Background: Internally displaced people in Iraq are still suffering because the solutions were not radical. This study aims to assess the impact of displacement on the socio-economic, well-being and mental health status of internally displaced families in Anbar province, Iraq. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted from 3rd to 17th April 2017. Data was collected using a universal sampling technique. A total of 355 households interviewed with a modified questionnaire consisting of 26 close-ended questions related to the socio-economic, demographic, wellbeing and the mental health characteristics. Results: At the time of the study, about 55.5% of the surveyed displaced families have not returned home yet. Big families of more than seven members (59.4%) and residency in renting houses (82.8%) are two variables that may contribute to an economic burden. Mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety spread among 62.3% of surveyed families. Significant rise in chronic diseases from 64 (18.0%) cases before displacement to 102 cases (28.7%) after displacement. Few of them (21.6%) were able to access public health services. People who experienced violence are verbally abused at 52.1%. Lack of the services (50.3%), the inability to repair the destroyed houses (26.4%) and the loss of house due to complete destruction (23.3%) were the significant factors inhibited families to return home back. Conclusion: Our findings indicate the need for urgent and strategic plans to improve the quality of logistics, health and infrastructure services to motivate the displaced families to return back to their homes.

BackgroundAdverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are considered as universal public health problem that associate with mental disorders and risky behaviors during adulthood. The aims of the paper are to estimate the prevalence of Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) among young adults in Iraq as well as to estimate the association between ACEs and depression.MethodsA convenience sample of young adults of 18–20 years was chosen from centre and west of Iraq, mainly from universities. The adverse childhood experiences were measured by Adverse Childhood Experiences Questionnaire. A depression scale was derived from the Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scales (DASS). Statistical tests: chi square was used to measure the association between adverse childhood experiences and other variables like gender and depression. Odds ratios were computed to estimate the risk for depression. A P value of less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant.ResultsThe total number of participants was 401, 38.9% of the subjects were men, while 61.1% were women. The mean age of the participants was 18.88 ± 0.745. The results revealed that the most common forms of ACEs among the subjects were physical neglect (19.8%) and emotional neglect (19.2%) followed by physical abuse (17.21%) while sexual abuse was 7.52%.There was statistically significant association between most forms of adverse childhood experiences especially emotional abuse, emotional neglect, physical abuse and physical neglect with depression.ConclusionACEs are not uncommon among young adults in Iraq and are associated with depression in adulthood. National programmes to support mental health rehabilitation might be necessary to reduce the effect of ACEs among Iraqi people, especially for adolescents and young adults.

Improved knowledge among women about maternal risk factors significantly reduced the likelihood of adverse events in pregnancy and childbirth. This study aimed to explore Iraqi women's knowledge and attitudes about maternal risk factors in pregnancy. A multicenter cross-sectional survey was conducted from 01 January to 31 March 2019 among women of the reproductive age (15-49 years). A convenient sampling technique using a semi-structured questionnaire was recruited to interview the sample. SPSS version 16.0 was used to analyze the data. Descriptive and inferential statistics (Chi-square test) were used to present data with the significance level considered at <0.05. Data of 250 women underwent final analysis. The mean age of respondents was 27.76 (±6.3 years). Most of the respondents (79.9%) correctly knew the maternal risk factors in pregnancy. A large percentage of women knew that poor nutrition, anemia (95.6%), smoking and passive smoke (95.6%), and obesity (85.2%) during pregnancy are risk factors affecting the fetus’ health. However, about 40.0% of women thought there was no harm during pregnancy, and therefore there was no need for medical check-ups regularly. In bivariate analysis, there was a significant association between knowledge and level of education. The higher the level of education, the greater the women's knowledge about risk factors such as malnutrition and anemia (P=<0.001), obesity (P=0.04), diabetes (P=0.002), repeated urinary tract infection (P=0.017), Rh incompatibility (<0.001), history of previous cesarean section (P=0.010), smoking and passive smoking (P=0.014) and evidence of bleeding (P=0.001). In conclusion, Iraqi pregnant women demonstrated a good level of knowledge about the risk factors during the pregnancy.

Background: Infertility is one of a major public health problem, affecting 15% of couples who attempt pregnancy; in 50% of them, the male partner is responsible. Both environmental and genetic factors, combined or separated, have been suggested as indefinable causes of infertility. Idiopathic infertility represents 15-20% of all cases. Aim of the study: To determine the clinical patterns and to review the etiologies of infertility among men in Fallujah city and its periphery. Patients and method: Between the beginning of January 2006 to the end of December 2010, 1410 infertile men from Fallujah city were enrolled in this study. All patients were evaluated by history and physical examinations to show the testicular size, varicocele of spermatic cord, vas deferens abnormalities and secondary sexual characteristics. Investigations including seminal fluid analysis (after three days abstinence and not >7 days) were done to all patients, and assessed according to WHO criteria, while hormonal study was indicated only to those patients with severe oligospermia. Results: One thousand eighteen patients (72.2%) had primary infertility while 392 (27.8%) had secondary type. Patients with infertility of less than five years were considered in this study, which accounts 1222 patients only. Of those 1222 patients 878 (71.8%) had primary type and 344 (28.2%) had secondary type of infertility. Sperm count was categorized as (zero, ˂ five millions , 5-10 million, ˃ 10-19 million and ≥ 20 million). For all 1222 patients the distribution was 126 (10.3%), 78 (7.1%), 65 (5.3%), 72 (5.9%) and 872 (71 .4%) respectively. Among those with primary infertility the sperm count distribution was 112 (12.8%) , 71 (8.1%) , 51 (5.8%) , 57 (6.5%) and 587 (66.9%) respectively ,while those with secondary infertility the distribution was 14 (4.1%) , 16 (4.7%) ,14 (4.1%) , 15 (4.4%) and 285 (82.8%) respectively. The sperm motility in 854 (70%) was lower than normal (asthenospermia),among them, those with primary infertility the motility was low in 620 (70.6%) while those with secondary type 234 (68%) had low motility. Six hundreds thirty eight patients (53.2%) have identifiable causes for their infertility (history of trauma , inguinal operations ,mumps, smoking ,varicocele ,STD ,chemotherapy , chronic medical illness , radiotherapy ,and renal transplant), while 584 patients (47.8%) have non-identifiable causes of infertility. The mean of their age is 30.79 years ±7.09 SD and their duration of infertility between 1-5 years, with mean of 2.28± 1.23SD. Among those patients with non-identifiable infertility, 410 patients (70.2%) had primary infertility and 174 patients (29.8%) had secondary type. Conclusion: Non-identifiable infertility is high among infertile men in Fallujah city compared to the results of other neighboring countries and previous Iraqi studies. These results may be in a way or another related to military pollution occurred in Fallujah city during 2004 that herald the need of further investigations.

Introduction: rimary health care is the first contact, continuous, comprehensive, and coordinated care provided to populations undifferentiated by gender, disease, or Organ system (1). It advocates an approach to health care based on principles that allow people to receive the care that enables them to lead socially and economically productive lives (2) .