3,408 research outputs found

    Relationship Between Knowledge, Attitude and Motivation of Officers in Managing the COVID-19 Vaccine Cold Chain: A Systematic Review

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    Background: Vaccines are an important tool in preventing serious infectious diseases. Cold chain management is essential to maintain vaccine quality, including storage, transportation, and distribution at appropriate temperatures. This study aims to investigate the relationship between knowledge, attitudes, and motivation of health workers responsible for cold chain management of the COVID-19 vaccine. Method: This was a systematic literature review study by searching through databases: Google Scholar, PubMed, Semantic Scholar, and Frontiers, using some keywords. 76 relevant previous studies were found. After filtering for publication year (post-2019), they reviewed 19 articles' abstracts. However, 10 articles lacked information on vaccine officers' knowledge, attitudes, and motivation in cold chain management. Thus, only 9 articles were included in the review. Results: The results show that adequate knowledge, training, and understanding of guidelines significantly influence desired vaccine cold chain management practices. These studies also highlight the importance of understanding guidelines, efficient implementation, and sustainability aspects in vaccine management. Conclusion: This research concludes that to increase the effectiveness of vaccination programs, efforts are needed to increase knowledge, training, and implementation of guidelines among health workers responsible for the vaccine cold chain. Efforts to understand and implement sustainable practices are also crucial. The conclusions from this research can help decision-makers improve vaccine cold chain management to ensure the success of the vaccination program

    Soft behaviour modelling of user communities

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    A soft modelling approach for describing behaviour in on-line user communities is introduced in this work. Behaviour models of individual users in dynamic virtual environments have been described in the literature in terms of timed transition automata; they have various drawbacks. Soft multi/agent behaviour automata are defined and proposed to describe multiple user behaviours and to recognise larger classes of user group histories, such as group histories which contain unexpected behaviours. The notion of deviation from the user community model allows defining a soft parsing process which assesses and evaluates the dynamic behaviour of a group of users interacting in virtual environments, such as e-learning and e-business platforms. The soft automaton model can describe virtually infinite sequences of actions due to multiple users and subject to temporal constraints. Soft measures assess a form of distance of observed behaviours by evaluating the amount of temporal deviation, additional or omitted actions contained in an observed history as well as actions performed by unexpected users. The proposed model allows the soft recognition of user group histories also when the observed actions only partially meet the given behaviour model constraints. This approach is more realistic for real-time user community support systems, concerning standard boolean model recognition, when more than one user model is potentially available, and the extent of deviation from community behaviour models can be used as a guide to generate the system support by anticipation, projection and other known techniques. Experiments based on logs from an e-learning platform and plan compilation of the soft multi-agent behaviour automaton show the expressiveness of the proposed model

    Doctor of Philosophy

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    dissertationExchanging patient specific information across heterogeneous information systems is a critical but increasingly complex and expensive challenge. Lacking a universal unique identifier for healthcare, patient records must be linked using combinations of identity attributes such as name, date of birth, and sex. A state's birth certificate registry contains demographic information that is potentially very valuable for identity resolution, but its use for that purpose presents numerous problems. The objectives of this research were to: (1) assess the frequency, extent, reasons, and types of changes on birth certificates; (2) develop and evaluate an ontology describing information used in identity resolution; and (3) use a logical framework to model identity transactions and assess the impact of policy decisions in a cross jurisdictional master person index. To understand birth certificate changes, we obtained de identifified datasets from the Utah birth certifificate registry, including history and reasons for changes from 2000 to 2012. We conducted cohort analyses, examining the number, reason, and extent of changes over time, and cross sectional analyses to assess patterns of changes. We evaluated an ontological approach to overcome heterogeneity between systems exchanging identity information and demonstrated the use of two existing ontologies, the Simple Event Model (SEM) and the Clinical Element Model (CEM), to capture an individual's identity history. We used Discrete Event Calculus to model identity events iv across domains and over time. Models were used to develop contextual rules for releasing minimal information from birth certificate registries for sensitive cases such as adoptions. Our findings demonstrate that the mutability of birth certificates makes them a valuable resource for identity resolution, provided that changes can be captured and modeled in a usable form. An ontology can effectively model identity attributes and the events that cause them to change over time, as well as to overcome syntactic and semantic heterogeneity. Finally, we show that dynamic, contextual rules can be used to govern the flow of identity information between systems, allowing entities to link records in the most difficult cases, avoid costly human review, and avoid the threats to privacy that come from such review

    Patent Landscape of Helminth Vaccines and Related Technologies

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    Executive Summary This report focuses on patent landscape analysis of technologies related to vaccines targeting parasitic worms, also known as helminths. These technologies include methods of formulating vaccines, methods of producing of subunits, the composition of complete vaccines, and other technologies that have the potential to aid in a global response to this pathogen. The purpose of this patent landscape study was to search, identify, and categorize patent documents that are relevant to the development of vaccines that can efficiently promote the development of protective immunity against helminths. The search strategy used keywords which the team felt would be general enough to capture (or “recall”) the majority of patent documents which were directed toward vaccines against helminths. After extensive searching of patent literature databases, approximately 2847 publications were identified and collapsed to about 446 INPADOC families. Relevant patent families, almost half of the total relevant families (210 being total number of relevant families), were then identified and sorted into the categories of trematodes, cestodes, nematodes or nonspecific helminth. The 210 patent families that were divided into these four major categories were then further divided into sub categories relating to common fields of technology (e.g. DNA vaccine, vaccine formulations, methods to produce subunits) This sorting process increased the precision of the result set. The four major categories (cestodes, nematodes, trematodes, and non specific applications) as well as the overall data set of the 210 relevant family members were subjected to a range of analytics in order to extract as much information as possible from the dataset. First, patent landscape maps were generated to assess the accuracy of the sorting procedure and to reveal the relationships between the various technologies that are involved in creating an effective vaccine. Then, filings trends are analyzed for the overall dataset of the 210 relevant families as well as by the categories of trematodes, cestodes, and nematodes. The country of origin each member of the 210 relevant families was determined, and the range of distribution to other jurisdictions was assessed. Filings were also analyzed by year, by assignee. Finally, the various patent classification systems were mapped to find which particular classes tend to hold helminth vaccine-related technologies. Besides the keywords developed during the searches and the landscape map generation, the classifications represent an alternate way for further researchers to identify emerging helminth vaccine technologies. The analysis included creation of a map of keywords describing the relationship of the various technologies involved in the development of helminth vaccines. The map has regions corresponding to plasmids and other gene based technologies used in DNA vaccines for Japonicum Schistosoma. Important technologies listed on the map include the use of reverse genetics to create reassorted viruses targeted for the use in veterinary applications. Additionally, the map suggests that numerous subunits exist for use in vaccines targeting cestodes, trematodes, and nematodes. Another major finding was that the number of patent documents related to helminths being published has been steadily increasing in the last decade, as shown in the figure below. Until the early-1990s, there were only a few helminth vaccine related patent documents being published each year. The number of publications increased noticeably when TRIPS took effect, resulting in publication of patent applications. However, since 2006 the number of vaccine publications has exploded. In the years 2011 and 2012, about 23 references disclosing parasitic worm vaccine technologies were published each year. Thus, interest in developing new and more efficacious helminth vaccines has been growing in recent years. The origin of the vaccine-related inventions was also analyzed. The team determined the country in which the priority application was filed, which was taken as an indication of the country where the invention was made or where the inventors intended to practice the invention. By far, most of the relevant families originated with patent applications filed in the United States and China. Other prominent priority countries were the United Kingdom, Japan, Brazil, Australia and France. Countries with the most filings were also analyzed. Countries that were heavily targeted for patent filings included the United States, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. Top assignees for these families were mostly large pharmaceutical companies, with the majority of patent families coming from Heska, followed by Merck & Co., Institute Pasteur, AusBiotech Biotechnology, and Biological Sciences Research Council. Lastly, the jurisdictions were inventors have sought protection for their vaccine technologies were determined, and the number of patent families filing in a given country is plotted on the world map shown (Fig. 25). The United States, Canada, Australia, Japan, New Zealand and France have the highest level of filings, followed by Germany, Brazil, India, United Kingdom and Spain. However, although there are a significant number of filings in Brazil, the remainder of Central and South America has only sparse filings. Of concern, with the exception of South Africa, few other African nations have a significant number of filings. In summary, the goal of this report is to provide a knowledge resource for making informed policy decisions and for creating strategic plans concerning the assembly of vaccines targeting highly prevalent helminth infections. The ITTI team has defined the current state of the art of technologies involved in the manufacture of helminth vaccines, and the important assignees, inventors, and countries have been identified. This document should aid in evaluating the current state of vaccines technologies targeting helminths and the potential outgrows of these technological fields. Furthermore, as this report illustrates, the steady increase in helminth patenting, expanded diversity of assignees and greater global filings, indicates that intellectual property protection does not inhibit the development of crucial innovations for this class of neglected diseases, but, on the contrary, appears to be a driver of accelerated research and development

    An Optimization Analysis of the Subject Directory System on the Medlineplus Portal - An Investigation of Mental Health, Children, Teenagers, and Older Adults Related Health Topics

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    The Internet is a common means for people to search for health information. The subject directory of MedlinePlus offers Internet searchers a browsing environment so that those seekers could start from a broad term and refine their search terms to meet their real information needs, thus resulting in a better information search. For those novice users who are not familiar with relevant domain knowledge, MedlinePlus’s directory can be of great assistance and enable the portal to adopt to a more general population. Such a subject directory system and its involved health topics in the MedlinePlus portal formed a network where a specific research methodology, social network analysis, is applicable. In this study, four health topic groups – mental health, children, teenagers, and older adults - were selected as the focus for the investigation toward the subject directory on the MedlinePlus portal. This study applied social network analysis to explore the health topic directories and connection patterns among the health topics that comprised the subject directory of the MedlinePlus portal, and identified the influential topics (i.e., those health topics which play more important roles than others in connecting different topics) among the topic networks. As a result, different recommendations were made toward mental health, children, teenagers, and older adults related health topics, respectively. New optimized structural networks were suggested to be built for each of the four health topic subcategories according to the similarity values calculated through the cosine similarity measure in terms of the textual information contained in health topics’ Web pages, as well as the key nodes identified in the networks of health topics. Evaluations were later conducted to compare the original and optimized structural networks of the four health topic groups regarding their topics’ new similarity values. Newly identified influential health topics were verified to have improved the overall semantic connections among the whole networks. Last but not least, the recommendation results were evaluated by two health field experts and the evaluation outcomes proved that the recommendations suggested in this study were consistent with the opinions generated by health professionals. The findings of this research will provide suggestions to optimize and enhance the current navigation guidance system in MedlinePlus, improve the information searching effectiveness among the portal users, offer insights to public health portal creators, and support other researchers focusing on subject directory systems

    A Service Oriented Architecture Approach to Achieve Interoperability between Immunization Information Systems in Iran

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    Clinical decision support (CDS) systems can support vaccine forecasting and immunization reminders; however, immunization decision-making requires data from fragmented, independent systems. Interoperability and accurate data exchange between immunization information systems (IIS) is an essential factor to utilize Immunization CDS systems. Service oriented architecture (SOA) and Health Level 7 (HL7) are dominant standards for web-based exchange of clinical information. We implemented a system based on SOA and HL7 v3 to support immunization CDS in Iran. We evaluated system performance by exchanging 1500 immunization records for roughly 400 infants between two IISs. System turnaround time is less than a minute for synchronous operation calls and the retrieved immunization history of infants were always identical in different systems. CDS generated reports were accordant to immunization guidelines and the calculations for next visit times were accurate. Interoperability is rare or nonexistent between IIS. Since inter-state data exchange is rare in United States, this approach could be a good prototype to achieve interoperability of immunization information

    Information Systems and Healthcare XXXIV: Clinical Knowledge Management Systems—Literature Review and Research Issues for Information Systems

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    Knowledge Management (KM) has emerged as a possible solution to many of the challenges facing U.S. and international healthcare systems. These challenges include concerns regarding the safety and quality of patient care, critical inefficiency, disparate technologies and information standards, rapidly rising costs and clinical information overload. In this paper, we focus on clinical knowledge management systems (CKMS) research. The objectives of the paper are to evaluate the current state of knowledge management systems diffusion in the clinical setting, assess the present status and focus of CKMS research efforts, and identify research gaps and opportunities for future work across the medical informatics and information systems disciplines. The study analyzes the literature along two dimensions: (1) the knowledge management processes of creation, capture, transfer, and application, and (2) the clinical processes of diagnosis, treatment, monitoring and prognosis. The study reveals that the vast majority of CKMS research has been conducted by the medical and health informatics communities. Information systems (IS) researchers have played a limited role in past CKMS research. Overall, the results indicate that there is considerable potential for IS researchers to contribute their expertise to the improvement of clinical process through technology-based KM approaches

    Does Language Determine Our Scientific Ideas?

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    SummaryThis paper argues that the influence of language on science, philosophy and other field is mediated by communicative practices. Where communications is more restrictive, established linguistic structures exercise a tighter control over innovations and scientifically motivated reforms of language. The viewpoint here centers on the thesis that argumentation is crucial in the understanding and evaluation of proposed reforms and that social practices which limit argumentation serve to erode scientific objectivity. Thus, a plea is made for a sociology of scientific belief designed to understand and insure social‐institutional conditions of the possibility of knowledge and its growth. A chief argument draws on work of Axelrod concerning the evolution of cooperation
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