Background:Substance abuse (SA) refers to the harmful or hazardous use of psychoactive substances, including alcohol and illicit drugs. The most common substances which are usually abused are alcohol and tobacco. Herein, we assessed the prevalence of SA among regular degree health science students of the Sheba University College (SUC).Materials and Methods:A cross-sectional survey was carried out among 1076 SUC students using self-administered structured questionnaire. The simple sampling technique was used to select students. Descriptive statistics, bivariate, and multivariate analysis were done.Results:The overall prevalence of “ever used substance” for at least one was 45.5%. The most commonly used drugs in descending order were alcohol (25.1%), cigarette (11.4%), and khat (9.2%). Male participants, urban setting, peer pressure, personal pleasure, and academic dissatisfaction and pocket money were highly associated with SA.Conclusion:This study showed a lower magnitude (45.6% ever use and 21% still using) of SA among students' compared to other studies. Even if a considerable decrease in SA among study subjects, the creation of awareness and health education should be continued to fully combat the problem of abuse.

Background:People use khat (Catha edulis) for its pleasant stimulant effect of physical activity, consciousness, motor, and mental functions. Although there are reports assessing the effect of khat on memory, there was no study based on formal systematic review and meta-analysis.Objective:We have therefore conducted this meta-analysis to determine the level of evidence for the effect of khat (C. edulis Forsk) on memory discrepancy.Methods:MEDLINE, Cochrane Library, PubMed, Academic Search Complete, SPORTDiscus, ScienceDirect, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar were searched to retrieve the papers for this review. Keywords utilized across database search were khat, cat, chat, long-term memory, short-term memory, memory deficit, randomized control trial, and cross-sectional survey. The search was limited to studies in humans and rodents; published in English language.Result:Finding of various studies included in our meta-analysis showed that the effect of acute, and subchronic exposure to khat showed that short-term memory appears to be affected depending on the duration of exposure. However, does not have any effect on long-term memory.Conclusion:Although a number of studies regarding the current topic are limited, the evidenced showed that khat (C. edulis) induced memory discrepancy.

BackgroundHepatitis B virus is one of the most causative agents of human liver disease, including acute and chronic hepatitis, cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. The disease is a great health problem worldwide, with estimated of 350 million chronically infected people. Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of hepatitis B virus in Tefera Hailu Memorial Hospital (THMH) for the last three years (2013, 2014, 2015) by using secondary data.MethodA three year retrospective record review was conducted from March 01/2015-July 30/2015. All registered data for hepatitis B virus serological screening of the specified period were included. The data were collected by predesigned data collection sheet. The sample size was calculated by simple statistical estimation to be 149 for each year.ResultOf 482 subjects, 215 (44.60 %) were females and 267 (55.40 %) were males. The overall prevalence of HBV was 102 (21.16 %). The positivity rate was 69 (14.31 %) in the age group between 15 and 45. There was a decrease in the prevalence of HBV from 2012 up to 2014.ConclusionThe seroprevalence of HBsAg was higher in males than in females and the yearly prevalence decreases from 2012–2014. But HBV infection is still a public health problem in Ethiopia. Therefore intensification of health education concerning modes of transmission and prevention of HBV, early case finding and treatment is recommended to reduce the spread of the disease.