In spite of having been formulated nearly two decades back, there is as yet no consensus on the validity of the clinically popular self-medication hypothesis (SMH) of substance use disorders in patients with dual diagnosis. SMH broadly proposes that patients use substances in a non-random fashion so that the psychopharmacologic characteristics of particular substances are used to alleviate a variety of psychiatric symptoms and emotional distress. In order to test the SMH empirically, it was broken down to five sub-hypotheses, which were tested in a group of dual-diagnosis schizophrenia (DDS) patients vis-à-vis a group of only-schizophrenia (S) patients (n = 22 each). The DDS group scored lower than the S group regarding general and some specific psychopathology. The DDS patients ascribed reasons for substance use more often for hedonistic pursuit but also for reduction in symptoms and distress. There was a trend for alcohol to be used more for self-medication purposes compared to opioids and cannabis. The perceived effects of these three substances were significantly different on several symptom/distress dimensions. Finally, there was some degree of "match" between symptom-oriented reasons for use of substances and the effect that was perceived. All of this evidence provides a consistent but modest support for the SMH for "some patients, some substances, and some symptoms." The implications are discussed.
Awareness of CVD and its risk factors was far from optimal among the adolescent school-aged children in this study. A school-based educational program may help improve awareness of CVD and reduce the future disease burden in the community. The results of this study may be useful in formulating a nationwide school health program to deal with the emerging epidemic of CVD in countries such as India.
The conventional paper-based system for malaria surveillance is time-consuming, difficult to track and resource-intensive. Few digital platforms are in use but wide-scale deployment and acceptability remain to be seen. To address this issue, we created a malaria surveillance mobile app that offers real-time data to stakeholders and establishes a centralised data repository. The MoSQuIT app was designed to collect data from the field and was integrated with a web-based platform for data integration and analysis. The MoSQuIT app was deployed on mobile phones of accredited social health activists (ASHA) working in international border villages in the northeast (NE) Indian states of Assam, Tripura and Arunachal Pradesh for 20 months in a phased manner. This paper shares the challenges and opportunities associated with the use of MoSQuIT for malaria surveillance. MoSQuIT employs the same data entry formats as the NVBDCP’s malaria surveillance programme. Using this app, a total of 8221 fever cases were recorded, which included 1192 (14.5%) cases of P. falciparum malaria, 280 (3.4%) cases of P. vivax malaria and 52 (0.6%) mixed infection cases. Depending on network availability, GPS coordinates of the fever cases were acquired by the app. The present study demonstrated that mobile-phone-based malaria surveillance facilitates the quick transmission of data from the field to decision makers. Geospatial tagging of cases helped with easy visualisation of the case distribution for the identification of malaria-prone areas and potential outbreaks, especially in hilly and remote regions of Northeast India. However, to achieve the full operational potential of the system, operational challenges have to be overcome.
A novel technique to predict path loss in hilly terrain scenario is presented. The technique exploits the correlation between known terrain height and its corresponding path loss measurement when the receiver moves along the terrain curvature. This correlated information is converted into the regression formula and is used to predict the path loss for any arbitrary terrain structure that is the subset of known terrain height database. The prediction of the path loss is compared with the published results. The comparison shows significant improvement over other empirical model such as Stanford University Interim (SUI) model.
Background: India is going through a major economic and epidemiological transition. With the adoption of a Western lifestyle, atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (CVD) has emerged as the leading cause of death. India is currently the second most populous country with a population of 1.3 billion and two-thirds of this population are less than 35 years of age. As a result, India is facing major challenges in dealing with CVD. Purpose: This study was conducted to assess the level of health awareness of CVD in school-aged children (10 to 16 years) and to evaluate the effect of a brief educational intervention in enhancing the level of awareness with a goal of developing a school-based health education program. Methods: A school-based survey was conducted in Calcutta, India in August, 2018. This involved a pre-evaluation of CVD health awareness, a short presentation on CVD, and a post-evaluation of CVD health awareness. Results: The survey involved 2,564 students from 18 schools (11 girls’, 5 boys’, 2 coeducation). The mean age of participating students was 14.6 years, 72% were girls, 55% of the students were in the 9th grade, 38% were from 10 th grade, and the rest were from a combination of 8 th ,11 th, and 12 th grades. After assessing students’ awareness in six domains with 20 multiple-choice questions, the mean pre-test score was 46.5 (SD ± 13.3) with a maximum score of 100, and the mean post-test score was 53.6 (SD ± 20.6) ( p < 0.001). Conclusions: Awareness of CVD and its risk factors was inadequate among school-aged children in Calcutta. A school-based educational program may promote awareness of CVD and adoption of healthy lifestyle practices. The results of this study may help formulate a nationwide school health program to ameliorate the morbidity and mortality of CVD in India where it has emerged as a modern epidemic.
Curcumin (CurH3) forms a blue derivative (CurH2−) when it combines with superoxide radicals. The blue colouring is caused by the proton loss of curcumin to the superoxide radicals. In DMSO, in the presence of excess NaOH and dissolved oxygen, superoxide radicals are produced by consuming the hydroxyl ion which causes the deprotonation of curcumin (Cur3−) and gives the corresponding orange colour. The production of superoxide radicals increased as it was more exposed to air (maybe oxygen). As a result, the pH drops, and the orange derivative is protonated by one H+ ion, producing the corresponding blue colour derivative (CurH2−). The conversion of the orange derivate to the blue derivative may suggest the presence of oxygen in the surrounding atmosphere, allowing the feasibility of a novel oxygen sensor. The physicochemical characteristics and stability of this blue-coloured curcumin derivative are investigated. The distinct colour shifts of curcumin upon the addition of different volumes of NaOH were also investigated. The UV-Vis and FTIR analyses were used to study the stability of the blue curcumin derivative.
Background: Rheumatic heart disease (RHD) is prevalent in low income countries, with a regional prevalence in South Asia of 2.2 per 1,000 children aged 10-16 years. Awareness among school children is very important for seeking effective secondary prophylaxis. We studied the current level of awareness in school-aged children and evaluated the effect of a 7-item questionnaire-based survey in improving awareness of RHD. The study was conducted in a rural district of India in August, 2017. The objectives were to assess the level of awareness of RHD and to evaluate the effect of a questionnaire-based survey in improving awareness. Methods: The study involved 8,646 students in the age group 10-16 years from 20 schools in Midnapore, India. We carried out a pre-test questionnaire survey, a multimedia presentation on RHD, and a post-test survey that assessed students’ knowledge and awareness of its incidence and prevalence, symptoms and signs, morbidity and mortality, ways to prevent and/or reduce the disease burden, and when to seek medical attention. The data were analyzed to evaluate improvement in the level of awareness by this intervention using a 29-point scoring system in 7 domains. Regression analysis was performed to identify the factors that may enhance awareness. Results: Awareness among the school children (mean age 13, 45% boys) was modest. There was a significant improvement in their knowledge after the intervention with the survey questionnaire and the presentation by the study team (Table). Regression analysis showed female sex and higher grade in school were major determinants for improvement of the knowledge level by this intervention (p < 0.05 without any significant interaction noted between sex and grades in school). Conclusions: Current awareness among children about RHD is modest. A school-based intervention by administration of a survey questionnaire and presentation can help in improving the awareness about RHD and hopefully promote secondary prophylaxis to reduce the morbidity and mortality from the disease.
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