Factors associated with caregivers' consistency of use of bed nets in Nigeria: a multilevel multinomial analysis of survey data.

BACKGROUND: Malaria remains endemic in Nigeria despite programmes and policies put in place toward malaria elimination. Long-lasting insecticidal nets have been documented to offer protection from malaria by preventing mosquito bites. While many studies have examined the factors associated with the use of bed nets in Nigeria and across Africa, little information is available on the factors associated with consistency of use of bed nets. METHODS: The data for this study were derived from a household survey conducted in three states in Nigeria (Akwa Ibom, Kebbi and Nasarawa) between July and September 2015 by the Health Communication Capacity Collaborative, a 5-year cooperative agreement supported by the United States Agency for International Development and the US President's Malaria initiative and led by the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs. The analysis was limited to a total of 3884 men and women selected from 2863 households with at least one bed net. Multilevel multinomial logistic regression was used to assess the factors associated with consistency of use of bed nets. RESULTS: The findings revealed 43.2% of the respondents use bed nets every night, while 38.4% use bed nets most nights. The factors associated with using a bed net every night rather than rarely or never using a bed net included sociodemographic and household variables (age, gender, religion, household size, net density, and household wealth), ideational variables (perceptions about severity, susceptibility, self-efficacy to use nets, and response-efficacy of bed net; awareness of place of purchase; willingness to pay for bed nets; attitudes towards net use; and descriptive norm about nets), and state of residence. The three study states differ significantly in terms of most of the independent variables included in the estimated model. CONCLUSIONS: The study recommends that efforts designed to promote consistent use of bed nets should be state-specific and include strategies targeting ideational variables. Furthermore, given the significance of unmeasured heterogeneity at the cluster level, strategies to engage and mobilize the community, such as community dialogue, home visits and engaging community leadership, are relevant.

Pattern of Utilisation of Dental Health Care Among HIV-positive Adult Nigerians.

PURPOSE: To determine the pattern of dental care utilisation of people living with HIV (PLHIV). MATERIALS AND METHODS: A cross-sectional questionnaire survey of 239 PLHIV patients in three care centres was done. Information on sociodemographics, dental visit, risk groups, living arrangement, medical insurance and need of dental care was recorded. The EC Clearinghouse and WHO clinical staging was used to determine the stage of HIV/AIDS infection following routine oral examinations under natural daylight. Multivariate logistic regression models were created after adjusting for all the covariates that were statistically significant at univariate/bivariate levels. RESULTS: The majority of subjects were younger than 50 years, about 93% had not seen a dentist before being diagnosed HIV positive and 92% reported no dental visit after contracting HIV. Among nonusers of dental care, 14.3% reported that they wanted care but were afraid to seek it. Other reasons included poor awareness, lack of money and stigmatisation. Multivariate analysis showed that lack of dental care was associated with employment status, living arrangements, educational status, income per annum and presenting with oral symptoms. The area under the receiver operating curve was 84% for multivariate logistic regression model 1, 70% for model 2, 67% for model 3 and 71% for model 4, which means that the predictive power of the models were good. CONCLUSION: Contrary to our expectations, dental utilisation among PLHIV was generally poor among this group of patients. There is serious and immediate need to improve the awareness of PLHIVs in African settings and barriers to dental care utilisation should also be removed or reduced.

Teachers' perspectives on sexual and reproductive health interventions for in-school adolescents in Nigeria.

High prevalence of early and unprotected sex, resulting in adverse reproductive health outcomes, has been reported among adolescents in Nigeria. While school-based sexual and reproductive health interventions for in-school adolescents is widely recognized, little is known on the kind of involvements desired by teachers and their perceptions of handling students' reproductive health concerns. In this study, the teachers favoured school-based reproductive health education (RHE), but have divers' opinions on what should be included in such RHE. Majority was not willing or comfortable in personal counseling of students but can teach RHE in classroom environment. They support the current approach of expelling pregnant school girls. The article advocates for gender-sensitive and developmental-oriented approaches that will ensure rehabilitation and re-integration of pregnant girls into the school system after their delivery, and recommend the need to build teachers skills and promote students-teachers dialogue in order to optimize school environment for addressing ASRH.

Why actions for early treatment of febrile illnesses in children are delayed by caregivers.

The study explored why actions for early treatment of febrile illnesses in children are delayed by caregivers of children less than five years in five Local Government Areas (LGAs) of southwestern Nigeria using four indicators: caregivers' perception of illness, notion of causation and seriousness, belief in efficacy of selected pathway, and the decision making process. Seven types of febrile illnesses (yellow fever, typhoid fever, ordinary fever/malaria, hot body fever, rain fever, cold fever, and headache fever) were identified and yellow fever was perceived as the most severe type (60.8%). Only 24.2% correctly identified an infected mosquito bite as the cause of ordinary fever/malaria. Use of leftover drugs at home (55.6%) was the main action taken and fathers were the main decisionmakers in all cases. Empowerment of women for improved knowledge on causation, severity, and importance of prompt action for a healthy outcome is recommended.