Jayashree Seeri

Background and Objective: BMI and WHR are most widely used measures to define obesity and predict its complications, such as diabetes and hypertension. Hence study emphasized to know correlation among above parameters. Methods: A Cross sectional study conducted among 240 adults who screened for Hypertension, DM based on history and examination or both. Anthropometric measurements, Blood pressure, random blood glucose levels and ECG was recorded for individuals with suspected complications of cardiovascular diseases. Data was analyzed using SPSS 18 for descriptive, analytical statistics χ 2 (P value) and Pearson’s correlation co-efficient. Results: 240 individuals attendant health checkup, 87 of them found to be hypertensives and/ or diabetic. Obesity was significantly high in females (65.2%, 95.6%) as compared to males (41.5%, 61%) with respect to both BMI and W/H ratio respectively. There was a statistical difference in obesity by BMI and WHR, where in 79% of the subjects showed hi...

INTRODUCTION: The contraceptive knowledge of today’s teenagers decides the future of contraceptive practices of tomorrow’s eligible couples. High abortion rate of 46%2 of live births is associated with lack of contraceptive awareness. MATERIALS AND METHOD: The study was conducted among 426 students belonging to 3 rural colleges in Bangalore, South India. RESULTS: Majority 83.1% of the students were aware of legal age at marriage for girls however 79.6% of the preferred 18-21 years. 78.4% of them preferred two child norm. However, the knowledge regarding contraceptive practices was poor. The awareness regarding condoms was 70.9%, 30.8% for OCPs, 8.9% for IUCD. 16.2% for Emergency contraception and 32.6% for surgical method. 82.6% of them felt that there must be spacing between two children and only 8.6% were aware of IUCD for the same. More than 50% of the students felt that family planning improves health, solves social problems and improves quality of life. CONCLUSION: The study cl...

Introduction: Childhood malnutrition is a significant health problem in India and important cause for childhood morbidity and mortality. Lack of knowledge about child feeding contributes significantly to poor nutritional status among children. A system to deliver nutrition education effectively would be of value in India. Hence, the present study was designed to assess nutritional status of 2 to 6 year Anganwadi children and to evaluate effect of nutrition education and supplementary nutrition on nutritional status of malnourished Anganwadi children Methods: An Interventional study was carried out in rural anganwadi centres selected by cluster sampling technique. Intervention was done in the form of Nutrition education based on positive deviance approach, supplementary nutrition and supervision. Weight for age of study participants was measured every quarter for a period of one year. Results: The prevalence of underweight initially was 47.3%. After intervention prevalence reduced to...

OBJECTIVE: To assess the growth status of High school children in Rural Primary health centre area of South India. METHODS: Children from various High schools aged between 13 to 16 years belonging to a PHC area were surveyed in a School Health Program. Height and weight was measured following standard procedures. General nutritional status was assed clinically. SPSS Version 16 was used to analyze the data. RESULTS: 630 students were examined. The overall prevalence of stunting was 44.6%. It was significantly higher in boys (47.7) than girls (41.6). Around 71% of the students were underweight, Boys (77.3%) were significantly underweight as compared to girls (64.6).21% of the children showed signs of malnutrition. CONCLUSION: The nutritional status of high school children in Rural Field Practice area is poor compared to many other studies.

Background: Free health camp is an important means to cater health services to the needy people in an underdeveloped county like India with difficult geographical terrain. The objective of this study was to assess the morbidities of patients attending the free health camp in Ramanagara District, Karnataka.Methods: A cross sectional descriptive study was conducted at free health camp in Jogaradoddi, Ramanagara District, Karnataka, by the staff and interns of department of community medicine of a medical college. All the individuals who attended the camp were included in the study. Patients who attended the health checkup camp were assessed for morbidity. Data collected by semi structured questionnaire was entered into Microsoft Excel and analyzed using SPSS version-17.0.Results: A total of 123 patients visited the health camp, among them 68(55.28%) of them were males and 55 (44.71%) were females. 41 (33.8%) were in the age group of 21-30 years. Majority were skilled workers with 30(2...

Stress appears to be universally prevalent entity in all students, regardless of their age sex, education, parent’s occupation, and presence or absence of a role model. Medical education is long and emotional taxing. Medical students thus experience tremendous stress during their undergraduate study. Hence the objective of this study was to evaluate general health condition and depression among first year MBBS students and also to determine the correlation between general health condition and depression. This study was a cross sectional and single centered study included 149 students of first year MBBS. In this study general health was assessed by using Goldberg’s general health questionnaire, depression was measured by Center for epidemiologic studies depression scale, student stress was measured by student stress survey questionnaire. Statistical analysis indicated the general health condition of students from urban background was significantly better than that of students from rural (P

Background: Basic medical graduate must possess skills of communication in health education for health promotion. There is a little scope for formal training in communication in health education in the current curriculum. Objectives: The objectives of this study were to assess the communication skills of undergraduates in health education and to assess the role of modular training in improving their communication skills. Materials and Methods: An interventional study conducted in a medical college in South India. A total of 88 2nd year medical students underwent four theory classes on health education. They were subsequently divided into two groups of 44 each. The intervention group underwent modular training for four sessions of 2 h duration each which included demonstration, video play, focused group discussion, and role play. The control group underwent repeat theory classes. All the students performed health education session of 15 min duration and were assessed by standardized blinded assessors using a questionnaire. Proportions and Z-tests were applied using SPSS (17.0). Results: Majority of the students in both the groups performed well in verbal communication skills such as clarity of speech (72.3% in control and 89.7% in intervention group) and being audible (84.1% in control and 89.7% in intervention group). Both the groups lacked non-verbal skills of interaction and involving the audience in discussion (45.5% in control and 43.6% in intervention group). There was no significant difference between the intervention and control groups in any of the parameters. Conclusion: Communication skills in health education among 2nd year medical students are poor. Short-term training has no effect in improving their communication skills.