There is a large volume of published studies describing the adverse relationship between treatment non-adherence with tuberculosis treatment outcome. Non-adherence could result in increased risks of prolonged infectiousness, drug resistance, relapse cases and poor survival among tuberculosis patients. Nevertheless, few studies are to be found providing detailed on the reason of defaulting treatment among tuberculosis patients in Malaysia. Hence the goal of this paper is to find out the barriers and motivations factors that affect patients’ treatment compliance among our local tuberculosis patients. This is a qualitative study which included 12 in-depth interviews with tuberculosis non-compliance patients who were treated at Institute of Respiratory Medicine, Kuala Lumpur. All the conversations were recorded, transcribed and analysed by using thematic analysis. It was found that low knowledge, self-negative attitudes, traditional believes, negative perceptions towards health caregiver, drug side effects, stigma, financial problems, less family support and work commitments are the barriers that prevent the patients from religiously taking their anti-tuberculosis treatment. Meanwhile, factors that encourage them to continue their treatment were the believes of bad effects of the disease onto their lives and health, good relationship between patient and health caregiver and social support from people around them. In conclusion, non-adherence involved a dynamic influence of individual, socio-economic and treatment-related factors on the patients. The results presented here may facilitate improvement in the activities in promoting compliance among tuberculosis patients in the future which tailored to the patients’ specific needs.
Abnormal malignant growth of breast cells often occurs among women after menopause. But, recently, breast cancer (BC) is increasing in trend among young women, mainly in Asian countries. Breast cancer in young women (BCYW) usually presented with higher grades, advanced stage, and aggressive subtype. The survival of BCYW is poor with a more progressive and higher chance of recurrence and metastasis. Treatment for BCYW usually is more intensive and extensive, which causes more side effects that potentially lead to psychosocial issues. This article review highlights the unique and complex issues of BCYW in Malaysia and around the world.
Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is one of the major public health problems in Malaysia. It remains the most common permanent deferral among blood donors. In Malaysia, the national vaccination programme has been introduced since 1989 to prevent HBV transmission. The objective of this study is to determine the prevalence and associated risk factors of HBV infection among first-time blood donors after the implementation of the national hepatitis B vaccination programme. Methods: This is a retrospective cohort study involving tracing of the database of National Blood Centre Malaysia. The record of first-time blood donors who had donated between 1st January 2010 and 31st December 2015 and were screened HBV positive was reviewed and analysed. Results: There were 376,737 first-time donors who had donated blood and 575 of them screened positive for HBV. The overall prevalence of seropositive for hepatitis B was 0.15%. The prevalence was higher at 0.23% among donors born before the year 1989 (pre-vaccination era) compared to 0.05% among donors born in and after the year 1989 (post-vaccination era). Perinatal transmission was found to have 15 times higher odds of developing HBV infection as compared to those who had the combination of risk factors among those born after the year 1989 (adjusted OR=14.95, 95% CI 1.80=124.01). Conclusion: The implementation of the national vaccination programme reduced the prevalence of hepatitis B among donors who received vaccination at birth compared to those who did not.
Hope leads to lower depression and anxiety and is associated with improved quality of life of cancer patients. In this
study, Hope Scale (HS) was translated into Malay, and the psychometric properties of the Malay version of the Hope
Scale were investigated among Malaysian cancer patients. Concurrent translation and back translation of the original
English version of the Hope Scale were performed, and the Malay version was administered to 195 cancer patients
with different cancer diagnoses at baseline assessment and 2 months later at follow-up. The Hope Scale (Malay) total
score (Cronbach’s α = 0.72; intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.67) and its domains (Cronbach’s α [pathway] =
0.7; Cronbach’s α [agency] = 0.7; ICC[Pathway] = 0.64; ICC[Agency] = 0.70) demonstrated acceptable internal consistencies and
test-retest reliability. Convergent and discriminant validities were also achieved by the Hope Scale (Malay). The Hope
Scale (Malay) demonstrated construct validity, as confirmatory factor analysis demonstrated that the items in the Hope
Scale (Malay) best fit into two domains, which was true for the original English version. The Hope Scale (Malay) had
acceptable psychometric properties and thus is suitable for assessing hope in Malaysian cancer patients.
Objective: It is important to investigate the association between spousal support
and psychology of cancer patients, thus a validated instrument to measure the
degree of perceived spousal support is required. We translated and evaluated the
psychometric properties of the Sources of Social Support Scale-Malay version
(SSSS-Malay) among Malaysian cancer patients.
Methods: In this study, the
SSSS-Malay and Hope Scale-Malay [used to compare with the SSSS-Malay to
assess discriminant validity] were administered to 195 Malaysian cancer patients
during baseline assessment. The SSSS-Malay was re-administered 2 months
after the baseline assessment during follow-up.
Results: The SSSS-Malay total
score (Cronbach’s α = 0.70, intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.72) and
its domains (Cronbach’s α ranging from 0.70 to 0.83, intraclass correlation
coefficient ranging from 0.6 to 0.76) exhibited good internal consistencies and
good test-retest reliability. The SSSS-Malay also demonstrated good convergent
and discriminant validities. However, confirmatory factor analysis of the SSSSMalay
showed that it was best fit into a 3-factor model instead of the 4-factor
model of the original English version.
Conclusion: The SSSS-Malay
demonstrated good psychometric properties for use in Malaysian cancer
patients.
Introduction: Posttraumatic growth (PTG) is a positive psychological change in
life that occurs as a result of struggle with highly challenging life crises. There is
a growing need to explore posttraumatic growth (PTG) in cancer patients, as
higher PTG may enhance well-being of patients.
Objectives: The aim of this
study was to translate the Posttraumatic Growth Inventory-Short Form (PTGISF)
into the Malay language and evaluate its psychometric properties for
assessing Malaysian cancer patients in future studies.
Methods: Two parallels
forward and backward translations of the PTGI-SF into the Malay language
were conducted. The test was administered to 195 cancer patients. Reliability
was evaluated by testing internal consistency (Cronbach’s α) and calculating the
test-retest intra-class correlation coefficient, and validity was examined by
determining face, convergent, and discriminant validities and using
confirmatory factor analysis (CFA).
Results: The Malay version of the PTGI-SF
and its five domains demonstrated good internal consistencies and acceptable
test-retest reliability. All 10 items of this version were highly correlated with
their own domains and thus exhibited convergent validity. Discriminant validity
was achieved, as all domains of the Malay PTGI-SF was not highly correlated
with the domains of the Source of Social Support Scale. CFA resulted in a bestfitting
5-factor model.
Conclusion: The Malay version of the PTGI-SF is a
suitable tool for measuring PTG in Malaysian cancer patients.
Introduction: Breast cancer is the most common cause of cancer death among women. The purpose of this study is to determine the 5-years survival rate and prognostic factors among breast cancer patients in a tertiary oncological centre in Penang, Malaysia. Methods: A retrospective cohort study was conducted at the Advanced Medical and Dental Institute, Universiti Sains Malaysia. All 214 cases of breast cancer diagnosed from 1st January 2008 until 31st December 2012 were selected and retrospectively followed-up until 31st December 2017. The survival status for this study was referring to the record of the National Registration of Malaysia. Kaplan-Meier with Log-rank test and Cox regression were used for the univariable and multivariable analysis, respectively. Results: The mean (SD) age at diagnosis was 50.98 (±10.75) years. The majority of the patients were Malay (55.7%) and married (96.5%). After controlling for the effect of underlying comorbidities, lymph nodes involvement, marital status, vascular involvement and adjuvant therapy; it was found that marital status (adj HR= 3.63, 95% CI 1.17-11.24) and lymph nodes involve- ment (adj HR=2.36, 95% CI 1.17-4.76) were the significant prognostic factors. Conclusion: This study re-emphasizes the role of marital status and lymph nodes involvement as independent predictors of the long-term survival of breast cancer patients. Further studies are needed to assess the promising benefit of personalized treatment and specific supportive care given to the patients with these risk factors for better cancer experience and survival.
Infant feeding is thought to modulate cardiovascular risk factors such as obesity, hypertension, hyperglycemia, and dyslipidemia. This possible association between patterns of feeding with development of cardiovascular disease later in life provides the opportunity for early intervention and prevention strategies. Among all the feeding methods applied, breastfeeding is thought to be the best method and is said to be attributable to future health benefits. How- ever, current evidence from the literature is weak and inconsistent to advocate risk factors management. Therefore, this narrative review aims to provide current findings in assessing the association of breastfeeding pattern and risk of developing cardiovascular diseases later in life. We searched three databases (MEDLINE, PubMed and Google Scholar) from year 2000 to 11 July 2018. Findings on the association between breastfeeding and cardiovascular risk factors are equivocal, although positive trend of beneficial effects of breastfeeding in reducing risk of cardiovascular diseases in adulthood was reported in majority of the studies. Future research should address all limitations that were identified by previous studies such as bias of study design and heterogeneity of samples to establish the association between breastfeeding pattern and cardiovascular disease in later life.