ABSTRACT
Background: Iodine deficiency disorders (IDD) constitute the single largest cause of preventable neurological damage worldwide. Majority of consequences of IDD are invisible and irreversible but at the same time these are preventable. The study was conducted to assess the prevalence of goiter in school children aged 6-12 years, to estimate the urinary iodine excretion and to assess the level of iodine concentration in salt samples obtained from households of selected school children.Methods: Population proportionate to size sampling. Sample size was 90 primary school-going children of age 6-12 years in each selected village, total 2700 from 30 villages/wards in Betul district, Madhya Pradesh, India.Results: The prevalence of goiter among the 6-12 years children was found to be 32.06%. Females had higher prevalence compared to males. Of the 540 salt samples, 370 (68.4%) had iodine concentration ?15 ppm at household level.Conclusions: IDD is a mild public health problem in Betul district.
ABSTRACT
Background: Improper food production, handling, and preparation techniques have direct influence on health. A food borne disease is a disease usually either infectious or toxic in nature, caused by agents that enter the body through ingestion of food. The objective of the present study was to assess the food safety knowledge and hygienic practices among food handlers and to assess the improvement in knowledge and hygienic practices after educational intervention.Methods: This was a longitudinal educational interventional study, carried out during October to December 2017 among 50 randomly selected food handlers in and around Gandhi Medical College campus, where the study subjects were interviewed by using a questionnaire in local language regarding their knowledge and practices of food handling, and were then later educated on proper food handling practices by lecture and demonstration method followed by a post intervention interview after a gap of 2 weeks.Results: Out of 50 food handlers, 62% had knowledge of the food borne diseases and it raises up to 100% post intervention. During pre-intervention, only 78% of the participants used to wash their hands before preparing meal and after intervention 92% were washing their hands before preparing meal.Conclusions: Food safety knowledge and hygienic practices among food handlers improved by 73% after the educational intervention. Maximum improvement was seen in the use of gloves, caps and hand washing practices.
ABSTRACT
Introduction: Work related musculoskeletal disorders areone of the most common occupational diseases which mainlyaffect lower back, neck and upper and lower extremities. Workrelated MSDs can affect shoulders, arms, elbows, wrists,hands, back, legs and feet. Symptoms include tenderness,pain, tingling, stiffness and swelling. The study aimed to findout the prevalence and pattern of musculoskeletal disordersamong the bank employees.Material and Methods: A cross sectional study was carriedout among the bank employees (272) employed at AreraHills Bhopal and evaluation of MSD’s with NORDICmusculoskeletal questionnaire.Results: The mean age of study paricipants was 34.8±10.6years,and the number of male staffs (67.95%) outnumberthat of females (32.05%). The mean hours spent per week onwork is around 50.3±9.8 hours. Lower back associated MSDwere more common (65.25%) among the staffs, while ankleswere the least effected (6.5%). Most disabling MSD wasseen to be that of wrist/hand (34.3%) followed by lower back(27.8%).Conclusion: Moderate prevalence of musculoskeletaldisorders and associated disability was reported by bankworkers in Arera Hills. Lower back associated morbiditieswas more prevalent among the bank workers