Antibiotic Prescribing Trends in an Omani Paediatric Population

Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate antibiotic prescribing patterns for paediatric patients at Sultan Qaboos University Hospital (SQUH), a tertiary care hospital in Muscat, Oman. Methods: This retrospective cross-sectional study included all 1,186 prescriptions issued for 499 patients at the paediatric outpatient clinic and paediatric inpatient ward at SQUH between March and May 2012. Results: Of the 499 patients, 138 (27.6%) were prescribed a total of 28 different antibiotics. A total of 185 (15.6%) antibiotic prescriptions were issued among the total drug prescriptions. Preschool children aged 0–6 years were prescribed antibiotics most frequently (n = 110). Co-amoxiclav was the most commonly prescribed antibiotic in both inpatients and outpatients (27.0% and 33.9%, respectively), followed by cefuroxime in inpatients (13.5%) and azithromycin in outpatients (18.6%). Co-amoxiclav was the most commonly prescribed antibiotic in both 0–6 (31.3%) and 7–11 (23.3%) year-olds, while cefuroxime was most commonly prescribed in children ≥12 years old (25.0%). Conclusion: Antibiotic prescription patterns in this population were similar to those in North America, Europe and Asia. To confirm the findings of this study, further research on antibiotic prescription trends across the wider paediatric population of Oman should be initiated

EFL Teachers’ Awareness, Practices and Challenges of Teaching English Communicatively in Oman Post Basic Education Schools

This study investigated the perceived knowledge and actual practice of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) among post basic education teachers in Omani schools, along with the influence of gender and length of teaching experience years on teachers’ practice of this approach. It also explored the different challenges faced by teachers when implementing CLT. A total of 122 EFL Omani teachers took part in this study. The respondents completed the following: (1) a twenty-five item questionnaire concerning CLT principles; and (2) a questionnaire regarding the challenges of CLT. The results revealed that Omani EFL teachers have a high degree of awareness of the principles of CLT. However, they practice this approach at a moderate level, while their gender and length of teaching experiences have little impact on their actual practice of this approach. The findings further indicated that the implementation of CLT in Omani classrooms is hindered by: (1) teachers’ lack of training in CLT; (2) lack of time to prepare communicative activities; (3) students’ low levels of proficiency in English; (4) large class sizes; and (5) difficulties assessing the linguistic aspects of the language. This resulted in the drawing up of a number of recommendations

FCC, BCC and SC Lattices Derived from the Coxeter-Weyl groups and quaternions

We construct the fcc (face centered cubic), bcc (body centered cubic) and sc (simple cubic) lattices as the root and the weight lattices of the affine extended Coxeter groups W(A3) and W(B3)=Aut(A3). It is naturally expected that these rank-3 Coxeter-Weyl groups define the point tetrahedral symmetry and the octahedral symmetry of the cubic lattices which have extensive applications in material science. The imaginary quaternionic units are used to represent the root systems of the rank-3 Coxeter-Dynkin diagrams which correspond to the generating vectors of the lattices of interest. The group elements are written explicitly in terms of pairs of quaternions which constitute the binary octahedral group. The constructions of the vertices of the Wigner-Seitz cells have been presented in terms of quaternionic imaginary units. This is a new approach which may link the lattice dynamics with quaternion physics. Orthogonal projections of the lattices onto the Coxeter plane represent the square and honeycomb lattices

Machine Learning Approach for Predicting Systemic Lupus Erythematosus in Oman-based Cohort

Objectives: Design a machine learning-based prediction framework to predict the presence or absence of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE) in a cohort of Omani patients. Methods: Records of 219 patients from 2006 to 2019 were extracted from SQU Hospital electronic records, 138 patients have SLE, and the remaining 81 have other rheumatologic diseases. Clinical and demographic features were analyzed to focus on the early stages of the disease. Our design implements Recursive Feature Selection (RFE) to select only the most informative features. In addition, the CatBoost classification algorithm is utilized to predict SLE and an explainer algorithm (SHAP) is applied on top of the CatBoost model to provide individual prediction reasoning which is then validated by rheumatologists. Results: CatBoost achieved an Area Under the ROC curve (AUC) score of 0.95 and a Sensitivity of 92%. Four clinical features (Alopecia, renal disorders, Acute Cutaneous Lupus, and hemolytic anemia) along with the patient’s age were shown to have the greatest contribution to the prediction by the SHAP algorithm. Conclusion: We have designed and validated an explainable framework to predict SLE patients and provide reasoning for its prediction. Our framework enables early intervention for clinicians which leads to positive healthcare outcomes. Keywords: Systemic Lupus Erythematosus; Interpretation; Machine Learning; Supervised; Clinical Decision Support System; Statistical Data; Data Analysis

Investigating English teachers’ beliefs and practices in relation to the Continuous Assessment reform in the Sultanate of Oman

This thesis presents the findings of a study, which investigated the beliefs, and practices of teachers of English with regard to the Continuous Assessment (henceforth CA) reform in the assessment system in the Sultanate of Oman. The study also examined how teachers’ beliefs and other contextual factors influence the way teachers interpret and implement the CA reform. The ultimate aim of the study was to develop an understanding of the relationship between teachers’ beliefs and their actual CA practice, which as a result extends our understandings of the implementation of CA and the challenges that influence the process of implementation. The study adopted a triangulation design in which both quantitative and qualitative methods complemented each other. It started by exploring the beliefs and practices of 237 teachers of English in a questionnaire. It then explored those beliefs and practices of CA in the follow-up interviews with six working teachers of English, and through observations of specific classroom assessment practices. Finally, it probed the cognitive bases of their practices through post-observation interviews. The analysis of the data pointed to a large gap between teachers’ stated beliefs about CA and their actual assessment practices. Although in the questionnaire they generally expressed strong positive beliefs about the value of CA as an assessment approach and re-affirmed those beliefs in the follow-up interviews, they mostly showed a limited uptake of CA implementation in real practice. The study highlighted complex relationships amongst the CA reform, teachers' practices, teachers’ beliefs, and certain contextual factors. The study revealed that these contextual factors are interrelated and collectively widen the mismatch between teachers’ stated beliefs about CA and their actual practice and to the limited uptake of CA implementation. This study illustrates the value of studying the relationship between teachers’ stated beliefs and their actual practices in order to develop an understanding of the implementation of assessment reforms, what teachers do while implementing them and how their beliefs and other contextual factors influence the way they interpret and implement such major educational reforms

Impacts of quality management relations on sustainability performance

PhD ThesisThis study utilises the business relations theory as the theoretical lens to illustrate the links between quality management relations and the three dimensions of sustainability. The goal is to investigate the influences of the internal and external dimensional views of quality management (QM) relations in enhancing sustainability performance empirically. The internal quality management relations are associated with management and employees’ factors, while the external quality management relations are connected with customers’ and suppliers’ factors. Sustainability performance is measured through the social, environmental, and economic sustainability performance dimensions, which represent the triple bottom line (TBL). Additionally, this study examines the moderating impact of stakeholder pressure on the relationships between quality factors and sustainability dimensions. Also, the mediating effects of quality training, employee relations, supplier relations and customer relations were tested. Finally, this study examines group differences between the service and manufacturing sectors to enhance the generalisation of the survey findings. From this, a model is established to examine 24 hypothesised relationships. Questionnaires were used to collect data from top managers of 467 UK service and manufacturing firms. Statistical analysis and structural equation modelling (SEM) techniques were applied to test and analyse the data. The findings show that internal and external quality relations contribute to sustainability performance directly and indirectly, from management relations (MR) through employee relations (ER), customer relations (CR) and supplier relations (SR). Also, the results show that management relations (MR) supports other QM relations and is indirectly related to sustainability performance. The main effects were spread across the service and manufacturing sectors, and the results helped to identify the impact of different QM relations across different sustainability performance dimensions. The moderation results show mixed outcomes for QM relations and sustainability performance. This study is relevant for academics and practitioners as it focuses on significant QM management relations that are beneficial for the triple bottom line (TBL) of firms. This research contributes to the streams of business relations research by examining the internal and external quality aspects related to management, employees, customers, and suppliers to explain the mechanisms through which those internal and external aspects could contribute to the firms’ sustainability performance. As firms adopt internal and external QM relations to sustain their competitive advantage and achieve operational performance, their social, environmental, and economic sustainability performance dimensions improve. The importance of this research is that it investigates the influence of specific QM relations on the three dimensions of sustainability by providing robust and generalisable simultaneous examinations of these sustainability dimensions, primarily the social one. The social dimension has been paid less attention than the other sustainability dimensions and examining this aspect will provide further knowledge that has thus far been neglected in sustainability studies.government of Oma

The availability of the skills of distance learning techniques among the 5G6FDWQWEEWWWof A\u27Sharqiyah University in the Sultanate of Oman in light of some variables

This study aimed to measure the availability of distance educationtechniques skills among students of A\u27Sharqiyah University,in Omanand also aimed to reveal the differences between the average scores of some of these technical skills according to the study variables (gender,college,and year). The sample consisted of 256 students from the university, whichregistered in the summer semester of the academic year 2019/2020. In order to achieve the objectives of the study,the researchers develop a scale to determine the training need for the study skills,which consisted of 10 skills;the validity and the reality of the scale were confirmed. The study showed that the skills of distance education techniques are available,with the students to a medium degree,and the study concluded that there are no statistically significant differences between the average skills between males and females،while the study showed a statistically significant differences attributed to the college variables attributed to the students of the College of Arts and Humanities at the level of Less than 0.05,and it was found that the statistical differences were attributed to the second year students at a level less than 0.05. One of the most important recommendations of the study is that universities and those in charge of university education should be interested in providing qualifying programs in teaching and learning techniques related to distance education for all university students