such as early referral to care and treatment, reduced stigma and increased social support. Objectives: We determined the prevalence, barriers and facilitators to HIV sero-status disclosure among clients attending the Antiretroviral (ARV) clinic in AminuKano-Teaching Hospital, Kano. Method: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among 231 HIV positive patients attending ARV clinic at AKTH using a systematic sampling technique. Interviewer-administered semi-structured questionnaire was used to obtain respondent's socio-demographic characteristics, disclosure status, barriers and facilitators of HIV sero-status disclosure. We conducted univariate, bivariate and multivariate analysis using SPSS version 22, and a p- value ≤0.05 was considered as the level of significance. Results: The mean age of the respondents was 35 ± 8.64 years with a male to female sex distribution of 53% to 47 % respectively. Majority were not married (74.0%) and two thirds (67%) were Muslims. This study found that 60% of the respondents had disclosed their HIV sero-status and 97% of them had done so voluntarily. The fear of divorce/neglect (p<0.01, aOR=0.017, 95% CI=0.02-0.15) and fear of stigma (p<0.01, aOR=0.03, 95% CI= 0.00-0.03) were found as barriers to HIV sero-status disclosure. Financial difficulties (p<0.01, aOR=3.03, 95% CI=1.16-5.61) and the need for improved access to necessary medical care (p=0.04, aOR=6.52, 95% CI=1.85-23.15) were found to facilitate HIV sero status disclosure. Conclusion: The study found a low HIV sero-status disclosure in Kano. Disclosure being major recommendation by World Health Organisation and the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention requires strengthening during patients counselling and education sessions

TRADITIONAL BIRTH ATTENDANTS AND REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH SERVICES IN THE CONTEXT OF COVID-19: A SCOPING REVIEW

Background: In developing countries, the lack of accessible, affordable and acceptable orthodox care makes a significant proportion of the populace patronize the nearby available and cheap traditional birth attendants (TBAs) that share similar local custom and tradition. Although there are widely diverging shreds of evidence regarding their effectiveness as health care providers, they may have a limited role as a workforce during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic where the more community-based distribution of commodities is increasingly considered due to movement restrictions. However, it is still doubtful if their integration into the formal health system may substantially contribute to basic health care delivery especially in the rural often hard to reach areas. Objectives: To explore the various roles of TBAs in reproductive health service delivery with implication for redefining their roles especially with the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic. Methodology: We searched and reviewed relevant literature on TBAs in PubMed, Africa Journals Online (AJOL) and Google scholar and relevant institutional websites for the role of TBAs pre and during the pandemic. The databases searched yielded 92 articles of potential significance to this review. After title/abstract review, 65 articles were moved to full document review. Nineteen articles explicitly and strictly focusing on TBAs concerning reproductive health were included in this review. Results: TBAs are providers of a wide range of reproductive health services and training to expand their roles and makes them safer is necessary for any consideration of their engagement; this implies the fight against COVID-19. TBAs should only be engaged if the gap in the resources for health must be filled by leveraging on their existing traditional roles and acceptance in the community. Conclusion: TBAs are widely utilised providers of care to their communities especially in the area of maternal care. With increasing emphasis on community-based services in healthcare delivery and the emergence of COVID-19, their roles must be reviewed and updated regularly to redefine their role in the health care delivery system especially because of the myriad personal and technical limitations associated with them. Any engagement with them should be with caution and as a stop-gap measure

Categorical data analysis using SPSS for periodontology

Statistics is a very powerful tool for data measurement. It can give meaning to meaningless numbers. On the basis, data can be classified as categorical or continuous. This book focuses on categorical data analysis. Categorical data classifies an observation to one or more categories. To get a clear understanding on how to analyze categorical data, this book emphasizes on categorical data analysis, especially for all beginners among dental students, dental researchers and dental lecturers. It is a compulsory method of analysis that researchers should learn, as it provides core skills that will be very useful for conducting categorical data analysis. Besides that, this book gives the researchers an idea on how to design a study that will optimize the output of the research study

Endobronchial Tuberculosis Simulating Lung Cancer and Healing without Bronchial Stenosis

Endobroncheal tuberculosis is defined as tuberculous infection of the tracheobronchial tree with microbial and histopathological evidence. The disease is usually mistaken for other lung diseases including lung cancer. Bronchial stenosis is a common complication of this type of tuberculosis despite the use of effective anti-tuberculous chemotherapy. We are presenting a case of endobronchial tuberculosis that simulated lung cancer and healed without residual bronchial stenosis

Malaysian and Italian trend line for Covid-19: A study on trend analysis

The first objective of this study was to evaluate trend line pattern, obtain the appropriate statistical equation model, and predict individual numbers infected by Covid-19. The second objective is to obtain a predictive equation model and forecast death rate for Malaysia and Italy. Malaysia's first positive case Covid-19 recorded January 24, 2020, consisting of three cases. Collected from January 24 to March 29, 2020. Sixty-six day-observations, based on their trend line pattern, earned special attention. Although the first positive case was identified on January 31, 2020, involving two patients. From January 31 to March 29, 2020, approximately 59 observations were collected from Italy. On 18 March 2020, the pattern will contrast with the Malaysian Movement Control Order (MCO). Malaysia and Italy collect death figures. A similar methodology will be applied to find the best-fitted model that fits both countries' death-number scenario. In Italy, the number of Covid-19-infected patients rises and meets quadratic trend line patterns. This induces extreme public distress and diversion. The quadratic trend line series analysed individual Covid-19-infected results. After March 18, 2020, it will continue to use a linear pattern. However, trend deaths also follow quadratic trend line pattern. Trend-line quadratic matched Italy's results. The quadratic line-of-trend model projection demonstrated dominance in estimating infected Covid-19. The quadratic death line from daily death collection data also showed superiority in estimating death number. The fitted quadratic model is better fitted in the Malaysian case, but the pattern shifts to linear trend line after MCO is implemented

Antihyperglycemic and Antioxidative Effects of Hydroxyethyl Methylcellulose (HEMC) and Hydroxypropyl Methylcellulose (HPMC) in Mice Fed with a High Fat Diet

The effect of dietary feeding of hydroxyethyl methylcellulose (HEMC) and hydroxypropyl methylcellulose (HPMC) on the glucose metabolism and antioxidative status in mice under high fat diet conditions was investigated. The mice were randomly divided and given experimental diets for six weeks: normal control (NC group), high fat (HF group), and high fat supplemented with either HEMC (HF+HEMC group) or HPMC (HF+HPMC group). At the end of the experimental period, the HF group exhibited markedly higher blood glucose and insulin levels as well as a higher erythrocyte lipid peroxidation rate relative to the control group. However, diet supplementation of HEMC and HPMC was found to counteract the high fat-induced hyperglycemia and oxidative stress via regulation of antioxidant and hepatic glucose-regulating enzyme activities. These findings illustrate that HEMC and HPMC were similarly effective in improving the glucose metabolism and antioxidant defense system in high fat-fed mice and they may be beneficial as functional biomaterials in the development of therapeutic agents against high fat dietinduced hyperglycemia and oxidative stress