Planning and execution of a successful hepatitis B immunization program

Today's college students occupy a "window" between older adults, whose need for hepatitis B vaccination is minimal, and younger people who receive the vaccine as part of their childhood immunization series. However, because of the high-risk activities that are often part of student behavior, college students are among the individuals who are at the highest risk for this disease; 75% of all reported hepatitis B cases occur in persons between the ages of 15 and 39 years. It is therefore imperative that college health professionals take seriously their responsibility to educate students about issues related to hepatitis B and make available programs that enable the students to receive immunizations. This article briefly describes a successful hepatitis B education and immunization program at an institution that has no mandatory prematriculation immunization requirements.     

Green and lean: a Gemba–Kaizen model for sustainability enhancement

Abstract

Despite the encouraging results obtained from the application of Green Lean, organizations have found the integration of Green and Lean, and their implementation as an integrated approach, challenging. This paper therefore presents a model for integrating Lean and Green based on the Gemba-Kaizen approach. The proposed model was developed on the basis of a through literature review on Gemba and Kaizen, conducted on peer reviewed journal articles and pragmatic books, and the more than 40 years of accumulated experience of the authors as academics, researchers, industrialists and consultants. The model was validated through two cases study in the aerospace and automotive industries. The results showed that the proposed model helped the case organizations to reduce the consumption of resources and improve their environmental performance. The proposed model can be the basis for further research on Lean and Green, contributing to help organizations to improve their sustainability performance.     

Workplace discrimination and cancer

Data from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) Integrated Mission System database were analyzed with specific reference to allegations of workplace discrimination filed by individuals with cancer under ADA Title One. These 6,832 allegations, filed between July 27, 1992 and September 30, 2003, were compared to 167,798 allegations from a general disability population on the following dimensions: type of workplace discrimination; demographic characteristics of the charging parties (CPs); the industry designation, location, and size of employers; and the outcome or resolution of EEOC investigations. Results showed allegations derived from CPs with cancer were more likely than those in the general disability population to include issues involving discharge, terms and conditions of employment, lay-off, wages, and demotion. Compared to the general disability group, CPs with cancer were more likely to be female, older, and White. Allegations derived from CPs with cancer were also more likely to be filed against smaller employers (15-100 workers) or those in service industries. Finally, the resolution of allegations by CPs with cancer were more likely to be meritorious than those filed from the general disability population; that is, actual discrimination is more likely to have occurred.     

Infant‐Directed Prosody Helps Infants Map Sounds to Meanings

Adults typically use an exaggerated, distinctive speaking style when addressing infants. However, the effects of infant‐directed (ID) speech on infants' learning are not yet well understood. This research investigates how ID speech affects how infants perform a key function in language acquisition, associating the sounds of words with their meanings. Seventeen‐month‐old infants were presented with two label‐object pairs in a habituation‐based word learning task. In Experiment 1, the labels were produced in adult‐directed (AD) speech. In Experiment 2, the labels were produced in ID prosody; they had higher pitch, greater pitch variation, and longer durations than the AD labels. We found that infants failed to learn the labels in AD speech, but succeeded in learning the same labels when they were produced in ID speech. Experiment 3 investigated the role of variability in learning from ID speech. When the labels were presented in ID prosody with no variation across tokens, infants failed to learn them. Our findings indicate that ID prosody can affect how readily infants map sounds to meanings and that the variability in prosody that is characteristic of ID speech may play a key role in its effect on learning new words.     

Therapeutic alliance between youth and staff in residential group care: Psychometrics of the therapeutic alliance quality scale

Therapeutic alliance has been frequently studied in individual counseling sessions; however, research on therapeutic alliance in residential settings for youth with mental health diagnoses has been limited. This may be due, in part, to the presence of multiple service providers often in caregiving roles. The purpose of this study was to examine the psychometric quality of a widely utilized measure of therapeutic alliance used in psychotherapy with youth in residential care where the treatment is provided by a trained married couple. We also compared the relationship between youth ratings of their male and female service providers, as well as examined correlations in ratings between youth and staff on therapeutic alliance. Finally, we investigated the direction, magnitude, and trajectory of change in therapeutic alliance over a 12-month period following admission into residential care. The method was a longitudinal assessment of 135 youth and 124 staff regarding therapeutic alliance over the course of 12 months or discharge from services. Results indicated strong psychometric properties and high correlations for youth ratings of both their male and female service providers. However, the correlation was low between youth and service provider ratings of alliance. Longitudinal analyses indicated that rates of therapeutic alliance changed over time.     

The Perspectives of Older Greek-Australians Toward Changes in the Nature of Family Support: Implications for Family Care Policies

Internationally, public policies encourage “aging in place,” and the majority of older Australians requiring care in the community receive informal care, supplemented by publicly subsidized formal services. The effect of contemporary social changes on informal care in aging migrant communities is poorly understood. This articles explores the perceptions of older Greek-Australians toward changes in the nature of family support. Bicultural and bilingual researchers carried out in-depth interviews (n?=?27) and five focus groups (n?=?63 total participants) with older Greek-Australians in modern Greek. While “cultures of care” remain among Greek-Australian families, the means for a family to assist have shifted, and these compromises are met with considerable powerlessness among older Greek-Australians. Implications for policy include the need to better involve older migrants and their families in decisions about their care needs, potentially involving consumer-directed care models. Service providers may also need to adopt the use of new technologies to communicate with increasingly time-pressured family members.     

Collaboration with Caveats: Research–Practice Exchange in Planning

Abstract

Researcher and practitioner collaboration in urban planning is both critical to good outcomes and problematic to achieve in reality. Collaboration has the potential for new partnerships, better research problem definition, improved research design and greater impact on practice and policy. However, politics, stakeholder agendas and funding bodies bring pressures and constraints, for which research professionals require a broader set of skills to manage. We examine researcher–practitioner collaboration as part of an action research project on urban greening in Australia. Focusing on a stakeholder engagement workshop, we examine the mechanisms used to overcome barriers to research-practice exchange. We find overt consideration of common barriers to access and use of research when planning collaboration exercises can help facilitate more productive engagement, creating spaces for mutual understanding and generating shared objectives. However, we also find that efforts at collaboration challenge traditional research practices, involve tensions and caveats, and require a different mode of researcher engagement.     

Youth and parent perceptions of aftercare supports at discharge from residential care

While much is known about youth struggles after reintegration into the home and community settings following stays in out‐of‐home care, little is known about appropriate supports for aftercare, or parent (see Note ¹ ) and youth perceptions during this critical transition period. This study seeks to begin to address these questions through surveys evaluating youth (n = 48) and parent (n = 48) perceptions of (i) transition planning, family preparedness and aftercare; (ii) youth preparedness for the transition period across major life domains (e.g. education, health care, relationships); and (iii) the importance of specific aftercare supports and services. Results indicate differences between youth and parents on perceptions of need for continued supports, likelihood of participation in aftercare programs; and youth preparedness for success in relationships, family and independent living domains. In contrast, similarities were found on youth and parent ratings regarding the importance of specific services and supports, with both groups indicating supports in education as most important and supports in mental health as least. Study limitations, future research and implications are provided.     

Executing Facial Control During Deception Situations

Behavioral countermeasures are the strategies engaged by liars to deliberately control face or body behavior to fool lie catchers. To date research has not shown whether deceivers can suppress elements of their facial expression as a behavioral countermeasure. This study examined whether participants could suppress facial actions such as eyebrow movements or smiles on command when under scrutiny by a lie catcher. The results derived from micro momentary coding revealed that facial actions can be reduced, but not eliminated, and that instructions to suppress one element of the expression resulted in reduction in all facial movement, regardless of veracity. The resulting implications for security contexts are discussed.     

Multiple objective optimization of bluetooth scatternets

Bluetooth technology permits wireless interconnection for local area communication. While the specification defines how up to eight devices can connect using the same radio channel to form a piconet, piconets may overlap, permitting the formation of much larger networks called scatternets. To create connected scatternets, a wide range of decentralized protocols (algorithms) have been proposed. In this paper we address the centralized optimization of topological characteristics that affect scatternet performance. Knowledge of optimized scatternet topology is useful when comparing decentralized protocols and the scatternets they produce. This paper introduces the first multiple objective optimization framework for scatternets, which operates by optimizing node sequencings that represent scatternets. Using NSGA-II, the framework is described, tuned and applied to determine the trade-offs between competing optimization objectives. Finally, the results are used to benchmark the performance and characteristics of four existing protocols from the literature. This research is supported by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (GR/S23155/01).