Background: Adolescence is characterized by unique, multiple physical, psychological and social development. Understanding the well-being of adolescents and the factors that contribute to it will help towards clarifying and defining ways to better help adolescents prepare for adult life. Therefore, the present study aims to find out the relationship between Perceived Social Support (PSS) and Psychological Well-Being (PWB) among Nepalese adolescence based on mediating role of Self-esteem (SE). Methods: The study was conducted among 348 adolescents studying in grade 9 and 10 of government secondary level schools of Pokhara Metropolitan city, Nepal. Data were collected through self-administered standard tools-Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS), Rosenberg self-esteem scale (RSES) and General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12). For statistical analysis descriptive statistics, correlation, regression and mediation analyses were used. The statistical significance of mediating effect of the tested model was examined through a path proposed by Baron and Kenny and Bootstrap method. Results: Overall, the finding suggests that PSS indirectly affects PWB of adolescents through mediating variable SE. Adolescents who perceive good social support had higher SE, which in turn contributed to their PWB. Furthermore, the study found no significant gender difference for PSS, SE and PWB. Also among various sources of PSS, both boys and girls were more oriented towards family for social support than friends and others. Conclusion: Adolescents who experience higher social support are likely to have higher SE and are more likely to have better PWB. The findings of the study will be useful to the parents, teachers, counselors, psychologist and researchers to develop strategies to enhance adolescent's mental health.

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Background: An efficient ambulance service is a vital component of emergency medical services. We determined the emergency ambulance response and transport times and ambulance exit outcomes in Bhutan. Methods: A cross-sectional study involving real-time monitoring of emergency ambulance deployments managed by a central toll-free (112) hotline (20 October 2021 to 20 January 2022) was carried out. Results: Of 5092 ambulance deployments, 4291 (84%) were inter-facility transfers, and 801 (16%) were for emergencies. Of the latter, 703 (88%) were for non-pregnancy-related emergencies (i.e., medical, surgical, and accidents), while 98 (12%) were for pregnancy-related emergencies. The median ambulance response and patient transport times were 42 (IQR 3–271) and 41 (IQR 2–272) minutes, respectively. The median round-trip distance travelled by ambulances was 18 km (range 1–186 km). For ambulance exit outcomes that were pregnancy-related (n = 98), 89 (91%) reached the health facility successfully, 8 delivered prior to ambulance arrival at the scene or in the ambulance during transport, and 1 had no outcome record. For the remaining 703 non-pregnancy deployments, 29 (4.1%) deployments were deemed not required or refusals, and 656 (93.3%) reached the health facility successfully; 16 (2.3%) died before the ambulance’s arrival at the scene, and 2 (0.3%) were not recorded. Conclusions: This first countrywide real-time operational research showed acceptable ambulance exit outcomes. Improving ambulance response and transport times might reduce morbidities and mortalities further.

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Health care providers are at risk of acquiring human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection from occupational exposure, with nurses being the most vulnerable. Post exposure prophylaxis (PEP) of HIV is the only way to reduce risk of HIV after potential exposure. A study was conducted on Nurses Knowledge on PEP of HIV at Gandaki Medical College (GMC), Pokhara to find out the knowledge on PEP of HIV among nurses. Descriptive cross sectional research design was used for the study. Probability stratified systematic random sampling technique was used for sampling and self administered questionnaires was used for data collection with sample size of 90 nurses working in GMC. The data was analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 20 software programme and presented in terms of frequency distribution, percentage, mean and standard deviation. For inferential statistics, chi square test was used at 5% level of significance. The findings of the study revealed that mean age of the respondents was 24.57 with standard deviation 3.43. Out of 90 respondents majority (83.3%) of the respondents were PCL passed and 47.8% of the respondents had adequate knowledge regarding PEP of HIV. The study found no significant association between demographic variables and knowledge level. It can be concluded that the nurses need to improve their level of knowledge on PEP of HIV by participating in different training programs. Health institution should also conduct continue nursing education programme to improve and update knowledge among the employees.