474,348 research outputs found
Laboratory surveillance of communicable diseases : enteric pathogens
Laboratories represent a crucial link in the surveillance chain. Since only a small proportion of cases of enteric infections are asked to submit a stool sample, one needs to assess the practices for testing for enteric pathogens and their notification practices. Five local laboratories participated in this study. This included a description of the laboratory practices; capacity for stool sample analysis; awareness of the notification system and the factors which could improve the system at laboratory level.peer-reviewe
Wavelet-Based Kernel Construction for Heart Disease Classification
© 2019 ADVANCES IN ELECTRICAL AND ELECTRONIC ENGINEERINGHeart disease classification plays an important role in clinical diagnoses. The performance improvement of an Electrocardiogram classifier is therefore of great relevance, but it is a challenging task too. This paper proposes a novel classification algorithm using the kernel method. A kernel is constructed based on wavelet coefficients of heartbeat signals for a classifier with high performance. In particular, a wavelet packet decomposition algorithm is applied to heartbeat signals to obtain the Approximation and Detail coefficients, which are used to calculate the parameters of the kernel. A principal component analysis algorithm with the wavelet-based kernel is employed to choose the main features of the heartbeat signals for the input of the classifier. In addition, a neural network with three hidden layers in the classifier is utilized for classifying five types of heart disease. The electrocardiogram signals in nine patients obtained from the MIT-BIH database are used to test the proposed classifier. In order to evaluate the performance of the classifier, a multi-class confusion matrix is applied to produce the performance indexes, including the Accuracy, Recall, Precision, and F1 score. The experimental results show that the proposed method gives good results for the classification of the five mentioned types of heart disease.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio
DSOGI-PLL based power control method to mitigate control errors under disturbances of grid connected hybrid renewable power systems
The control of power converter devices is
one of the main research lines in interfaced renewable
energy sources, such as solar cells and wind turbines.
Therefore, suitable control algorithms should be
designed in order to regulate power or current properly
and attain a good power quality for some disturbances,
such as voltage sag/swell, voltage unbalances and fluctuations,
long interruptions, and harmonics. Various
synchronisation techniques based control strategies
are implemented for the hybrid power system applications
under unbalanced conditions in literature studies.
In this paper, synchronisation algorithms based
Proportional-Resonant (PR) power/current controller
is applied to the hybrid power system (solar cell + wind
turbine + grid), and Dual Second Order Generalized
Integrator-Phase Locked Loop (DSOGI-PLL) based PR
controller in stationary reference frame provides a solution
to overcome these problems. The influence of
various cases, such as unbalance, and harmonic conditions,
is examined, analysed and compared to the PR
controllers based on DSOGI-PLL and SRF-PLL. The
results verify the effectiveness and correctness of the
proposed DSOGI-PLL based power control method
Optimization of the position of single-lead wireless sensor with low electrodes separation distance for ECG-derived respiration
A classical method for estimation of respiratory information from electrocardiogram (ECG), called ECG - derived respiration (EDR), is using flexible electrodes located at standard electrocardiography positions. This work introduces an alternative approach suitable for miniaturized sensors with low inter-electrode separation and electrodes fixed to the sensor encapsulation. Application of amplitude EDR algorithm on single-lead wireless sensor system with optimized electrode positions shows results comparable with standard robust systems. The modified method can be applied in daily physiological monitoring, in sleep studies or implemented in smart clothes when standard respiration techniques are not suitable
Weblogs in Higher Education - Why Do Students (Not) Blog?
Positive impacts on learning through blogging, such as active knowledge construction and reflective writing, have been reported. However, not many students use weblogs in informal contexts, even when appropriate facilities are offered by their universities. While motivations for blogging have been subject to empirical studies, little research has addressed the issue of why students choose not to blog. This paper presents an empirical study undertaken to gain insights into the decision making process of students when deciding whether to keep a blog or not. A better understanding of students' motivations for (not) blogging may help decision makers at universities in the process of selecting, introducing, and maintaining similar services. As informal learning gains increased recognition, results of this study can help to advance appropriate designs of informal learning contexts in Higher Education. The method of ethnographic decision tree modelling was applied in an empirical study conducted at the Vienna University of Technology, Austria. Since 2004, the university has been offering free weblog accounts for all students and staff members upon entering school, not bound to any course or exam. Qualitative, open interviews were held with 3 active bloggers, 3 former bloggers, and 3 non‑ bloggers to elicit their decision criteria. Decision tree models were developed out of the interviews. It turned out that the modelling worked best when splitting the decision process into two parts: one model representing decisions on whether to start a weblog at all, and a second model representing criteria on whether to continue with a weblog once it was set up. The models were tested for their validity through questionnaires developed out of the decision tree models. 30 questionnaires have been distributed to bloggers, former bloggers and non‑ bloggers. Results show that the main reasons for students not to keep a weblog include a preference for direct (online) communication, and concerns about the loss of privacy through blogging. Furthermore, the results indicate that intrinsic motivation factors keep students blogging, whereas stopping a weblog is mostly attributable to external factors
Physicians Infrequently Adhere to Hepatitis Vaccination Guidelines for Chronic Liver Disease
Background and Goals:Hepatitis A (HAV) and hepatitis B (HBV) vaccination in patients with chronic liver disease is an accepted standard of care. We determined HAV and HBV vaccination rates in a tertiary care referral hepatology clinic and the impact of electronic health record (EHR)-based reminders on adherence to vaccination guidelines.Methods:We reviewed the records of 705 patients with chronic liver disease referred to our liver clinic in 2008 with at least two follow-up visits during the subsequent year. Demographics, referral source, etiology, and hepatitis serology were recorded. We determined whether eligible patients were offered vaccination and whether patients received vaccination. Barriers to vaccination were determined by a follow-up telephone interview.Results:HAV and HBV serologic testing prior to referral and at the liver clinic were performed in 14.5% and 17.7%; and 76.7% and 74% patients, respectively. Hepatologists recommended vaccination for HAV in 63% and for HBV in 59.7% of eligible patients. Patient demographics or disease etiology did not influence recommendation rates. Significant variability was observed in vaccination recommendation amongst individual providers (30-98.6%), which did not correlate with the number of patients seen by each physician. Vaccination recommendation rates were not different for Medicare patients with hepatitis C infection for whom a vaccination reminder was automatically generated by the EHR. Most patients who failed to get vaccination after recommendation offered no specific reason for noncompliance; insurance was a barrier in a minority.Conclusions:Hepatitis vaccination rates were suboptimal even in an academic, sub-speciality setting, with wide-variability in provider adherence to vaccination guidelines. © 2013 Thudi et al
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A Playroom Internal Waiting Area Improves Productivity in the Pediatric Emergency Department
Introduction: Pediatric emergency department (PED) volume is often constrained by the number of available treatment rooms. In many PEDs patients occupy treatment rooms while awaiting test results or imaging, thereby delaying care for patients who arrive after them.Methods: We opened a PED where selected patients were moved to a playroom when they did not actively require a treatment room. The treatment room was then available for the next patient. We measured the effect of using the playroom on time from arrival to rooming and length of stay (LOS) using proportional hazards regression and the odds of being roomed within 30 minutes of arrival using logistic regression. We adjusted for the number of the previous eight patients who were “playroom eligible”; age; triage category; provider; the number of patients who arrived within the preceding hour; prior census; and testing ordered in the preceding eight patients.Results: We analyzed 43,634 patient encounters, of which 10,134 (23%) were playroom eligible. The adjusted hazards ratio for the next patient being roomed was 1.14 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.10-1.18) per prior playroom eligible patient. The adjusted odds ratio of the next patient being roomed within 30 minutes was 1.46 (95% CI, 1.33-1.56) per prior playroom eligible patient. The playroom typically decreased median rooming time by four to 42 minutes and LOS by two to 40 minutes depending on patient volumes and acuity. The benefit of the playroom was maximal at busier times.Conclusion: Implementing a playroom in the PED for selected patients generally decreased time to rooming of the next patient and LOS
Buyer power in U.K. food retailing: a 'first-pass' test
Habtu Weldegebriel, University of Warwick
Abstract
The potential existence of buyer power in U.K. food retailing has attracted the scrutiny of the U.K.'s anti-trust authorities, culminating in the second of two comprehensive regulatory inquiries in recent years. Such inquiries are authoritative but correspondingly time-consuming and costly. Moreover, detection of buyer power has been dogged by the paucity of reliable evidence of its existence. In this paper, we present a simple theoretical model of oligopsony which delivers quasi-reduced form retailer-producer pricing equations with which the null of perfect competition can be tested using readily available market data. Using a cointegrated vector autoregression, we find empirical results that show the null of perfect competition can be rejected in seven of the nine food products investigated. Though not conclusive on the existence of buyer power, the proposed test offers a means via which the behaviour of the retail-producer price spread is consistent with it. At the very least, it can corroborate the concerns of the anti-trust authorities as to whether buyer power is potentially one source of concern
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