Prescription ethics in a low-middle income country: Thematic analysis of research from Pakistan.

The ethics of physician prescriptions is a matter of global concern. While commonalities exist in reasons for unethical prescribing practices such as physician incentivization by pharmaceutical companies, the underlying social determinants may be different across countries and socioeconomic strata. This scoping review has collected themes from publications around prescription ethics from Pakistan.

Listening to Caregivers: Narratives of Health Seeking for Children Under Five with Pneumonia and Diarrhea: Insights from the NIGRAAN Trial in Pakistan.

Background: Understanding health-seeking behaviors of caregivers is important to reduce child mortality. Several factors influence decision-making related to childhood illnesses.

Objective: The objective of this study was to gather caretaker narratives to develop a comprehensive understanding of the context and process of caregiving at household level during all stages of an episode of diarrhea and pneumonia in children <5.

Violence and abuse among working children in urban and suburban areas of lower Sindh, Pakistan.

Background: Child labourers are exposed to an insecure environment and higher risk of violence. Violence among child labourers is an under-studied phenomenon which requires contextual assessment.

Aims: We applied Bronfenbrenner's ecological model (micro-, exo- and macro-system) to understand the interplay of individual, community, societal and policy context fuelling violence.

Applying Public Health Principles to Better Manage the COVID-19 Pandemic: "Community Participation," "Equity," and "Cultural Sensitivity".

Although coronavirus vaccine roll-out is beginning, standard public health practices will, for most people, remain their first line of protection for some time. Three principles guiding the pandemic control process, namely community participation, promotion of equity, and cultural sensitivity, can help people adhere to public health advice. These three principles can enhance intervention effectiveness, decreasing the rate of infection and protecting human rights, promoting social harmony and preventing unrest.

Malnutrition and food insecurity in child labourers in Sindh, Pakistan: a cross-sectional study.

Background: Child labour is common in low- and middle-income countries. Although child labour is widespread in Pakistan, no data are available on the health of child labourers.

Aims: This study aimed to assess the food security, food intake and nutritional status of child labourers aged 5-14 years working in lower Sindh, Pakistan.

Impact of humanities and social sciences curriculum in an undergraduate medical education programme.

Objective: To evaluate the impact of humanities and social sciences curriculum in an undergraduate medical education programme.

Methods: The qualitative study was conducted from May 2016 to May 2017 at a private medical college in Karachi where humanities and social sciences subject is an art of the undergraduate curriculum as a 6-week module at the start of Year 1 of the five-year programme. Focus group discussions were held with students from all the five years as well as with faculty related to humanities and social sciences, basic sciences and their clinical counterparts.

Recommendations: putting an end to child labour in Pakistan!

Child labour is rampant in Pakistan since ages. Laws, policies, programmes and strategies to eliminate child labour have been in place with little gain. Implementation of laws and sustainability of programmes offer barriers to eliminate the menace.

Exploring women and traditional birth attendants' perceptions and experiences of stillbirths in district Thatta, Sindh, Pakistan: a qualitative study.

Background: Pakistan reports the highest stillbirth rate in the world at 43 per thousand births with more than three-quarters occurring in rural areas. The Global Network for Women's and Children's Health maintains a Maternal and Newborn Health Registry (MNHR) in 14 study clusters of district Thatta, Sindh Pakistan. For the last 10 years, the MNHR has recorded a high stillbirths rate with a slow decline.

Insight into Mechanistic Action of Thymoquinone Induced Melanogenesis in Cultured Melanocytes.

Background: Melanin plays a crucial role in camouflage, social communication and protection against harmful ultraviolet radiations. Melanin is synthesized by melanocytes through melanogenesis and several intrinsic and extrinsic factors are involved during the process. Any change occuring in the normal melanogenesis process can cause severe pigmentation problems of hypopigmentation or hyperpigmentation.

Stretching the boundaries of medical education A case of medical college embracing humanities and social sciences in medical education.

Objective: Aga Khan University, a private medical college, had a vision of producing physicians who are not only scientifically competent, but also socially sensitive, the latter by exposure of medical students to a broad-based curriculum. The objective of this study was to identify the genesis of broad-based education and its integration into the undergraduate medical education program as the Humanities and Social Sciences (HASS) course.

Methods: A qualitative methodology was used for this study.

Schools of public health in low and middle-income countries: an imperative investment for improving the health of populations?

Background: Public health has multicultural origins. By the close of the nineteenth century, Schools of Public Health (SPHs) began to emerge in western countries in response to major contemporary public health challenges. The Flexner Report (1910) emphasized the centrality of preventive medicine, sanitation, and public health measures in health professional education.

Situation analysis of child labour in Karachi, Pakistan: a qualitative study.

In Karachi, large employment opportunities, burgeoning population and the availability of cheap labour might be the contributing factors for the increasing prevalence of child labour. A literature review was conducted in 2007 that included published and unpublished literature since 2000. Various organizations working in the field were also covered, while the perception of the child labourers was covered through three focus group discussions.

How we developed a bioethics theme in an undergraduate medical curriculum.

The 5-year undergraduate medical curriculum at Aga Khan University integrates basic sciences with clinical and community health sciences. Multimodal strategies of teaching and learning, with an emphasis on problem-based learning, are utilized to equip students with knowledge, skills, behaviours, attitudes and values necessary for a high-calibre medical graduate. Bioethics teaching was introduced in the medical curriculum in 1988 and has since undergone several changes.

Women's empowerment in Pakistan-definitions and enabling and disenabling factors: a secondary data analysis.

Purpose: The purpose of the study was to explore Pakistani women's definition of women's empowerment, including its enabling and disenabling factors. Through understanding empowerment, interventions may be developed for women to be empowered.

Design: Transcriptions of 35 interviews from a previous study were reanalyzed through secondary data analysis.

A source of strength and empowerment? An exploration of the influence of disabled children on the lives of their mothers in Karachi, Pakistan.

Purpose: Previous literature has highlighted marginalisation and stigma of children with disabilities in developing countries, but few studies have explored the central care-giving environment and the relationship of the mother and her child with disabilities in this context. A group of women caring for children with disabilities in a low income community in Karachi, Pakistan was identified for the study. The aims were: (1) to explore the influence children with disabilities have on the daily lives of their mothers, (2) to describe the factors which influence the care-giving capacity of mothers.

Tawana project-school nutrition program in Pakistan--its success, bottlenecks and lessons learned.

Tawana Pakistan Project, a multifaceted pilot project (Sept. 2002 to June 2005) was funded by the Government of Pakistan to address poor nutritional status and school enrollment of primary school age girls. The core strategy was to create safe environment empowering village women to take collective decisions.

Medical education and training: responding to community needs.

At its inception in 1987, the Aga Khan University introduced the idea of community-based medical education in Pakistan, at a time when this model was being introduced and adapted internationally. Human resource development has been a major objective in the Department of Community Health Sciences (CHS). CHS has contributed to developing a medical curriculum that addresses the health needs of the community at large.