T.A. EHWARIEME

This study assessed the burden of care as a predictor of quality of life among care givers of hypertensive patients attending a tertiary health facility in Benin City, Edo State. A cross sectional survey was conducted with 195 caregiver-patient pairs with data collected using structured questionnaires, the Zarit Burden Interview (ZBI), and the WHO Quality of Life-BREF(WHOQoL-BREF) instrument that assessed their demographic characteristics, burden of care among caregivers, health-related quality of life (HRQoL) of caregivers and hypertensive patients, and the factors associated with burden of care among caregivers. The findings revealed thatabout 56.4% of caregivers experienced a high level of burden, with a mean ZBI score of 44.07(SD = 6.30), and 13.8% reported severe burden. Moreso, having no formal education (compared to tertiary education) was associated with significantly lower odds of experiencing a higher burden of care (OR = 0.362, 95% CI [0.148, 0.885], p = 0.026). Furthermore, caregivers who desired to continue caregiving (compared to not desiring to continue) were significantly more likely to report a high burden of care (OR = 2.431, 95% CI [1.297, 4.556], p = 0.006). Additionally, multivariate analysis examining the relationship between quality of life domains and the likelihood of experiencing a high burden of care revealed that reporting a low psychological quality of life (compared to high psychological QoL) significantly increased the odds of high burden (OR = 6.474, 95% CI [1.369, 30.616], p = 0.018), and reporting a low environmental quality of life (compared to high environmental QoL) also significantly increased the odds of high burden (OR = 6.168, 95% CI [1.069, 35.596], p = 0.042). However, the study concluded on the need for targeted caregiver education, psychosocial support, and strategies to improve patient adherence to mitigate caregiver burden and enhance their quality of life

This study assessed the burden of care as a predictor of quality of life among care givers of hypertensive patients attending a tertiary health facility in Benin City, Edo State. A crosssectional survey was conducted with 195 caregiver-patient pairs with data collected using structured questionnaires, the Zarit Burden Interview (ZBI), and the WHO Quality of Life-BREF (WHOQoL-BREF) instrument that a sessed their demographic characteristics, burden of care among caregivers, health realted quality of life (HRQoL) of caregivers and hypertensive patients, and the factors associated with burden of care among caregivers. The findings revealed that about 56.4% of caregivers experienced a high level of burden, with a mean ZBI score of 44.07 (SD = 6.30), and 13.8% reported severe burden. Moreso, having no formal education (compared to tertiary education) was associated with significantly lower odds of experiencing a higher burden of care (OR = 0.362, 95% CI [0.148, 0.885], p = 0.026). Furthermore, caregivers who desired to continue caregiving (compared to not desiring to continue) were significantly more likely to report a high burden of care (OR = 2.431, 95% CI [1.297, 4.556], p = 0.006). Additionally, multivariate analysis examining the relationship between quality of life domains and the likelihood of experiencing a high burden of care revealed that reporting a low psychological quality of life (compared to high psychological QoL) significantly increased the odds of high burden (OR = 6.474, 95% CI [1.369, 30.616], p = 0.018), and reporting a low environmental quality of life (compared to high environmental QoL) also significantly increased the odds of high burden (OR = 6.168, 95% CI [1.069, 35.596], p = 0.042). However, the study concluded on the need for targeted caregiver education, psychosocial support, and strategies to improve patient adherence to mitigate caregiver burden and enhance their quality of life.

This aim of this study is to assess the knowledge and practices of safe handling and administration of chemotherapeutic drugs amongst tertiary health facility, Benin City. The study adopted a descriptive cross-sectional research design and simple random sampling method was used to select Two hundred and seventy-eight nurses in the University of Benin Teaching Hospital, Benin City. A well-structured questionnaire was used as instruments of data collection. The data was analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Simple frequency and percentage were used to describe the data, while chi-square was used to test
the hypotheses. The level of significance was set at p<0.05. The analysis was performed using the IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 28.0 for windows. The result shows that majority of the respondents have fair level of knowledge of chemotherapeutic drugs and low level of practice of safe handling of chemotherapeutic drugs and that none of the sociodemographic characteristics was associated with level of knowledge of chemotherapeutic drugs. The study therefore recommends that there is the need for Institutions to implement and enforce standardized procedures for administering chemotherapy, ensuring the use of appropriate PPE and adherence to safety protocols.

Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) remain the leading cause of global mortality, with a rising burden in sub-Saharan Africa driven by rapid urbanization and unhealthy lifestyle changes. In Nigeria, modifiable risk factors such as poor diet, physical inactivity, tobacco use, and alcohol consumption are increasingly prevalent, yet limited data exist on how these behaviors correlate
with physiological risk factors within urban communities. This study aimed to assess behavioral lifestyle practices as correlates of modifiable physiological risk factors for cardiovascular disease among adult residents in the Ekosodin community, Benin City, Nigeria. A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted using a systematic sampling technique. The sample used a
Kth interval of 2in selecting households and then adult residents within the community. Data were collected through a structured questionnaire and physical measurements, including body mass index (BMI) checking the height and weight, blood pressure (BP), and waist circumference (WC). Descriptive statistics were used to analyze patterns of behavior and risk factors, while chi- square and multivariate logistic regression were employed to test associations and hypotheses. Among adult residents in Ekosodin community (Benin City, Nigeria), cardiovascular disease risk significantly correlated with unhealthy lifestyle behaviors as 38.6% had hypertension, 57.5% were overweight/obese, 34% were high-risk residents, with risk factors more prevalent among
males (39.7%), those aged over 60 (66.7%), individuals with no formal education (54.2%), those earning less than ₦20,000 monthly (39.4%), and those with a family history of CVD (43.9%).The study highlights the strong correlation between lifestyle behaviors and cardiovascular risk factors among adults in the Ekosodin community. It underscores the urgent need for community- based health promotion interventions that target behavior modification. Public health policies should prioritize education and prevention strategies to address the growing burden of cardiovascular diseases in urban Nigerian settings.

Diabetes mellitus(DM)is a disease of global public health importance associated with high morbidity and mortality (Nnachi et al., 2023). According to International Diabetes Federation report of 2015, about 415million people have DM globally with the figure projected to have
increased to 642million by 2040 or maybe even doubled by the year 2040 (Nwatu et al., 2019). The greatest increase will be in developing countries (69%) compared with developed countries (20%), withn non-communicable disease (NCDs) accounting for up to 80% of deaths among developing countries. In Botswana, the prevalence of DM among adults (20–79years) is approximately 52 per 1000 people out of which 31.6 per 1000 remain undiagnosed. Healthrelated quality of life (HRQOL) refers to the physical, psychological and social aspects of health
that are influenced by person’s experience on beliefs, expectations and perceptions (Nwatu et al., 2019).