In the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), held in Cairo, Egypt, in 1994, representatives from more than 180 countries formally recognized the reproductive health needs of adolescents. The World Health Organization (WHO) defines adolescence as the period of life between ages 10 and 19. One-fifth of world population is in this age group. 1 On the heels of ICPD, adolescent health is given special focus in Reproductive and Child Health Programme (which is presently evolved as reproductive, maternal, new born, child and adolescent health (RMNCH+A)) as well as in the National Health Mission.

Background: Adolescents (10-19 years) constitute about one-fifth of India’s population. Adolescence proves to be one of the most crucial and vulnerable phase in the path of human life cycle.1 The aim of the study was to assess school-going adolescents (15-19 years) knowledge, attitude and practices toward sexual and reproductive health and understand their expectations from AFC (adolescent friendly clinics). Method: A cross-sectional study was carried out in 2015 in Mumbai, India, to assess the perception, knowledge and attitude of adolescents toward sexual and reproductive health (SRH). The self-administered questionnaire was filled by 100 adolescent boys and 100 girls from two ITI schools. Results: More than half of the students in this study had no accurate understanding about various questions asked about sexual and reproductive health. However, boys had higher score about sexual and reproductive health knowledge as compared to girls. Fifty-two percent girls change sanitary napkins 3-4 times a day followed by 36% girls who change it just 1-2 times a day. Sixteen percent boys had indulged in sex while none of the girls had indulged in sex before. The most common symptom suffered was itching in genitalia by 18% boys and 10% girls in the past 12 months. Forty-seven percent boys and 2% girls considered pre-marital sex as fine. Fifty-one percent boys and 55% girls were not satisfied with the source of information in the school. None of the adolescents had heard of or visited AFC. They welcomed the idea of AFC. However, privacy and confidentiality in AFC was their main concern. They also wanted sex education in schools or health talks to be organized in their school. Conclusion: Knowledge about sexual and reproductive health was not found to be adequate among adolescents while there were 59 boys and 10 girls who had been involved in sexual behavior of varied nature (kissing, masturbation, intercourse, etc.). There is a dire need to impart information about SRH to adolescents through sex education in schools and AFCs. AFCs should be called adolescent friendly centers (instead of clinics) and sex education sessions should be called health class or life skills sessions as the word sex is a controversial and stigmatized word in India.

Introduction: Adolescence is a transitional stage of physical, psychological and social development from puberty to legal adulthood. Objectives: To compare the perceived common problems between middle and late adolescents; and to find out the association between common problems of middle and late adolescents, and gender. Material & Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted in two private schools of rural Bangalore in November 2015. It included High School children aged 14-19 yrs. A pretested self reported open-ended questionnaire was administered to the study subjects after getting informed consent from principal and their parents. Statistical Analysis: Data was entered in MS-Excel. Data was analyzed using SPSS software. Association between two proportions was accepted as significant when p value was less than 5% using chi-square test. Results: A total of 481 students aged 14 to19 years participated in the present study. There were 51% males and 49% females. Most of the students were in late adolescence (69.23%). Nearly 30.77% study subjects were in middle adolescent phase. Educational problems were present in most (61.12%) of the students. Psychological problems were found in 18.30% of students. About 16.63% of study subjects were having any one of the health problems. During mid adolescence, educational problems were present in most (43.24%) of the males followed by health problems (33.78%). While females had more health problems (54.69%) than educational problems (26.56%), it was also statistically significant.

Background: Ear diseases are important health problems among children in India and can result into hearing loss. In 2005, prevalence of deafness was 63 million in India, of which a large percentage was below 14 years. The growing magnitude of these problems made the Government of India initiate a National Program for Prevention and Control of Deafness in 2006 but the pace of functioning is still behind the desired level. Objective: The study was done to find outthe pattern of unsafe ear care practices and health seeking behavior in ear diseases among school-age children in a resettlement colony of Delhi. Methodology: A total of 1398 school-aged (5-14 years) children residing in Kalyanpuri resettlement colony of East Delhi were studied in the year 2011. Study subjects (and their parents if subjects were minor) were interviewed in detail regarding their present ear complaints. All the subjects were also examined clinically to diagnose ear problemspresent at the time of survey. The data was analyzed using SPSS version 12. Results: Out of total 1398 subjects, 744 (53.2%) were boys and 654 (46.8%) girls and 1249 (89.3%) of them were school-going. Ear problems were identified in 249 (33.2%)subjectsout of which 166 (66.7%) did not use medical facilities, 15.2% used government and 18% used private facilities. Almost 60% of the subjects had the history of practicing self-cleaning of ear canal by unhygienic and unsafe methods. Conclusion and Recommendations: Health education, routine ear screening in schools and periodic ear screening camps may be useful for prevention of ear problems.

Background: Most non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are strongly associated and causally linked with four modifiable lifestyle risk factors, viz., tobacco use, physical inactivity, unhealthy diet and harmful use of alcohol. Over half of NCD deaths are associated with behaviors that are established during adolescence and these behaviors persist throughout life. So this study was taken up to determine the proportion of adolescent school students having modifiable lifestyle risk factors for NCDs and to assess the factors associated with risky health behavior. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study conducted among 772 adolescent students from 12 schools in Imphal West, selected by stratified two-stage cluster sampling, from November 2012 to September 2014. Information regarding socio-demographic characteristics and behavioralrisk factors were collected using a self-administered questionnaire. Chi-square test and binary logistic regression were used for analysis. Results: Almost all of the students (99.6%) had at least any one of the risk factors. 34.3% of students were ever tobacco users, 26.8% had continued exposure to second-hand smoking, 35.9% were ever betel chewers, 30.7% have consumed alcohol. These habits were more common in boys, Christian students and those belonging to affluent families. Majority of the students (58.6-78%) have initiated these habits at or before 15 years of age. Over 3/5th of students had unhealthy dietary habits, 51.7% physical inactivity. About 14% of the adolescents were overweight and 2.5% obese. The chances of being overweight/ obese were higher among physically inactive students (OR=2.01), excess TV/ computer use (OR=1.56), private school students (OR=1.49) and lower among girls (OR=0.68).