ghanaopendata/ghanaian-research-english huggingface dataset:
Assessing Nurses’ Competencies in Managing Critically Ill Patients in the Intensive Care Unit. A Study at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital

Critically ill patients have life-threatening health problems that leave them in a vulnerable state and thus need urgent medical attention. The critical care nurse (CCN) forms an integral part of the expert team of medical professionals who provide the needed care for such patients and spend the most time with the patient. The CCN possesses the requisite set of competencies to decide care strategies for patient management for optimum recuperation, and comfort for the patient. Lack of these competencies as a result of the shortage of CCNs could have dire consequences for the patient in the ICU. Critical care nurses form approximately one-third of the nursing workforce in the ICUs of Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH). Thus, evaluation of nurse competencies in the ICUs of KBTH was found to be necessary. A quantitative and cross-sectional study employing a 66-item questionnaire was used to assess demographic characteristics, critical thinking, professional development and practice, and communication and coordination competencies of 133 nurses from all the ICUs at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH). Benner’s scale was used to guide the grading of the level of competence of all consenting participants. The study revealed that more than 80% of nurses in the ICUs were competent although critical care nurses formed less than one-third of participants. The areas of competencies assessed were also found to correlate strongly with each other (p<0.001). Competence was found to be significantly associated with age, status in the ICU, level of education, specialty, and years of experience (p<0.001). Additionally, logistic regression analysis showed that the years of experience, as well as Senior and Principal officer ranks significantly (R 2 = 0.407, F(4, 128) = 21.98, p < .001) predicted the overall competence of the ICU nurse. Steps would have to be taken to train and mentor younger and less experienced staff of the ICU even if they are trained as critical care nurses to achieve an acceptable level of competence in their duties towards the critically ill.

Source: UG
Assessing Ocean Wave Dynamics, Potential Sediment Transport, and Coastal Erosion along Accra Coast in Ghana

This study assessed wave dynamics and sediment transport along the coast of Accra in Ghana and compared the results with coastal erosion trend. Wave data from NOAA global wave model and measured buoy wave data were analysed as well as the potential sediment transport using the CERC's equation. The estimated mean significant wave height was 1.40 m and the period was between 10 and 15 seconds. The potential sediment transport rate was between 4.1 ×105 m3/yr and 4.1 ×105 m3/yr, while coastal erosion rate was 1.13 m/yr. Potential sediment transport rate increases from west to east. Coastal erosion is relatively high along the eastern and western coasts of Accra, while the central coast is relatively stable. Wave heights increased gradually from 1.00 m in January to a peak of 1.73 m in August, and eventually decreased to 1.10 m in December. The shape of the nearshore profile is significantly different along the eastern coast relative to the western and central coasts. This indicates that sediment transport intensity and nearshore bathymetry interaction in part explain the rate of erosion observed along the Accra coast in Ghana.

Source: UG
Assessing Patient Satisfaction And Some Related Factors In The Kasena Nankana District-Ghana

To access the relationship between patient satisfaction and some contributing factors, a study was conducted on 200 patients from the War Memorial Hospital. 54% of the patients were males whilst 46% were females. About 67% of the patients were satisfied meaning the satisfaction level at the hospital is higher. A logistic regression model was developed to establish a relationship between patient satisfaction and some contributing factors (age, sex, education, job, health, LTIME, AESTH, PHWR and NHIS). The result indicates that the most important variables associated with patient satisfaction are Sex, LTIME (length of time in attaining services), AESTH (aesthetic features) and PHWR (Patient health-worker relationship).

Source: UG
Assessing Postnatal Immunisation Services in a Low-Resource Setting: A Cross-Sectional Survey

Background/Objectives: Postnatal immunisation is critical for maternal and child health, particularly in low-income countries. Despite international efforts, maternal awareness and access to care remain limited. Understanding the drivers behind postnatal immunisation services is critical for improving neonatal and maternal healthcare interven tions. Methods: A tertiary healthcare facility’s postpartum mothers who were seeking immunisation services participated in a prospective cross-sectional electronic survey. Con venience sampling was used to select respondents, who then answered a structured elec tronic questionnaire intended to obtain information on immunisation practices. To evaluate important trends and correlations, data was analysed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. A factor analysis was performed using the principal component analysis method, eigenvalue criteria, communalities, and confirmatory factor analysis. The study adhered to the STROBE guidelines. Results: We found that postnatal mothers’ good immunisa tion practices were influenced by their adherence to immunisation schedules (% variance: 56.407; Eigenvalue: 7.33), and significant satisfaction with communication (% variance: 8.338; Eigenvalue: 1.084); giving a cumulative variance explained of 64.745% of the total variance of variables under study. However, suboptimal practices include limited resource availability, poor record maintenance, insufficient support for side effects, a lack of sup port from healthcare providers, and a decline in immunisation recommendations, all of which had Eigenvalue <1 and insignificant percentage of variance contribution to the total variance explained. We developed a two-factor model of postnatal immunisation practices, focusing on adherence and effective communication. The model showed high loadings and adequate fit indices (χ 2 (34) = 91.333, p < 0.001; CFI = 0.945; TLI = 0.927; RMSEA = 0.071; SRMR = 0.042), good evidence of internal consistency (α = 0.823–0.877), and composite reliability (ω = 0.832–0.877). Conclusions: The study recommends a comprehensive ap proach to increasing newborn vaccine coverage, which includes health education, improved service delivery, and culturally sensitive communication strategies. Future research should focus on digital health interventions, community-based initiatives, and policy-driven postnatal care.

Source: UG
Assessing production constraints, management and use of sorghum diversity in north-east Ghana: A diagnostic study

This paper reports on the results of a diagnostic study conducted to assess the problems and needs of sorghum farmers in north-east Ghana with the aim of determining the type of research that would be useful for them in their own context. The importance of the crop and its position within the cropping system are identified. Sorghum is still an integral part of the livelihoods of farmers. The crop is very versatile and not only contributes to food security but also plays a part in the socio-culrural, socio-economic, and religious aspects of the lives of farmers. Farmers have different uses for the varieties they grow, which depends on the morphological, agronomic and gastronomic traits of the crop. Sorghum varieties introduced from the research institutions have several problems including lodging, poor grain quality, bird damage and precocious germination. Farmers have developed management strategies for dealing with some of these problems. Nevertheless, further work is required by breeders to make the varieties more acceptable to users. Sorghum production constraints identified include poor soils, erratic rainfall and pest infestation of the grain during storage. The diagnostic study suggests that because farmers produce their own seed, enhancing their ability to improve the quality of their seed would be of benefit to them. The study further underscores the importance and value of diversity for farmers. It also highlights their understanding of diversity, and management and use of variation in their agronomic practices. Areas identified for further research together with farmers aim at enhancing farmers' knowledge towards strengthening their practices in diversity management and improving seed storage practices.

Source: UG
Assessing program coverage of two approaches to distributing a complementary feeding supplement to infants and young children in Ghana

The work reported here assesses the coverage achieved by two sales-based approaches to distributing a complementary food supplement (KOKO Plus™) to infants and young children in Ghana. Delivery Model 1 was conducted in the Northern Region of Ghana and used a mixture of health extension workers (delivering behavior change communications and demand creation activities at primary healthcare centers and in the community) and petty traders recruited from among beneficiaries of a local microfinance initiative (responsible for the sale of the complementary food supplement at market stalls and house to house). Delivery Model 2 was conducted in the Eastern Region of Ghana and used a market-based approach, with the product being sold through micro-retail routes (i.e., small shops and roadside stalls) in three districts supported by behavior change communications and demand creation activities led by a local social marketing company. Both delivery models were implemented sub-nationally as 1-year pilot programs, with the aim of informing the design of a scaled-up program. A series of cross-sectional coverage surveys was implemented in each program area. Results from these surveys show that Delivery Model 1 was successful in achieving and sustaining high (i.e., 86%) effective coverage (i.e., the child had been given the product at least once in the previous 7 days) during implementation. Effective coverage fell to 62% within 3 months of the behavior change communications and demand creation activities stopping. Delivery Model 2 was successful in raising awareness of the product (i.e., 90% message coverage), but effective coverage was low (i.e., 9.4%). Future programming efforts should use the health extension / microfinance / petty trader approach in rural settings and consider adapting this approach for use in urban and periurban settings. Ongoing behavior change communications and demand creation activities is likely to be essential to the continued success of such programming.

Source: UG
Assessing Project Management Maturity in Africa: A Ghanaian Perspective

The level of project management awareness and recognition of the standards and knowledge sharing among professionals is on the rise. Despite this many projects continue to fail. Ameliorating project failure requires project management maturity among practitioners. Project management maturity is the progressive development of an enterprise-wide project management approach, methodology, strategy, and decision-making process. To ascertain the level of maturity among project-oriented organizations in Ghana the following research questions were raised: Is the concept of PM maturity understood in Ghana? What are Project Management Maturity levels in Ghana? What maturity models are in use? Are there differences in project management maturity levels in industries in Ghana? The study was exploratory and utilized a questionnaire survey method to collect data on project management Maturity in Ghanaian organizations. Purposive sampling was used to select a sample of 200 managers from different economic sectors. The findings showed that differences exist in the current project management maturity levels across each phase of the project life cycle for all organizations. The study also showed that most of the practitioners expect their respective organizations to attain higher levels of project management maturity (PMM) albeit at various levels. Organizations operating in the non-profit (NGO) category exhibited relatively higher levels of maturity compared to the other categories of organizations in all five phases of the project management life cycle. Firms in the public sector of Ghana recorded low levels of maturity in most of the phases of the project management life cycle. This may be attributed to the low level of project management expertise in the sector, with possible dire consequence to the country’s development since the public sector accounts for a large percentage of projects executed in Ghana. Overall, the findings seem to indicate that project management maturity occurs in phases; PM maturity does not occur as an event but is an ongoing process that is interlinked. The implication therefore is that organisations cannot claim to be mature in one area and neglect the other; it becomes imperative for project-implementing organizations in Ghana to strive to attain maturity in all five phases of the project management life cycle to attain the full benefits of the projects they implement.

Source: UG
Assessing Project Maturity in Africa: A Ghanaian Perspective

The level of project management awareness and recognition of the standards and knowledge sharing among professionals is on the rise. Despite this many projects continue to fail. Ameliorating project failure requires project management maturity among practitioners. Project management maturity is the progressive development of an enterprise-wide project management approach, methodology, strategy, and decision-making process. To ascertain the level of maturity among project oriented organisations in Ghana the following research questions were raised: Is the concept of PM maturity understood in Ghana? What are Project Management Maturity levels in Ghana? What maturity models are in use? Are there differences in project management maturity levels in industries in Ghana? The study was exploratory in nature and utilized a questionnaire survey method to collect data on project management Maturity in Ghanaian organizations. Purposive sampling was used to select a sample of 200 managers from different economic sectors. The findings showed that differences exist in the current project management maturity levels across each phase of the project life cycle for all organisations. The study also showed that most of the practitioners expect their respective organisations to attain higher levels of project management maturity (PMM) albeit at various levels. Organisations operating in the non-profit (NGO) category exhibited relatively higher levels of maturity compared to the other categories of organisations in all the five phases of the project management life cycle. Firms in the public sector of Ghana recorded low levels of maturity in most of the phases of the project management life cycle. This may be attributed to the low level of project management expertise in the sector, with possible dire consequence to the country’s development since the public sector accounts for a large percentage of projects executed in Ghana. Overall, the findings seem to indicate that project management maturity occurs in phases; PM maturity does not occur as an event but is an ongoing process that is interlinked. The implication therefore is that organisations cannot claim to be mature in one area and neglect the other; it becomes imperative for project implementing organisations in Ghana to strive to attain maturity in all the five phase of the project management life cycle in order to attain the full benefits of the projects they implement.

Source: UG
Assessing psychosocial distress associated with homelessness in Ghana: A springboard for interventional policy design

This study investigated the causes of homelessness in Ghana and associated psychosocial distress. A sample of 86 homeless participants listed perceived causes of their homelessness and completed measures of psychosocial distress, and 97 non-homeless participants completed the same measures psychosocial distress. Causes of homelessness among the participants included poverty (30.1%), migration (10.4%), unemployment (2.2%), parental demise (2.2%), parental neglect (0.5%), and parental divorce (0.5%). Multivariate analysis revealed higher psychosocial distress among the homeless than the non-homeless. Homeless females reported higher levels of stress and suicidality than their male counterparts. The study demonstrates the need for timely and effective implementation of interventions such as provision of affordable housing, financial assistance, job-creation, and skill training for the homeless directly related to known causes of homelessness and accounting for gender differences.

Source: UG
Assessing public preferences for deep sea ecosystem conservation: a choice experiment in Norway and Scotland

Recent events around the world have revealed varying degrees of public support for climate change and environmental regulation. Applying a latent class logit model, this study investigates Norwegian and Scottish public’s economic support for proposed deep sea management policies for novel attributes, identifying the presence of preference heterogeneity. Marine litter and health of fish stocks were the attributes with the highest values in absolute terms. This was followed by the size of the protected area coverage, whilst the creation of jobs was the least valued. The results highlight public support for the further collective action required by the EU in moving beyond the 2020 objective of achieving good environmental status of Europe’s seas, despite the low WTP values of the minority classes in each country

Source: UG
Assessing Regional Climate Trends in West Africa Under Geoengineering: A Multimodel Comparison of UKESM1 and CESM2

This study investigates West Africa's climate vulnerability under stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI), using UKESM1 and CESM2 models. We analyzed temperature and precipitation responses for 2050– 2069 relative to 2015–2034 under SSP2‐4.5 and ARISE‐SAI‐1.5 scenarios. Our approach involved evaluating temperature and precipitation anomalies, applying signal‐to‐noise ratio (SNR) analysis—defined as the ratio of the forced climate response to internal variability—to assess signal robustness, and using cumulative distribution (CDF) and probability density (PDF) functions to explore shifts in precipitation extremes. Results indicate that under SSP2‐4.5, both models project significant warming. UKESM1 simulates increases near 1.8°C, while CESM2 projects between 1.0°C and 1.2°C. Under ARISE‐SAI‐1.5, UKESM1 shows pronounced cooling, with temperatures dropping up to 0.3°C below the reference period at some latitudes. CESM2 shows a more uniform cooling, with temperatures between 0°C and 0.3°C above the reference. SNR analysis reveals robust, statistically significant temperature changes across the region, clearly emerging above natural variability by midcentury. Precipitation changes, however, show lower SNR values and greater spatial uncertainty, suggesting weaker and less predictable hydrological responses. CDF and PDF analyses highlight complex shifts in precipitation extremes, suggesting that while SAI could counteract warming trends, it may introduce additional variability and uncertainty in rainfall projections. These results emphasize the importance of multimodel comparisons in assessing geoengineering impacts on regional climates, as differing sensitivities to radiative forcing and feedback can produce divergent outcomes.

Source: UG
Assessing residential satisfaction among low income households in multi-habited dwellings in selected low income communities in Accra

Multi-habitation is the predominant housing strategy adopted by low income households to address their housing needs in urban areas in Ghana. The recent housing policy draft in Ghana recommends multi-habitation as an urban low income housing strategy. However, a couple of researches indicate that households living in multi-habited houses are faced with a myriad of challenges. One such challenge is conflict over inadequate shared facilities. Using both quantitative and qualitative methods of data collection, this paper examines multi-habited households’ residential satisfaction with a holistic approach where the characteristics of the dwelling unit, the social networks and neighbourhood facilities are all considered in accessing household satisfaction. Five low income communities in the Greater Accra Metropolitan Area were studied. The research found out that the dwelling characteristics have a negative influence on the residential satisfaction of the respondents. Households derived the most satisfaction from community support but were moderately satisfied with their neighbourhood characteristics. The significance of this finding on multi-habited housing development and planning in Ghana reflects in the design, location and maintenance of such dwellings.

Source: UG
Assessing rural communities concerns for improved climate change adaptation strategies in Northern Ghana

Northern Ghana is becoming vulnerable to risks induced by climate change. There is an urgent need to improve communities' ability to cope by implementing risk-preventive measures at the household and community levels. However, studies have shown that the existing risk communication system often fails to encourage the people to implement risk-preventive measures because community concerns are not seriously taken in the adaptation planning and management process. The present study systematically examines community concerns about existing risks and possible adaptation strategies by conducting group meetings in four rural communities in theWaWest District. Results show that local communities consider drought or water scarcity to be the most severe risk from climate change because it is directly affecting their livelihood, which ismainly rain-fed subsistence agriculture. As their livelihood is increasingly affected by drought, the local communities are becoming more exposed to floods and other natural calamities. Presently, the climate change adaptation strategies of the local communities are weak and ineffective. It is found that improved irrigation facilitated by rainwater harvesting, watershed management, and seasonal weather forecasting are the preferred adaption strategies. Though a high level of intention to adopt non-structural preventive measures is observed, local communities report that a lack of knowledge and insufficient financial resources aremajor impediments to their implementation.

Source: UG
Assessing Rwanda’s Economic Reform Programme Towards Development

Economic reform programmes have been major drivers of economic growth and development in both developed and developing countries. The notion of economic growth and development is very crucial to developing countries. Rwanda, a country that has encountered numerous economic downturns. The study identified that despite the various economic reform programmes adopted by Rwanda, it is still challenged with underemployment issues and poverty. The study analyses the extent to which the six pillars of the “Vision 2020”, an economic reform programme which was adopted the government of Rwanda in 2000 have curbed these issues and, fostered economic growth and development in the country. The study employs qualitative research method in analyzing the data obtained. A multivariate analysis was adopted to access the relation between the pillars of the “Vision 2020” and economic development. Further, the study also outlined certain limitations that hampered the implementation of the “Vision 2020”. It identified that certain laws such as the ban on street vending and the lack of access to a port affected the implementation of the “Vision 2020”. The study recommended that the government of Rwanda should invest in developing the welfare of its citizens and construct more railways to facilitate trade relations. The study concluded that long-term economic reform programmes are ideal for developing economies due to the level of development associated with it.

Source: UG