BACKGROUND Unintended pregnancy is associated with poorer health outcomes for women and their families. In Tajikistan, around 26% of married 15-24 year old women have an unmet need for contraception. There is some evidence that interventions delivered by mobile phone can affect contraceptive-related behaviour and knowledge. We developed an intervention delivered by mobile phone app instant mess...

BACKGROUND Tajikistan and other Central Asian republics are facing intertwined epidemics of injecting drug use and HIV. This paper aims to examine drug scene, drug use, drug-related infectious diseases, drug treatment and other responses to health consequences of drug injecting in two Tajik cities of Kulob (Khatlon Region) and Khorog (Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast). METHODS We conducted ...

tern Med 70: 251, 1969 9. Meister SG, Helfant RH: Rapid bedside differentiation of ruptured interventricular septum from acute mitral insufficiency. N Engl J Med 287: 1024, 1972 10. Popp RL, Fowles R, Coltart DJ, Martin RP: Cardiac anatomy viewed systematically with two dimensional echocardiography. Chest 75: 579, 1979 11. Seward JB, Tajik AJ, Hagler DJ, Mair DD: Visualization of isolated ventr...

BACKGROUND Tajikistan has the highest incidence rate of tuberculosis (TB) in Central Asia. Its health system still bears many features from Soviet times and is under-funded. Affordability is a major barrier to health care. Little is known about health care seeking of TB patients in post-Soviet countries and their delay until the start of TB therapy. The low estimated case detection rate in Taji...

The Afghan resistance sees its struggle more in terms of a "holy war" (jihad) than as a war of national liberation. In a country in which reference to the "nation" is avery recent phenomenon, where the State is perceived as exterior to society and where allegiance belongs to the local community, Islam remains the sole point of reference for all Afghans. It is only in the southern Pushtun tribal...

Uplift and amalgamation of the high-elevation (>3000 m) Tian Shan Pamir ranges in Central Asia restricts westerly atmospheric flow thereby limits moisture delivery to leeward Taklimakan Desert Tarim Basin (<1500 m), second largest modern sand dune desert on Earth. Although some research suggests that hyper-arid conditions observed today developed by ca. 25 Ma, stratigraphic eviden...