Fault-tolerant Cooperative Tasking for Multi-agent Systems

A natural way for cooperative tasking in multi-agent systems is through a top-down design by decomposing a global task into sub-tasks for each individual agent such that the accomplishments of these sub-tasks will guarantee the achievement of the global task. In our previous works [1], [2] we presented necessary and sufficient conditions on the decomposability of a global task automaton between cooperative agents. As a follow-up work, this paper deals with the robustness issues of the proposed top-down design approach with respect to event failures in the multi-agent systems. The main concern under event failure is whether a previously decomposable task can still be achieved collectively by the agents, and if not, we would like to investigate that under what conditions the global task could be robustly accomplished. This is actually the fault-tolerance issue of the top-down design, and the results provide designers with hints on which events are fragile with respect to failures, and whether redundancies are needed. The main objective of this paper is to identify necessary and sufficient conditions on failed events under which a decomposable global task can still be achieved successfully. For such a purpose, a notion called passivity is introduced to characterize the type of event failures. The passivity is found to reflect the redundancy of communication links over shared events, based on which necessary and sufficient conditions for the reliability of cooperative tasking under event failures are derived, followed by illustrative examples and remarks for the derived conditions.Comment: Preprint, Submitted for publicatio

Influence of Palliative Care Training on Last-Year Nursing Department Students’ Perception on Regarding Spirituality and Spiritual Care: A Single-Group Pretest–Posttest Intervention Study

PubMed: 30229412Spiritual care is a part of integrated care and should not be considered as a separate aspect of palliative care. Spirituality is seen as a requirement that must be met for all patients. The aim of this study is to determine the influence of palliative care on the perception levels of student nurses regarding spirituality and spiritual care. The research was carried out as a single-group pretest–posttest intervention study. The study was conducted with 70 student nurses. Data were collected via personal information form and spirituality and spiritual care grading scale (SSCGS). Frequency, percentage, average, standard deviation, paired sample t-test and Wilcoxon test were used to analyze the data. 55.7% of the students who participated in research stated that they had never heard of spiritual care, and 81.4% of the students stated that they had not obtained any information regarding spiritual care. The point average of the student nurses related to SSCGS was found to be 3.27 ± 0.21 before training and 3.35 ± 0.22 after training. The difference between the total point averages of the student nurses pre- and posttraining was found to be statistically significant (p < 0.05).As a result of the research, the perception of the student nurses regarding spirituality and spiritual support was found to be above the middle and increased significantly after the training. In accordance with these results, it is suggested that spiritual care training should be included more into nursing education. © 2018, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature

Correlation Between Spiritual Well-being and Quality of Life in Patients With Urinary Incontinence: A Cross-sectional Descriptive Study

PubMed: 33290250Urinary incontinence (UI) increases the risk of medical complications and psychosocial, physical, and emotional problems. PURPOSE: This cross-sectional descriptive study investigated the correlation between spiritual well-being (SWB) and quality of life (QOL) in patients with UI. METHODS: Patients with UI visiting an outpatient urology clinic of a university hospital in Turkey were invited to participate. Data were collected using the Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy-Spiritual Well-Being 12 Item Scale (FACIT-Sp-12) (range 0-48 with higher scores indicating better SWB) and the Incontinence Quality of Life Questionnaire (I-QOL) (range 0-100 with higher scores indicating better QOL). RESULTS: The sample consisted of 383 patients. Most were female (235; 61%), had completed high school (169; 44%), had experienced UI for an average of 3.54 years (SD 3.44), and were between 21 and 92 years of age (mean 52.7; SD 14). The mean I-QOL score was 65.31 ± 19.71 with subscores ranging from a low of 59.69 for social embarrassment to a high of 71.44 for psychosocial impact. The average FACIT-Sp-12 score was 28.00 ± 6.08. Overall I-QOL and FACIT-Sp-12 scores were weakly positively correlated (r = .235). CON- CLUSION: In this study both QOL and SWB scores were good; higher UI-specific QOL scores and some subscores were asso-ciated with higher SWB scores and subscores. Incontinence QOL should be determined together with SWB in patients with UI

The relationship between moral sensitivity and medical errors attitude in nursing students

The aim of this descriptive and correlational study was to determine the relationship between nursing students' moral sensitivity and attitudes towards medical errors. The study sample consisted of 309 fourth graders of the school of nursing of a university. Data were collected using a Descriptive characteristics form, the Moral Sensitivity Questionnaire (MSQ) and the Medical Errors Attitude Scale (MEAS). Participants had a mean MSQ and MEAS score of 91.31 ± 21.29 and 3.77 ± 0.44, respectively. There was a negative correlation between MEAS and MSQ scores, indicating that the higher the moral sensitivity, the higher the participants’ awareness of medical errors and error reporting. It is, therefore, recommended that students be offered moral education based on different teaching methods to help them develop positive attitudes towards medical errors. © 202

The impact of forensic nursing course on students’ knowledge level on forensic evidence

PubMed: 31233969The study is designed as quasi experimental including pre-test and post-test. The sample of the study is consisted of 98 students who are taking the Forensic Nursing course in the second year of the School of Nursing at a university. The mean score obtained from the test on the knowledge of forensic evidence before the training was 23.63 ± 5.24 while the mean score after the training was 33.32 ± 4.54. A statistically significant difference was found when the average scores of the students were compared before and after the course of forensic nursing. It was revealed that the course of forensic nursing taken by the students has a positive effect on the knowledge of forensic evidence of students and increases their knowledge level. The results suggest to add a course of forensic nursing as an elective or mandatory course to the curriculum of nursing programs and disseminate the postgraduate education on forensic nursing. © 2019 Elsevier Ltd and Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicin

Design of Observers for Hybrid Systems

A methodology for the design of dynamical observers for hybrid plants is proposed. The hybrid observer consists of two parts: a location observer and a continuous observer. The former identifies the current location of the hybrid plant, while the latter produces an estimate of the evolution of the continuous state of the hybrid plant. A synthesis procedure is offered when a set of properties on the hybrid plant is satisfied