ABSTRACT
Background: It is felt that medical training should largely be made in close proximity of public health & social environment compared to a tertiary care hospital. The package of training could include an exposure to the rural community because a fresh graduate doctor does not have concept of broad community healthcare needs. Aims & Objectives: The aim of the study was to assess the effectiveness of a program designed to expose medical student to the rural community and support system in health. Methods: The study was conducted in December 2008 among 96 medical student of 7th semester. This was a quasi- experimental design with before and after intervention assessment. Assessment was made based on presentations on comparisons of mock village scenario Vs real village experience. A structured questionnaire was used to assess change in knowledge. Results: The mean of the test scores in communication skill and knowledge (based on presentations) in average mock village scenario were 45.94 and improved to 53.56 after real village stay. There was an improvement of 7.62(16.6 %, p<0.001).The mean pre and post village stay score in knowledge based on questionnaire was 56.02 and 67.12 respectively with an improvement of 11.1 (19.81%, p<0.001). The programme was also found to be interesting to the students and villagers. Conclusions: A village stay programme to teach undergraduate student in a field setting to expose them to various parameters of practice of primary health care can help them understand the contextual needs of the society.
ABSTRACT
In developing countries, children of 0-5 years of age form a large as well as "high risk" group. Malnutrition poses a grave risk to the health of these children. The main objectives of this study were to assess the health & nutritional status of children of 0-5 years of age group & to study the influence of various epidemiological factors on health & nutritional status of children on 0-5 years of age group. It is a community based cross sectional study done in randomly selected three wards of Petlad town, district Anand in Gujarat state. 300 children of age group 0-5 years selected by systematic sampling method. Mother of each child included in the study was subjected to personal interview in her own house followed by clinical examination & anthropometric measurements of the child. The three indices of nutritional status namely, weight for age, height for age, & weight for height were expressed in standard deviation units from the median for the international reference populations as per WHONCHS standards & were compared with WHONCHS growth reference data. The prevalence of under weight (wt. for age below 2SD) was 43.67%. 50.3% children were found stunted (ht. 1br age below -2 SID) with higher prevalence in 2nd and 5th year of life. Prevalence of wasting (wt. for ht. below 2SD) was comparatively low (23.2% with a peak in 3rd year of life). These nutritional parameters showed a significant association with parental education, socio-economic status, family size, environmental conditions (safe drink water, sanitary waste disposal & overcrowding), & episodes of common diseases.