Premarital fertility, defined as birth before first marriage, is investigated in Madagascar, using two Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) conducted in 1992 and 1997. About 8 per cent of all births and 23 per cent of first births take place before marriage, despite a low underlying mean age at first marriage, estimated to be 18.6 years in the absence of a previous birth. A premarital first bir...

Despite a growing literature documenting strong linkages between income and health, there remains little understanding of how economic factors shape disease outcomes in the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Using individual level data from nineteen sub-Saharan African countries, we show that negative income shocks can lead to substantial increases in HIV prevalence. We match data on individuals’ HIV status fr...

The underlying motivation of this study is to account for the spatial variation of factors affecting women’s access to land, which has been largely ignored by the traditional regressionbased model studies, much to the detriment of spatially varying relationships. Using household and individual-level data from the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS), this study used Geographically Weighted Regr...

Previous studies, conducted mainly in Asian countries, have shown that women‘s empowerment is associated with contraceptive use, lower fertility, and longer birth intervals. Yet little is known about the association of women‘s empowerment with fertility desires in subSaharan African countries where overall fertility levels remain high. This study tries to fill this gap, exploring whether women‘...

BACKGROUND Poor response rates can jeopardise the validity of the findings of epidemiological surveys. The aim of this study was to undertake a randomised controlled trial to determine the effectiveness of different strategies for maximizing parental consent rates for dental health surveys of young children. METHODS The trial took place within the 2007/2008 NHS Epidemiological Dental Health S...

This survey study assessed former students' perceptions on the efficacy of how well a newly implemented master's in health professions education degree program achieved its academic aims. These academic aims were operationalized by an author-developed scale to assess the following domains: a) developing interprofessional skills and identity; b) acquiring new academic skills; and c) providing a ...

Background. Most of the childhood illnesses can be proven with effective interventions. However, countless children die needlessly in developing countries due to the failure of their guardians to seek care timely. The aim of this study was to assess health care seeking behavior of caretakers of children under the age of five years for treatment of common childhood illnesses. Methods. Further an...

Singur Health Centre Area comprising of 3.2 square miles, situated 21 miles north-west of Calcutta and consisting of 4 Unions, has been organized as a rural practice-field for the All-India Institute of Hygiene and Public Health, Calcutta. A general health survey of this area was conducted with the following ?bjects :? 1. To obtain an integrated picture of the health conditions of the populatio...

This paper reassesses the nexus between female education, employment and fertility in Nigeria. The four Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) that have been conducted in the country (1990–2008) were analysed. Between 1990 and 2008, the educational status of women improved appreciably and the proportion of illiterate women in the country declined from 57.2 to 35.8 per cent. Multivariate analysis ...

OBJECTIVES Examine the validity of using a self-completed Stated Preference Discrete Choice Modeling (SPDCM) questionnaire to measure parents' preferences for vaccinating their children against varicella. METHODS A qualitative approach was used to assess the way parents understood the technical information in the questionnaire and the factors they considered to be important to the immunizatio...