We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
To save content items to your account,
please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies.
If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account.
Find out more about saving content to .
To save content items to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org
is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings
on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part
of your Kindle email address below.
Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations.
‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi.
‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
The Early Ordovician (late Tremadocian; Stairsian) trilobite Gonioteloides Kobayashi has long been known from a small number of pygidia assigned to a single formally named species, and its affinities have not been assessed. Silicified material from western Utah and southeastern Idaho includes six distinct species assigned to the genus, one of which is the type species. Two others (G. moffitti and G. pankowskii) are new and formally named. An additional three species that are clearly new but known from sparse material are described in open nomenclature. Gonioteloides has a stratigraphic distribution through five consecutive trilobite zones in the mid-Stairsian Stage (upper Tremadocian). Although exoskeletal morphology of three species is almost completely known, the phylogenetic affinity of the taxon remains difficult to determine. It is tentatively assigned to Dimeropygidae Hupé.
A household-level constant visual deterrent advocacy campaign to reduce tobacco intake was conducted in rural Bangladesh.
Aims
To evaluate smoking tobacco expenditure by campaign components.
Methods
We conducted a single-blind clustered randomized controlled trial on 630 adult male household heads from 16 chars (riverine islands) in rural northern Bangladesh, between November 2018 and January 2019. Intervention allotment was randomized at the char level to minimize spillovers, with 8 chars in treatment and control groups each. The intervention provided households in treatment chars (n = 323) with two visual warning posters, detailing the health effects of tobacco on oneself and external actors, to be hung inside the household for 4 weeks. Households in control chars (n = 307) received nothing. Reported daily smoking (log) tobacco expenditure values were the primary outcome of interest.
Results
Final analysis was conducted using 251 and 210 smokers in treatment and control chars respectively. The intervention reduced relative smoking tobacco expenditure by 12.8% (95% CI −31.45 to 5.81) but was not statistically significant (P-value = 0.163). Weak to moderate emotional reactions to the posters was identified as a reason for the statistical insignificance.
Conclusion
For a visual anti-tobacco intervention to have a substantial impact, it must induce strong emotional responses.
Introduction: Cases of anaphylaxis in children are often not appropriately managed by caregivers. We aimed to develop and to test the effectiveness of an education tool to help pediatric patients and their families better understand anaphylaxis and its management and to improve current knowledge and treatment guidelines adherence. Methods: The GEAR (Guidelines and Educational programs based on an Anaphylaxis Registry) is an initiative that recruits children with food-induced anaphylaxis who have visited the ED at the Montreal Children's Hospital and at The Children's Clinic located in Montreal, Quebec. The patients and parents, together, were asked to complete six questions related to the triggers, recognition and management of anaphylaxis at the time of presentation to the allergy clinic. Participants were automatically shown a 5-minute animated video addressing the main knowledge gaps related to the causes and management of anaphylaxis. At the end of the video, participants were redirected to same 6 questions to respond again. To test long-term knowledge retention, the questionnaire will be presented again in one year's time. A paired t-test was used to compare the difference between the baseline score and the follow-up score based on percentage of correct answers of the questionnaire. Results: From June to November 2019, 95 pediatric patients with diagnosed food-induced anaphylaxis were recruited. The median patient age was 4.5 years (Interquartile Range (IQR): 1.6–7.4) and half were male (51.6%). The mean questionnaire baseline score was 0.77 (77.0%, standard deviation (sd): 0.16) and the mean questionnaire follow-up score was 0.83 (83.0%, sd: 0.17). There was a significant difference between the follow-up score and baseline score (difference: 0.06, 95% CI: 0.04, 0.09). There were no associations of baseline questionnaire scores and change in scores with age and sex. Conclusion: Our video teaching method was successful in educating patients and their families to better understand anaphylaxis. The next step is to acquire long-term follow up scored to determine retention of knowledge.
To evaluate the influence of cannabis in the long-term follow-up in patients with a first psychotic episode, comparing those who have never used cannabis with (a) those who used cannabis before the first psychotic episode but stopped it during the follow-up, and (b) those who used cannabis both before and after the first psychotic episode.
Method
Patients were followed from the first psychotic admission. They were assessed at 1, 3 and 5 years obtaining information about functional outcome, positive and negative symptoms. At 8th year functional outcome was evaluated. Patients were classified in 3 groups: 40 that never used cannabis (NU), 27 that used cannabis and stopped during follow-up (CUS), and 25 that had continued use during follow-up (CU).
Results
At baseline, there were differences neither in functional outcome nor in negative symptoms. The CUS group improved the functional outcome during the follow-up (p< 0.001), while CU and NU groups did not show any significant results (p= 0.466 and p= 0.370 respectively). CUS group had also a significant decreasing trend in negative symptoms (p= 0.012), whereas for the other two groups no significant results were observed (p= 0.069 and p= 0.226 respectively). All groups improved in positive symptoms during follow-up.
Conclusions
Although cannabis use has deleterious effect, to stop it after the first psychotic episode produces a clearly improvement in the long-term follow-up.
There are manic disorders with depressive symptoms in mixed mania that do not reach the threshold for the diagnosis of mixed episode.Mania and hypomania are evaluated with scales that do not detect the depressive symptoms of patients in manic episode.
Objectives
To determine the usefulness of HAMD-5 and MES depression scales in patients with bipolar disorder type I and II who have a manic or hypomanic episode with depressive symptoms. These scales were compared with the HAMD-21 and the MADRS scales respectively.
Methods
100 subjects between 18 and 65 years old were included. All patients met the DSM-IV-TR criteria for bipolar disorder with manic or hypomanic symptoms and major depression.All patients were evaluated at baseline and at 3 and 4 weeks during the follow-up.
Results
At baseline the HAMD-5 and the MES had high reliability (α = 0.88 and α = 0,74 respectively)The test-retest reliability between the 3rd and the 4th week was great for both scales (HAMD-5: r = 0,89; p < 0,001; MES: r = 0,77; p < 0,001).The convergent validity had an acceptable level for the HAMD-5 (HAMD-21/HAMD-5 = 0,73; 95% CI 0,599–0,873) and for the MES (MADRS/MES = 0,79; 95% CI 0,766–0,894)Regarding the discriminant validity, the values for the HAMD-5 and MES were higher than for the HAMD-21 and MADRS respectively (HAM-5: AUC = 0,92, 95% CI: 0,892–0,980; MES: AUC = 0,86, 95% CI: 0,786–0,934).
Conclusions
Both scales showed an adequate correlation with the HAMD-21 and MADRS and a high capacity of detection of mixed, pure and other symptoms as their remission.
This study aims to assess the impact of a behavioural intervention, in the form of a self-monitoring record-keeping logbook, in reducing smoking tobacco expenditure amongst adult male household heads in rural Bangladesh.
Method
The experiment was designed as a single-blind clustered randomised controlled trial utilising two-stage random sampling. A total of 650 adult male household heads were sampled from 16 chars (riverine islands) from Gaibandha, Northern Bangladesh, with eight chars in treatment and control groups each, between November 2018 and January 2019. The intervention consisted of a logbook to record daily smoking tobacco intake for 4 weeks provided only to participants in treatment chars (n = 332) while households in control chars received nothing (n = 318).
Results
Final analysis was conducted using 222 and 210 households in the treatment and control chars respectively. The logbook intervention had a significant impact (P-value = 0.040) on reducing daily tobacco expenditure by 14% (α = 95%; CI: −0.273, −0.008) for the treatment group relative to the control group based on a difference-in-difference estimator. This is equivalent to a reduction of 20 cigarettes or 140 bidis smoked in a month.
Conclusion
Our minimal contact intervention successfully induced a reduction in smoking tobacco expenditure, which could effectively be incorporated with existing programs in the char regions of Bangladesh.
Although the efficacy of endovascular thrombectomy (EVT) for acute ischemic stroke caused by intracranial anterior circulation large vessel occlusion (LVO) is proven, demonstration of local effectiveness is critical for health system planning and resource allocation because of the complexity and cost of this treatment.
Methods:
Using our prospective registry, we identified all patients who underwent EVT for out-of-hospital LVO stroke from February 1, 2013 through January 31, 2017 (n = 44), and matched them 1:1 in a hierarchical fashion with control patients not treated with EVT based on age (±5 years), prehospital functional status, stroke syndrome, severity, and thrombolysis administration. Demographics, in-hospital mortality, discharge disposition from acute care, length of hospitalization, and functional status at discharge from acute care and at follow-up were compared between cases and controls.
Results:
For EVT-treated patients (median age 66, 50% women), the median onset-to-recanalization interval was 247 min, and successful recanalization was achieved in 30/44 (91%). Alteplase was administered in 75% of cases and 57% of controls (p = 0.07). In-hospital mortality was 11% among the cases and 36% in the control group (p = 0.006); this survival benefit persisted during follow-up (p = 0.014). More EVT patients were discharged home from acute care (50% vs. 18%, p = 0.002). Among survivors, there were nonsignificant trends in favor of EVT for median length of hospitalization (14 vs. 41 days, p = 0.11) and functional independence at follow-up (51% vs. 32%, p = 0.079).
Conclusion:
EVT improved survival and decreased disability. This demonstration of single-center effectiveness may help facilitate expansion of EVT services in similar health-care jurisdictions.
Endovascular thrombectomy (EVT) is efficacious for ischemic stroke caused by proximal intracranial large-vessel occlusion involving the anterior cerebral circulation. However, evidence of its cost-effectiveness, especially in a real-world setting, is limited. We assessed whether EVT ± tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) was cost-effective when compared with standard care ± tPA at our center.
Method:
We identified patients treated with EVT ± tPA after the Endovascular treatment for Small Core and Anterior circulation Proximal occlusion with Emphasis on minimizing computed tomography to recanalization times trial from our prospective stroke registry from February 1, 2013 to January 31, 2017. Patients admitted before February 2013 and treated with standard care ± tPA constitute the controls. The sample size was 88. Cost-effectiveness was assessed using the net monetary benefit (NMB). Differences in average costs and quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) were estimated using the augmented inverse probability weighted estimator. We accounted for sampling and methodological uncertainty in sensitivity analyses.
Results:
Patients treated with EVT ± tPA had a net gain of 2.89 [95% confidence interval (CI): 0.93–4.99] QALYs at an additional cost of $22,200 (95% CI: −28,902–78,244) per patient compared with the standard care ± tPA group. The NMB was $122,300 (95% CI: −4777–253,133) with a 0.85 probability of being cost-effective. The expected savings to the healthcare system would amount to $321,334 per year.
Conclusion:
EVT ± tPA had higher costs and higher QALYs compared with the control, and is likely to be cost-effective at a willingness-to-pay threshold of $50,000 per QALY.
How to restore citizens’ trust and cooperation with the police in the wake of civil war? We report results from an experimental evaluation of the Liberian National Police’s (LNP) “Confidence Patrols” program, which deployed teams of newly retrained, better-equipped police officers on recurring patrols to rural communities across three Liberian counties over a period of 14 months. We find that the program increased knowledge of the police and Liberian law, enhanced security of property rights, and reduced the incidence of some types of crime, notably simple assault and domestic violence. The program did not, however, improve trust in the police, courts, or government more generally. We also observe higher rates of crime reporting in treatment communities, concentrated almost entirely among those who were disadvantaged under prevailing customary mechanisms of dispute resolution. We consider implications of these findings for post-conflict policing in Liberia and weak and war-torn states more generally.
The effectiveness of salt iodisation in improving the mental development of young children has not been assessed. We implemented a community-based cluster-randomised effectiveness trial in sixty randomly selected districts in the Amhara region of Ethiopia. We randomly allocated each district to treatment and randomly selected one of its villages. In parallel to national salt iodisation efforts, iodised salt was brought early into the markets of the thirty intervention villages before it became widely available in the thirty control villages 4–6 months later. The primary outcome was children’s mental development scores on the Bayley Scales. This was an intention-to-treat analysis using mixed linear models adjusted for covariates and clusters. The trial was registered at ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT013496. We assessed 1835 infants aged 5–11 months at baseline. The same children (85 % of the sample) were re-assessed at 20–29 months when all villages had iodised salt. At endline, urinary iodine concentration was higher in children in the intervention group compared with those in the control group (median 228·0 v. 155·1 µg/l, P=0·001). The intervention group had higher scores compared with the control group on the Bayley composite score (raw scores:130·60 v. 128·51; standardised scores: 27·8 v. 26·9; d=0·13; 95 % CI 0·02, 0·23) and three of the four subscales: cognitive (53·27 v. 52·54, d=0·13; 95 % CI 0·03, 0·23), receptive language (20·71 v. 20·18, d=0·13; 95 % CI 0·03, 0·24) and fine motor (35·45 v. 34·94, d=0·15; 95 % CI 0·04, 0·25). The introduction of iodised salt contributes to children’s higher urinary iodine concentration and mental development.
Vorticity distributions in axisymmetric vortex rings produced by a piston–pipe apparatus are numerically studied over a range of Reynolds numbers, $Re$, and stroke-to-diameter ratios, $L/D$. It is found that a state of advective balance, such that $\unicode[STIX]{x1D701}\equiv \unicode[STIX]{x1D714}_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D719}}/r\approx F(\unicode[STIX]{x1D713},t)$, is achieved within the region (called the vortex ring bubble) enclosed by the dividing streamline. Here $\unicode[STIX]{x1D701}\equiv \unicode[STIX]{x1D714}_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D719}}/r$ is the ratio of azimuthal vorticity to cylindrical radius, and $\unicode[STIX]{x1D713}$ is the Stokes streamfunction in the frame of the ring. Some, but not all, of the $Re$ dependence in the time evolution of $F(\unicode[STIX]{x1D713},t)$ can be captured by introducing a scaled time $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}=\unicode[STIX]{x1D708}t$, where $\unicode[STIX]{x1D708}$ is the kinematic viscosity. When $\unicode[STIX]{x1D708}t/D^{2}\gtrsim 0.02$, the shape of $F(\unicode[STIX]{x1D713})$ is dominated by the linear-in-$\unicode[STIX]{x1D713}$ component, the coefficient of the quadratic term being an order of magnitude smaller. An important feature is that, as the dividing streamline ($\unicode[STIX]{x1D713}=0$) is approached, $F(\unicode[STIX]{x1D713})$ tends to a non-zero intercept which exhibits an extra $Re$ dependence. This and other features are explained by a simple toy model consisting of the one-dimensional cylindrical diffusion equation. The key ingredient in the model responsible for the extra $Re$ dependence is a Robin-type boundary condition, similar to Newton’s law of cooling, that accounts for the edge layer at the dividing streamline.
Children from low-income countries consuming predominantly plant-based diets but little animal products are considered to be at risk of Fe deficiency. The present study determined the Fe status of children from resource-limited rural households.
Design
A cross-sectional study.
Setting
Twenty six kebeles (the smallest administrative unit) from six zones of the Amhara region, Ethiopia.
Subjects
Children aged 54–60 months (n 628).
Results
Grain, roots or tubers were the main dietary components consumed by 100 % of the study participants, followed by pulses, legumes or nuts (66·6 %). Consumption of fruit and vegetables (19·3 %) and meat, poultry and fish (2·2 %) was low. Children had a mean dietary diversity score of 2·1 (sd 0·8). Most children (74·8 %, n 470) were in the lowest dietary diversity group (1–2 food groups). Rate of any morbidity in the preceding 14 d was 22·9 % (n 114). Infection or inflammation (α1-acid glycoprotein >1·2 g/l) was present in 30·2 % (n 184) of children. Children had a high rate of stunting (43·2 %). Of the total sample, 13·6 % (n 82) of children were anaemic, 9·1 % (n 57) were Fe deficient and 5·3 % (n 32) had Fe-deficiency anaemia. Fe-deficiency erythropoiesis was present in 14·2 % (n 60) of children.
Conclusions
Despite consuming a predominantly plant-based diet and little animal-source foods, there was a low prevalence of Fe-deficiency anaemia. This illustrates that dietary patterns can be inharmonious with Fe biochemical status; thus, Fe-related interventions require biochemical screening.
In this work, we report a comparative investigation of InxGa1-xN (SL) and InxGa1-xN/GaN (MQW) structures with an indium content equivalent to x=10%. Both structures are grown on (0001) sapphire substrates using MOCVD and MBE growth techniques. Optical properties are evaluated for samples using PL characteristics. Critical differences between the resulting epitaxy are observed. Microstructures have been assessed in terms of crystalline quality, density of dislocations and surface morphology. We have focused our study towards the fabrication of vertical PIN photodiodes. The technological process has been optimized as a function of the material structure. From the optical and electrical characteristics, this study demonstrates the benefit of InGaN/GaN MQW grown by MOCVD in comparison with MBE for high speed optoelectronic applications.
Guzzo, Fink, King, Tonidandel, and Landis (2015) provide a clear overview of the implications of conducting research using big data. One element we believe was overlooked, however, was an individual-level perspective on big data; that is, what impact does this sort of data collection have on the individuals being studied? As psychologists, the ethics and impact of big data collection from workers should be at the forefront of our minds. In this reply, we use years of research on electronic monitoring and tracking to provide evidence that an individual-level perspective is an essential part of the discussion surrounding industrial–organizational psychology and big data. Specifically, we examine electronic performance monitoring (EPM) literature to identify how the widespread, pervasive collection of employee data affects employees’ attitudes and behaviors.
This paper presents optimization-based dynamic three-dimensional (3D) human running prediction. A predictive dynamics method is used to formulate the running problem, and normal running is formulated as a symmetric and cyclic motion. In addition, a slow jog along curved paths has been formulated. It is a non-symmetric running motion, so a stride formulation has been used. The dynamic effort and impulse are used as the performance measure, and the upper body yawing moment is also included in the performance measure. The joint angle profiles and joint torque profiles are calculated for the full-body human model, and the ground reaction force is determined. The effects of foot location and orientation on the running motion prediction are simulated and studied. Simulation results from this methodology show good correlation with experimental data obtained from human subjects.
The objective of this study was to assess the effects of milk replacer and rumen inert fat on growth, testicular development, puberty, semen production and sperm motion characteristics of ram lambs reared under intensive management in semi-arid climatic conditions. Seven-day-old male lambs of Malpura breed (n=20) were divided equally into two groups. Up to weaning, the lambs in G1 group (control) were fed concentrate, green khejri (Prosopis cineraria) leaves and cowpea (Vigna unguiculata) hay along with suckling of dams, whereas lambs in G2 group were fed reconstituted milk at 17 g/lamb per day for the 1st week and at 34 g/lamb per day from 2nd week in addition to the feed inputs given in G1. During post weaning, lambs in the G1 group were given control concentrate, whereas in G2 the control concentrate supplemented with 40 g rumen inert fat per kg of feed was offered along with dry pala (Zizyphus nummularia) and ardu (Ailanthus excelsa) leaves. BWs of lambs were recorded weekly up to 6 months of age. Ram lambs of both the groups were trained for semen collection at a weekly interval from the age of 5 months and simultaneously testicular measurements were recorded fortnightly. The feeding of milk replacer and rumen inert fat had positive (P<0.05) effects on BW, testicular length, testicular volume, semen volume, sperm concentration, mass motility, % motility, % rapid, medium or slow motile spermatozoa. However, no significant effect was observed on testicular breadth, scrotal circumference, age of puberty, sperm velocities and other CASA-derived parameters. The results of this study indicate that higher plane of nutrition in the form of milk-replacer feeding during preweaning and rumen inert fat-supplemented feed during the postweaning period to growing ram lambs enhances their growth, testicular development and semen quality.
This paper reports for the first time the presence of Holothuria (Roweothuria) arguinensis in the Algerian coastal waters. Individuals of this species were taken from the Tamentefoust area (Bay of Algiers, Algeria, 3°13′E 36°48′N) at 4.5 m depth and examined, using traditional morphological and endoskeletal characters. The general body form and the ossicles are in accordance with the descriptions of the species obtained in the literature.