Keystone Design Sliding Skin Flap for the Management of Small Full Thickness Burns

Deep dermal burns and full thickness burns are generally managed by excision and split thickness skin grafting. The skin graft may lead to unacceptable colour changes and be aesthetically unacceptable. Also, there may be a contour defect and, furthermore, it is followed by varying degrees of contracture. The keystone design sliding flap, first described in 2003, avoids the need for grafting and is not associated with any skin graft problems. We report two cases of the use of this flap as the primary surgery in reconstruction of small full thickness burn defects.

Medical Tourism Abroad : A new challenge to Oman’s health system - Al Dakhilya region experience

Objectives: This study aimed to understand why people seek medical advice abroad given the trouble and expense this entails. The types of medical problems for which treatment abroad was sought, preferred destinations and satisfaction with the treatment were explored. A secondary aim was to give feedback to stakeholders in the health care system on how to handle this issue and meet the needs of the community. Methods: 45 patients who had recently travelled abroad for treatment were asked to complete a questionnaire or were interviewed by telephone. Results: 40 questionnaires were received. 68% of the respondents were male. Orthopaedic diseases were the most common conditions leading patients to seek treatment abroad. Thailand was the most popular destination followed by India (50% and 30% respectively). 85% of respondents went abroad for treatment only, 10% for treatment and tourism and 2.5% were healthy, but travelled abroad for a checkup. Interestingly, 15% of the participants went abroad without first seeking medical care locally. Out of those initially treated in Oman, 38.2% had no specific diagnosis and 38.2% had received treatment, but it was not effective. 73% of respondents obtained information on treatment abroad from a friend. The Internet and medical tourism offices were the least used sources of information. 15% of the patients experienced complications after their treatment abroad. Conclusion: Various facts about medical treatment abroad need to be disseminated to the public. This will necessitate greater effort in public health promotion and education. 

Learners’ Perspective on Critical Factors to LMS Success in Blended Learning: An Empirical Investigation

The use of Learning Management System (LMS) in academic institutions is becoming an imperative for many institutions. The success of LMS in academic institutions may be initiated by instructors’ adoption; however, LMS survives in the long run by learners’ continuous adoption and use. Consequently, the objective of this article is to examine the critical factors that influence the success of LMS in blended learning in terms of actual usage, perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and user satisfaction from the learners’ perspective. The study also examines how these success measures impact learners’ continuous intention to use LMS in blended learning. These critical factors are related to the major entities of LMS adoption: learner characteristics (computer anxiety, technology experience, self-efficacy, and personal innovativeness), instructor characteristics (attitude, teaching style, control, and responsiveness), LMS characteristics (system quality, information quality, and service quality), classmates characteristics (attitude and interaction), course characteristics (quality and flexibility), and organization characteristics (management support and training). Based on 512 learners, the results showed that all of these factors are critical to one or several success measures, except for learner self-efficacy, instructor online responsiveness, and management support. The results also showed that all success measures are critical to learners’ continuous intention to use LMS in blended learning

A study of visible light communication channels for high speed roadways

A visible light communication channel study is conducted for high speed roadways under clear night sky conditions in which street light poles transmit to receivers on top of moving vehicles. A detailed analysis of the communication channel is undertaken. Exact and approximate analytical DC channel responses are obtained and analyzed, and the channel capacity and RMS time delay spreads are derived. Numerical studies verify that visible light communications are feasible for high speed roadways

Empowering Organizations through Customer Knowledge Acquisition: A pilot investigation

Customers are becoming more powerful, and customer knowledge can empower organizations and improve their performance. Customer knowledge has been classified in three categories: knowledge FOR customer, knowledge ABOUT customer and knowledge FROM customer. The value of knowledge management has been recognized by organizations. However, the value of external customer knowledge has not fully been recognized, and its impacts have not been sufficiently investigated. Consequently, the objective of this study is to empirically assess the impact of acquiring each type of customer knowledge. Based on preliminary analysis of 13 organizations in banking industry, this study detected that the acquisition of customer knowledge is significantly associated with business processes, employees, products, customers, market and financial performance

Two Communities = One Home

On October 29, 1996 a young boy was born in a beautiful country called Oman. ... This boy had everything he needed: a loving family, warm weather, great food. However, one day he decided that he wants to try something new. He wanted to leave his comfort zone. So, he came up with a big decision—to study abroad. This decision wasn\u27t the easiest dissection to make. However, with the support of his family and friends, he bought his ticket and he left his family for the first time in his life. He left home, the familiar food, the warm weather to start his new journey to Dayton, Ohio. The first things he heard when he arrived in Dayton were: “Welcome to Dayton” and “Welcome to the University of Dayton.” When he started at UD, he saw how the people are great. They are kind and always smiling

MEDLINE® Indexing of the Sultan Qaboos University Medical Journal : A great leap forward for biomedical research and publishing in the Gulf region

N