Usual Source of Care among Patients with Psychological Distress and its Effects on Healthcare Expenditures, Utilization, and Patient Satisfaction

Usual Source of Care among Patients with Psychological Distress and its Effects on Healthcare Expenditures, Utilization, and Patient Satisfactio

The impact of foreign direct investment on agricultural output of Nigeria

This study examines the impact of Foreign Direct Investment on Agricultural output in Nigeria from 1970-2012 using an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model. Data were sourced from the National Bureau of statistic (NBS), Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and the World Development Indicators. Results from the analysis reveal that Foreign Direct Investment, Government expenditure and Exchange rates in the period under study have significant positive effects on Agricultural output, whereas Interest rates and Inflation variables have negative effect on Agricultural output, although the Inflation rate is not significant. Increase in volume of Foreign Direct Investment is recommended, Government and other stakeholders should seek Foreign Direct Investment. It is also recommended to improve macroeconomic policies that will encourage agricultural sector productivity in Nigeri

The Effect of Religious Conflicts in Northern Nigeria on Public Health Outcomes: A Case Study of Cholera Outbreak

Violent conflicts, in most cases, pose an unquantifiable challenge to human health and health systems especially in developing countries. Complex humanitarian emergencies as a result of conflicts could severely have negative consequences on public health. Nigeria has faced series of threatening security challenges, but the one caused by the activities of the socalled Islamist sect, the Boko Haram (BH), remains protracted, especially in Borno, a State in the north-eastern part of the country. The resultant outcome is the internally displaced persons (IDPs) who have suffered from many diseases especially cholera, which has continued to ravage these displaced populations. Conflict can contribute to water shortage through the destruction of water sources, such as wells, reservoirs and laid pipes, and its contamination. This is happening on an already weak health system. Though cholera is easily treatable, concerted efforts by government and medical humanitarian agencies are urgently required to ameliorate the situation of the IDPs. An appropriate strategy of control of the transmission of cholera and emergency medical intervention can help alleviate the devastating effects. The management of cholera transmission include the supply of sufficient water sources, adequate sanitation, and a public health campaign to maximize the effects of these measures. One key health system challenge that could limit the effectiveness of the interventions would be the people. This paper focuses on studying the resultant large numbers of IDPs from the BH conflict, discussing cholera outbreak as a specific health issue, and presenting a focused humanitarian intervention to address this health need

SOCIAL MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES AS DETERMINANTS TO INFORMATION SHARING AMONG LIS STUDENTS IN KWARA STATE UNIVERSITY, MALETE

This study examines social media technologies as determinants to information sharing among Library and Information science students in Kwara State University, Malete. This study adopts descriptive survey method of research design. The population includes the students of Library and Information Science, Kwara State University, Malete with population of 1431. The sample size was selected using Raosoft sample size table. However the study used simple random sampling technique with sample size of 304 while web-based questionnaire was used in the data collection. Link to the web-based questionnaire was shared on the different social media platforms of WhatsApp and Telegram of students. However, only 192 students responded to the questionnaire which represent 63% return rate. This is consider enough and accepted for the study. The study found out that majority of respondents use Facebook, Linkedln, WhatsApp and YouTube as social media technologies to share information. The study also revealed that LIS students in Kwara state university use social media technologies to share information on political, education, economic and entertainment. Finally, the study also revealed that inadequate power supply, lack of internet access, lack of proper maintenance of infrastructure and equipment and lack of enthusiasm on the part of instructors as challenges LIS students encountered in using social media technologies to sharing information in Kwara State University, Malete. The study recommends that Alternative power supply should be provided and training and workshop should be stage for students to have better skills on the use social media technologies

Bridging the Gap Between Theatre Practice and Islamic Studies: An Interdisciplinary Engagement

Theatre is seen as all-encompassing because it delves into every aspect of life as the case may be. On the other hand, Islamic studies deals also, with every aspect of life because it is religious based. To an extent, most Islamic scholars agreed that it a total way of life. But as agreeing as it seems with both disciplines, there exist disparities and misconceptions about theatre and drama by those with religious bigotry. They have misconstrued the discipline of theatre as misleading and misguiding. There is no denying the fact that some persons in any area of study may try to misbehave sometimes, but that may not be concluded as everybody in the particular field of study is wayward. This menace has contributed in painting the theatre discipline black, thus affecting the practice. It is against this backdrop that the study aims at constructing the bridge of understanding between both disciplines, engaging interdisciplinary paradigm. Hence, in order to achieve this, the study adopts the survey approach of quantitative research methodology to investigate how some Muslims have misconstrued theatre and the possible mediation into the challenge. The findings of the study reveal that people, especially Muslims misunderstood theatre because the character and behaviour most people in the discipline portray. The paper thus, concludes that there is need for theatre artists to re-mould the mode of dressing and general behaviour for societal acceptance. Hence, the study recommends that, Islam and Muslims have a very important role in this reconstruction bid between theatre and Islamic studies

A New Hybrid Approach for Solving Large-scale Monotone Nonlinear Equations

In this paper, a new hybrid conjugate gradient method for solving monotone nonlinear equations is introduced. The scheme is a combination of the Fletcher-Reeves (FR) and Polak-Ribiére-Polyak (PRP) conjugate gradient methods with the Solodov and Svaiter projection strategy. Using suitable assumptions, the global convergence of the scheme with monotone line search is provided. Lastly, a numerical experiment was used to enumerate the suitability of the proposed scheme for large-scale problems

Uncovering behavioural diversity amongst high-strength Pseudomonas spp. surfactants at the limit of liquid surface tension reduction

Bacterial biosurfactants have a wide range of biological functions and biotechnological applications. Previous analyses had suggested a limit to their reduction of aqueous liquid surface tensions (γ Min), and here we confirm this in an analysis of 25 Pseudomonas spp. strains isolated from soil which produce high-strength surfactants that reduce surface tensions to 25.2 ± 0.1-26.5 ± 0.2 mN m -1 (the surface tension of sterile growth medium and pure water was 52.9 ± 0.4 mN m-1 and 72.1 ± 1.2 mN m -1, respectively). Comparisons of culture supernatants produced using different growth media and semi-purified samples indicate that the limit of 24.2-24.7 mN m -1 is not greatly influenced by culture conditions, pH or NaCl concentrations. We have used foam, emulsion and oil-displacement behavioural assays as a simple and cost-effective proxy for in-depth biochemical characterisation, and these suggest that there is significant structural diversity amongst these surfactants that may reflect different biological functions and offer new biotechnological opportunities. Finally, we obtained a draft genome for the strain producing the highest strength surfactant, and identified a cluster of non-ribosomal protein synthase genes that may produce a cyclic lipopeptide (CLP)-like surfactant. Further investigation of this group of related bacteria recovered from the same site will allow a better understanding of the significance of the great variety of surfactants produced by bacterial communities found in soil and elsewhere. </p

Linear programming application in optimal allocation of buses to inter and intra state routes from Katsina State Transport Authority Service, Nigeria

In this paper, we study Linear Programming application in optimal allocation of Buses to inter and intra state routes from Katsina State transport authority services to maximize profit and boost the state’s internally generated revenue. The problem was formulated from the data collected at their headquarters and by taking into consideration all the constraints. The TORA (a software for finding solution to linear programming problems) was used to obtained the solution to the model which yielded the maximum objective value of ₦729, 578 daily after 16 iterations. This gives better result when compared to the current initiative schedule by the authority that yields ₦584, 652 per day. By the recommendation schedule, the State will be getting additional ₦144,926.00 daily which translates to 24.8% daily profit increase and over ₦4,000,000.00 monthly when implemented