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Background: Patients with diabetes on insulin therapy use sharps (e.g., needles) on a regular basis and a considerable proportion of them, within their home environments. These sharps and other bloodstained materials, if not disposed of appropriately has the potential to be a public health hazard., Objective: Our objective was to explore the practices related to sharps disposal among patients with diabetes from North Colombo Teaching Hospital (CNTH), Ragama, Sri Lanka., Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional study on 158 patients with diabetes from the CNTH. Patients had to use sharps for the daily management of their disease for inclusion into the study group. Data were collected on sharps disposal practices using an interviewer-administered questionnaire. Clinic records were also used as a secondary data source., Results: Most patients, 153/158 (96.8%) used syringes to inject insulin. Forty-three patients (27%) involved others (e.g., family) when disposing of sharps. Used sharps were commonly disposed to the household garbage bin by 66 participants (41.7%). Other methods used for sharps disposal were: sharps container, toilet pit, household garbage dump and indiscriminate measures. Importantly most patients, 147 (93%) had received no information on how to dispose of sharps after usage., Conclusion: Patients commonly used unsafe practices in home-based sharps disposal. These included disposing of in the household garbage bin, burning sharps in the household garbage dump and disposing of into the common garbage dump of the community. Being male and being > 60 years of age was associated with a higher dependence on family members for sharps disposal. Patient education and public resources for sharps handling can help improve this situation.

Background: Breast cancer is the commonest cancer among Sri Lankan women. The aim of this study was to document the breast cancer profile of a group of Sri Lankan women and compare it with regional data. Patient-tumor characteristics and predicted prognosis are compared with the immune profile., Methods: A total of 814 Sri Lankan women with breast cancer were studied, with their information retrieved from patient records. Tumor type and grade were reassessed on routine tissue sections. The Nottingham Prognostic Index (NPI) was calculated. Estrogen receptors (ER) and human epidermal receptor 2 (HER2) were assessed using Dako antibodies. Strong nuclear staining for ER in >10% of tumor cells and strong, complete cell membrane staining (3+) for HER2 were regarded as positive. An SPSS-16 software program and the chi-squared test were used for statistical analysis., Results: The highest prevalence (32%) was in the 50- to 59-year age cohort (mean +/- SD 51.88 +/- 11.939 years). In all, 58% of the tumors measured between 2 and 5 cm. Most (52%) were moderately differentiated and were invasive ductal carcinomas (86.3%). Regional lymph node metastasis was present in 41% of the patients. ER was expressed in 31.7% and was more frequent in women >35 years (p < 0.024). HER2 was found in 14.5% of tumors. Its expression was lower in ER-positive tumors (p < 0.000). Well-differentiated tumors were frequently ER-positive (p < 0.000) and HER2-negative (p < 0.001). The NPI was better for ER-positive (p < 0.000) and HER2-negative tumors (p < 0.028)., Conclusions: The overall profile of breast cancer and immune characteristics of Sri Lankan women in this study was largely comparable to profiles documented elsewhere in the region despite the lower prevalence of ER.