International consensus definition of low anterior resection syndrome

Aim: Low anterior resection syndrome (LARS) is pragmatically defined as disordered bowel function after rectal resection leading to a detriment in quality of life. This broad characterization does not allow for precise estimates of prevalence. The LARS score was designed as a simple tool for clinical evaluation of LARS. Although the LARS score has good clinical utility, it may not capture all important aspects that patients may experience. The aim of this collaboration was to develop an international consensus definition of LARS that encompasses all aspects of the condition and is informed by all stakeholders. Method: This international patient–provider initiative used an online Delphi survey, regional patient consultation meetings, and an international consensus meeting. Three expert groups participated: patients, surgeons and other health professionals from five regions (Australasia, Denmark, Spain, Great Britain and Ireland, and North America) and in three languages (English, Spanish, and Danish). The primary outcome measured was the priorities for the definition of LARS. Results: Three hundred twenty-five participants (156 patients) registered. The response rates for successive rounds of the Delphi survey were 86%, 96% and 99%. Eighteen priorities emerged from the Delphi survey. Patient consultation and consensus meetings refined these priorities to eight symptoms and eight consequences that capture essential aspects of the syndrome. Sampling bias may have been present, in particular, in the patient panel because social media was used extensively in recruitment. There was also dominance of the surgical panel at the final consensus meeting despite attempts to mitigate this. Conclusion: This is the first definition of LARS developed with direct input from a large international patient panel. The involvement of patients in all phases has ensured that the definition presented encompasses the vital aspects of the patient experience of LARS. The novel separation of symptoms and consequences may enable greater sensitivity to detect changes in LARS over time and with intervention

International consensus definition of low anterior resection syndrome

Aim: Low anterior resection syndrome (LARS) is pragmatically defined as disordered bowel function after rectal resection leading to a detriment in quality of life. This broad characterization does not allow for precise estimates of prevalence. The LARS score was designed as a simple tool for clinical evaluation of LARS. Although the LARS score has good clinical utility, it may not capture all important aspects that patients may experience. The aim of this collaboration was to develop an international consensus definition of LARS that encompasses all aspects of the condition and is informed by all stakeholders. Method: This international patient–provider initiative used an online Delphi survey, regional patient consultation meetings, and an international consensus meeting. Three expert groups participated: patients, surgeons and other health professionals from five regions (Australasia, Denmark, Spain, Great Britain and Ireland, and North America) and in three languages (English, Spanish, and Danish). The primary outcome measured was the priorities for the definition of LARS. Results: Three hundred twenty-five participants (156 patients) registered. The response rates for successive rounds of the Delphi survey were 86%, 96% and 99%. Eighteen priorities emerged from the Delphi survey. Patient consultation and consensus meetings refined these priorities to eight symptoms and eight consequences that capture essential aspects of the syndrome. Sampling bias may have been present, in particular, in the patient panel because social media was used extensively in recruitment. There was also dominance of the surgical panel at the final consensus meeting despite attempts to mitigate this. Conclusion: This is the first definition of LARS developed with direct input from a large international patient panel. The involvement of patients in all phases has ensured that the definition presented encompasses the vital aspects of the patient experience of LARS. The novel separation of symptoms and consequences may enable greater sensitivity to detect changes in LARS over time and with intervention

Are cities aware enough? A framework for developing city awareness to climate change

Cities are growing and becoming more complex, and as they continue to do so, their capacity to deal with foreseen and unforeseen challenges derived from climate change has to adapt accordingly. In the last decade, an effort has been made to build city resilience and improve cities’ capacity to respond to, recover from and adapt to climate change. However, certain city stakeholders’ lack of proactive behavior has resulted in less effective city resilience-building strategies. In this sense, the importance of developing stakeholders’ awareness of climate change in order to ensure proactivity is documented in the literature. However, there is a lack of studies that define how, when and what should be done to develop stakeholders’ climate change awareness at a city scale. This paper presents a framework to develop stakeholders climate change awareness as a result of a systematic literature review and a co-creation process with the participation of 47 experts through a focus group and a Delphi study. The framework defines a four-step process and includes nine policies that seek to develop stakeholders’ climate change awareness. The framework concludes determining the responsibilities of each stakeholder by defining the policies they should implement, and the effect one policy might cause on other stakeholders and among policies

Statistical Post-Editing: A Valuable Method in Domain Adaptation of RBMT Systems

We present two experiments with Basque to verify the improvement obtained for other languages by using statistical post editing. The small size of available corpora and the use a morphological component in both RBMT and SMT translations make different our experiments from hose presented for similar works. Our results confirm the improvements when using a restricted domain, but they are doubtful for more general domains.

Are cities aware enough? A framework for developing city awareness to climate change

Cities are growing and becoming more complex, and as they continue to do so, their capacity to deal with foreseen and unforeseen challenges derived from climate change has to adapt accordingly. In the last decade, an effort has been made to build city resilience and improve cities’ capacity to respond to, recover from and adapt to climate change. However, certain city stakeholders’ lack of proactive behavior has resulted in less effective city resilience-building strategies. In this sense, the importance of developing stakeholders’ awareness of climate change in order to ensure proactivity is documented in the literature. However, there is a lack of studies that define how, when and what should be done to develop stakeholders’ climate change awareness at a city scale. This paper presents a framework to develop stakeholders climate change awareness as a result of a systematic literature review and a co-creation process with the participation of 47 experts through a focus group and a Delphi study. The framework defines a four-step process and includes nine policies that seek to develop stakeholders’ climate change awareness. The framework concludes determining the responsibilities of each stakeholder by defining the policies they should implement, and the effect one policy might cause on other stakeholders and among policies

Toward a Taxonomy for Classifying Crisis Information Management Systems

In this chapter, we describe the process and the preliminary results of developing a taxonomy of Crisis Information Management Systems (CIMS). Building the taxonomy, we aim at orienting the understanding of the area (main topics, interrelations, challenges, gaps, etc.) and guide the search of the literature and systems focused on the topic of interest. Following the iterative method proposed by Nickerson et al. in 2013, we focused on the emergency response stage of the emergency management lifecycle and defined a taxonomy organized along seven dimensions, namely, coordination, collaboration, information management, visualization, communication, intelligence, and global support; for each dimension, a number of characteristics understood as features of CIMS have been identified. The first version of the Tax-CIM taxonomy has been applied to the analysis of 15 CIMS, showing that some changes had to be made and led to a second and more robust version.Borges, MR.; Canos Cerda, JH.; Penades Gramage, MC.; Labaka Zubieta, L.; Bañuls, VA.; Hernantes Apezetxea, J. (2023). Toward a Taxonomy for Classifying Crisis Information Management Systems. En Disaster Management and Information Technology. Professional Response and Recovery Management in the Age of Disasters. Springer Link. 409-433. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20939-0_1940943