Description of patients admitted to a burn unit of Yekatit 12 Hosptial, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

OBJECTIVES: The over all aim of the study is to describe the characteristics of patients with burn injuries admitted Yekatit 12 Hospital, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. METHODS: The design of the study is a cross-sectional type. The data was collected prospectively. All the 121 burn patients admitted to Yekatit Hospital, from July 2001 to September 2002 were included in this study. RESULTS: In the study, the median age was 22 years (range 2 months to 70 years). Among them 64.5% were female and 35.5% were male. Scald was a common cause of burns for young children and flame was a common cause for adults. The frequent mechanism of burn injury for adults was exploding kerosene stove. The average mean total body surface area (TBSA) burnt was 17.1 %. The over all median hospital stay was 44 days. Most of the adults (74.7%) had delayed split thickness grafting. The mortality was 11.6%. This study showed that burn is an important health problem in the country, and it is also burden on the existing poor health care system in our setup. CONCLUSION: Even though this study may not show the true picture of burn patients seen in the country, it can represent the clinical picture of patients seen in most hospitals. To have a clear picture of burns in the population a community based epidemiological study should be done.     

Living with pelvic organ prolapse: voices of women from Amhara region,Ethiopia

Introduction

The objective of the study was to explore how women with symptomatic pelvic organ prolapse in a low-income setting explain, experience, and handle the potential practical and social consequences of the condition.

Methods

An explorative qualitative design was employed using in-depth interviews in the data collection. A total of 24 women with different degrees of symptomatic pelvic organ prolapse were included; 18 were recruited at the hospital and 6 from the community. Fieldwork was carried out in the Amhara region of northwest Ethiopia in 2011 and 2015.

Results

The informants held that the pelvic organ prolapse was caused by physical strain on their body, such as childbirth, food scarcity or hard physical work, particularly during pregnancy and shortly after delivery. Severe difficulties and pain while carrying out daily chores were common among the women. The informants used a variety of strategies to manage their work while striving to avoid disclosure of their condition. Disclosure was related to embarrassment and fear of discrimination from people living close to them, including the fear of being expelled from the household. Most of the informants, however, experienced substantial support from relatives, friends, and at times also from their husband, after disclosing their condition.

Conclusions

The study highlights how symptomatic pelvic organ prolapse may severely affect women’s lives in a low-income setting. The condition is perceived to be both caused by and aggravated by the heavy physical burdens of daily work.

     

Modeling and Simulation of Human Body Heat Transfer System Based on Air Space Values in 3D Clothing Model

Comfort can be considered as subjective feeling, which could be affected by the external ambient, by the physical activity, and by clothing. Considering the human body heat transfer system, it mainly depends on various parameters including clothing materials, external and internal environment, etc. The purpose of the current paper is to study and establish a quantitative relationship between one of the clothing parameters, ease allowance (air gap values) and the heat transfer through the human body to clothing materials and then to the environment. The study considered clothing which is integrated with the 3D ease allowance from the anthropometric and morphological data. Such incorporating of the clothing’s 3D ease control was essential to properly manage the air space between the body and the proposed clothing thermal regulation model. In the context of thermal comfort, a clothing system consisting of the human body, an ease allowance under clothing, a layer of textile materials, and a peripheral layer adjacent to the textile material was used. For the complete system, the heat transfer from the skin to the environment, which is influenced by thermoregulation of the human body, air gap, tissue, and environmental conditions were also considered. To model and predict the heat transfer between the human body and the temperature of skin and clothes, a 3D adaptive garment which could be adjusted with ease allowance was used. In the paper, a thermoregulatory model was developed and proposed to predict the temperature and heat within clothing material, skin, and air space. Based on the result, in general the main difference in the temperature of clothing and skin from segment to segment is due to the uneven distribution of air layers under the clothing.     

Asymptomatic Malaria in Households and Neighbors of Laboratory Confirmed Cases in Raya Kobo District,Northeast Ethiopia

BackgroundMalaria is the leading vector-borne parasitic disease that is causing high morbidity and mortality worldwide. So far huge efforts to control and eliminate malaria are hindered by the occurrence of asymptomatic carriers that are a potential source of infection. Yet, there is a scarcity of data nationally and in the current study area as well. Therefore, this study was aimed to assess the prevalence of asymptomatic malaria in Northeast Ethiopia.MethodsA community-based cross-sectional study was conducted in 2019 involving a total of 270 study participants recruited via purposive non-probability sampling technique. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data on sociodemographic characteristics, individual and household factors related to asymptomatic malaria. Data were entered in Epi Data 3.1 version and analyzed by using SPSS version 20, and p< 0.05 was considered statistically significant.ResultsThe overall prevalence of asymptomatic malaria was 7.0%, with 3.0%, 5.2%, and 12.0%, respectively by Rapid diagnostic tests (RDT), Microscopy and Polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The majority of infections (73.7%) were identified from index households. Previous malaria history (AOR: 4.030, 95% CI: 1.021–15.903), living with index cases (AOR: 3.880, 95% CI: 1.275–11.806) and family size > 6 members (AOR: 4.820, 95% CI: 1.260–18.437) were significant predictors of asymptomatic malaria.ConclusionReactive case detection had identified considerably higher asymptomatic malaria cases in the community. Therefore, active case investigation should be established in the community by tracking the symptomatic cases at the health facilities.     

International prostate symptom score as a clinical outcome measure for Ethiopian patients with urethral stricture

Eighty-four urethral stricture patients and 73 controls were studied prospectively over a 6 months period in Tikur Anbessa Hospital from April to August 2000. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the use of International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS) as an outcome measurement instrument for urethral stricture patients in Ethiopia. The Amharic translation of IPSS (IPSS Amh) was used in this study. Internal consistency was 0.91. Construct validity was 0.73. Test-retest reliability was 0.95. Sensitivity and specificity were 76% and 71% respectively. In conclusion the IPSS Amh was found to be valid for use in urethral stricture patients in Ethiopia. We recommend the wide use of this cheap and easily available clinical measurement instrument.