Indian Journal of Medical and Health Sciences

Background: Rubella is the leading vaccinepreventable cause of birth defects. Rubella infection in pregnant women may cause fatal death or congenital defects known as congenital rubella syndrome. Still, Rubella vaccination is not part of the universal immunization program in the country. Aim: To study the seroprevalence of rubella in adolescent school girls and ante-natal women. Methods: A multi-centric study to determine the seroprevalence of rubella among children and families was carried out in Delhi and Pune so as to arrive at a decision to find out the magnitude of the problem. Six hundred antenatal mothers attending service hospital OPD and six hundred school students of classes VI to XII were evaluated for presence of rubella IgG and IgM. In addition, certain socioeconomic parameters were also studied. Result: It was found that 29% girls in Pune and 24% in Delhi were susceptible to Rubella. The agestratified seroprevalence shows susceptibility to rubella decreased as the age increased among the girls of Pune. Approximately 10% of the screened ante-women were susceptible to Rubella in both cities. Conclusion: Ten percent of the mothers were susceptible to rubella infection during pregnancy and are thus at a risk of giving birth to babies with Congenital Rubella Syndrome. The adolescent girls though had a higher prevalence of seronegativity. World Health Organisation (WHO) has long ago recommended universal immunisation against Rubella. It is logical that rubella vaccine should be introduced in the immunization schedule for school going girls.

Keywords: Rubella; Seroprevalence; School girls; Ante-natal women.

Introduction: Organophosphate pesticide poisoning (OPP) is continued to be a major global health problem especially in developing countries. This study was planned to evaluate epidemiological, clinical profile and outcome of OPP admitted in tertiary care hospital North West zone of Rajasthan, India. Materials and Methods: A total of 96 patients suffering from OP poisoning were evaluated for epidemiology, clinical profile and outcome. Diagnosis of OP poisoning was done by history, clinical examination and serum butyrylcholinesterase level assay. All patients were evaluated as per Performa and follow up till discharge. Severity of OPP was assessed by POP score and GCS score. Results: Out of 96 cases 76 were males 20 females, age ranging 14-55 years, mean age 26 ± 8, 85.4% were below age 30 years. Most of the patients were farmer, illiterate and belonging to rural area. Most common cause of poisoning was suicidal intention and most common route of poisoning was ingestion. Chlorpyrifos was the most common salt used followed by Monocrotophos, Phorate 10%, Dimethoate 30% and Quinalphos 25%. 8.3% had mild poisoning, 65.6% had moderately severe while 26% had severe OPP as evaluated by POP score. 19 patients required ventilator support, 10 cases developed ARDS and 6 had IMS. Mortality rate was 9.4%. Monocrotophos poison, amount of poison, long duration of poisoning, Hypokalemia, high bicarbonate level, high POP score and low GCS score were associated with poor outcome Conclusions: Thorough clinical evaluation is important for diagnosis and assessment of severity of OPP. POP score and GCS score help in assessing severity of OPP and its outcome. OPP is associated with life-threatening complications. Early detection and immediate treatment in intensive care units can increase the chances of survival rate in such cases. Banning of the most toxic pesticides may reduce the number of significant unintentional and intentional poisoning episodes.

Keywords: Organophosphate; Poisoning; POP score.

Background: Psoriasis is a chronic inflammatory skin disease with itchy, coloured scaly lesion/ patches on the skin. It can present with arthritis, nail involvement with cosmetically disfiguring affecting the quality of life (QOL). Knowledge of psoriasis is essential so as to avoid misbelieves & discrimination against psoriasis patients, which can be achieved through the future medicos if they are aware of scientific facts. Materials & method: An observational, crosssectional study of 100 MBBS students’ undergone clinical batches with 20 objective questions of answers Yes/No, comprising of six different headings as entered in a master chart. Percentage of desired/correct answers was calculated & “average” of 6 categories compared for ranking, so as to judge the level /percentage of awareness of each question/ headings. Results: Out of six-6 categories all students heard about psoriasis. Knowledge of “Myths - misbelieves” as well as advanced knowledge was 34.8%, Scientific knowledge- 29.3%, General knowledge- 27.4%, Awareness- 20%, Except the A, all categories lie below average (35%), showing poor knowledge about psoriasis. Conclusions: The undergraduate MBBS students having a poor knowledge about psoriasis who must be well trained with exposure to psoriasis patients since Doctors are the topmost in spreading the knowledge.

Keywords: Psoriasis Knowledge MBBS; Undergraduates; Poor Awareness

Fever of unknown origin (FUO) or pyrexia of unknown origin (PUO) is a real medical issue at times. Modern investigations can help in diagnosing but in some rare cases, it remains a medical challenge. Patients and clinicians are worried about unexplained fevers. Causes of most of the fevers is identified and approach to diagnosis in such cases is usually related to history, physical examination and basic laboratory clues. The correct approach in such cases is to follow clues and start with the least invasive evaluation. This will help in avoiding unnecessary harm and cost to the patient. Miscellaneous conditions also cause FUO.

Validity, reliability and feasibility are important attributes for any method of assessment. Increasing objectivity in any method of assessment increases its reliability and validity. Multiple choice questions (MCQs) has only one possible answer hence it is highly objective. However, constructing a good MCQs not only requires good in-depth knowledge of the subject but good amount of planning. Failing to do this can result in technical flaws in MCQs in the form of testwiseness and irrelevant difficulty which reduces its reliability and validity. Effectiveness as an MCQ can be assessment by item analysis which helps to improve the quality of MCQs and identify which MCQs are either too easy, too difficult or technically flawed. Hence this review article in written which highlights the measures to be taken while constructing a MCQ and how to minimize flaws in them.

Background: Estimation of stature has a very significant role to play in forensic anthropometry for personal identification. Present study is undertaken to derive regression equations for estimation of stature from digit length. Material and methods: Present study was carried out on 481 males subjects among the tribal population of Udaipur district. The stature and digit length were calculated and the data was analyzed statistically and the regression equations were derived. Result: The correlation between height and digit length in Tribals of Udaipur was found correlation coefficient (r) as 0.0519 for right digit and for left digit it was 0.0473 and for combined digit length 'r' was 0.0496 in males. Conclusion: The present study revealed that the Digit length in males was highly significant of right and left sides (p < 0.05). There was a high correlation between right & left side digit length of males (0.999). There was a very low correlation between digit length of males of right (0.051) and left (0.047) sides with the stature.

Validity, reliability and feasibility are important attributes for any method of assessment. Increasing objectivity in any method of assessment increases its reliability and validity. Multiple choice questions (MCQs) has only one possible answer hence it is highly objective. However, constructing a good MCQs not only requires good in-depth knowledge of the subject but good amount of planning. Failing to do this can result in technical flaws in MCQs in the form of testwiseness and irrelevant difficulty which reduces its reliability and validity. Effectiveness as an MCQ can be assessment by item analysis which helps to improve the quality of MCQs and identify which MCQs are either too easy, too difficult or technically flawed. Hence this review article in written which highlights the measures to be taken while constructing a MCQ and how to minimize flaws in them.