Prescient custodians: biocultural ecological economics and restorative governance of the Wet Tropics

Ellie Bock explored conceptualisations of ecological economics, biocultural concepts and governance, investigating Indigenous Protected Areas intersecting with the Wet Tropics World Heritage Area and its buffer. Her study found evidence of the presence and emergence of biocultural ecological economies in the Wet Tropics bioregion, with implications for restorative governance policy

Protecting the Privacy of Canadians\u27 Health Information in the Cloud

This article presents results from a year-long research project reviewing health privacy issues in the cloud, funded by the Contributions Program of the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC). Section I provides a brief primer on cloud computing and its applications in data-centric health research and health care. Section II reviews Canadian privacy and health privacy laws and how they apply to CSPs. Section III identifies privacy risks arising from the technological, organizational, and jurisdictional complexity of cloud computing. Section IV argues that Canadian health privacy laws fail to address difficulties custodians face in balancing responsibilities with CSPs, determining whether foreign laws offer comparable protection, and ensuring transparency is maintained as data migrates to the cloud. In Section V, we survey standard agreements (Terms of Service) and privacy policies of leading CSPs, arguing that cloud contracts do not sufficiently address gaps in legislative protection for privacy and security. In Section VI, we identify the discrepancies in Canadian laws that apply to PHI which threaten interoperability of cloud contracts across provinces. This review is the first comprehensive review of legal and contractual privacy protections in the Canadian health sector. By identifying potential gaps in protection, we aim to inform the business decisions and contractual practices of both custodians and CSPs in Canada. By identifying discrepancies across provinces, we also aim to stimulate cooperative reform and harmonization of health privacy governance across Canada

Development of model to facilitate male involvement in the reproductive health context by the registered nurses

The purpose of this article is to describe the process followed in the development of the model of facilitating male partner involvement in reproductive health (RH) context by the nurses. Namibia is one of the African countries affected by cultural and socio-economic influences that have persuaded gender roles in a way that hinders male-partner involvement in RH context. This phenomenon make difficult for the nurses to facilitate their involvement. The research methods were done in four phases. Phase 1 entitled concepts analysis. Phase one was done into two steps namely step1 - concepts identification and step 2 - concepts definition. During concept identification, qualitative, exploratory, descriptive design was followed. The target population included male and female partners attending health facilities and all nurse managers (registered nurses in charge) that provided RH services in the health facility in a northern region in Namibia. Individual interviews and focus were conducted until data saturation occurred. During the research three fundamental principles such as respect person, beneficence and justice were adhered. Tech’s eight steps of descriptive data analysis were used. Three (3) main categories, six (6) categories and twelve (12) subcate-gories were identified using open coding and conceptualization. The main concepts of the model were identified and classified using a survey list of Dickoff, James, Wiedenba (Dickoff,James, Wiedenbach, 1968; Mckenna, 2006). Phase 2 dealt with the creation of interre-lationship statements between concepts identified in step 1. In phase 3 focuses with the description of the model using strategies pro-posed by (Chinn & Kramer, 1991). In phase 4, the description of guidelines and evaluation for the model was also done. The applied the principle of trustworthiness through developing dependability, credibility, transferability and confirmability in all four phases. A model was developed based on a theory generated approach. The model consist of five phase namely, situational analysis in the exter-nal environment (community) and internal environment (health facilities); establishment of partnership (male and female partner and Nurses), management process, maintaining the conducive environment and control & terminus/ outcome phase. It was concluded that facilitation of Male involvement in RH care context is needed. Further the recommendations were made to implement a model within the current health care framework in which reproductive health is provided.Unknow

Kennisbasis WOT Fisheries 2011 - what is in the Programme?

The KBWOT Fisheries programme is core to the maintenance and development of the expertise that underpins the statutory obligations of fisheries monitoring and advice for the Netherlands. The structure of the KBWOT Fisheries programme for 2011 changed to reflect the recent discussions on the research direction between IMARES, CVO and EL&I. One of the strengths of the structure of the KBWOT Fisheries programme was the bottom up approach to calls for projects to fulfil the research priorities. This however was seen as giving the programme the potential to miss strategic needs of both the science development within IMARES and the research questions of EL&I, thus the programme now also contains a specific project request on an research subject relevant to IMARES and EL&I needs. The KBWOT Fisheries programme will fund 12 projects in 2011. The projects will investigate competition in exploited fish communities, long term changes in eel populations, the spawning habitat of mackerel, sub-stock structure in fish, trawling impact on benthic communities, quality assurance in fish aging, surveys of shellfish, maturity staging of fish and acoustic methods. Plus a targeted project specifically designed to research needs of IMARES and EL&I will be carried out into the trade-offs in FMSY targets for North Sea flatfish fisheries

User-centred design of flexible hypermedia for a mobile guide: Reflections on the hyperaudio experience

A user-centred design approach involves end-users from the very beginning. Considering users at the early stages compels designers to think in terms of utility and usability and helps develop the system on what is actually needed. This paper discusses the case of HyperAudio, a context-sensitive adaptive and mobile guide to museums developed in the late 90s. User requirements were collected via a survey to understand visitors’ profiles and visit styles in Natural Science museums. The knowledge acquired supported the specification of system requirements, helping defining user model, data structure and adaptive behaviour of the system. User requirements guided the design decisions on what could be implemented by using simple adaptable triggers and what instead needed more sophisticated adaptive techniques, a fundamental choice when all the computation must be done on a PDA. Graphical and interactive environments for developing and testing complex adaptive systems are discussed as a further step towards an iterative design that considers the user interaction a central point. The paper discusses how such an environment allows designers and developers to experiment with different system’s behaviours and to widely test it under realistic conditions by simulation of the actual context evolving over time. The understanding gained in HyperAudio is then considered in the perspective of the developments that followed that first experience: our findings seem still valid despite the passed time

Information Quality in Secondary Use of EHR Data : A Case Study of Quality Management in a Norwegian Hospital

The motivation for undertaking this study relates to my experiences from practice in a public hospital, where I have observed variations in reaching organizational goals of quality management informed by electronic health records (EHR) data. For example, while some departments and units have long-time traditions in meeting the quality goals that are set locally, regionally, or nationally, other departments and units struggle to meet the same quality goals. Thus, generating actionable information by reusing routinely collected EHR data does not necessary lead to action in response to the information. This process of generating information from existing EHR data, and communicating and using such information for organizational purposes, may be challenging in a highly complex environment such as health care organizations. Within this process, information quality (IQ) may influence actors’ perceptions of action possibilities the information offers, thus influencing the actual use of the information required to reach organizational goals. EHR data can be used for clinical purposes at the point-of-care (i.e., primary use) and reused for purposes that do not involve patient treatment directly (i.e., secondary use). Examples of such secondary use includes quality management, research, and policy development. Though it is widely accepted that IQ influences the use of EHR systems and the information generated by EHR systems, research on the implications of IQ on health care processes is limited: the focus of the current literature is concerned with defining and assessing IQ in primary use of EHR data, whereas the role of IQ in secondary use of EHR data remains unclear. Thus, this dissertation investigates the role of IQ in secondary use of EHR data in an organizational context. This dissertation addresses this practical and theoretical challenge by focusing on the overall research objective of understanding the role of IQ in secondary use of EHR data. To address this research objective, this dissertation explores the following research questions: RQ1. How do human actors influence in transformation of IQ while generating, communicating, and using information in secondary use of EHR data? RQ2. What are the underlying generative mechanisms through which IQ transforms in the process of secondary use of EHR data?publishedVersio