Health Promotion articles list

In the context of emerging sustainability challenges, demarketing has continued to draw the attention of academicians and practitioners globally over the past few years. It is interesting to note that demarketing is as old as marketing itself, yet its application and scope have grown from the past two decades only. Kotler and Levy, (1971) has defined demarketing as “that aspect of marketing which deals with discouraging customers in general or a certain class of customers in particular on a temporary or permanent basis”. This systematic literature review attempts to enrich the discussion on demarketing research through a systematic and comprehensive review of 64 articles published between 2000 and 2022. Using TCCM framework, we present relevant theories, research contexts, study characteristics, and methodologies used in demarketing research. Our review (1) Presents a systematic and comprehensive overview of the research in demarketing over the last two decades (2) Examines studies in demarketing within the framework of ‘triple bottom line’ approach for sustainability (3) Suggests a suitable definition of demarketing considering its exorbitant application within the sustainability context (4) Identify gaps and sets agenda for future research. Our systematic literature review found that research in demarketing has been growing considerably over the past two decades, twice as much in the last decade compared to the previous decade with spill-over to new sectors. The literature review, through the lens of ‘triple bottom line’ approach, is able to establish that demarketing can be employed to effectively address the sustainability challenges encountered by policymakers and practitioners.

Jeevan lawrence

The utilization of traditional medicine (TM) is prevalent among the general population in Africa; however, its use among individuals with diabetes in the region remains underdocumented. This review aimed to synthesize the available literature to identify the prevalence and predictors of TM use among persons with diabetes in Africa. A systematic search was conducted across multiple databases, including MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, and AMED, covering studies published from 2000 to April 2023. Of 1560 records identified, 24 articles met the inclusion criteria. The prevalence of TM use varied significantly, ranging from 12.4% to 77.1%, with a median prevalence of 50%. TM was commonly used concurrently with conventional medicine (CM) (35.4–88.4%), with a majority (63.8–91.3%) not disclosing TM use to healthcare providers. Female gender, long diabetes duration, use of oral antiglycaemic medication and family history of diabetes emerged as the most common factors that predicted the use of TM. This review highlights the widespread use of TM among individuals with diabetes in Africa, often in conjunction with CM. The high prevalence of undisclosed TM use emphasizes the urgent need for healthcare providers to actively inquire about TM use during clinical consultations to address potential herb–drug interactions and adverse effects.

Emmanuel Ekpor

Administering medication to children at home presents substantial challenges for caregivers. Errors in dosage, timing, or administration method could be harmful. A key contributor to such errors is inadequate knowledge of pediatric medication. The objective of this study was to explore how parents in Libya administer oral medications to their children and the self-care therapies they use for them. A cross-sectional study was conducted using an online self-designed questionnaire consisting of yes/no and multiple-response questions. The sample size was 523 parents with valid questionnaires. Inclusion criteria were being a parent of children aged six months to 10 years and consent to participate. The data were analyzed by the Chi-square test was employed to examine associations between demographic characteristics and parental behaviors and techniques of medication administration. One-third of parents used inappropriate tools to administer liquid medications to their children. When children resisted medication, 49.3% of parents insisted on administering it, 10.7% mixed it with milk or other drink, 5.2% mixed it with food, and 9.2% dissolved solid forms in water or another drink. Additionally, 9.4% of parents admitted to giving doses higher than prescribed, trying to achieve rapid recovery. Furthermore, 82.0% of the parents engaged in self-medication of children, mostly with antipyretics (86.4%) but also with antibiotics (2.5%). We concluded that knowledge of the correct practices for administering oral medication to children was inadequate. It is suggested to develop educational programs for parents on correct practices.

Mediterranean Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences

India is a country of immense diversity. It is home to people of many different racial, languages, ethnic, religious, and national backgrounds. Groups of people in India differ from each other not only in physical or demographic characteristics but also in distinctive patterns of behavior and these patterns are determined by social and cultural factors like language, region, religion, and caste. Apart from behaviour, economic development, level of education and political culture of the people in various social segments differ from region to region. More you can say that economy and cultures have been enriched by the contributions of migrants from round the globe. In an increasingly globalised world, migratory movements is continuously shaping the countries all over the world. Some countries like India and Ireland, which set the example of economic development and social integration, have the positive impact of the migration by globalisation and some countries like USA, which recently witness racism, xenophobia and discrimination have the negative impact on the migrants. It does not mean India do not face fragmentation and USA do not have cohesion. USA have many stories which show successful integration process, that facilitated the lives of immigrant communities, but being a developed country it still suffers from cultural alienation. In these countries, borders are built within borders to create cultural divides that do not allow people to integrate. Recently, this problem has become more prominent due to the rise of terrorism, clash of cultures in the world, leading to the glorification of stereotypes. People are becoming less accepting towards anyone who does not belong to their region. Migration does not stop after people move from one place to another place. The main question start after that ‘now what’ they will do. That is why this topic needs to be discussed thoroughly in order to find better solutions. This paper will begin with an analysis of different approaches to Migration, discuss the target groups for integration policies, provide indicators of the current situation of migrants and proceed to an analysis of integration tools: legislation, social policies and participatory processes. It will focus not only on the impact of migration but also on social integration, mix culture like indo-western culture in a comparative basis.

Ekta Meena

India is a country of immense diversity. It is home to people of many different racial, languages, ethnic, religious, and national backgrounds. Groups of people in India differ from each other not only in physical or demographic characteristics but also in distinctive patterns of behavior and these patterns are determined by social and cultural factors like language, region, religion, and caste. Apart from behaviour, economic development, level of education and political culture of the people in various social segments differ from region to region. More you can say that economy and cultures have been enriched by the contributions of migrants from round the globe. In an increasingly globalised world, migratory movements is continuously shaping the countries all over the world. Some countries like India and Ireland, which set the example of economic development and social integration, have the positive impact of the migration by globalisation and some countries like USA, which recently witness racism, xenophobia and discrimination have the negative impact on the migrants. It does not mean India do not face fragmentation and USA do not have cohesion. USA have many stories which show successful integration process, that facilitated the lives of immigrant communities, but being a developed country it still suffers from cultural alienation. In these countries, borders are built within borders to create cultural divides that do not allow people to integrate. Recently, this problem has become more prominent due to the rise of terrorism, clash of cultures in the world, leading to the glorification of stereotypes. People are becoming less accepting towards anyone who does not belong to their region. Migration does not stop after people move from one place to another place. The main question start after that ‘now what’ they will do. That is why this topic needs to be discussed thoroughly in order to find better solutions. This paper will begin with an analysis of different approaches to Migration, discuss the target groups for integration policies, provide indicators of the current situation of migrants and proceed to an analysis of integration tools: legislation, social policies and participatory processes. It will focus not only on the impact of migration but also on social integration, mix culture like indo-western culture in a comparative basis.

Ekta Meena

In this paper, investigations are made to analyze the human body temperature during wound healing process due to surgery. Wound is considered after the skin graft. Skin graft is a technique used in plastic surgery. Skin is the first line of defense between the human and environment, it is very susceptible to damage. Internal body or core temperature (Tb) is one of the clinical vital signs along with pulse and respiratory rates. Any disturbance in body temperature will drive complexities in wound healing process. These studies are important in the mechanism of establishing the limits of thermal regulation of human body during the healing process in different situations and conditions. The Finite element method is used to analyze tissues temperature for normal tissues (donor site) and abnormal tissues (tissues after surgery). Appropriate boundary conditions have been framed. Numerical results are obtained using Crank Nicolson Method.

Manisha Jain

Physically unclonable function (PUF) is a hardware security module preferred for hardware feature based random number and secret key generation. Security of a cryptographic system relies on the quality of the challenge-response pair, it is necessary that the key generation mechanism must unpredictable and its response should constant under different operating condition. Metastable state in CMOS latch is undesirable since it response becomes unpredictable, this feature used in this work to generate a unique response. A feedback mechanism is developed which forces the latch into the metastable region; after metastable state, latch settle to high or state depends on circuit internal condition and noise which cannot be predicted. Obtained inter hamming variation for 8 PUF is 51% and average intra hamming distance is 99.76% with supply voltage variation and 96.22% with temperature variation.

Abhishek Kumar

One of the unique features of Indian society is prevalence of caste system which was originated thousands of years back to demarcate the people engaged in different occupation or jobs. Initially it was not much rigid but gradually people belonging to upper castes for their own selfish means to maintain their monopoly made this arrangement hereditary and started treating people of lower castes disgracefully. For preservation of this system, people started controlling their women to prevent inter-caste marriages and the concept of endogamy came up. This robbed away many types of freedom from women. For women belonging to lower castes, this situation is worse as they are doubly subjugated on the basis on caste as well as gender. Men belonging to their own caste treat them as secondary beings. This paper throws light on this intersection. How intersection of these two kinds of inequalities place them at the lowest position in Indian society. Dr. B.R. Ambedkar rises as their leader who all his life worked for empowerment of downtrodden section of society. He argues that education is the primary tool for evading these differences among people. He further emphasizes to adopt the concept of exogamy to break the backbone of Indian caste system and to immediately leave a religion or culture which legitimizes such system of inequality among people of the same land.

Swati sharma

One of the unique features of Indian society is prevalence of caste system which was originated thousands of years back to demarcate the people engaged in different occupation or jobs. Initially it was not much rigid but gradually people belonging to upper castes for their own selfish means to maintain their monopoly made this arrangement hereditary and started treating people of lower castes disgracefully. For preservation of this system, people started controlling their women to prevent inter-caste marriages and the concept of endogamy came up. This robbed away many types of freedom from women. For women belonging to lower castes, this situation is worse as they are doubly subjugated on the basis on caste as well as gender. Men belonging to their own caste treat them as secondary beings. This paper throws light on this intersection. How intersection of these two kinds of inequalities place them at the lowest position in Indian society. Dr. B.R. Ambedkar rises as their leader who all his life worked for empowerment of downtrodden section of society. He argues that education is the primary tool for evading these differences among people. He further emphasizes to adopt the concept of exogamy to break the backbone of Indian caste system and to immediately leave a religion or culture which legitimizes such system of inequality among people of the same land.

Swati sharma

Background:Calcium, the very important mineralhelps in growth and development ofinfants.Calcium helps in building strong bones, teeth,proper functioning of nerves and muscle, blood clot and in activating the enzymes that convert food into energy. Infants and Children are growing new bone all the time, they need continuous supply of calcium to support the healthy growth.Milk is the only food for infants which is richest source of calcium. Some infants are sensitive to lactose in milk because they have Lactose Intolerance. The present study aimsto develop an alternate milk forlactose intolerance infants with finger millet and pearl millet.Method:Traditional methods were used to process the milletswhich help in retaining and increasing the nutritional content in millets.The millet milk was analyzed for calcium content using the ICPMS.The millet milk was supplemented for 6 weeks to albino rats in comparison with cow milk. The tibia weight and length were measured and calcium content in tibia was analyzed. Result:The calcium content of the millet milk was 80mg/100mlwhere as in cow milk it was 120mg/100ml.The mean calcium content of the tibia inalbino rats was15.35±3.50mg/dl fed with millet milkand20.40±3.74mg/dl in rats fed with cow milk.Conclusion: The developed millet milk contain good amount of calcium on par with cow’s milk, it can be used as substitute milk for lactose intolerant infants.

Kimeera Ambati

The purpose of this study is to explore the impacts of foreign cartoons programs on the social behavior and attitude of Pakistani Children. It is forecasting different cartoon programs 24/7; hence, children spend most of their leisure in front of the television. All these cartoon characters affect the social life and psyche of the children and induce positive and negative mannerism in their daily lifestyles. It has found that one of the most disturbing factor is that the ferocity in children today is increasing rapidly due to following their favorite violent cartoon characters which are even different from their culture and societal norms. The issue is violence is what they see in every cartoon program in one or the other way. Their Guardians are unaware that these cartoons they let their children watch are destroying their parenting as negative forces are attacking the innocent minds of this generation. The study gives the insight of why and what is happening with non-parametric statistics studied and used for thorough analysis. The behavioral outcome of the kids like, imitating their preferred animation character, utilizing various dialects, watching the TV as opposed to deciding on outdoor games and being difficult about getting precisely the same outfits and embellishments as their adored character. This contextual analysis features the disturbing circumstance that guardians are uninformed of. There is something other than mimicking the particular character. The only traits of watching these foreign cartoon characters is that it might damage their own customs and they wildly become to believe these characters as their role models.

Zaki Hasan

This review was aimed to describe a new approach of healthcare performance strategy based on individual genetic variants. Personalized medicine is a model for health care which is a combination of preventive, personalized, participatory and predictive measures. It is an approach for a better treatment by identifying the disease causing genomics makeup of an individual. This work features key advancements in the improvement of empowering advances that further the objective of customized and precision medication and the remaining difficulties that, when tended to, may produce phenomenal abilities in acknowledging genuinely individualized patient consideration. Customized treatment for patients determined to have strong tumors has brought about a few advances as of late. To improve a multi-drug approach ready to coordinate DNA and RNA adjustment, proteomics and metabolomics will be essential. The execution of translational examinations dependent on fluid biopsy and organoids or xenografts to assess molecular changes because of clonal weight produced because of the utilization of target specialists or tumor heterogeneity would help in the recognition of systems of opposition, proposing opportunities for novel mixes. The investigation of massive data in oncology can profit altogether from being engaged by artificial intelligence and machine learning strategies.

Mediterranean Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences

Vaccination hesitation may affect the national efforts to slow down the spread of coronavirus among the population. This study was aimed to explore the views of final year pharmacy students at Faculty of Pharmacy, Elmergib University, Al kums, Libya towards COVID-19 vaccination. The study was conducted before the vaccine becomes available in Libya. A semi-structured questionnaire was distributed on March 14, 2021 to the fourth- year pharmacy students at Elmergib ‎University, Al khums Libya. Results showed a high degree of hesitancy towards vaccination against this virus (52.6%). Student's participants who said they would take the vaccine probably have said that because of their stress that caused by COVID-19 pandemic (47.4%). With regard to the gender, the participants’ views had no significant difference between male and female students on whether to take the vaccine or not (P = 0.825). In conclusion, hesitations towards vaccination and stress caused by student fear from the virus need to be addressed to minimize public reluctant to take the vaccine and to improve the education process during the pandemic.

Mediterranean Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences

Thrombocytopenia is a recurrent hematological disturbance in pregnancy. In pregnant women with thrombocytopenia, the risk of excessive bleeding during or after child-birth is high, particularly when they require a cesarean section, other surgery during pregnancy, labor or in the puerperium period. The objective of this study was to assess the prevalence of thrombocytopenia among pregnant women attending antenatal care service at Tripoli University Hospital, Libya. A cross-sectional analysis was used to determine the prevalence thrombocytopenia in pregnant women attending prenatal care services from July to December, 2020 at Tripoli University Hospital. A structured pretested questionnaire was used to obtain socio-demographic data, nutritional factors, obstetrics and gynecological factors, history and clinical conditions. Venous blood samples were collected for platelet count and other platelet parameters, which determined by using Sysmex automation. A total of 72 participated women; about 40%, 35% and 259% of the participants were in the third, second and first trimester, respectively. The mean number of children that women have was 2, with 2.7% having just one child and 47% having three or more children. This study concluded that the prevalence of thrombocytopenia and mostly with mild form is 8.3% and as being greater among pregnant women living in rural areas. Health care providers should do thrombocytopenia test regularly for every pregnant woman in order to prevent excessive bleeding during pregnancy, especially whom living in rural areas.

Mediterranean Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences

COVID-19 pandemic has spread all over the world and has caused psychological impacts. Medical students are known to be vulnerable population, experiencing higher levels of anxiety, depression and other psychological disorders compared to non-medical students. The nature of life changes like what happened and still happening during the pandemic have its impact on mental health of the students. The aim of this study was to identify the psychological impacts of COVID-19 on medical students among different universities to develop profiles to characterize students' anticipated levels of psychological impacts during the pandemic. Also, to search for potential risk factors that could make students more likely to experience these impacts. An online survey was filled by medical students (n = 100) at faculties of medicine, dentistry, pharmacy and medical sciences of different universities: University of Benghazi, Libyan International Medical University, Omar Almokhtar University, Cairo University and Alexandria University. The students were taken to the further analysis. Thus, 55% of the participants had psychological impacts due to the pandemic and 17% had severe effect. Some of these impacts were actually positive as a large number (58%) of the participants felt relaxed during the pandemic. Multiple stressors were identified that contributed to the increased levels of stress, anxiety and depression. These included concern about academic performance (80%), concern about self/dear-one’s health (90%), difficulty with concentration (46%), disruption to sleeping patterns (78%), increased social isolation (26%), disruption to eating patterns (48%), changing in the living environment (26%), financial difficulties (34%) increased class workload (20%) depressive thoughts (37%) and suicidal thoughts (07%). In conclusion, the study indicates that COVID-19 pandemic have positive and negative impacts on medical students. Thus, it is suggested that measures need to alleviate students’ stress, which might have harmful effects in different aspects.

Mediterranean Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences

HIV/AIDS cases in Indonesia continue to increase and have spread to all provinces in Indonesia. Bandung is one of the cities with a high number of people living with HIV/AIDS in Indonesia. As one of the areas with the highest number of reported HIV cases, the Bandung city government seeks prevention and treatment through the role of existing stakeholders. However, stigma and discrimination against people living with HIV & AIDS, now referred to as PLHIV, are still found and are difficult to eliminate. People diagnosed as contaminated with the HIV & AIDS virus often get a negative stigma. This study aims to analyze how to remove the stigma and discrimination of people with HIV/AIDS through the role of civil society. The research results show that stigma against HIV is often directed at certain minority groups and is often associated with morals and religion. Meanwhile, discrimination against people with HIV is manifested in violations of individual rights in the economic, social, and cultural spheres. The issue of stigma and discrimination against PLWHA has not received serious attention. Therefore, the role of civil society is very important because it can open a dialogue with the community regarding HIV/AIDS to dispel myths that tend to discriminate against PLHIV.

Syahrul Tuba

Background: As Bangladesh has gained the reputation of improving the health sectors, much health related sites still require improvements. Community clinic services (CCS) may contribute to this sector with its foremost importance. So this study was conducted to investigate the utilization and health services provision by community clinics (CCs) in rural area. Methods: A descriptive longitudinal study was conducted among three community clinics of Jashore and a structured questionnaire was developed on which most of the questions were developed to find out the contributions of these community clinics. Here for data analysis we used SPSS version 25.0 software. Results: Here we analyzed health service related data from three randomly selected community clinics (CCs). We found an average of 15 patients got antenatal care every month by the Komlapur CC throughout the year. About 140 patients received health services per month from Dogachiya CC. About 634 children were benefited by Saziyali CC throughout the year. By this study we came to know that average 67-75 patients were provided iron supplementations each month by Saziyali CC. All of the CCs had active referral system and online reporting system. Conclusion: From our study we came to know that majority % of rural people are now dependent on community health care services. But most of the community clinics have many limitations regarding infrastructure, training, medicines, financial etc. So the government should take necessary steps regarding this.

Arafat Hassan Razon

Background: Old age is one of the vulnerable and prone stages in terms of health status. So this study aimed to assess the nutritional status and common health complications of older people. Methods: Simplified Nutritional Appetite Questionnaire (SNAQ), Anthropometric measurements, Diet History Method, and Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA) tools were used to measure the nutritional status. Data were analyzed by using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 16. Results: Out of the total 320 elderly participants the mean SD value for the age of male and female was 67.25 6.5 and 67.32 7.7 years respectively. According to BMI classification, it was noticed that with advancing age the percentage of underweight was also increased such as for 60–75 years old age group the underweight percentage was 30.0% where for 76 to 85 and >85 years old age group the underweight percentage was 45.0% and 60.0% respectively. According to the MNA score, 97 elderly respondents were malnourished and a total of 172 respondents had SNAQ scores below 14. This study found a statistically significant (P < 0.05) correlations among various health complications with nutritional status according to MNA score. In addition 56.6% (OR ¼ 1.24, 95% CI ¼ .799–1.939), 63.8% (OR ¼ 1.18, 95% CI ¼ .745–1.857) and 64.7% (OR ¼ 1.14, 95% CI ¼ .720–1.804) respondents had diabetes mellitus, hypertension and cardiovascular disease respectively. The risk of musculoskeletal pain (OR ¼ 1.073, 95% CI ¼ .684–1.681), bedsore (OR ¼ 1.884, 95% CI ¼ .903–3.934) and decreased sense of thirst (OR ¼ 1.278, 95% CI ¼ .821–1.991) were higher among females than males. A little number of the elderly used to take milk, meat, and fish daily. Conclusion: During this cross-sectional study, significant correlations among nutritional changes with health complications were determined. To prevent malnutrition among the elderly a proper health policy as well as periodical nutritional screening should be conducted

Arafat Hassan Razon

Background: Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a very common gastrointestinal dis-order worldwide, but research regarding this disease is rare in Bangladesh. This studyaimed to assess the prevalence of IBS and its associated risk factors among universitystudents in Bangladesh.Methods: This is a cross-sectional study. A total of 300 randomly selected partici-pants were included in this study. By using a structured questionnaire and anthropo-metric methods, we collected all the required data for our study. The diagnosis of IBSwas based on Rome III criteria.Results: The overall prevalence of IBS was 39.3%, but the majority (77.3%) had nobasic awareness of IBS. In our study, anxiety and depression (χ2 = 6.817; odds ratio[OR] = 1.910; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.172, 3.113; P = 0.011) had a signif-icant relationship with IBS and IBS had a significant (P < 0.001) relationship withfood intolerance (χ2 = 8.737; OR = 2.130; 95% CI = 1.284, 3.531), chest pain(χ2 = 7.482; OR = 2.035; 95% CI = 1.218, 3.401), and insomnia (χ2 = 19.320;OR = 2.907; 95% CI = 1.794, 4.709). In our dietary data, the intake patterns of vege-tables (P = 0.000), fast food (P = 0.000), and tea–coffee (P = 0.003) showed astrong significant association with IBS. On the other hand, monthly household income(P = 0.154) and body mass index (BMI) (P = 0.138) showed no significant associa-tion with IBS. Among our study subjects, IBS-constipation (54.2%) was more com-mon than IBS-diarrhea (27.1%) and IBS-mixed (18.6%). Moreover, among the 118IBS respondents, 67.8% had a headache with increased flatulence (95.8%) as the mostcommon IBS-related complication.Conclusion: IBS is common in university students of Bangladesh and is associatedwith anxiety, depression, and particular dietary patterns.

Arafat Hassan Razon

Adverse drug reactions have increased significantly in people as many new drugs have come to the market in the last two decades. This has not only economic consequences but also causes morbidity and mortality. In Bangladesh, some incidents happened related to drug problems and it took several lives. Spontaneous reporting of adverse drug reactions can primarily control this situation and healthcare professionals can play an immeasurable role. Therefore, this study was aimed to be conducted at seven different hospitals and diagnostic centers to find out the actual scenario of adverse drug reactions among the healthcare professionals in Bangladesh to make them aware of adverse drug reactions and the reporting system, and to know about their opinion towards adverse drug reactions. However, after evaluation of the questionnaires it was found that a large number of healthcare professionals were not aware of adverse drug reactions and pharmacovigilance, especially the nurses. It was found that 13.3% of nurses did not know about adverse drug reactions and 93.3% of them had not reported any reactions. Furthermore, many healthcare professionals did not show a positive attitude towards pharmacovigilance. If proper pharmacovigilance practice cannot be started, the nation will face serious economic and health-related problems.

Mediterranean Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences