Background:: Food taboos during pregnancy can have both positive and negative impacts on maternal and fetal health. While food provides essential nutrients necessary for pregnancy, certain traditional beliefs lead to the avoidance of specific foods. Objectives: : to assess the nutritional status of pregnant women, identify commonly avoided foods, and explore the reasons behind food taboos. Methodology: : A cross-sectional study was conducted with a sample of 366 pregnant women at ≥ 20 weeks of gestation. Data were collected from January to December 2023. Data collection included four components: sociodemographic characteristics, food taboo practices, reasons for food avoidance, and nutritional status. Interviews were conducted using strutted questionnaires, and additional notes were recorded. Data analysis was performed using SPSS statistical software version 23 using descriptive analysis (number and percentages). Results:: The prevalence of food taboos among pregnant women was 48% (174366). Commonly avoided foods included beef, frogs, insects, goat meat, chicken, fish, balut, sea ood, honey, milk, dried buffalo skin, kha vegetables, kao thong vegetables, papaya, kaolame (sticky rice inside the bamboo), and durian fruit. The main reasons for food avoidance were traditional beliefs, concerns about fetal health, fears of difficult labor, perceived risks to maternal health, and concerns about stillbirth. Additionally, some women avoided certain foods due to personal dislikes or allergies. Regarding nutritional status, the majority of pregnant women experienced normal weight gain (59.6%), while 25.4% had mild weight gain, and 15.0% had low weight gain. Conclusion: Pregnant women must balance their nutritional needs with traditional beliefs that have been passed down through generations. Nutritional interventions and counselling should be designed with cultural sensitivity, incorporating local knowledge and the influence of community leaders. Additionally, healthcare providers should be trained to address food taboos in a way that promotes maternal and fetal health.

Background: : Stroke is the first leading cause of death in Lao PDR. In the last ten years, deaths as a result of stroke have increased by 19.5 %. We hypothesized that the global COVID-19 pandemic caused people living with non-communicable diseases to become more vulnerable to becoming severely ill or dying, with a delayed presentation to the Emergency Department and increased stroke severity. Objectives: : To understand the experience for the care service in outpatient department (OPD) visits of patients with stroke before and during the Covid-19 pandemic in Lao, PDR. Methodology: : We conducted a cross-sectional study of patients with stroke who were followed up at the Stroke OPD clinics in three central hospitals from April to October 2023 to explore their experiences of care before and during the pandemic. Results: : Among 294 patients, 59.9% were male, and the mean age was 59.5 years (SD 11.9). Almost all (96.9%) of them had been vaccinated against COVID-19. Most (68.4%) reported that they had been affected by factors related to the pandemic when they attended OPD clinics (process/steps of service, number of staff, communication, and social distancing). Participants reported they most valued being seen by a specialist at their follow-up appointments. When comparing the service before and during the pandemic, they noted that staff numbers went down during COVID-19. They were also obliged to test for COVID-19 before appointments. To improve the service in a similar situation in the future, they recommended better communication and health education by using posters and having a process to fix a queue. Conclusion: Stroke services need to consider pandemic preparedness to optimize service delivery for patients in a future pandemic situation.

Background: A key success to achieve the highest potential in the nursing profession is the clinical nurse leaders (CNL) who are likely to have key roles for improving quality of patient care, but nothing published about this topic in the Lao PDR. Objective: To evaluate the duties, leadership roles and to develop nursing technical leadership roles in central hospitals, Vientiane Capital. Methodology: The study is action research conducted between 12/2019 - 6/2020, with 3 phases (1) preparation phase, (2) implementation-1 phase, and (3) implementation-2 phase (development of CNL roles. Results: One hundred and eleven clinical nurse leaders from five central hospitals in Vientiane Capital participated in the study of which 92% were female; aged between 30-39 years (50%), and most of them worked in the Internal Medicine departments and their working experience ranged from 10-19 years (40.5%). About thirty-nine percent of the participants were mid-level nurses. The overall performance score for CNL roles was moderate with a mean of 3.2/5. The performance score was significantly different between levels of education of the nurses (for example between those who were auxiliary nurses and those who held the bachelor degree by training) with p-value <0.05. Conclusion The role of clinical nurse leaders in central hospitals evaluated systematically, traditionally and as routine work was not really satisfactory. The overall CNL performance was moderate and there remain some roles that need to be promoted particularly the research role.

Background and Rational: Improving quality of services is one of the main strategies of the Ministry of Health to strengthen health care services, aiming to provide better care. The Emergency Ward (ER) of Mahosot Hospital provides services to patients 24 hours a day. Since the work there is very busy, some complaints were arisen from the nurses regarding the workload, insufficient staffing levels, and staffs did not have time for families. In addition, three nurses asked to change their jobs and 6 ask to move to another ward. We, therefore, conducted this study to assess job satisfaction of the nurses and obstacles in regards to their work and management. Methodology: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted from 19-25 February 2018. Thirty-three nurses working in ER were interviewed using pre-designed and pre-tested questionnaire comprising 4 parts. Data analysis was done using SPSS. Result: The mean age of the respondents was 34.3 years, 85% were female and 73% were married. Nearly half of them did not have children. Thirty-nine percent of them have worked for 6-10 years with 73% having a nursing degree. The majority of them are satisfied with their current work (90.9 %) and 79% of them said that they had a great job with appreciation from their colleagues. More than half had the appropriate opportunity for short-course training and support from the head of department. Observing their practice, we found that they had clean nursing uniform (66.7%), showed appropriate behaviors (54.5%), friendly service (54.5%) and had good relationships with their colleagues (63.6%). Regarding the obstacles and solution, they reported that some problems need to be solved including those related to human resource (90.9%), relationships with other nurses (21.2%), head nurses (9%), doctors (27.16%), nature of workplace and environment (63%), facility and management (27%), equipment and medicine availability (72.7%), remuneration (51.5%) and others (30%). Conclusion The job satisfaction level of the nurses at ER of Mahosot Hospital is high but there remain some concerns related to work safety, working environment, equipment and salary. Therefore, it is vital that these problems should be solved urgently in order to strengthen quality of health care service.