Can simple household assistive products enhance the self-care of health and well-being?

Purpose The ageing population is a global phenomenon that is occurring in many countries around the world, including the UK. According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the proportion of the UK population aged 65 years and over is projected to increase, reaching 25% by 2045. This increase will have a significant impact on a range of social and economic issues. One of the ways to reduce this impact is to improve self-care. Design/methodology/approach The availability of simple assistive devices can facilitate physical activity and help complete daily living activities. These devices can also help in the self-management of long-term health and well-being. To encourage self-care, it is essential to create awareness about these assistive products. Simple assistive products such as shoe horns, magnifying glasses or a sphygmomanometer that are readily available to buy from shops were grouped into four boxes or kits. The authors provided these simple devices to 175 community-dwelling older adults in deprived areas and followed them up via a phone survey after 4–6 weeks. Findings The authors recorded overall positive feedback on individual products and the kit. The results indicate that there was a sense of empowerment and ability by the recipients to take control of their health and well-being and management of their health condition using items contained in the kit provided. Practical implications The study results show that simple assistive products empower older adults to self-care and can provide a positive impact on their activities of daily living. Originality/value Previous studies have shown that regular exercise can enhance both physical and mental abilities and reverse certain chronic health issues. Simple household devices can aid in increasing physical activity. This work highlights how these devices enable older adults to take care of themselves, with a focus on capturing their personal perspectives and experiences

Vedel-objektiiv abil salvestatud kaugseire piltide analüüs kasutades super-resolutsiooni meetodeid

Väitekirja elektrooniline versioon ei sisalda publikatsiooneKäesolevas doktoritöös uuriti nii riist- kui ka tarkvaralisi lahendusi piltide töötlemiseks. Riist¬varalise poole pealt pakuti lahenduseks uudset vedelläätse, milles on dielekt¬rilisest elastomeerist kihilise täituriga membraan otse optilisel teljel. Doktoritöö käigus arendati välja kaks prototüüpi kahe erineva dielektrilisest elastomeerist ki¬hilise täituriga, mille aktiivne ala oli ühel juhul 40 ja teisel 20 mm. Läätse töö vas¬tas elastomeeri deformatsiooni mehaanikale ja suhtelistele muutustele fookuskau¬guses. Muutuste demonstreerimiseks meniskis ja läätse fookuskauguse mõõtmiseks kasutati laserkiirt. Katseandmetest selgub, et muutuste tekitamiseks on vajalik pinge vahemikus 50 kuni 750 volti. Tarkvaralise poole pealt pakuti uut satelliitpiltide parandamise süsteemi. Paku¬tud süsteem jagas mürase sisendpildi DT-CWT laineteisenduse abil mitmeteks sagedusalamribadeks. Pärast müra eemaldamist LA-BSF funktsiooni abil suu¬rendati pildi resolutsiooni DWT-ga ja kõrgsagedusliku alamriba piltide interpo¬leerimisega. Interpoleerimise faktor algsele pildile oli pool sellest, mida kasutati kõrgsagedusliku alamriba piltide interpoleerimisel ning superresolutsiooniga pilt rekonst¬rueeriti IDWT abil. Käesolevas doktoritöös pakuti tarkvaraliseks lahenduseks uudset sõnastiku baasil töötavat super-resolutsiooni (SR) meetodit, milles luuakse paarid suure resolutsiooniga (HR) ja madala resolut-siooniga (LR) piltidest. Kõigepealt jagati vastava sõnastiku loomiseks HR ja LR paarid omakorda osadeks. Esialgse HR kujutise saamiseks LR sisendpildist kombineeriti HR osi. HR osad valiti sõnastikust nii, et neile vastavad LR osad oleksid võimalikult lähedased sisendiks olevale LR pil¬dile. Iga valitud HR osa heledust korrigeeriti, et vähendada kõrvuti asuvate osade heleduse erine¬vusi superresolutsiooniga pildil. Plokkide efekti vähendamiseks ar¬vutati saadud SR pildi keskmine ning bikuupinterpolatsiooni pilt. Lisaks pakuti käesolevas doktoritöös välja kernelid, mille tulemusel on võimalik saadud SR pilte teravamaks muuta. Pakutud kernelite tõhususe tõestamiseks kasutati [83] ja [50] poolt pakutud resolutsiooni parandamise meetodeid. Superreso¬lutsiooniga pilt saadi iga kerneli tehtud HR pildi kombineerimise teel alpha blen¬dingu meetodit kasutades. Pakutud meetodeid ja kerneleid võrreldi erinevate tavaliste ja kaasaegsete meetoditega. Kvantita-tiivsetest katseandmetest ja saadud piltide kvaliteedi visuaal¬sest hindamisest selgus, et pakutud meetodid on tavaliste kaasaegsete meetoditega võrreldes paremad.In this thesis, a study of both hardware and software solutions for image enhance¬ment has been done. On the hardware side, a new liquid lens design with a DESA membrane located directly in the optical path has been demonstrated. Two pro¬totypes with two different DESA, which have a 40 and 20 mm active area in diameter, were developed. The lens performance was consistent with the mechan¬ics of elastomer deformation and relative focal length changes. A laser beam was used to show the change in the meniscus and to measure the focal length of the lens. The experimental results demonstrate that voltage in the range of 50 to 750 V is required to create change in the meniscus. On the software side, a new satellite image enhancement system was proposed. The proposed technique decomposed the noisy input image into various frequency subbands by using DT-CWT. After removing the noise by applying the LA-BSF technique, its resolution was enhanced by employing DWT and interpolating the high-frequency subband images. An original image was interpolated with half of the interpolation factor used for interpolating the high-frequency subband images, and the super-resolved image was reconstructed by using IDWT. A novel single-image SR method based on a generating dictionary from pairs of HR and their corresponding LR images was proposed. Firstly, HR and LR pairs were divided into patches in order to make HR and LR dictionaries respectively. The initial HR representation of an input LR image was calculated by combining the HR patches. These HR patches are chosen from the HR dictionary corre-sponding to the LR patches that have the closest distance to the patches of the in¬put LR image. Each selected HR patch was processed further by passing through an illumination enhancement processing order to reduce the noticeable change of illumination between neighbor patches in the super-resolved image. In order to reduce the blocking effect, the average of the obtained SR image and the bicubic interpolated image was calculated. The new kernels for sampling have also been proposed. The kernels can improve the SR by resulting in a sharper image. In order to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed kernels, the techniques from [83] and [50] for resolution enhance¬ment were adopted. The super-resolved image was achieved by combining the HR images produced by each of the proposed kernels using the alpha blending tech-nique. The proposed techniques and kernels are compared with various conventional and state-of-the-art techniques, and the quantitative test results and visual results on the final image quality show the superiority of the proposed techniques and ker¬nels over conventional and state-of-art technique

Applications of Artificial Intelligence in the Treatment of Behavioral and Mental Health Conditions

Introduction Artificial intelligence (AI) is the branch of science that studies and designs intelligent devices. For individuals unfamiliar with artificial intelligence, the concept of intelligent machines may bring up visions of attractive human-like computers or robots, like those described in science fiction. Others may consider AI technology to be mysterious machines limited to research facilities or a technical triumph that will come in the far future. Popular media accounts on the deployment of aerial drones, autonomous autos, or the potential dangers of developing super-intelligent technologies may have raised some broad awareness of the subject

Critical literacy in a global context: Reading Harry Potter

Millions of adolescents across the globe eagerly await and read each new Harry Potter fictional novel. As a series, the novels can be assumed to participate influentially in the production of adolescent literacies and subjectivities. Situated in politically conservative times, however, the texts may support readings in simple accord with culturally pervasive conservative views which favour conventionally masculinist, martial views of the individual and of society. Such readings potentially confirm ancient prejudices built out of differences which themselves may be associated with the socio-cultural reproduction of violent conflicts. Nevertheless, contemporary conditions such as planetary climate change and globalised political fear demand resolutions based not in conflict but in unprecedented degrees of global and local co-operation. This thesis, then, explores ways in which the Harry Potter texts may be approached from a critical literacy perspective to support readers to contest conservatively-aligned readings and to question the role of the texts in preparing students for a world of peace and cooperation

Values for a Post-Pandemic Future

This open access book shows how value sensitive design (VSD), responsible innovation, and comprehensive engineering can guide the rapid development of technological responses to the COVID-19 crisis. Responding to the ethical challenges of data-driven technologies and other tools requires thinking about values in the context of a pandemic as well as in a post-COVID world. Instilling values must be prioritized from the beginning, not only in the emergency response to the pandemic, but in how to proceed with new societal precedents materializing, new norms of health surveillance, and new public health requirements. The contributors with expertise in VSD bridge the gap between ethical acceptability and social acceptance. By addressing ethical acceptability and societal acceptance together, VSD guides COVID-technologies in a way that strengthens their ability to fight the virus, and outlines pathways for the resolution of moral dilemmas. This volume provides diachronic reflections on the crisis response to address long-term moral consequences in light of the post-pandemic future. Both contact-tracing apps and immunity passports must work in a multi-system environment, and will be required to succeed alongside institutions, incentive structures, regulatory bodies, and current legislation. This text appeals to students, researchers and importantly, professionals in the field

Responsible AI in Africa

This open access book contributes to the discourse of Responsible Artificial Intelligence (AI) from an African perspective. It is a unique collection that brings together prominent AI scholars to discuss AI ethics from theoretical and practical African perspectives and makes a case for African values, interests, expectations and principles to underpin the design, development and deployment (DDD) of AI in Africa. The book is a first in that it pays attention to the socio-cultural contexts of Responsible AI that is sensitive to African cultures and societies. It makes an important contribution to the global AI ethics discourse that often neglects AI narratives from Africa despite growing evidence of DDD in many domains. Nine original contributions provide useful insights to advance the understanding and implementation of Responsible AI in Africa, including discussions on epistemic injustice of global AI ethics, opportunities and challenges, an examination of AI co-bots and chatbots in an African work space, gender and AI, a consideration of African philosophies such as Ubuntu in the application of AI, African AI policy, and a look towards a future of Responsible AI in Africa. This is an open access book

Aeronautical Engineering: A continuing bibliography with indexes, supplement 155, December 1982

This bibliography lists 272 reports, articles and other documents introduced into the NASA scientific and technical information system in November 1982