Probabilistic priority assessment of nurse calls

Current nurse call systems are very static. Call buttons are fixed to the wall, and systems do not account for various factors specific to a situation. We have developed a software platform, the ontology-based Nurse Call System (oNCS), which supports the transition to mobile and wireless nurse call buttons and uses an intelligent algorithm to address nurse calls. This algorithm dynamically adapts to the situation at hand by taking the profile information of staff and patients into account by using an ontology. This article describes a probabilistic extension of the oNCS that supports a more sophisticated nurse call algorithm by dynamically assigning priorities to calls based on the risk factors of the patient and the kind of call. The probabilistic oNCS is evaluated through implementation of a prototype and simulations, based on a detailed dataset obtained from 3 nursing departments of Ghent University Hospital. The arrival times of nurses at the location of a call, the workload distribution of calls among nurses, and the assignment of priorities to calls are compared for the oNCS and the current nurse call system. Additionally, the performance of the system and the parameters of the priority assignment algorithm are explored. The execution time of the nurse call algorithm is on average 50.333 ms. Moreover, the probabilistic oNCS significantly improves the assignment of nurses to calls. Calls generally result in a nurse being present more quickly, the workload distribution among the nurses improves, and the priorities and kinds of calls are taken into account

Taking what we have and making what we need: Utilizing Natural Helping Support Networks to decrease self directed violence among Adolescents of Color.

Previous research has linked family and community connectedness with decreased risk of self-directed violence among adolescents. Despite the strong correlation between social connectedness and lowered risk of self-directed violence, very few interventions use social connections as mediators. This article identifies the risk and protective factors associated with self-directed violence among adolescents of color. In alignment with Healthy People 2020, this paper highlights the social determinants of self-directed violence including factors associated with individual’s social and physical environments. The authors provide an interdisciplinary review of current trends and historical data on self-directed violence in adolescents of color. The researchers suggest, the lack of culturally appropriate interventions, mental illness and the complex nature of social constructs in communities of color, makes solving the problem of self-directed violence difficult. This article examines how informal helpers can be utilized as an intervention to decrease health disparities experienced by adolescents of Color in the area of self-directed violence. The authors conclude that adolescents of Color are more likely to attempt to access support for mental/emotional concerns from members of their informal helping network before interacting with formal services. This paper offers a theoretical framework for creating culturally tailored strategies that utilizes informal helping networks. The proposed framework focuses on empowering and increasing education and knowledge about self-directed violence within the informal helping network while providing social and emotional support to adolescents of color

Working in partnership through early support: distance learning text: working with parents in partnership (book chapter)

This is a chapter from the distance learning text for the 'Working in Partnership through Early Support' accredited training programme. "Our intention in this chapter... is to provide a theory of helping, known as the Family Partnership Model. It is based upon the notion that the most effective relationship between parent and helper is a partnership, as first discussed by Mittler, Cunningham and others in the 1970s. It is an explicit and relatively simple framework intended as a guide for all people working with children and their families. Having described the theory, we will look briefly at its implications for service development, training and professional support, the use of the Early Support materials in promoting partnership and the evidence for working in this way." - pp. 2-

Ready, Willing and Able: Kansas City Parents Talk About How to Improve Schools and What They Can Do to Help

Are parents an untapped resource in improving and reimagining K -- 12 education in Kansas City? What do they think would enhance student learning and what are they willing to do to help their children get the education they deserve? These are among the questions explored in an in-depth survey of 1,566 parents with children now in public school in the Kansas City metropolitan area. This study finds the majority of parents in the Kansas City area ready, willing and able to be more engaged in their children's education at some level. For communities to reap the most benefit from additional parental involvement, it is important to understand that different parents can be involved and seek to be involved in different ways.The results of this research, detailed in the following pages, show that nearly a third of the region's parents may be ready to take on a greater role in shaping how local schools operate and advocating for reform in K -- 12 education. These parents say they would be very comfortable serving on committees focused on teacher selection and the use of school resources. Their sense of "parental engagement" extends beyond such traditional activities as attending PTA meetings, coaching sports, volunteering for bake sales, chaperoning school trips and seeing that their children are prepared for school each day. Yet, despite their broad interest in a deeper, more substantive involvement in shaping the region's school systems, relatively few of these "potential transformers" have actually participated in policy-oriented activities in the past year. Moreover, this survey finds that even though the majority of parents seem less inclined to jump into school policy debates, many say they could do more to support local schools in the more traditional school parent roles

Paths to justice in the Netherlands: looking for signs of social exclusion

In 2003 Genn's Paths to Justice study for the UK was replicated in the Netherlands. A survey was held among 3.500 citizens into their experiences with problems for which there might be a legal solution.The data were collected by internet questionnaires, which were addressed to a random sample of an internet panel. In this paper we present some major findings on: (1) the incidence of justiciable problems within the population; (2) the kind of strategies people choose to solve their problems; (3) the outcome of different strategies for resolving justiciable problems; (4) the public's perceptions of the legal system. More specifically, we study differences with respect to age, marital status, educational level, income level and social class, in order to shed some light on the role and scope of social exclusion. Our results suggest that access to justice in the Netherlands is not so much restricted by the supply of legal advice and the organisation of the legal system, as well as by insufficient social-psychological capabilities of the citizens concerned.Legal procedure, legal system, social exclusion

Teacher responses to a planning framework for junior technology classes learning outside the classroom

This paper describes teacher responses to a framework designed to support teacher planning for technology. It includes a learning experience outside the classroom [LEOTC] and is designed specifically for five-year-old students. The planning framework draws together characteristics of technology education, junior primary classrooms and LEOTC to describe the role of the teacher, parent helpers and students as they work through three identified phases - preparing for a visit outside the classroom, participating in a learning experience outside the classroom, and post-visit activities in the classroom. This framework was trialled using a case study approach in two new-entrant classrooms in which students made chocolates for Mother's Day as part of a technology unit. Students partook in a LEOTC visit to a chocolate factory in order to examine the practice of experts before designing and making their own chocolate gift. Data sources for this paper included interviews with two participating teachers. The analysis of these suggest the use of the planning framework led to the thorough preparation of parent helpers and students, clearly defined roles for both the teachers and the parents, and the use of valuable strategies which enhanced students memories of their visit enabled them to apply aspects of the knowledge gained to their own technological practice

Creating Interaction Scenarios With a New Graphical User Interface

The field of human-centered computing has known a major progress these past few years. It is admitted that this field is multidisciplinary and that the human is the core of the system. It shows two matters of concern: multidisciplinary and human. The first one reveals that each discipline plays an important role in the global research and that the collaboration between everyone is needed. The second one explains that a growing number of researches aims at making the human commitment degree increase by giving him/her a decisive role in the human-machine interaction. This paper focuses on these both concerns and presents MICE (Machines Interaction Control in their Environment) which is a system where the human is the one who makes the decisions to manage the interaction with the machines. In an ambient context, the human can decide of objects actions by creating interaction scenarios with a new visual programming language: scenL.Comment: 5th International Workshop on Intelligent Interfaces for Human-Computer Interaction, Palerme : Italy (2012

ANGELAH: A Framework for Assisting Elders At Home

The ever growing percentage of elderly people within modern societies poses welfare systems under relevant stress. In fact, partial and progressive loss of motor, sensorial, and/or cognitive skills renders elders unable to live autonomously, eventually leading to their hospitalization. This results in both relevant emotional and economic costs. Ubiquitous computing technologies can offer interesting opportunities for in-house safety and autonomy. However, existing systems partially address in-house safety requirements and typically focus on only elder monitoring and emergency detection. The paper presents ANGELAH, a middleware-level solution integrating both ”elder monitoring and emergency detection” solutions and networking solutions. ANGELAH has two main features: i) it enables efficient integration between a variety of sensors and actuators deployed at home for emergency detection and ii) provides a solid framework for creating and managing rescue teams composed of individuals willing to promptly assist elders in case of emergency situations. A prototype of ANGELAH, designed for a case study for helping elders with vision impairments, is developed and interesting results are obtained from both computer simulations and a real-network testbed