Neck circumference and waist circumference may be used in clinical practice and epidemiological studies as an index of overweight/ obesity among school-going adolescents.

Background: Time management is a skill that perhaps impacts the students’ academic achievement. The objective of the study is to study the time management skill and perceived academic achievements among university students.Methods: A cross sectional study was done among medical students studying in one of the private medical colleges of Odisha. Time management questionnaire developed by Britton and Tesser was used as a study tool. It includes 18 questions distributed in 3 dimensions: short-range planning, time attitudes and long-range planning. All the questions were value based on the Likert scale of five value scores. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics. Means of various dimensions were compared.Results: 51.90% of the participants possessed moderate to low level time management score. Participants who obtained higher percentages of mark (70-80%) also had high mean score on general time management.24.1% of the participants never write a set of goals for their self for each day and 21.5% never spend time for each day planning. Whereas 48% always keep their desk clear of everything other than what they are working on it, 40.5% sometimes review their class notes, even when a test is not imminent, 37.9% sometimes make a schedule of the activities that they have to do on work days and 37.9% sometimes make constructive use of their time.Conclusions: To improve academic performance, students are in need of IEC programs in relation to time management.

Background:Stress among diabetic patients is much more as compared to normal individuals. A delayed recognition of stress undoubtedly worsens the prognosis for survival for many diabetic patients. Hence, this study was planned to develop an intervention model for the reduction of stress among diabetic patients and to evaluate the developed intervention model in the proposed group.Methods:This study was conducted in endocrinology outpatient department of a tertiary care hospital. Starting at random, the patients were allocated to control group and test group. Controls were given printed educational materials. Test group were counseled with intense lifestyle education using both printed materials and computers; they were contacted by telephones by the investigator every 3 weeks for 3 months and SMS were sent every week containing some educational tips.Results:Mean age was 54 ± 11.5 years overall ranging from 30 years to 80 years. About two-third of participants were males with similar distribution in both the groups (intervention = 66%, control = 64%). Half (50%) of the participants lived in joint families, followed by nuclear families (40%). Most (83%) were married and with either graduate or above graduate education (n = 39%). No significant difference was observed in socio-demographic characteristics among both control and intervention groups (P > 0.05). The average stress scores were similar (18.9) at baseline for control and intervention arms. At 3-month follow-up, however, these scores reduced to 17.05 in the intervention arm while they increased to 20.7 in the control arm. At 3 months follow-up, higher proportion of stress reduction was seen in the intervention group.Conclusions:Intervention in the form of intensive lifestyle education and phone calls and SMS significantly decrease their stress score. Mobile-based education has great potential to improve their mental status and increase patient-provider communication, and to decrease stress.