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Colonization and ongoing colonial policies and practices are contributing to increased dementia rates in Indigenous populations. This health inequity could be addressed by implementing culturally safe dementia interventions specifically designed for Indigenous people. We conducted a scoping review of culturally safe dementia care interventions for Indigenous populations. Databases searched included OVID (Medline, PsycINFO, Embase, Healthstar), Informit Indigenous Collection, JBI EBP, Scopus/Elsevier and PubMed. Eligibility criteria included studies in English, interventions designed specifically for Indigenous persons living with dementia and evaluative outcomes of the intervention. In total, 2,259 articles were identified. After removing duplicates, 1,394 titles and abstracts were screened and 54 studies were screened for eligibility. Of these, no studies were eligible for inclusion. This empty review reveals a massive and inexcusable gap in knowledge around developing, implementing and evaluating culturally safe Indigenous-specific dementia care interventions. Future directions for research include working with Indigenous peoples to determine what culturally safe interventions for dementia look like, implementing high-quality studies with evidence-based measures and outcomes, and improving efforts to get this important work published to inform future studies.
By any measure, Japan's modern empire was formidable. The only major non-Western colonial power in the twentieth century, Japan at the height of its empire controlled a vast area of Asia and numerous archipelagos in the Pacific Ocean. Its reach extended from Sakhalin Island north of the Japanese archipelago to the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific and expanded into Manchuria, areas of China, Korea, and much of Southeast Asia and Micronesia. Over the more than seven decades of Japanese colonial rule (1869-1945), Japan successfully naturalized two colonies (Ainu Moshir/Hokkaido and the Ryukyu Kingdom/Okinawa) into its national territory. The massive extraction of resources and extensive cultural assimilation policies radically impacted the lives of millions of Asians and Pacific Islanders. The political, economic, and cultural ramifications of this era are still felt today.
Many Japanese and others today understand Hokkaido as an ancient part of Japan, and do not know that the island was only formally absorbed in the mid-19th century. This article explains the process by which the island of Ezo was annexed by the Japanese in 1868 and renamed Hokkaido (“the path to the northern seas”). The Japanese also began transforming Ezo, now Hokkaido, in order to thoroughly incorporate the island into the new central polity. This transformation had dire consequences for the indigenous Ainu population. This article also introduces two Japanese laws that were ratified in the late 19th century: the Emigrant Protection Law of 1896 and the Hokkaido Former Natives Protection Law of 1899. “Enacted like bookends on the (First) Sino-Japanese War,” the latter was to have an especially serious effect on the livelihoods of the Ainu. Komori argues that Japan sought through those two laws to protect its territorial interest vis-à-vis the major Western colonial powers in two different places and ways. The Emigrant Protection law was legislated to encourage and also protect Japanese migrants who were rapidly moving into Hawai'i and other areas internationally while the Hokkaido law encouraged migration to Hokkaido by suppressing the Ainu.
Dental management is critical prior to radiotherapy (RT) for head and neck cancer (HNC) but cumbersome and time intensive. This qualitative study investigates dentists’ evaluative processes to identify areas for improvement.
Methods:
Semi-structured interviews were conducted with dentists involved in the care of HNC patients. The interviews were guided by the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research and the Theoretical Domains Framework to identify factors influencing pre-RT dental management.
Results:
Five dentists were participated in the interviews. Key themes were identified through qualitative and quantitative evaluation and are as follows: Coordination among care providers, knowledge of the RT plan, visual depictions of dose distribution and understanding of the patient’s dental history.
Conclusions:
This study demonstrates the complexity of pre-RT management and identifies key elements. Knowledge of the RT plan and improved interdisciplinary coordination represents opportunities for improvement. Visual dose prediction methods may expedite and improve pre-RT management.
Observers were randomized to time and location across two different Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICUs) to count hand hygiene opportunities (HHOs). Mean hourly HHO was lower at night and during use of precautions, and higher in shared rooms. HHO benchmarks can support implementation of group electronic monitoring systems in NICUs.
Transdisciplinary sustainability scientists work with many different actors in pursuit of change. In so doing they make choices about why and how to engage with different perspectives in their research. Reflexivity – active individual and collective critical reflection – is considered an important capacity for researchers to address the resulting ethical and practical challenges. We developed a framework for reflexivity as a transformative capacity in sustainability science through a critical systems approach, which helps make any decisions that influence which perspectives are included or excluded in research explicit. We suggest that transdisciplinary sustainability research can become more transformative by nurturing reflexivity.
Technical summary
Transdisciplinary sustainability science is increasingly applied to study transformative change. Yet, transdisciplinary research involves diverse actors who hold contrasting and sometimes conflicting perspectives and worldviews. Reflexivity is cited as a crucial capacity for navigating the resulting challenges, yet notions of reflexivity are often focused on individual researcher reflections that lack explicit links to the collective transdisciplinary research process and predominant modes of inquiry in the field. This gap presents the risk that reflexivity remains on the periphery of sustainability science and becomes ‘unreflexive’, as crucial dimensions are left unacknowledged. Our objective was to establish a framework for reflexivity as a transformative capacity in sustainability science through a critical systems approach. We developed and refined the framework through a rapid scoping review of literature on transdisciplinarity, transformation, and reflexivity, and reflection on a scenario study in the Red River Basin (US, Canada). The framework characterizes reflexivity as the capacity to nurture a dynamic, embedded, and collective process of self-scrutiny and mutual learning in service of transformative change, which manifests through interacting boundary processes – boundary delineation, interaction, and transformation. The case study reflection suggests how embedding this framework in research can expose boundary processes that block transformation and nurture more reflexive and transformative research.
Social media summary
Transdisciplinary sustainability research may become more transformative by nurturing reflexivity as a dynamic, embedded, and collective learning process.
There is growing evidence that the broadband radio spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of star-forming galaxies (SFGs) contain a wealth of complex physics. In this paper we aim to determine the physical emission and loss processes causing radio SED curvature and steepening to see what observed global astrophysical properties, if any, are correlated with radio SED complexity. To do this, we have acquired radio continuum data between 70 MHz and 17 GHz for a sample of 19 southern local ($z \lt 0.04$) SFGs. Of this sample 11 are selected to contain low-frequency ($ \lt $300 MHz) turnovers (LFTOs) in their SEDs and eight are control galaxies with similar global properties. We model the radio SEDs for our sample using a Bayesian framework whereby radio emission (synchrotron and free-free) and absorption or loss processes are included modularly. We find that without the inclusion of higher frequency data ($ \gt $17 GHz) single synchrotron power-law based models are always preferred for our sample; however, additional processes including free-free absorption (FFA) and synchrotron losses are often required to accurately model radio SED complexity in SFGs. The fitted synchrotron spectral indices range from $-0.45$ to $-1.07$ and are strongly anticorrelated with stellar mass suggesting that synchrotron losses are the dominant mechanism acting to steepen the spectral index in larger/more massive nearby SFGs. We find that LFTOs in the radio SED are independent from the inclination of SFGs; however, higher inclination galaxies tend to have steeper fitted spectral indices indicating losses to diffusion of cosmic ray electrons into the galactic halo. Four of five of the merging systems in our SFG sample have elevated specific star formation rates and flatter fitted spectral indices with unconstrained LFTOs. Lastly, we find no significant separation in global properties between SFGs with or without modelled LFTOs. Overall these results suggest that LFTOs are likely caused by a combination of FFA and ionisation losses in individual recent starburst regions with specific orientations and interstellar medium properties that, when averaged over the entire galaxy, do not correlate with global astrophysical properties.
Evidence-based insertion and maintenance bundles are effective in reducing the incidence of central line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSI) in intensive care unit (ICU) settings. We studied the adoption and compliance of CLABSI prevention bundle programs and CLABSI rates in ICUs in a large network of acute care hospitals across Canada.
Being married may protect late-life cognition. Less is known about living arrangement among unmarried adults and mechanisms such as brain health (BH) and cognitive reserve (CR) across race and ethnicity or sex/gender. The current study examines (1) associations between marital status, BH, and CR among diverse older adults and (2) whether one’s living arrangement is linked to BH and CR among unmarried adults.
Method:
Cross-sectional data come from the Washington Heights-Inwood Columbia Aging Project (N = 778, 41% Hispanic, 33% non-Hispanic Black, 25% non-Hispanic White; 64% women). Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) markers of BH included cortical thickness in Alzheimer’s disease signature regions and hippocampal, gray matter, and white matter hyperintensity volumes. CR was residual variance in an episodic memory composite after partialing out MRI markers. Exploratory analyses stratified by race and ethnicity and sex/gender and included potential mediators.
Results:
Marital status was associated with CR, but not BH. Compared to married individuals, those who were previously married (i.e., divorced, widowed, and separated) had lower CR than their married counterparts in the full sample, among White and Hispanic subgroups, and among women. Never married women also had lower CR than married women. These findings were independent of age, education, physical health, and household income. Among never married individuals, living with others was negatively linked to BH.
Conclusions:
Marriage may protect late-life cognition via CR. Findings also highlight differential effects across race and ethnicity and sex/gender. Marital status could be considered when assessing the risk of cognitive impairment during routine screenings.
Late-onset sepsis (LOS) in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) causes significant morbidity and mortality, yet guidance on empiric management is limited. We surveyed NICUs across Canada and the United States regarding their empiric antimicrobial regimens for LOS, thereby identifying large practice variations and high rates of empiric vancomycin use.
Congress directed the Secretary of Defense (DoD) to conduct a Pilot program to increase the National Disaster Medical System’s (NDMS) surge capacity, capabilities, and interoperability to support patient movement during a large-scale overseas contingency operation.
Methods
The Pilot conducted a mixed methods exploratory study, the Military-Civilian NDMS Interoperability Study (MCNIS), identifying 55 areas of solutions for NDMS innovation that align with interagency stakeholder interests. Priorities were determined via facilitated discussions, refined and validated by all five Pilot sites.
Results
As the DoD provides essential support for the patient movement component within NDMS, the results highlighted areas for improvement between receiving patients at an airfield and moving them to NDMS definitive care partners during a large medical surge event. This includes patient tracking capabilities, transportation processes and patient placement.
Conclusions
In collaboration with the Departments of Health & Human Services, Homeland Security, Transportation, and Veterans Health Administration, the Pilot is addressing these areas for improvement, by executing site-specific projects that will be validated and identified for export across the system. Leaders across the Pilot site healthcare networks are working to enhance patient movement and tracking. Ultimately, the Pilot will deliver dozens of proven solutions to enhance the NDMS’s patient movement capabilities.
This study creates a virtual space for language learning using a user-customizable metaverse platform and explores its potential for EFL learning. To this end, a virtual learning space, grounded in constructivist learning principles – contextualized learning, active learning, and collaborative learning – was created on a 2D metaverse platform. The metaverse was designed as a simulated deserted island for enjoyable and playful learning, allowing the students to actively explore, discover, and interact as they look for clues to escape the island. For educational application, 29 Korean middle school students participated in a two-hour activity. Data included screen recordings of student activities, student surveys, and interviews with the students and teachers. The findings showed that, as an EFL learning space of playful constructivism, the metaverse had great potential to embed contextualized learning and served as a medium for active learning that positively affected student interest and motivation. The results confirmed that the team-based approach combined with a game-like metaverse fostered student collaboration. Overall, the study showcased how language instructors can make use of a customizable metaverse for L2 learning and how a virtual space may serve as an arena for learner-centered instruction.
Postoperative wound care after craniotomy is not standardized.
Objective:
Evaluate the impact of a standardized post-craniotomy wound care protocol on surgical site infection (SSI).
Design and Setting:
Prospective quasi-experimental single-center intervention cohort study involving adult patients undergoing craniotomy at a 461-bed academic medical center in Orange County, California from January 2019–March 2023 (intervention) compared to January 2017–December 2018 (baseline).
Methods:
A postoperative neurosurgical wound care protocol was developed involving chlorhexidine cloths to remove incisional clots and to clean the surgical incision and adjacent hair after craniotomy surgery. Protocol adherence was monitored by routine inpatient surveillance of wounds and photo-documentation for real-time feedback to surgeons and nursing staff. Impact of the intervention was assessed using multivariable regression models.
Results:
There were 3560 craniotomy surgeries and 62 (1.7%) SSIs; 1251 surgeries and 30 (2.4%) SSIs during baseline, and 2309 surgeries and 32 (1.4%) SSIs during intervention. Process evaluation after implementation found significant decreases in incisional clots, erythema, drainage, and unclean hair. In multivariable analysis, the intervention was associated with fewer SSI (odds ratio (OR): 0.5 (0.3, 0.9), P = 0.02).
Conclusions:
A standardized post-craniotomy wound care protocol involving cleaning of the incision and adjacent hair, including removal of incisional clots with chlorhexidine cloths was effective in reducing the risk of SSI.
Background: The molecular and epidemiological landscape of C. difficile infection (CDI) has evolved markedly in the last decade; however, limited information is available contrasting differences between adult and pediatric populations. We describe a multicenter study evaluating healthcare-associated (HA) and community-associated (CA) adult and pediatric-CDI identified in the Canadian Nosocomial Infection Surveillance Program (CNISP) network from 2015 to 2022. Methods: Hospitalized patients with CDI were identified from up to 84 hospitals between 2015–2022 using standardized case definitions. Cases were confirmed by PCR, cultured, and further characterized using ribotyping and E-test. We used two-tailed tests for significance (p≤0.05). Results: Of 30,817 cases reported, 29,245 were adult cases [HA-CDI (73.2%), CA-CDI (26.8%)] and 1,572 were pediatric cases [HA-CDI (77.7%), CA-CDI (22.3%)]. From 2015 to 2022, HA-CDI rates decreased 19.7% (p=0.007) and 29.4% (p=0.004) in adult and pediatric populations, respectively (Figure 1). CA-CDI rates remained relatively stable in the adult population (p=0.797), while decreasing 60.7% in the pediatric population (p=0.013). Median ages of adult and pediatric patients were 70 (interquartile range (IQR), 58–80) and seven (IQR, 3–13) years, respectively. Thirty-day all-cause mortality was significantly higher among adult vs. Pediatric CDI patients (11.0% vs 1.4%, p < 0.0001). No significant differences in other severe outcomes were found. Ribotyping and susceptibility data were available for 4,620 samples: 3,558 adult (77.0%) and 1,062 pediatric (23.0%). The predominant adult and pediatric ribotypes (RT) were 106 (12.2/16.2%), 027 (11.4/3.2%), and 014 (8.8/8.2%). Overall, RT027 prevalence significantly decreased from 17.9% in 2015 to 3.2% in 2022 (p=0.003), while RT106 increased from 8.5% to 14.4%. Resistance rates among adult and pediatric isolates were similar for all antimicrobials tested except moxifloxacin (16.2% vs. 6.2%, p < 0.0001, respectively). Adult moxifloxacin resistance decreased from 30% to 6.3% from 2015 to 2022 (p=0.006). Adults with moxifloxacin-resistant CDI were older (median: 74 vs. 69 years, p < 0.001) and had higher thirty-day all-cause mortality (13% vs. 9.8%, p=0.041) and recurrence (10% vs. 5.7%, p < 0.001) compared to those with moxifloxacin non-resistant CDI, while these trends were not observed in pediatric patients. Among RT027 strains, moxifloxacin resistance decreased from 91.0% in 2015 to 7.1% in 2022. There was one metronidazole-resistant pediatric sample in 2018 and no resistance to vancomycin or tigecycline in either population. Conclusion: We have found differences in the epidemiological and molecular characteristics of adult and pediatric CDI, with higher thirty-day all-cause mortality among adults. Overall, RT106 has replaced RT027 as the predominant ribotype with a concomitant decrease in fluoroquinolone resistance.
The Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation (MLSRA) is a landmark prospective, longitudinal study of human development focused on a sample of mothers experiencing poverty and their firstborn children. Although the MLSRA pioneered a number of important topics in the area of social and emotional development, it began with the more specific goal of examining the antecedents of child maltreatment. From that foundation and for more than 40 years, the study has produced a significant body of research on the origins, sequelae, and measurement of childhood abuse and neglect. The principal objectives of this report are to document the early history of the MLSRA and its contributions to the study of child maltreatment and to review and summarize results from the recently updated childhood abuse and neglect coding of the cohort, with particular emphasis on findings related to adult adjustment. While doing so, we highlight key themes and contributions from Dr Dante Cicchetti’s body of research and developmental psychopathology perspective to the MLSRA, a project launched during his tenure as a graduate student at the University of Minnesota.
OBJECTIVES/GOALS: To determine whether cardioprotective effects observed in individuals taking dietary supplementation with eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), an ω-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid, are realized by altering platelet function, and if these effects are mediated through the 12-lipoxygenase derived metabolite, 12-hydroxyeicosapentaenoic acid (12-HEPE). METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: Washed platelets or platelet rich plasma from healthy human donors were treated with EPA and 12-HEPE to assess their ability to inhibit platelet activation. Platelets were stimulated with agonists targeting different steps of the hemostatic response to vascular injury. Platelet aggregation, dense granule secretion, surface expression of integrin αIIbβ3 and P-selectin, and clot retraction were analyzed. To assess signaling through Gαs-GPCRs and protein kinase A activity, phosphorylation of vasodilator-stimulated phosphoprotein (VASP) was examined via western blot following treatment with EPA or 12-HEPE. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: EPA and 12-HEPE dose-dependently inhibit both collagen and thrombin-induced platelet aggregation. Furthermore, 12-HEPE more potently attenuates dense granule secretion and surface expression of platelet activation markers, integrin αIIbβ3 and P-selectin, in comparison to EPA. Plasma treated with EPA delayed thrombin-induced clot retraction, while 12-HEPE had no effect. Additionally, treatment with 12-HEPE increases phosphorylation of VASP, suggesting it could signal through the activation of the eicosanoid Gαs-GPCRs. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE: Here, we show for the first time that EPA directly inhibits platelet activation through its 12-LOX metabolite, 12-HEPE. These findings provide further insight into the mechanisms underlying the cardioprotective effects of EPA. A better understanding of current PUFA supplementations can inform treatment and prevention of cardiovascular diseases.
A clinical decision support system, EvalMpox, was developed to apply person under investigation (PUI) criteria for patients presenting with rash and to recommend testing for PUIs. Of 668 patients evaluated, an EvalMpox recommendation for testing had a positive predictive value of 35% and a negative predictive value of 99% for a positive mpox test.
Individuals often use self-directed strategies to manage intake of tempting foods, but what these strategies are and whether they are effective is not well understood. This study assessed the frequency of use and subjective effectiveness of self-directed strategies in relation to BMI and snack intake.
Design:
A cross-sectional and prospective study with three time points (T1: baseline, T2: 3 months and T3: 3 years). At T1, demographics, frequency of use and subjective effectiveness of forty-one identified strategies were assessed. At T2 and T3, current weight was reported, and at T2 frequency of snack intake was also recorded.
Setting:
Online study in the UK.
Participants:
Data from 368 participants (Mage = 34·41 years; MBMI = 25·06 kg/m2) were used for analysis at T1, n = 170 (46·20 % of the total sample) at T2 and n = 51 (13·59 %) at T3.
Results:
Two strategy factors were identified via principal axis factoring: (1) diet, exercise, reduction of temptations, and cognitive strategies, and (2) planning, preparation and eating style. For strategy 1, frequency of use, but not subjective effectiveness, was positively related to BMI at T1. Subjective effectiveness predicted an increase in BMI from T1 and T2 to T3. No relationship to snack intake was found. For strategy 2, frequency of use was negatively related to BMI at T1. Neither frequency of use nor subjective effectiveness were related to changes in BMI over time, but subjective effectiveness was negatively correlated with unhealthy snack intake.
Conclusion:
Self-directed strategies to reduce the intake of tempting foods are not consistently related to BMI or snack intake.
Human societies are changing where and how water flows through the atmosphere. However, these changes in the atmospheric water cycle are not being managed, nor is there any real sense of where these changes might be headed in the future. Thus, we develop a new economic theory of atmospheric water management, and explore this theory using creative story-based scenarios. These scenarios reveal surprising possibilities for the future of atmospheric water management, ranging from a stock market for transpiration to on-demand weather. We discuss these story-based futures in the context of research and policy priorities in the present day.
Technical Summary
Humanity is modifying the atmospheric water cycle, via land use, climate change, air pollution, and weather modification. Historically, atmospheric water was implicitly considered a ‘public good’ since it was neither actively consumed nor controlled. However, given anthropogenic changes, atmospheric water can become a ‘common-pool’ good (consumable) or a ‘club’ good (controllable). Moreover, advancements in weather modification presage water becoming a ‘private’ good, meaning both consumable and controllable. Given the implications, we designed a theoretical framing of atmospheric water as an economic good and used a combination of methods in order to explore possible future scenarios based on human modifications of the atmospheric water cycle. First, a systematic literature search of scholarly abstracts was used in a computational text analysis. Second, the output of the text analysis was matched to different parts of an existing economic goods framework. Then, a group of global water experts were trained and developed story-based scenarios. The resultant scenarios serve as creative investigations of the future of human modification of the atmospheric water cycle. We discuss how the scenarios can enhance anticipatory capacity in the context of both future research frontiers and potential policy pathways including transboundary governance, finance, and resource management.
Social Media Summary
Story-based scenarios reveal novel future pathways for the management of the atmospheric water cycle.