ABSTRACT
Introduction: The identification of deceased is essential during legal investigations, such as crimes resulting infatality or discovery of unclaimed human body. Stature of an individual plays vital role in determining theidentity of unknown person. Over the past decades, several anthropometric measurements of body segments hadbeen used to compute the stature of an individual with variable degree of accuracy.Aim: To formulate the regression equations to estimate the stature from hand length.Materials and Methods: The cross-sectional analytical study was conducted in 197 students consisting of 100females and 97 males, in College of Medical Science, Bharatpur, Nepal. Height and length of both hands weremeasured in each student with Stadiometer and spreading caliper respectively. The data was analysed usingSPSS version 16.0.Results: The mean values of height and length of both hands were statistically higher in males than in females(p<0.05). A significant positive correlation was observed between the height and length of right and left hands inboth males and females, (p<0.05). The coefficients of determination were 0.39 in males for both hands and thatin females were 0.51 for right hand and 0.49 for left hand. The calculated height (derived using regressionequations) revealed no significant difference from the observed height in both male and female students (p>0.05).Conclusion: This study provides regression equations to estimate stature from the hand length measurements, ashand length relates well with stature.
ABSTRACT
Background: The patient dependence can be concretely assessed on the basis of the ability of the patient to care for himself/ herself with regard to various activities of day to day life. While the patient is sick & hospitalized this dependence is met by the professional support and assistance provided by health professionals, primarily nurses. Thus, the patient dependence as a quantitative measure can be considered as a base from which many aspects of care and progress can be investigated as well as other managerial decisions can be made. Aims: The present study aimed to investigate the levels of dependence among patients admitted to the psychiatric unit of a tertiary hospital using a standardized scale. Methodology: A total of 50 subjects were studied for duration of one month while the dependence was quantitatively measured on three occasions, at time of admission and twice at an interval of 15 days each. Results: The results revealed that 70% of the subjects had high level of dependence. Also there were differences in dependence scores in different domains of dependence. The study also assessed the impact of demographic variables and other disease related variables on the level of dependence. Conclusion: Taking into account, the various dimensions of dependence in clients with mental health problems, the current study implicates the need to identify the ways to optimize the staff resources for best quality outcome meeting the established standards of care.