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Introduction: Husband and wife as a couple are fully responsible for their current and future. In our society, the husband is mostly responsible for making the decision regarding any expenses. In India, there is a need to reduce the maternal mortality rate, and Husband’s involvement in antenatal care could be a key to success as it will enable them to support their partner in adequate preparation for birth and to utilize emergency obstetric care early if complications arise. Aim and Objectives: To find out about male involvement in the utilization of maternal healthcare services by their spouse and various factors affecting male involvement in the utilization of maternal healthcare services. Methods: This study was conducted in urban and rural field practice areas attached to the Department of Community Medicine, PGIMS, Rohtak. The study included 400 couples where 200 each were recruited from rural and urban areas. Out of 17 subcenters under CHC Chiri eight, subcenters were selected randomly by lottery method. A line list of these couples was prepared at each subcenter using ANC and birth register. Couples were enrolled from this line list till a sample size of 25 was reached at each of these eight subcenters. In this way, a total of 200 couples were enrolled from rural areas in which women delivered and availed maternal health services in the last 6 months. In urban areas, an equal number of couples were enrolled from each of these three urban health posts till the sample size of 200 was reached in an urban area. Results: The majority of the husbands (73%) reported that they participated in their wives’ utilization of maternal health services. Twenty‑seven percent did not participate in their wives’ utilization of maternal health services. It also showed that 71.0% of the husbands did not know about the investigations that needed to be performed during a woman’s pregnancy. Only 29% were aware of it. On analysis, it was observed that 73% of the husbands had good participation in their spouses’ maternal and child health (MCH) care, while the rest had poor participation (27%). It also showed that as the education level of the participants’ husbands increased, their participation in their spouses’ MCH care increased, with the highest being observed among graduates (91.3%) and the lowest among those with primary schooling level education (66.7%) which were statistically significant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Children are considered as an important asset for any country and their health as one of the important indicators of a healthy country. There are several factors affecting children's health and anemia is one of them. Globally around 1.62 billion people are affected by it, which corresponds to 24.8% of the population, with the highest prevalence of anemia (47.4%) among preschool-aged children. Aim: The present study was conducted to estimate the prevalence of anemia among toddlers (12–36 months) and to determine the associated factors. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out among toddlers (12–36 months) in the urban field practice area of Pt. B.D. Sharma PGIMS, Rohtak. A total of 170 toddlers were enrolled in the study and their mothers were interviewed using a semi-structured pretested questionnaire. Hb was estimated by Sahli's acid hematin method. The data were analyzed using SPSS software version 20. Results: In the present study, more than half (55.9%) participants were girls and 44.1% were boys. The overall prevalence of anemia was found to be 62.4%, with mild, moderate, and severe anemia being 41.8%, 17.7%, and 2.9%, respectively. The children with regular intake of iron supplementation were found to be 6.625 times likely to be nonanemic as compared to those with no supplementation. Conclusion: Every endeavor should be made to combat the anemia in children through multisectoral and multipronged approach such as nutritional education of mothers, growth monitoring, nutritional supplementation, etc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Adolescents are being involved in aggressive activities nowadays. Sometimes, involvement in aggressive activities may be fatal for the victim as well as for the doer. It is a matter of great concern for all including parents, teachers, psychologists, social reformers, and others. A momentary expression of anger sometimes may spoil the future life of the adolescents. Aim and Objectives: To determine the prevalence of aggression and to identify the psychosocial risk factors associated with aggression among school-going adolescents. Methodology: The study recruited 480 school-going rural adolescents from eight government senior secondary schools in the rural block of Beri, district Jhajjar (Haryana). Observations: The mean age of the adolescents was 14.11 ± 1.12 years; 49.4% of the adolescents were found to be aggressive. After applying binary logistic regression, there was a statistically significant relation between aggression and determinants like class, gender, occupation of the father. Conclusion and Recommendations: The study concluded that determinants like age, class of students, gender of the subject, occupation of father found a significant association with aggression. To solve this current situation, parents must give love, attention to their children and must act in an appropriate way in front of them and be role models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: WHO indicates that India has the highest burden of soil-transmitted helminthiasis (STH) in the world, contributing to 25% of the total global cases, with 220 million children aged 1–14 estimated to be at risk. Aim and Objective: To study the association between the socioeconomic factors and STHs among primary school children in a rural area of Haryana. Methodology: The study was conducted among children aged 6–10 years studying in the rural government primary schools in the rural areas of Haryana. A total of 300 children were enrolled from government school. Results: The study found that the prevalence of helminthiasis was 28.7% (86/300) and of these 14.0% children were infected with Ascaris lumbricoides and sex wise association with Helminthic infection was observed as statistically nonsignificant. One third of the (31.39%; 27/86) children were pallor and 5.81% subjects were having Bitot's spot while 13.95% children were having constitutional symptoms such as weakness, 6.97% subjects have fatigue, and 5.81% children have body ache. Discussion: The morbidity can be reduced with appropriate inputs to improve the environmental factors. This may need investment for sanitary latrines, food hygiene, and safe drinking water, anti-helminthic drugs, and health education. Conclusion and Recommendations: The results of the study concluded and recommended that proper implementation of national deworming day and other long-term strategies like sanitation, clean drinking water, adequate sanitation, and also improvement in nutritional status through various nutritional health programmes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In the world, helminthiasis is the major public health problem in school-age children. More than 60 million school-age children live in intensively transmitted areas and they need immediate treatment and preventive interventions. Methodology: The study was conducted in the rural government schools of Block Beri, District Jhajjar (Haryana), India, and the study was descriptive and cross-sectional in design. The study recruited 300 school-going children in the age group of 6–10 years. Results: In this study, the mean age of subjects was 7.68 ± 1.467 years and prevalence of soil-transmitted helminths was 28.7%. The association between practice of hand washing and practice of washing fruits and vegetables with helminthic children were found statistically significant. Conclusion and Recommendation: Impart health education among community through primary care physician about wash hands before eating food and after defecation, washed thoroughly raw and uncooked food before eating. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Swine flu caused by influenza virus and it’s a respiratory disease of pigs. The people like farmers and pork processors working in close proximity with pigs are at higher risk of getting swine flu. In India, a total of 117 deaths and 1,154 cases have been reported in the first two months of year 2018. Objectives: To assess the community perception about Swine flu among adults in an urban slum of District Rohtak. Methodology: The study was a community based epidemiological study with cross-sectional design and carried out by visiting house to house. The study recruited 500 adults of age 18-60 years. Results: The study found that there was no significant difference between gender and age with heard of swine flu while education wise (p= 0.002) and caste wise (p=0.011) awareness of swine flu was found to be statistically significant. Conclusion and Recommendation: The study concluded that the majority of subjects heard about swine flu and majority of subjects said that swine flu spread after coughing or sneezing. The study recommends that health care functionaries should spread awareness about signs and symptoms of swine flu. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Adolescence is a transition phase through which a child matures into an adult. The physical changes in the human body are from infant to child to adolescence to adult to old age. All phases of life behave like a coin with both good and bad facets attached to each phase of life. Aims & Objectives: 1. To study perception and awareness regarding pubertal changes among school going adolescent boys. 2. To study the association between education and perceived pubertal problems among study subjects. Material & Methods: The study was conducted among male students of senior secondary schools of community development block Beri in one year. The study universe comprised of students in middle and late adolescence (aged 14-18 years) studying in 9th to 12th classes of the senior secondary schools in the area. A total of 1000 male students were selected from these schools which were more than the required sample size of 891. Results: The study found that 42.66% students and a half (50%) of students of class 9th & 10th and class 11th & 12th respectively considered that pubertal changes as a normal phenomenon. The majority of students admitted practicing masturbation and felt shy and guilty for practicing masturbation, also students felt fatigued after night emission. Conclusions: The study concludes that adolescent's sexuality which often causes controversy and concern among adults is least discussed with them during adolescence. The reasons for this may be many, including moral grounds or because of concomitant health risks and threats to wellbeing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Influenza Subtype Ahas caused various pandemics; in 1918-19 Spanish flu [A (H1N1)], Asian Flu [A (H2N2)] 1957-59, Hongkong Flu [A (H3N2)] 1968-69 and "Swine Flu" [A (H1N1)] 2009-10. H1N1 flu virus causes respiratory illness in people, affecting the nose, throat and lungs. Influenza can be transmitted through airborne route by droplets from infected human beings or direct contact or contact with fomites. Agent H1N1 influenza derives Segments from four influenza viruses; North American Swine, North American Avian, Human Influenza and Eurasian Swine. Pigs Infected with Influenza virus from different host of human or bird origin may act as "mixing vessel" which may lead to reassortment of influenza genes and can create a new strain of influenza virus. Subtype A of Influenza virus can Undergo mutation that can take place within the genome (Antigenic drift) / or reassortment among the genetic materials of subtypes (Antigenic Shift) resulting in a new virus. Antigenic analyses of the recent circulating A (H3N2) viruses have shown differences from the A (H3N2) virus used in the influenza vaccines for 20142015. Recently, countries in Northern Africa, Middle East, and India reported an increase in influenza A (H1N1) pdm09 activity. The predominant strain in western countries has been seasonal influenza A (H3N2) where as in India the California strain of2009 is prevailing. It has been reported that the recent 2014-2015 H1N1A outbreak in India has resulted in >30,000 cases with over 2000 deaths. These recent spurt of cases and deaths which was even higher than the original H1N1 2009 outbreak in India resulted in a widespread debate that this strain H1N1A2009 has mutated or not. Improved surveillance and monitoring of the influenza outbreak is need of the hour to both treat as well as prevent spread of the virus. Due to better connectivity world over and high infectious nature of influenza, there is an urgent need to develop a comprehensive and a standardized response to influenza epidemic outbreaks. There is a need of genetic and phenotypic analysis of the virus as and when cases are reported world over and general dissemination of the data is needed to ensure access to this data source in case of any outbreak. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]