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Objective: There is as yet a paucity of data on intramedullary spinal cord tumours (IMSCTs) in sub-Saharan Africa. This study aims to define the clinical profile and outcome of management of IMSCTs in a Nigerian tertiary hospital. Methods: This is a retrospective study of all the patients who had surgery for IMSCTs in our hospital over a 14 year period. Results: There were 20 patients, 9 males, 11 females, in this study. The median age was 33 years (range = 7–78 years). The median duration of symptoms was 12 months (range = 1–120 months). Motor deficit was present in all but one (95%) of our patients. Only 25% of the patients presented in good functional status (McCormick grades I and II). The tumours were confined to the thoracic region in 10 patients (50%), while tumours in the thoracic region extending to the adjoining cervical and lumbar regions were seen in 6 patients (30%). Gross total tumour resection was achieved in 60% of the patients and subtotal resection in the remaining 40%. Astrocytoma and ependymoma were the most common tumours, each occurring in 35% of the cases. Six patients (30.0%) improved, 12 patients (60.0%) remained neurologically the same, while 2 patients (10.0%) deteriorated at the time of last follow up. The mortality rate was 15%. The preoperative functional status was a significant predictor of postoperative outcome (p = 0.03). Conclusion: Astrocytoma and ependymoma were the most common histological tumour types among our patients. Late presentation and poor pre-operative functional status were prominent features of our patients’ cohort.

Objective: This study is aimed at comparing differential effect of Levetiracetam (LTC) monotherapy and Carbamazepine (CZP) monotherapy in W omen with epilepsy (WWE) on gonadal hormone. Methods: 87 WWE were recruited comprising randomly of 46 and 41 on CZP and LTC group respectively with diagnosis and classification based on International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE). Reproductive hormones (Luteinizing Hormone (LH), Follicle stimulating hormone, progesterone, estradiol and testosterone) were assayed. National Hospital Seizure Severity Scale (NHSS) and Zung self-reporting depression scale (ZSRDS) were used to assess the seizure severity and the mood respectively. Data was analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20. The Chi-square test was used to compare categorical variables while Student's t-test or its non-parametric equivalent where appropriate were used to compare continuous variables. Results: Clinical characteristics were comparable in both groups except for ZSRDS (p = 0.048), NHSS (p = 0.012) and hip circumference (p = 0.037). The CZP group had a higher ASEX score and proportion of WWE with clinically significant sexual dysfunction (p

As the COVID-19 pandemic became a global health concern, many business activities have had to adjust to the protocols required to keep people safe, thereby altering the work structures of many professionals. With data gathered from 466 respondents in Nigeria, of which approximately 70% are from the South-West, this study shows how the factors associated with the health crisis have affected work productivity during this period. The snowball survey research design techniques with the two-way interaction model were employed. Multiple Correspondence Analysis was used to analyse and understand multiple and pairwise qualitative factors that influence productivity. The first part of the analysis identified boredom, remuneration, internet availability, fear of COVID-19 and depressing news of COVID-19 as the factors that had significant impacts on workers’ productivity. The second part of the analysis shows how the categories of the five significant factors were either associated or not with productivity. An analysis of each of these factors showed that fear of the disease was associated with slight productivity but access to internet facilities and remuneration were strongly associated with improved work productivity, while boredom and depressing news about COVID-19 were associated with non-productivity during this period. Further evidence also showed that training and new skills acquisition might improve workers’ productivity much more. We, therefore, recommend dynamic skills acquisition, training, and investment in tools and services that will enhance flexibility with the changing work structure that comes because of global crises.

Background: Allergic conjunctivitis occasionally may result in some ocular morbidities. This ranges from innocuous to severe forms of ocular disorders. Aim: This study reports and compares ocular morbidities among children with ocular allergies living in an urban and rural community. Materials and Methods: A comparative cross-sectional study conducted in urban and rural schools among children aged 5–15 years using a multistage sampling method. Sociodemographic data, past ocular history, history of ocular allergies, and treatment were collected with an interviewer-based questionnaire and were analysed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 25. Descriptive analyses of sociodemographic variables and associated ocular morbidity were carried out. The Chi-square test was used to test associations between rural and urban groups. A P = 0.05 or less was considered significant. Results: Associated ocular morbidities were seen in 8% (19/238) of the children with allergic conjunctivitis. There was no statistically significant difference in the proportion of ocular morbidities observed between both locations (8.1 vs. 7.9 in the rural and urban location, respectively, with a P = 1.000). Children with mild forms of allergic conjunctivitis were 197 (82.8%), and only 1.7% had severe forms. The moderate and severe form of allergic conjunctivitis were more prevalent in the rural area (P = 0.002) while untreated allergic conjunctivitis was found in 168 (70.6%) of those affected. Conclusion: This study demonstrated a higher proportion of moderate-to-severe forms of allergic conjunctivitis among school children in the rural region with the majority being untreated.

Background and Aims: Birth asphyxia is one of the three main causes of neonatal mortality in Nigeria. Hypomagnesaemia has been reported amongst severely asphyxiated babies. Despite this, the prevalence of hypomagnesaemia amongst newborns with birth asphyxia has not been well researched in Nigeria. This study set out to determine the prevalence of hypomagnesaemia in term neonates with birth asphyxia and the relationship (if any) between magnesium levels and the severity of birth asphyxia or encephalopathy. Methods: In this cross-sectional analytical study, the serum magnesium levels of consecutive cases of birth asphyxia were compared to that of gestational age-matched healthy term neonates. Babies with Apgar scores

Highlights Bivalve’s exoskeletons from Anadara senilis, Crassostrea gasar, and Mytilus edulis are highly utilizable for a circular economy to reduce seafood waste. These shellfishes are high in minerals and chemical compounds and can be highly valorized in various industries.

This study determines the phytochemical contents of selected medicinal plant extracts quantitatively using spectrophotometry and to evaluate their safety on mammalian cells in vitro using tetrazolium-based colorimetric cytotoxicity assay. Twenty-two ethanolic plant extracts were assessed, and the result showed that Psidium guajava had the highest concentration of alkaloids (219.06±11.50mg/g dry-weight (dw)). In contrast, Acacia nilotica leaf extract with 191.60±9.07mg/gdw had the highest level of flavonoids. Vernonia amygdalina and Moringa oleifera contained more steroids than the other plant extracts while condensed tannin was highest in Carya illinoinensis (21.72 ± 0.84 mg/g dw). Coffea arabica, Acacia nilotica leaf, Vernonia amygdalina, Carya illinoinensis and Psidium guajava had more saponins than the other plant extracts. Regarding cytotoxicity evaluation, Allium cepa and Tulbaghia violacea with concentration killing 50% of cells (LC50) values of 0.5182±0.40 and 0.4909 ± 0.034 mg/ml, respectively, were the safest of all the plant extracts. Acacia nilotica pod and Camelia japonica leaf extracts were the most cytotoxic with LC50 values of 0.0101 ± 0.016 and 0.0151 ± 0.005 mg/ml, respectively, which are well below the recommended toxic cut-off point (0.03mg/ml). The best selectivity index (SI) value of 1.061 was obtained with Aloe ferox against S. aureus, which is a Gram-positive bacterium.

There have been few studies on topic difficulty in the public administration curriculum of African universities. This is further problematized by non-existent literature on the relationships between gender, future career interest and country of study on student difficulty in the study of public administration. This is a gap in the public administration literature which this study attempts to fill. The work is significant to the extent that our understanding of 'where the shirt tights' regarding topics that students find difficult will guide teachers and other stakeholders in applying appropriate remedies. The purpose of the study is to find out (a) what topics in public administration students find difficult to learn; (b) if there are statistically significant relationship between gender and concept difficulty in the study of public administration in African universities; (c) if there are statistically significant relationship between student's career interest and concept difficulty in the study of public administration; and (d) if there are statistically significant relationship between country of study and concept difficulty in the study of public administration. Quantitative method was employed with sample (N = 650). The study reports bureaucracy, decentralization, public policy and politics as moderately difficult; significant relationship between gender and concept difficulty; and significant relationship between student future career interest and concept difficulty. We suggest curriculum development that would improve students' knowledge by laying more emphasis on the perceived difficult areas in the study of public administration, gender, and encourage early students' interest in public sector career choices.

Over the years, the Nigerian government and partner agencies have implemented several interventions to unlock the untapped food security potential of aquaculture. However, there still exists a dearth of knowledge on the effect of these programmes on household food security, particularly among fish farming households in Nigeria. Therefore, this study engaged the Foster-Greer-Thorbecke model and the Probit model to examine the food insecurity incidence and the drivers of food security among the fish farming households in Nigeria. The study engaged secondary data of 1,587 fish farmers from the 2018/19 Nigeria Living Standard Survey panel data. The food insecurity estimates show that about 52.49% of fish farmers are food secure. The result further shows that most food insecure households are males, married, have fish farming as a primary occupation, reside in a rural area and are from the Northern part of the country with no formal education. Empirical evidence reveals that education, household size, access to phone, occupation, sector and location of the household head are the major determinants of food security. The study concludes that educating the fish farmers and upgrading the rural facilities will increase the probability of food security among the fish farming households in Nigeria.

Background: Despite a significant share of Nigeria’s budget in the health sector, the health status has not improved, as reflected by poor health indicators. Objective: This study investigates the linkages between government expenditure and health outcomes in Nigeria. Methods: The Autoregressive Distributed Lag technique was used to examine the short- and long-run effects of government health expenditure on health outcomes separately. The health outcome was captured by life expectancy at birth and mortality rate. Results: Findings show a negative relationship exists between health expenditure and mortality rate, implying that a rise in health expenditure leads to a decrease in mortality rate, while life expectancy at birth positively responds to the changes in health expenditure. Conclusions: As a policy recommendation from this study, the government should pursue increasing health expenditure and partner with the private sector in the form of Public-Private Partnerships to improve the health sector and outcomes.

Background: There is a rise in overweight and obesity in Africa. In Nigeria, there are increasing changes in lifestyle and associated increases in the prevalence of non-communicable diseases. This study aimed at determining the prevalence of overweight and obesity, lifestyle practices, and food consumption practices among female adults in Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria. Methods: In this cross-sectional study, using convenience sampling technique, an interviewer-administered questionnaire was used to obtain data from respondents. Descriptive statistics was used to obtain frequencies and percentages for categorical variables and chi-square test was used to determine association between variables at p

Identification of marine fishes across their geographical distribution is based primarily on morphological features. The ability of marine fishes to adapt to environmental changes sometimes leads to morphological differences that might give rise to wrong or misidentification of the fishes, unlike genetically based identification. Fish samples were collected with a trawl net used by demersal trawlers in Nigerian coastal waters between N 4.19823⁰ E 8.29929⁰ and N 6.18855⁰ E 3.14797⁰. The average length of the COI nucleotide sequences was approximately 584 bp. A total of 30 CO1 sequences were obtained from 18 fish species within 12 families with 97–100% identity with comparison to the Genbank database and BOLD. The average divergence within a species is 4.47%, 6.10% within a genus, and 15.94% within a family, while the maximum within a species and genus is 17.54% and 19.20% within a family. Four (4) species in the Nigerian marine environment have not been sequenced before in this study: Caranx fischeri, Pseudotolithus senegallus, Lagocephalus guentheri, and Sphyraena ensis. These findings will contribute to the barcode database of global marine fish species identification, provide baseline data for marine fishes in Nigerian waters based on the CO1 region, and serve educational purposes in universities, research institutes, fishery managers, and fish stock assessment.

IntroductionThe psychological health of healthcare workers (HCWs) has become a significant concern, particularly during the initial stage of a pandemic. This study compared the depressive symptoms among HCWs in high-risk areas (HRAs) and low-risk areas (LRAs) with matching demographics.MethodsA cross-sectional study was employed to compare the depressive symptoms (Patient Health Questionnaire score ≥ 10), workplace environment characteristics, the Health Belief Model (HBM) and socio-demographics of the HCWs working in HRAs and LRAs in several accessible regions (mainly Hubei Province and Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater–Bay–Area) in China. Eight hundred eighty-five HCWs were recruited for unmatched analysis between March 6 and April 2, 2020. After matching with occupation and years of service using a 1:2 ratio, 146 HCWs in HRAs and 290 HCWs in LRAs were selected for matched analysis. Subgroup analyzes were performed using two individual logistic regressions to delineate the associated factors in LRAs and HRAs, respectively.ResultsHCWs in LRAs (Prevalence = 23.7%) had 1.96 times higher odds of depressive symptoms than those in HRAs (Prevalence = 15.1%) after adjusting for occupation and years of service (p

Gender inequality is high in Africa compared to other regions of the world. This disparity jeopardises the efforts targeted at improving human development and economic growth in the continent. This study provides empirical evidence on the drivers of human development in Africa across gender and country income groups, covering 54 countries over the period 1990 to 2019. It employed the Mean Group estimator for analysis to accommodate slope heterogeneity and cross-sectional dependence. The paper used Human Development Index (HDI) to proxy human development, while HDI across gender was employed to capture gender differences in human development. Country income grouping followed the World Bank country classification into low, lower-middle and upper-middle-income economies. The findings showed more determinants of HDI when disaggregated across gender than otherwise. The drivers of HDI are similar across gender for each country income group, with infrastructure, particularly ICT shown to have a positive effect in the long run for all country groups. For lower-middle and upper-middle income countries, fertility rate induced a significant negative effect on HDI and gender human development but only in the long run. However, the effect was insignificant for male and female HDI in low-income countries. Moreover, an increase in real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) promotes human development regardless of a country's income classification. A larger positive effect of GDP was observed on the HDI for low-income countries. Therefore, in the bid to improve human development in Africa, efforts should continually be intensified towards promoting GDP growth regardless of the level of growth in macroeconomic income. Policies targeted at reducing fertility rates and increasing ICT are also encouraged as these will improve HDI and close the gap in HDI across gender.

Despite being curable and preventable, tuberculosis (TB) affected 10 million people worldwide in 2020. In the seven highest TB burden countries, private providers account for more than two-thirds of initial care seeking. Closing gaps and finding the “missing people” with TB requires engagement of the private sector for better diagnostics and treatment.This review explores the efforts of a public–private partnership to enhance TB diagnostics in Nigeria, covering logistics and the distribution of GeneXpert machines and other diagnostic tools. Over three years, the Nigerian “hub and spoke” model led to a 28-fold increase in referrals of people with presumed TB in private diagnostic facilities. Various stakeholders' perspectives are also included, providing insight into opportunities and challenges of working with the private sector in this effort.As countries tackle the setbacks brought by COVID-19 and move towards reaching the End TB targets, partnerships such as these can strengthen the foundations of health systems.