Background Dengue, the mosquito borne disease has become a growing public health threat in Bangladesh due to its gradual increasing morbidity and mortality since 2000. In 2019, the country witnessed the worst ever dengue outbreak. The present study was conducted to characterize the socio-economic factors and knowledge, attitude and practice (KAP) status towards dengue among the people of Bangladesh. Method A cross-sectional study was conducted with 1,010 randomly selected respondents from nine different administrative regions of Bangladesh between July and November 2019. A structured questionnaire was used covering socio-demographic characteristics of the participants including their knowledge, awareness, treatment and practices regarding dengue fever. Factors associated with the knowledge and awareness of dengue were investigated separately, using multivariable logistic regression. Results Although majority (93.8%) of the respondents had heard about dengue, however, they had still misconceptions about Aedes breeding habitat. Around half of the study population (45.7%) had mistaken belief that Aedes can breed in dirty water and 43.1% knew that Aedes mosquito usually bites around sunrise and sunset. Fever indication was found in 36.6% of people which is the most common symptom of dengue. Among the socio-demographic variables, the level of education of the respondents was identified as an independent predictor for both knowledge (p<0.05) and awareness (p<0.05) of dengue. The preventive practice level was moderately less than the knowledge level though there was a significant association (p<0.05) existed between knowledge and preventive practices. Our study noted that TV/Radio is an effective predominant source of information about dengue fever. Conclusion As dengue is emerging in Bangladesh, there is an urgent need to increase health promotion activities through campaigns for eliminating the misconception and considerable knowledge gaps about dengue.

Introduction Cervical cancer is the second most common gynecological cancer in Bangladesh. Lack of awareness of screening methods, risk factors, and symptoms may lead to presenting most cervical cancers at an advanced stage. We investigated knowledge and awareness of cervical cancer (CCa) among females at the Sheikh Hasina Medical College (SHMC) of Tangail district in Bangladesh. Methods A cross sectional survey was conducted to collect data via a structured questionnaire from SHMC during the period of February 2019 to January 2020. Data on socio-demographic characteristics and knowledge of cervical cancer were collected. Multivariable logistic regression models were used to identify factors associated with having heard and knowledge of cervical cancer. A p-value <0.05 was considered significant. Result Of all the interviews conducted, only 45.2% (493/1090) had heard of cervical cancer as a disease. Women were more likely to be aware of CCa if they were lived in urban areas, had higher education (university level education) and belong to high income families. The study revealed evidence of significant association between marital, literacy, residence and socio-economic status with women’s knowledge on cervical cancer (p< 0.05). Conclusion This study serves to highlight that there was impoverished knowledge about cervical cancer among Bangladeshi women. Hence, this indicates the government should take proper steps to raise awareness and knowledge levels via educational programs and health counseling.

Background Breast cancer (BCa) is a leading cause of mortality among women in Bangladesh. Many young women in Bangladesh have poor knowledge about breast cancer screening, including risk factors, warning signs/symptoms, diagnosis and early detection. We investigated awareness about breast cancer risk factors as a screening tool among women at the Sheikh Hasina Medical College (SHMC) of Tangail district in Bangladesh. Methods A cross sectional survey was conducted to collect data via a structured questionnaire from SHMC during the period of February to December 2019. A total of 1,007 participants (aged 33.47 (±12.37 years)) was considered for data analysis. Results Of the 1,007 women, about 50% were knowledgeable about the risk factors. Pain in the breast was identified as the most commonly warning sign/symptom of breast cancer. Only 32.2% of respondents knew at least one breast cancer screening method. The mean knowledge was scored 3.43 ± 2.25 out of a total possible score of 8. Awareness of BCa was associated with residence, family history of breast cancer, marital, literacy and socio-economic status (p <0.05). Only 14.7% of women who knew about BSE said they were conducting regular breast self-examination. Unmarried women (aOR: 2.971; 95% CI: 1.108–7.968) were more likely to have performed BSE compared to married women (p <0.05). Conclusion Although most participants were aware of breast cancer; knowledge about risk factors, warning signs/symptoms, early diagnosis and detection was relatively poor. Knowledge about performing BSE was particularly low. This highlights the importance of increasing awareness about breast cancer risk factors and early detection among young women in Bangladesh.

Thalassemia is one of the most common life-threatening yet preventable congenital hemoglobin disorders especially in South Asian regions like Bangladesh. It has become a rising public health concern for Bangladesh as 6–12% of the population are carriers and many of them are unaware of it. The purpose of the study is to inspect the knowledge and attitude towards thalassemia among the general people of Bangladesh. A cross-sectional survey was conducted in eight administrative regions of Bangladesh between January and October of 2020. A structured questionnaire was designed to collect information about thalassemia and socio-demographic characteristics. Multivariate logistic regression models were used to identify factors associated with knowledge of thalassemia. A p-value <0.05 was considered significant. Of the 1,248 participants, only 47.4% had heard of thalassemia. Half of the participants who heard about the disease had no idea that thalassemia was not a transfusion transmitted disease. Only 49.8% of participant correctly identified consanguineous marriages as an important risk factor. Majority of them knew that marriage between two carriers can lead to a child with thalassemia major. About 72.5% knew that blood tests are a diagnosis method to determine thalassemia. Among the socio-demographic variables, the level of education of the respondents was identified as an independent predictor for knowledge (p<0.05) on thalassemia. For example, graduate (aOR: 24.88; 95% CI: 6.238–99.232) or post-graduate (aOR: 33.18; 95% CI: 7.864–140.001) participants were more aware of thalassemia than non-graduates. However, about 68.2% of the participants showed a positive attitude towards premarital screening of themselves or their family members and 85.3% were willing to donate blood to thalassemia patients. The study shows that there is a need to disseminate the information on thalassemia since the knowledge gap is huge among people. These findings will strengthen the implementation of thalassemia major awareness through educational programs, health counseling, premarital screening and campaigning.

Water is one of the most vital elements of ecosystem and human being, but unfortunately nowadays, the pollution of surface and drinking water is an alarming problem. The present work deals with the assessment of physicochemical and bacteriological profile of several pond, jar and tube-well water samples to ensure its suitability for using and drinking. Total 30 samples were randomly selected and collected from Nakla Paurosova of Sherpur district by following the standard procedure. Bacteriological analysis was carried out by following the standard bacteriological methods. Most of the surface water sampling points were polluted by dumping of waste, cattle wash and were not suitable for drinking or other domestic purposes. Among three heavy metals, only Iron was detected in six tube-well water samples, one was also positive to arsenic, rest of the water bodies were negative to all of these metals.

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Background: Food allergy is an abnormal response of some particular foods triggered by the body’s immune system. Food addiction which generally shares a similar neurobiological and behavioral framework with substance addiction like foods. The aim of this study was to evaluate common food items responsible for food allergy along with food addiction among Bangladeshi people.Methods: A cross-sectional study among 699 participants in the Tangail district of Bangladesh was done to record the presence of food allergy and food addiction patterns. Chi-square tests and logistic regression analysis were performed to assess the association between different factors with food allergy and food addiction.Results: It was found that brinjal was the most frequent food item responsible for 28.3% of people’s food allergy. The main symptoms due to the food allergy were about 28.5% itching and 22.7% rash on the skin. According to this study, 50.4% of allergic patients took medicine and most of the allergic patients didn’t seek medical advice. A maximum of 72.8% of allergic patients also had an addiction to food. Street foods like jhalmuri, fried foods were the general food addicted items covering 34.9%. Food-addicted participants with food allergies reported significantly more problems with foods, where obesity and heart disease are recognized as clinical effects due to having higher amounts of fat and sugar to these foods.Conclusions: The study revealed some important determinants of food allergic and food addiction that will help to increase our knowledge for the greater interest of our health and further research.