1,720,960 research outputs found
Patterns and determinants of breastfeeding and complementary feeding practices in urban informal settlements, Nairobi Kenya
No full textBackgroundThe World Health Organisation (WHO) recommends exclusive breastfeeding during the first six months of life for optimal growth, development and health. Breastfeeding should continue up to two years or more and nutritionally adequate, safe, and appropriately-fed complementary foods should be introduced at the age of six months to meet the evolving needs of the growing infant. Little evidence exists on breastfeeding and infant feeding practices in urban slums in sub-Saharan Africa. Our aim was to assess breastfeeding and infant feeding practices in Nairobi slums with reference to WHO recommendations. MethodsData from a longitudinal study conducted in two Nairobi slums are used. The study used information on the first year of life of 4299 children born between September 2006 and January 2010. All women who gave birth during this period were interviewed on breastfeeding and complementary feeding practices at recruitment and this information was updated twice, at four-monthly intervals. Cox proportional hazard analysis was used to determine factors associated with cessation of breastfeeding in infancy and early introduction of complementary foods. ResultsThere was universal breastfeeding with almost all children (99%) having ever been breastfed. However, more than a third (37%) were not breastfed in the first hour following delivery, and 40% were given something to drink other than the mothers' breast milk within 3 days after delivery. About 85% of infants were still breastfeeding by the end of the 11th month. Exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months was rare as only about 2% of infants were exclusively breastfed for six months. Factors associated with sub-optimal infant breastfeeding and feeding practices in these settings include child's sex; perceived size at birth; mother's marital status, ethnicity; education level; family planning (pregnancy desirability); health seeking behaviour (place of delivery) and; neighbourhood (slum of residence). ConclusionsThe study indicates poor adherence to WHO recommendations for breastfeeding and infant feeding practices. Interventions and further research should pay attention to factors such as cultural practices, access to and utilization of health care facilities, child feeding education, and family planning. <br/
The association between post-weaning dietary patterns at age 1 and growth at age 2, from the Birth-to-Twenty cohort study, South Africa
No full textMSc (Med), Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, 2009Introduction Malnutrition remains the major cause of child mortality and an essential component in child development and future productivity of the child in the world. With the increasing prevalence of undernutrition, micronutrient deficiencies, and over nutrition in South Africa, it calls for interventions which will help reduce malnutrition since child‟s growth is partly dependant on their diet. This study aimed at determining the association between post-weaning dietary patterns at age one and growth at age two among children from the Birth-To-Twenty cohort in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Specific objectives: To describe dietary intake patterns (Diet Diversity Score and Food Variety Score) growth at age one and two among boys and girls in BT20, the prevalence of malnutrition (Stunting, wasting and underweight) among boys and girls in BT20, and to determine the association between dietary patterns at age one and growth at age two. Hypothesis There is no association between post-weaning dietary patterns at age one and growth at age two in the Birth-To-Twenty Cohort study. Study design: Prospective longitudinal study. Setting; Birth-To-Twenty Cohort study Johannesburg, South Africa. Inclusion criteria –Must have complete data on dietary questionnaires and growth data at age two. Data Collection data was collected on following variables; dietary patterns, socio-economic status, growth (height and weight), complimentary feeding, birthweight and gestational age. Anthropometric data (height and weight) was collected at age one and two. Food frequencies questionnaires were used for data collection. Data Analysis STATA 10 was used for data cleaning and analysis. Descriptive and inferential analysis was carried out. Multiple regression analysis was used to assess the association between outcome variable (growth at age 2) and dietary patterns at age 1(12months) and growth at age 2 (24months), and dietary patterns at age 1 controlling for confounders. P-values were calculated to test for
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statistical significance at 5% significance level. Results: Ninety six percent of the infants were introduced to solid foods when they were less than 6 months. The Food Variety Score (FVS) was 32.4 and 32.6 for boys and girls respectively; Diet Diversity Score (DDS) was 9.7 and 9.8 for boys and girls respectively. A proportion of 20.5% (n=164) infants were underweight at birth, the prevalence of stunting among the boys rose from 8% at year one to 19% at year two, wasting demonstrated a slight increase from 5% to 8%, underweight too showed a sharp increase from 11% to 25%. Among the girls stunting prevalence increased from 6% at year one to 20% at year 2, wasting slightly rose from 3% to 4% and underweight from 6% to 11%. There was 7.7% (n=35) catch up growth and 20.7% (n=94) catch down with regard to stunting. A proportion of 3.3% (n=15) infants had catch up for weight-for-height and 5.5% (n=25) had a catch down growth. 3.7% (n=17) had catch up growth with regard to weight-for- age and 11.2% (n=51) had catch down growth. Birthweight, underweight and stunting at age one, gender and ethnicity were associated with growth at age two. There was no association between dietary patterns at age one and growth at age two. Conclusion: Diet diversity is good within Soweto and consequently food diversity is not associated with infant growth, however other factors such as macronutrient intake and morbidity maybe important in the Soweto context. Inappropriate feeding practices such as feeding the infant with high sugar diet, high fat and refined foods should be addressed so as to curb the increasing catch down growth at age two. Introduction of solid foods at less than 6 months of age should also be addressed; this can be done by emphasising that exclusive breastfeeding in community health programs for the first 6 months
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Assessment of Health Insurance Schemes Uptake by the Informal Sector Workers at Matuu, Machakos County, Kenya
No full textHealth Insurance is a social protection against the possibility of incurring medical expenditure among individuals. It is a critical pillar of Health care financing and the main driver in achieving Universal Health coverage in most nations. The core objective of the study was to assess the level of current uptake of Health Insurance among informal sector workers in Matuu Ward within Machakos County. The target population were the informal workers in Matuu, Machakos County. The study research design was analytical cross sectional study which applied a mixed method approach in data collection and analysis. The mixed method was used to contribute to answering of the research questions and provide stronger evidence for corroboration of findings through triangulation. A sample of 202 respondents was selected for this study and primary quantitative data was obtained from sampled individuals involved in enterprises by use of questionnaires. Descriptive data analysis was done and categorical variables in form of frequencies and percentages was done; while numerical variables in form mean, standard deviation was done in analyzing and presenting the data. Qualitative data from key informants was manually analyzed and then grouped into themes and sub-themes. The study established that at 97% were aware of the health insurance and in addition, only 31% of the respondents were aware of the Universal Health Care (UHC) which is being piloted in Machakos County. The major source of information on health insurance schemes was friends as reported by 41.1% of the respondents. The major reason for stopping payments was loss of main source of income as reported by 41.7%. Chi-square results indicated that gender, age, level of education and income level had no significant effect on uptake of insurance. However, marital status had a significant effect on uptake of insurance. In conclusion, the uptake of health insurance by informal sector workers is high especially with the NHIF. This is because the Government has been aggressively improving the uptake by NHIF by all in the Country to facilitate access to Health Services. On the other hand, uptake of health insurance offered by private insurance firms is still low due to high premiums, bearing in mind that most of the informal sector workers earn very low and irregular incomes. Majority the informal sector workers deem health insurance coverage as important and feel that it should be encouraged as part of the efforts of facilitating Universal Health Coverage. The study recommends that the Government should make health insurance uptake continuity more attractive to the informal sector workers. Government and the private sector should explore Public Private Partnership in provision of health insurance with the aim of promoting the contribution of private health insurance schemes in expanding Universal Health Coverage. Lastly, the government should have tax incentive such as tax breaks or waiver for the informal sector workers who are insurance holders to encourage continuity.
Keywords: Health Insurance Schemes, Informal Sector Workers, Keny
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
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