Search

Abstract Background Adolescent mental health problems are on the rise globally, including in Sweden. One indicator of this trend is increased psychosomatic symptoms (PSS) over time. Lifestyle factors such as physical activity (PA), diet, smoking, and alcohol consumption may influence the time trends in PSS; however, the evidence base is scarce. The aim of this study was to investigate associations between time trends in PSS and lifestyle factors. Methods The study was based on data collected from a nationally representative sample of 9,196 fifteen-year-old boys and girls in Sweden using the Health Behavior in School-aged Children (HBSC) symptom checklist. The sample comprised nearly equal proportions of girls (50.5%) and boys. The lifestyle factors examined in this study included PA, regular breakfast intake, consumption of fruits, vegetables, sweets, or soft drinks, smoking, and alcohol drunkenness. We used data from 2002 to 2018 and stratified by family affluence scale (FAS) to demonstrate how the associations varied among the FAS groups. We fitted separate regression models for the high- and low-FAS groups, where interaction terms between the year of survey and each lifestyle factor were used to estimate the level and direction of associations between the factors and trends in PSS. Results There was a generally increasing trend in PSS mean scores from 2.26 in 2002 to 2.49 in 2018 (p

This data article describes data from an Our Voice citizen science data collection aiming at identifying elements that facilitate or hinder physical activity among adolescents in a medium sized city in Sweden. Twenty-four adolescents from two neighborhoods with low socioeconomic status in Sweden used the Stanford Healthy Neighborhood Discovery Tool app on their phones to take photographs and record audio narratives of aspects of their neighborhood that they perceived as facilitating or hindering their physically activity. In total, 186 photos of the neighborhood elements were taken by the adolescents and thereafter the research group categorized the photos into a final set of 16 elements of which 12 described the built environment and 4 the social environment. The data collection included the combination of the following data collected using the app: photographs, geocoded data of where the photographs were taken, recorded narratives describing the photographs, positive and negative neighborhood attributes (portrayed as a happy or sad “smiley face”), and an 8-item survey. In addition, we used official statistics from the City of Västerås describing the two neighborhoods as well as the whole city. This data article is associated with the article titled “Using citizen science to understand the prerequisites for physical activity among adolescents in low socioeconomic status neighborhoods - the NESLA study” [1].

BACKGROUND:Children with moderate acute malnutrition (MAM) have an increased risk of mortality, infections and impaired physical and cognitive development compared to well-nourished children. In parts of Ethiopia not considered chronically food insecure there are no supplementary feeding programmes (SFPs) for treating MAM. The short-term outcomes of children who have MAM in such areas are not currently described, and there remains an urgent need for evidence-based policy recommendations. METHODS:We defined MAM as mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC) of ≥11.0 cm and

Aims: This study aims to investigate trends in four types of adolescent mental health problems; that is, psychosomatic symptoms, depressive symptoms, suicidal ideations, and suicide attempts 2004–2020. A second aim is to investigate the moderating roles of socioeconomic status and sex in these trends. Methods: The analysis is based on repeated cross-sectional data 2004–2020 among grade 9 students in secondary schools in a Swedish county. In total, data from 19,873 students were included in the analysis. We fitted linear and logistic regression equations and used survey-years' coefficients to estimate the trends. We also estimated the moderating effects of socioeconomic status and sex using interactions between survey year and socioeconomic status and sex, respectively. Results: The trends in all mental health problems declined over time. Through its interaction with survey year, socioeconomic status moderated the trends; psychosomatic symptoms (B = −0.115, P <0.001), depressive symptoms (B = −0.084, P <0.001) and suicidal ideations (odds ratio 0.953, confidence interval 0.924–0.983) significantly declined over time among those with high socioeconomic status. However, socioeconomic status did not have an association with the trend in suicide attempts. Interaction between sex and year of survey was associated with significant decreasing trends in depressive symptoms and suicidal ideations only among girls. Conclusions: Adolescent mental health problems have decreased over time, but only for adolescents with high socioeconomic status, or only in depressive symptoms and suicidal ideations for girls. The results shed light on the growing inequalities in health outcomes across levels of socioeconomic status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The aim of this study is to investigate the extent to which school-related factors, such as school liking, participation in decision-making, school-related parental support, teachers' support, and school physical environment, explain trends in mental health problems. The problems considered are psychosomatic symptoms (PSS), depressive symptoms (DS), suicidal ideations (SI), and suicide attempts (SA) among Swedish adolescents of varying socioeconomic status (SES) from 2004 to 2020. Methods: We analyzed data collected through repeated cross-sectional surveys from 19,873 15-year-old students at schools in a county in Sweden. Boys and girls each constituted 50% of the participants. We fitted linear and logistic regression models to investigate associations between the school-related factors and trends in mental health problems. Results: Increased school-related parental support and school liking were cross-sectionally associated with decreased PSS, DS and SI, with school liking also associated with decreased SA. Conducive school physical environment was also found to be cross-sectionally associated with lower PSS and DS scores. Over time, mental health problems have shown a general increase among adolescents in the low SES group and a decrease among those in the high SES group. While school-related factors explained the improvement in mental health in the high SES group, we found such association only between parental support trends in PSS and DS, along with participation and trends in SA over time among adolescents in the low SES group. Conclusions: The results show that school-related factors play significant roles in influencing adolescent mental health. The influence, however, varied across SES gradients over time. This suggests that working against inequities in school-related factors would help address inequities in mental health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the synthesis of outside versus inside perspectives, this paper weighs the positive attributes of the so-called deprived place against its negative media image. Applying the concept of territorial stigmatization, small-scale citizen science was conducted to gain a unique understanding of the Swedish neighborhood from within. With the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal 11 in mind, this approach enables researchers to reach otherwise difficult to access young urban outcasts and probe the potential to overcome their community's lack of political influence. An overlap between local media narratives and urban outcasts' perceptions of "drug and crime" and "football and school" was revealed. Yet, this first-generation study also painted a somewhat different picture of the stigmatized neighborhood, supplying new insights about places that matter most for marginalized young males. In this Swedish case, their pictures revealed that the local corner market, football court and youth club act as an antidote for the effects of stigmatization. This Our Voice citizen science initiative proved to be a good measure of two communities' abilities to withstand stigmatization, which is either tainted by false perceptions from the outside or weakened by crime from within. Finally, attempting to bypass structural discrimination, citizen scientists' findings and researchers' conclusions were made available to students, colleagues and guests at a poster presentation hosted by Mälardalen University and to concerned politicians from Eskilstuna City Hall as well as the broader public via a local Swedish television station. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Guinea is the third hardest hit country in the region with 2,806 cases and 1,814 deaths as of January 11, 2015 after Sierra Leone and Liberia respectively. This KAP study was conducted in three sub-prefectures of Kouroussa in the Kankan region of Guinea from 15 December 2014 to 15 January 2015. It was conducted with the general objective of examining the knowledge, attitude and practice related to Ebola prevention and care among the public of Kouroussa Prefecture., Methods: A cross-sectional study design was employed to collect quantitative data to examine knowledge, attitude and practice related to Ebola. Structured questionnaire was administered by trained data collectors who were supervised by doctors and epidemiologists from WHO and Africa Union. Data were collected from 358 individuals (93% response rate) and analyzed in STATA 13 while tables and graphs are used to display results., Results: Over 96% of the respondents have ever heard about Ebola while only 76.2% believed the disease existed in Kouroussa. Avoiding physical contacts including hand shaking and contacts with body fluids, and early treatment of persons sick from Ebola were the two important prevention methods frequently mentioned (96.8% and 93.9%). Only 35.7% of respondents were found to have comprehensive knowledge about Ebola (composite of correctly accepting three methods of prevention (85%) and rejecting misconceptions (55.7%))., Conclusion: The high level of knowledge about modes of transmission and prevention methods has not positively affected the level of comprehensive knowledge about Ebola. In contrast, the prevailing high level of misconceptions surrounding Ebola was found to be responsible for a low comprehensive knowledge.