A hospital based cross sectional study was carried out to analyze prevalence of risk factors for stroke in hospitalized patient in a medical college hospital. 100 patients were chosen using purposive sampling technique. Highest incidence of stroke was between the 6th and 7th decade. Patients came from both urban (54%) and rural (46%) areas and most of them belong to the low-income group (47%). In occupational category; service holder (28%) and retired person (21%) were the highest groups. Most of the study subjects were literate (63%). CT scan study revealed that the incidence of ischaemic stroke was 61% and haemorrhagic stroke 39%. Analysis indicated hypertension as major risk factor for stroke (63%) and major portion of the patients (42.85%) were on irregular or no treatment. Twenty four percent of the patients had heart diseases and out of 24 patients 45.83% were suffering from ischaemic heart disease. The present study detected diabetes in 21% patients. Fifty three percent of the study subjects were smoker, 39% patients had habit of betelnut chewing. Out of 26 female patients, only 23% had history of using oral contraceptives. Majority of the patients were sedentary workers (46%). Thirty seven percent of the stroke patients were obese. Among the stroke patients 9% had previous history of stroke and 3% had TIA respectively. Most of the patients (21%) were awake while they suffered from stroke and the time of occurrence was mostly in the afternoon (46%). This study found that hypertension, cigarette smoking, ischaemic heart disease and diabetes mellitus are the major risk factors prevalent in our community while other risk factors demand further study.

Knowledge about the existing disease pattern and health seeking behavior is essential to provide need based health care delivery to any population and to make the health care system more pro-poor. A community based cross sectional study was conducted among 493 systematically selected households in the Modhukhali Upazilla of Faridpur District to determine the prevailing disease pattern and health seeking behavior in rural Bangladesh. Data were collected through face-to-face interview of the selected respondents. More than half of the respondents gave history of illness of her or her family members during the preceding 15 days. Fever (33.2%), gastrointestinal diseases (24.9%) and respiratory diseases (17.8%) were the most reported complaints. Overall, there were no discernible differences in the likelihood of seeking traditional or any kind of care considering socio-demographic variables and prevailing disease types. Occupation of household head as day labor or in agriculture and suffering from gastrointestinal diseases positively predicted use of para-professionals. Use of un-qualified allopths was negatively predicted by the male gender or literacy of the household head and presence of gastrointestinal, respiratory and other types of diseases and positively predicted by occupation of the household head in agricultural field or as day labor. Use of qualified allopaths was positively predicted by respiratory, skin/eye/ENT and other types of diseases and also by standard of living and relationship of the respondents with household head and negatively predicted by agricultural or day labor work of the household head. Existence of several distinct therapeutic systems in a single cultural setting was found to be an important feature of health care system in the study area. This study concluded that it is important to develop a need based health care delivery system and actions should be taken to improve the overall scenario of health system of rural Bangladesh. Key words: Disease pattern; health seeking behavior; rural area; Bangladesh DOI: 10.3329/fmcj.v6i1.7408 Faridpur Med. Coll. J. 2011;6(1): 32-37

This descriptive type of cross sectional study was conducted among the psychiatric patients who had attended at the out patient department of psychiatry in Mitford Hospital Dhaka, with the objective of assessing the nutritional status of psychiatric patients. Mean age of the patients were 34.87 ±12.63 years. Of the total 150 patients, 56% were male and 44% were female. Among the study subjects, 54% were married, 30% unmarried, 10% divorced and 5% were widow. Regarding occupation, 12% of the patients were in service, 8.7% were students and 24.7% were unemployed. Among the psychiatric patients, 42% had schizophrenia, 36.7% were bipolar mood disorder and 21.3% had other type of disorders. BMI of 66.7% patients were normal, 22% below normal and 11.3% were above normal. Among all the patients 71.4% male and 60.6% female were normal by BMI, whereas 11.3% patients were over weight. Among the over weight patients, 6% were male and 18.2% were female. In the present study 22% patients were under weight, where 22.6% were male and 21.2% were female. Nutritional assessment showed 61.9% male patients and 63.64% of female patients had normal MAC. Maximum of patients (72%) were anemic clinically. Again according to marital status 74.1% married and 58% of unmarried patients were found normal by BMI. In the study, 66.7% schizophrenic patients and 65.5% BMD patients were found in normal BMI. DOI: 10.3329/taj.v22i1.5022 TAJ 2009; 22(1): 82-87

Hypertension is an important independent predictor of cardiovascular disease, cerebrovascular accidents and death. The prevalence of cardiovascular diseases and hypertension is rapidly increasing in developing countries. A cross sectional study was conducted among 103 hypertensive patients during December 2009 to June 2010 in Goshair Hat Upazilla of Shariatpur District to determine the socio-demographic, clinical characteristics and status of control of hypertension in rural population. Respondents were distributed more or less equally among males and females. The mean ± SD and median age of the respondents were calculated as 59.97 ± 11.12 years, with 64% of them were included in the age group of 51 to 70 years. More than half of the respondents were housewives (51.5%), which were followed by businessmen (21.4%). Every three of five patients were over weight, while 22.3% respondents were obese. One third of the respondents were also diabetic (33%). None of the 103 patients had achieved the target for SBP (Systolic blood pressure) control (<140mm of Hg) and only 21.4% of the patients had achieved the target for DBP (Diastolic blood pressure) control (<90 mm of Hg). Again none of the diabetic hypertensive patients had achieved the target for SBP control (<130mm of Hg) and only one patient had achieved the target for DBP control (<80 mm of Hg). Overall five patients were found to have uncontrolled and severe hypertension (BP >180/110 mm of Hg), all of whom were female. From this study control of hypertension was found poor among rural hypertensive population. For effectively combating the burden of hypertension in this population, education and awareness about hypertension needs to be given priority. Key words: Hypertension; socio-demographic characteristics; rural area; control of blood pressure DOI: 10.3329/fmcj.v6i1.7402 Faridpur Med. Coll. J. 2011;6(1): 05-09

This cross- sectional study was conducted among the truck drivers at Daulatdia Ghat, Goalanda, Rajbari district. The objective of this study was to find out the knowledge and awareness about the risk of HIV/AIDS transmission among the truck drivers .Out of 226 respondents, 37.3% were within the age group 25 to 35 years. Most of the respondents (74%) were married and 44% were educated up to primary level. Half of the respondents (50%) had monthly income from taka 10,000 to taka 15,000 per month. From this study, it was found that 97% respondents had heard the name of HIV/AIDS, 61.8% had known about HIV/AIDS from media and newspaper. In respect of the route of HIV transmission, 39.8% of respondents thought that HIV is transmitted by sexual activities and 58.7% thought the disease is transmitted by syringe, transfusion. About 47.8% respondents thought that HIV can be detected from blood and 76% knew the fate of HIV/AIDS is death. Majority (82.5%) of the respondents obtained correct knowledge about HIV/AIDS transmission and 13.2% of them knew the place where test of HIV can be done. Key words: Knowledge; HIV/AIDS; Risk; Truck drivers DOI: 10.3329/fmcj.v5i2.6820Faridpur Med. Coll. J. 2010;5(2):46-49