Substance use among students of professional institutes of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

The study was aimed at determining the frequency, common type and causes of substance use among the professional institute of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan as well as comparing substance users based on gender and their residence [day scholars versus hostellers]. Three professional institutes i.e., Khyber Medical College [KMC] Peshawar, University of Engineering and technology [UET] Peshawar and Ghulam Ishaq Khan University [GIK] Topi were selected from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, for the study. From these three institutes, 300 willing participants both men and women were selected. Alcohol, Smoking, Substance Involvement Screening Test was administered on the sample. Chi-square was used to analyze the data. Hundreds students each were taken from KMC, UET and GIK. The age range of the sample was 19-25 years with a mean of 21.76 +/- 1.16 years. There were 204 [68%] students using various substances. Out of these, 138 were males and 66 females. The common substance used by the students was tobacco products [n=124, 41.4%] followed by sedatives [n= 44, 14.7%] and alcohol [n=20, 6.7%]. Out of 152 students residing in hostels, 91 were using substances compared to 63 out of 148 day scholars. The study revealed that Tobacco was the most common substance used in the study population. Males and students living in hostels were more substance consumer as compared to females and day scholars, respectively

Serial order in short-term memory: a comparative study between dementia patients and normal individuals

The present study is designed to investigate the impact of three different types of short term memory models on serial recall. It also aims to see the impact of these different memory models on different levels of neurological functioning. Fifty .four demented patients were selected from Khyber Teaching Hospital, Lady Reading Hospital and Mental hospital Peshawar, Pakistan. Mini Mental State Examination was used for screening as well as for measuring the intensity of dementia. On the basis of these scores, patients were bifurcated into two experimental groups of an equal number portraying severe dementia and moderate dementia. The control group [n=27] was selected from the normal population having no neurological dysfunction, and was matched on the basis of age, education and socioeconomic status. In order to explore the difference among the groups t-test was used. Results indicated a significant difference among the groups, which subsequently supports the hypothesis framed for this study

Mental health of children living in orphans homes

The present study aimed at an investigation of mental health of children living in orphans homes. The sample consisted of 60 subjects [both boys and girls] from different orphans homes of Peshawar and Mardan city, Pakistan. The sample was divided into three groups. Group I included children with deceased parents, group II consisted of children whose one parent was alive but they were living in orphans homes, whereas the third group consisting of children living with their parents sewed as control group. Purposive sampling technique was used to collect the data. It was hypothesized that children living in orphans homes will manifest a high number of depressive symptoms as compared to control group. It was also assumed that children with deceased parents will show more depressive symptoms as compared to children living with both parents. It was further assumed that a negative correlation will be found between self-esteem and depressive symptoms of children living in orphan homes. After collecting the demographic information Children Depression Inventory [Kovacs, 2003] and Rosenberg Self-esteem Scale [1965] were administered on the sample. One-way ANOVA shows a significant difference among the three groups. Research findings support our hypotheses

Depression: a causal factor of dementia

The present study was designed to identify the link between depression and dementia. It was hypothesized that: [1] The depressive patients are more vulnerable to dementia as compared to other mental diseases. [2] There would be a negative correlation between the long history of depression and scores on MMSE. Fifty-four dementia patients, willing to participate in the study, were selected from Khyber Teaching Hospital Peshawar. In-depth interview, DSM-IV and Mini Mental State Examination [MMSE] were used as instruments. Frequency distribution and Pearson Product Moment Coefficient of Correlation were applied. The results show that high percentage [66%] of the sample was suffering from depression. Further, inverse relationship between history of depression and the scores obtained on Mini Mental State Examination was found

Errors in short-term memory: a comparison among three positional models in patients with dementia and normal subjects

The present study was meant to investigate the types of error committed by dementia patients and normal subjects during recall under three different models. For this purpose three groups of subjects [N=81] were selected. Demented patients were referred from neurological and psychiatric wards of different hospitals of Peshawar. Mini Mental State Examination [MMSE] was used to determine the intensity of dementia. The score obtained on MMSE helped in the bifurcation of the patients into two groups i.e. severe and moderate dementia. Third group [control group] was matched on age, gender, education, and socio-economic status from normal population. Indigenous lists of visual clips based on relative, absolute and temporal coding of position were used to measure the types of error. One-way ANOVA was applied and the differences in types of errors among three positional models by patients with severe and moderate dementia and normal subjects were discussed. The present research highlights four types of error which are omission, intrusion, transposition and confusion