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KU reschedules papers | SZABIST job fair
KU reschedules two papers
Karachi, April 14, 2008: The University of Karachi has rescheduled some papers
of DDLS part-II annual examination-2007 and the one-year additional certificate
course for Graduate Physiotherapist part-II examination.
According to the
new schedule, the DDLS Advance Diagnostic Techniques paper will be held on April
16 from 2:30pm to 4pm at Faculty of Islamic Studies and the Graduate
Physiotherapist Ethics and Administration on the same day from 2pm to 5pm at the
Department of Psychology.
Meanwhile, in a separate announcement the
university has announced postponement of a seminar on "Social Discrimi-nation in
South Asia". The seminar was to be held on Monday. PPI
SZABIST job fair attracts multinational companies
Karachi: Human resource departments,
local and multinational, made sure they did not miss the SZABIST Job Fair on
Saturday.
Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science and Technology
(SZABIST) BBA final semester students organized the event which coincided with
the launch of their BBA Graduate Directory 2008. BMA Capital, PSO, First Women
Bank, HBL and TVOne set up stalls but others who could not make it sent drop
boxes. Job Fair Project Manager Muhammad Zohaib Ayaz, a final semester student,
confessed that it was a difficult even to organize but he was grateful to his
teacher Sheraz Siddiqui for support. According to Ayaz, most of the 120
companies they contacted were reluctant to participate even though a job fair
can save them some hiring costs and allow them to interact with prospective
workers. Currently, SZABIST is ranked number three in the business schools in
Pakistan according to the Higher Education Commission (HEC), he
mentioned.
SZABIST Executive Development Officer Sanam Pathan, who is
responsible for providing students with jobs and internships, said that given
the dearth of talent in Pakistan, a job fair was a good idea. For companies who
could not make it, they can get the necessary details on graduating students
(GPA, extra curricular, electives etc.) from the directory. "Organizations do
not only want to employ students with a high GPA but at times, on the basis of
their personality profile, and their extra curricular activities," she
said.
The job fair was also helpful for students in what SZABIST Deputy
Director Azra Maqsood called an era of "cut-throat competition" when it is
sometimes difficult to find the right career path and job. "With increased focus
on finding the right human resource, the trend of job fairs has increased over
the past few years," she added. "Companies are looking forward to such avenues
to find enthusiastic and motivated personnel."
First Women Bank Ltd. HR
Development Senior Vice President Rose-Maries Fernandez was "thrilled" to be at
the event. She had already offered jobs to two of the graduating students and
internships to many others. According to Fernandez, this was a good place to
find high caliber female employees. She said she wanted to find women for
entry-level jobs from where they could make their way up the
organization.
The TVONE stall was flooded with students who wanted to
give interviews and TVONE Assistant Brand Manager Naveed Zuberi said they
received over 60 resumes at the start of the event. They are looking for,
"energetic, dedicated, flexible and creative" individuals in marketing and sales
who could take the channel to a whole new level.
76% of city's uni students self-medicate: AKU
Karachi: About 76% of university
students in Karachi self-medicate, experts at the Department of Community Health
Sciences, Aga Khan University Karachi have found in a study - 'Self-medication
amongst University Students of Karachi: Prevalence, Knowledge and Attitudes' –
that appeared in the Journal of Pakistan Medical Association in its current
issue.
The study was conducted from Jan-Feb 2007 at 2 medical and 2
non-medical universities of Karachi. Of the 572 participants with the average
age of 21, 295 were medical and 277 were non-medical students. The prevalence of
self-medication was 76%. Forty three percent of students stated that they
altered the regimen of prescribed medicines while 61.9% stated that they stopped
taking a prescribed medicine without consulting a doctor. The most common reason
for self-medication was previous experience (50.1%) and the most common symptoms
were headache (72.4%), flu (65.5%), and fever (55.2%). Commonly used medicines
were analgesics (88.3%), antipyretics (65.1%) and antibiotics (35.2%).
Eighty-seven percent of the students thought self-medication could be harmful
and 82.5% students thought that it was necessary to consult a doctor before
taking a new medicine. There was no significant difference between the self
medication practices of medical and non medical students.
Self-medication is defined as obtaining and consuming drugs without the
advice of a physician either for diagnosis, prescription or surveillance of
treatment. This includes acquiring medicines without a prescription,
resubmitting old prescriptions to purchase medicines, sharing medicines with
relatives or members of one's social circle or using leftover medicines stored
at home.
There is much public and professional concern about the
irrational use of drugs. The prevalence rates are high all over the world with
rates going as high as 92% in the adolescents of Kuwait. Studies have shown that
self medication practices are more common in women and in those; who live alone,
have a lower socioeconomic status, have more chronic ailments, have psychiatric
conditions, are of younger age and in students.
The misuse of
nonprescription drugs amongst students has become a serious problem. The youth
is especially exposed to the media and the increased advertising of
pharmaceuticals poses a larger threat to the young population. This raises
concerns of incorrect self-diagnosis, drug interaction, and use other than for
the original indication A survey on widely advertised medications indicated that
the majority of college students used at least one of the advertised products,
without discussing this with their physicians.
In Pakistan, almost every
pharmacy sells drugs without a prescription; a phenomenon seen in many
developing countries. Consequently, antibiotics and potentially habit forming
medicines are easily available to the common man.
Although it is true
that self medication can help treat minor ailments that do not require medical
consultation and hence reduce the pressure on medical services particularly in
the underprivileged countries with limited health care resources, the
availability of the more complex drugs groups such as antibiotics without
prescriptions is a source of great concern. Moreover, the practice of self
medication often has many adverse effects and can lead to many problems,
including the global emergence of Multi-Drug Resistant pathogens, drug
dependence and addiction, masking of malignant and potentially fatal diseases,
hazard of misdiagnosis, problems relating to over and under dosaging, drug
interactions and tragedies relating to the side effect profile of specific
drugs.
In the ideal setting the only justifiable rationale for self
medication would be 'urgency of the problem' but amongst our participants this
was not the most popular reason; 'previous experience with similar symptoms'
(50.3%) and the 'problem seeming to be too trivial' (48.3%) were the commonest.
Most medicines had been purchased directly from pharmacies while the
stock of medicines at home ranked second. The latter carries the risk of
exposure to expired medicine, medicine meant for someone else or drugs that may
have been originally prescribed for a different problem. The former should make
us realize that it is disastrous to let pharmacies and medical stores continue
as the way they do in Pakistan. Medicines that are not over-the-counter drugs
should not be given without prescription. A very small percentage of pharmacists
actually give the appropriate medication when consulted. Daily Times
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| Education News | | Updated: 09 Feb, 2012 |
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