Background: Food vendors play a critical food safety role in the "farm to plate" continuum that is necessary for the prevention and control of food borne diseases and therefore, any lack of its understanding by the food vendors poses a serious challenge to food safety. Objective: To assess the knowledge, attitude and hygienic practices of food vendors in Owerri town of Imo State, Nigeria. Methods: The study was a Cross-Sectional descriptive design that used a proportionate convenience sampling technique to select 200 food vendors from the three Local Government Areas (LGAs) in Owerri town. Data were collected using a pretested semi-structured interviewer administered questionnaire. Descriptive analyses were done with frequencies and summary statistics. Chi square statistics were computed to determine significant relationships and p value was set at 0.05 significant level. Results: While a majority of the respondents had a good level of knowledge (81%) and positive attitude (71%) about food hygiene, only 37% of the respondents had a good level of hygienic practice. It was revealed that 32% and 46% of the respondents received training on food hygiene and environmental health worker inspection respectively. It was also revealed that, there were statistically significant relationships between knowledge (p = 0.001), attitude (p = 0.000), formal training on food hygiene (p = 0.000) and the level of food hygienic practices. Conclusion: The public health management of food vending services should involve the development of strategies that will equip them with the necessary knowledge and skills to provide vending services in a hygienic and safe manner.How to cite this paper: Iwu, A.C.,

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Background: Immunization coverage in different parts of the country varies widely despite efforts to improve the services. The immunization status of children is dependent on the dynamics of vaccination uptake which is complex and involves the interplay of different associated factors. Aim: To determine the immunization coverage, status and the determinants in under 5-year-old children in Owerri municipal, Imo State. Methods: The study was a community based cross-sectional study involving 420 women and 743 under 5-year-old children. A multistage sampling technique was employed and data were collected using a pretested, semi structured interviewer administered questionnaire. Data were analysed using a computer software SPSS-IBM version 20. Results: It revealed that 63.6% and 88.9% of children less than 12 months and between 12 -59 months respectively according to households were fully immunized. The bivariate analysis showed statistically significant associations between the immunization status of the children and place of birth delivery (p < 0.0001), maternal age (p < 0.0001), level of maternal education (p < 0.01), level of maternal knowledge (p < 0.0001), religion (p < 0.05) and ethnicity (p < 0.01). Significant predictors of being fully immunized were; maternal age 25 -29 years old (OR = 2.1), children aged 12 -59 months (OR = 4.6), mother having tertiary education (OR = 5.4), being a Christian Catholic (OR = 12.5), hospital births (OR = 25.2) and good level of maternal knowledge (OR = 37.7). Conclusion: Immunization coverage is relatively high but not optimal among the studied population and thus there is a need to develop strategies aimed at achieving full immunization coverage as this is critical in the reduction of childhood morbidity and mortality.

Introduction: Many developing countries are characterized by rapid population growth, which is partly attributed to high fertility rates, high birth rates, accompanied by steady declines in death rates, low contraceptive use and high but declining mortality rate. AIM: To determine the factors influencing family planning method use among women of reproductive age in urban communities of Imo state, Nigeria. Methodology: The study was a community based descriptive cross-sectional study involving 560 women of reproductive age who met the inclusion criteria and were selected using the multistage sampling technique. The data were collected using a pretested, semi-structured and interviewer administered questionnaire and were analyzed using EPI-INFO version 3.2.1. A p-value ≤ 0.05 was considered significant. Results:The mean age of the respondents was 32.7 ± 7.7 years with most of the women (99.1%) being aware of family planning. The common methods known were; pills (65.2%), injections (62.5%), condoms (61.3%) and natural family planning methods (49.5%). The prevalence of ever use and current use of family planning was 54.1% and 35.1% respectively and the commonest method ever (36%) and currently (26%) used was the condom. The factors found to significantly influence family planning method use in the study were: age of women, religion, family size, number of male children, monthly income, being able to access and pay for family planning services without partners financial support, contraceptive knowledge, prior discussion of family planning with part-

OBJECTIVEKnowing tuberculosis (TB) patients’ satisfaction enables TB program managers to identify gaps in service delivery and institute measures to address them. This study is aimed at evaluating patients’ satisfaction with TB services in southern Nigeria.MATERIALS AND METHODSA total of 378 patients accessing TB care were studied using a validated Patient Satisfaction (PS-38) questionnaire on various aspects of TB services. Factor analysis was used to identify eight factors related to TB patient satisfaction. Test of association was used to study the relation between patient satisfaction scores and patient and health facility characteristics, while multilinear regression analysis was used to identify predictors of patient satisfaction.RESULTSHighest satisfaction was reported for adherence counseling and access to care. Patient characteristics were associated with overall satisfaction, registration, adherence counseling, access to care, amenities, and staff attitude, while health system factors were associated with staff attitude, amenities, and health education. Predictors of satisfaction with TB services included gender, educational status, if tested for HIV, distance, payment for TB services, and level and type of health-care facility.CONCLUSIONPatient- and health system–related factors were found to influence patient satisfaction and, hence, should be taken into consideration in TB service programing.