Background: Depressive disorders are a common source of disability among women. In addition to the economic and human costs of maternal depression, children of depressed mothers are at risk for health, developmental, and behavioural problems. Community-based epidemiological data on antenatal depression from developing countries is scarce. Methods: A cross sectional study was carried out for a period of 4 months in urban health centre in Bangalore. Simple random sampling technique was used to select 250 pregnant women attending antenatal clinic. Information on socio-demographic variables, obstetric variables and mental health status was collected based on preformed proforma. Data was analysed using Statistical Programme for the social science (SPSS) version 16.0. Results: Amongst the study population, prevalence of depressive disorder was 24.8%.The depression was significantly increasing with advancing pregnancy. Socio economic status and depression was associated statistically significant (p=0.024). Educational status of women was associated with depression (p=0.053).women with history of abortion had more depression as compared to those who did not have abortions was statistically significant (p=0.02). Conclusions: Depressive symptoms occur commonly during 2nd and 3rd trimester of pregnancy, drawing attention to a need to screen for depression during antenatal care. Maternal health policies, a priority in developing countries, must integrate maternal depression as a disorder of public health importance. Interventions should target women in the early antenatal period.

Background: Substance abuse is an increasing public health problem. Use of tobacco, alcohol, and other substances is a global problem and affects many children and adolescents. Abuse of substances exposes the youth to several physical, psychological and social consequences. Objectives of the study were to determine the prevalence of substance abuse amongst high school students in selected schools of Bengaluru and to identify factors predisposing to substance abuse.Methods: Type of study was cross-sectional, study was done from November 2017 to January 2018, study subjects were high school students, sample size was 300, tool for study was structured questionnaire, descriptive analysis done using Microsoft Excel.Results: Out of 300 subjects 10% agreed that they have done abuse of substances. Most of them started it at age below 15 years. Most common reason to start was for fun.Conclusions: Substance abuse was present among high school students and most commonly abused substance was tobacco in the form of cigarettes and most common reason was for fun followed by peer pressure and low marks.

No abstract

The main objective is to study the prevalence of hypercholesterolemia among nurses working on shift and ascertain its association with socio economic parameters. The study was a cross sectional comparative study using randomized sampling technique. The sample population consisted of registered nurses working in randomly selected government and private hospitals in rural and urban areas of Thiruvananthapuram city. A Uniform sample size of 250 each were drawn from government and private hospitals of Thiruvananthapuram district to form a population size (N=500). Again a sub sample size of 25 each were drawn from government and private hospitals in rural and urban areas of Thiruvananthapuram (N=100) for the in depth studies. Only female nurses were included in the study who had minimum of five year experience and those who belonged to the age group between 25-45yrs. All the respondents selected for the study were doing their work on shift base from the day of joining their duty, which is the other condition for the study. A pretested schedule was used to elicit information using interview method. The information regarding demographic characteristics, shift details, medication, morbidity details and physical activities were collected. To estimate the level of total cholesterol, blood samples were collected from the subsample of 100 subjects from each group. Chi square tests were carried out for analysing the quantitative and categorized variables. Out of fifty respondents from private hospitals, the prevalence of border line hypercholesterolemia was thirty two percent and the prevalence of high risk hypercholesterolemia was ten percent. Results from respondents of government hospital also gave the same. Total cholesterol assessed in the subject from the two sectors was not significantly associated with age (χ²=8.738; χ²=6.051), experience (χ²=1.002; χ²=1.181) and area of residence (χ²=8.793; χ²= 2.062). The blood sample analysis revealed that a significant number of respondents were considered to be border line risk and high risk of hypercholesterolemia which suggests that irregular shift hours can be associated with increased risk of hypercholesterolemia leads to further fatal condition. However level of total cholesterol was not significantly influenced by factors like age, work experience and area of residence.