Health Care and Cleanliness in Tertiary Care Hospitals in Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

The present study was conducted to probe the cleanliness in the tertiary healthcare hospitals in Peshawar-Pakistan. The data was collected through a structured questionnaire from 600 sampled respondents admitted in three tertiary healthcare hospitals in Peshawar i.e. Khyber Teaching hospital, Hayatabad Medical Complex and Lady Reading Hospital through proportional allocation method. The patients were very critical about the healthcare and cleanliness in the above three major hospitals of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The Bi-variate analysis was made and the results reveal that hospital has clean and hygienic environment (P=0.006), Medical OPD, s were clean and tidy (P=0.000), wards were clean and well maintained (P=0.000), Toilets were clean and well maintained (P=0.000). The study recommended that hospital administration should keep focus on cleanliness in washroom, clean water and clean food to the patients.

Performance Evaluation of Rc Structures under Earthquake Loading

Existing seismic risk in Pakistan, especially in its Northern Areas, emphasis for a detailed and careful design of RC structures to withstand expected earthquake loads. The seismic performance of RC multistory structures is a complex process. An accurate assessment of seismic behavior of RC structures requires an analysis carried out under time history or parameters of time history of real time recorded earthquakes. In Pakistan, a large data bank of strong motion recorders exists in analog form, and its use in performance assessment of structures is very difficult without digitizing it. The response of a multistory RC building is greatly dependant on performance of its columns especially in inelastic range, which can be improved by providing sufficient confinement. Post earthquake surveys revealed that most of the RC buildings collapsed due to insufficient performance of their columns, which were found deficient in confinement. A limited work has been carried out in Pakistan to study the performance of RC columns under axial and lateral loading. Internationally, the efforts are continued to enhance the performance of RC columns subjected to seismic loads. The objective of this research has three main parts. The first part is to collect, segregate and digitize available analog form of earthquake data, which has been recorded in Pakistan. The second part is to device and test a technique which could enhance strength, ductility and stiffness of RC columns subjected to seismic loads and result in lesser residual deformations. The third part is to carry out seismic analysis of a RC multistory frame, using material behavior studied experimentally, under application of ground motion data of Pakistan. A novel digitizing technique is developed in this study that extracts the trace of recorded acceleration as a whole by saving all points required to draw digitized ground acceleration. The proposed digitizing approach has been compared with the available techniques to assess its efficiency. The confinement technique for RC columns developed in this study utilizes specialized rings of steel strips applied as transverse reinforcement in hinge zone. Eight large scale specimens have been cast and tested to study the performance of proposed technique. The experimental results indicated that proposed confining reinforcement, although with lesser volumetric ratio, improved the performance of RC columns by enhancing their shear resistance, ductility, energy dissipation capacity and reducing residual deformations. iiThe columns confined by proposed technique have been named as Steel Strip Confined (SSC) columns. The observed column behavior has been modeled in Response-2000 and DRAIN-3DX. RC frames are modeled in DRAIN-3DX using material properties calibrated with experimental data. The frames are analyzed under north-south component of El Centro ground motion and east-west component of Kashmir earthquake recorded at Abbottabad. The frames, modeled with properties of SSC columns, showed better performance by reducing the damage. The analysis indicates that Kashmir earthquake is more damaging in nature than El Centro ground motion.