Has COVID-19 changed carer's views of health and care integration in care homes? A sentiment difference-in-difference analysis of on-line service reviews

Closer integration of health and social care is a policy priority in many countries. The COVID-19 pandemic has reinforced the necessity of joining up health and social care systems, especially in care home settings. However, the meaning and perceived importance of integration for residents’ and carers’ experience is unclear and we do not know whether it has changed during the pandemic. Using unique data from on-line care home service reviews, we combined multiple methods. We used Natural Language Processing with supervised machine learning to construct a measure of sentiment for care home residents' and their relatives’ (measured by AFINN score). Difference-in-difference analysis was used to examine whether experiencing integrated care altered these sentiments by comparing changes in sentiment in reviews related to integration (containing specific terms) to those which were not. Finally, we used network analysis on post-estimation results to assess which specific attributes stakeholders focus on most when detailing their most/least positive experiences of health and care integration in care homes, and whether these attributes changed over the pandemic. Reviews containing integration words were more positive than reviews unrelated to integration in the pre-pandemic period (about 2.3 points on the AFINN score) and remained so during the first year of the pandemic. Overall positive sentiment increased during the COVID-19 period (average by +1.1 points), mainly in reviews mentioning integration terms at the beginning of the first (+2.17, p-value 0.175) and second waves (+3.678, p-value 0.027). The role of care home staff was pivotal in both positive and negative reviews, with a shift from aspects related to care in pre-pandemic to information services during the pandemic, signalling their importance in translating integrated needs-based paradigms into policy and practice

Reference grass evapotranspiration with reduced data sets: parametrization of the FAO Penman-Monteith temperature approach and the Hargeaves-Samani equation using local climatic variables

The computation of the grass reference evapotranspiration with the FAO56 Penman-Monteith equation (PM-ETo) requires data on maximum and minimum air temperatures (Tmax, Tmin), actual vapour pressure (ea), shortwave solar radiation (Rs), and wind speed at 2m height (u2). Nonetheless, related datasets are often not available, are incomplete, or have uncertain quality. To overcome these limitations, several alternatives were considered in FAO56, while many other procedures were tested and proposed in very numerous papers. The present study reviews the computational procedures relative to predicting the missing variables from temperature, i.e., the PM temperature approach (PMT), and estimating ETo with the Hargreaves-Samani (HS) equation. For the PMT approach, procedures refer to predicting: (a) the dew point temperature (Tdew) from the minimum or the mean air temperature; (b) shortwave solar radiation (Rs) from the air temperature difference (TD=Tmax-Tmin) combined with a calibrated radiation adjustment coefficient (kRs); and (c) wind speed (u2) using a default value or a regional or local average. The adequateness of computing Tdew from air temperature was reassessed and the preference for using an average u2 has been defined. To ease the estimation of Rs, for the PMT approach and the coefficient of the HS equation, multiple linear regression equations for predicting kRs were developed using local averages of the temperature difference (TD), relative humidity (RH) and wind speed as independent variables. All variables were obtained from the Mediterranean set of CLIMWAT climatic data. Two types of kRs equations were developed: climate-focused equations specific to four climate types - humid, sub-humid, semi-arid, and hyper-arid and arid -, and a global one, applicable to any type of climate. The usability of the kRs equations for the PMT and HS methods was assessed with independent data sets from Bolivia, Inner Mongolia, Iran, Portugal and Spain, covering a variety of climates, from hyper-arid to humid. With this purpose, ETo estimated with PMT and HS (ETo PMT and ETo HS) were compared with PM-ETo computed with full data sets to evaluate the usability of the kRs equations. Adopting the climate-focused kRs equations with ETo PMT, the RMSE averaged 0.59, 0.64, 0.65 and 0.72mm d−1 for humid, sub-humid, semi-arid, and arid and hyper-arid climates, respectively, while the RMSE values relative to ETo HS when using the respective climate-focused kRs equations averaged 0.58, 0.60, 0.60 and 0.69mm d−1 for the same climates. These results are similar to those obtained with the kRs global equation. The accuracy of the PMT approach when using the kRs equations was also evaluated when one, two, or all three Tdew, Rs and u2 variables are missing and the resulting goodness-of-fit indicators demonstrated the advantage of the combined use of observed and estimated weather variables. The usability of the kRs equations for an efficient parameterization of both the PMT approach and the HS equation is demonstrated with similar performance of PMT and HS procedures for a variety of climates. Because the ETo HS results depend almost linearly on temperature, the PMT approach, using estimates of the weather variables, is able to mitigate those temperature impacts, which trends may be contrary to those of other variables that determine ETo. The clear advantage of the PMT approach is that it allows using the available weather data in combination with estimates of the missing variables, which provides for more accurate ETo computationsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) as indicator of the soil degradation.

In this work we presenl lhe lemporal evolulion 01 lhe vegelalion and Iheir relalionship wilh lhe soil degradalion in an area loealed in Northeasl 01 lhe Madrid Communily (Spain)

Interferometric inverse synthetic aperture radar experiment using an interferometric linear frequency modulated continuous wave millimetre-wave radar

D. Felguera-Martín,1 J.-T. González-Partida,1 P. Almorox-González,1 M. Burgos-García,1 and B.-P. Dorta-Naranjo2 1Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaria s/n, Grupo de Microondas y Radar. Departamento de Señales, Sistemas y Radiocomunicaciones, Madrid, Spain 2Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Departamento de Señales y Comunicaciones, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain An interferometric linear frequency modulated continuous wave (LFMCW) millimetre-wave radar is presented, along with the results of an experiment conducted to study the feasibility of using it in a future millimetre-wave interferometric inverse synthetic aperture radar (InISAR) system. First, a description of the radar is given. Then, the signal processing chain is described, with special attention to the phase unwrapping technique. The interferometric phase is obtained by unwrapping the prominent target's phase in each antenna using a sliding frame processing technique. Cell migration issues in this method are also addressed. Simulations were carried out to illustrate and assess the processing chain and to show the effects of multipath echoes on the height measurement. In the real experiment, the range, speed and height of a moving target were tracked over consecutive inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) image frames, verifying the performance of the whole system

El clima vitícola de las principales regiones productoras de uvas para vino en España.

La historia vitícola de España mantiene una larga tradición. Entre sus antecedentes principales figuran fenicios, griegos y cartagineses, y ya en el siglo VI a.C. era conocido el arte de la vitivinicultura en el legendario reino de Tartesos, al suroeste de la península Ibérica. Sin embargo, el cultivo de la vid y la producción de vino se extienden por la mayor parte del país durante la dominación romana y la posterior romanización. De acuerdo con escritores de la época como Plinio, Marcial, Columela, Estrabón... podemos afirmar que los legionarios romanos valoraron y extendieron el vino de Iberia por la mayor parte del Imperio y, particularmente, lo acercaron a su capital Roma

Análisis de las temperaturas en dos áreas de interés olivícola del sudoeste bonaerense, Argentina

Se han comparado y analizado las temperaturas diarias de los observatorios de Coronel Dorrego y de Faro, ambas estaciones distantes a unos 20 km. Las temperaturas se han estudiado en relación al olivo debido a que en las zonas de estudio hay un creciente desarrollo de la producción olivícola, para ello se ha abordado una metodología de tratamiento de datos termométricos y se han analizado para su aplicación agroclimática en el cultivo del olivo. Se evidenció la variabilidad temporal y espacial entre ambas estaciones. La frecuencia de heladas como el período con heladas, es mayor en la localidad de Faro, la variabilidad de las heladas primaverales y el rigor anual en esa fecha hace que represente un factor de riesgo más importante para el éxito de una plantación de olivos en nuestra región. Del análisis de las temperaturas se concluye que la zona de Coronel Dorrego es más adecuada para el cultivo del olivo en comparación a la zona de Faro. Estas diferencias entre zonas tan próximas como Faro y Coronel Dorrego, dejan en evidencia la necesidad de un análisis de tipo mesoclimático, y el análisis local de las diferencias agroclimáticas.We compared and analyzed daily temperatures both at Coronel Dorrego and Faro observatories, 20km distant stations. They were studied because are important in this region to olive production, it was conducted thermometric data processing and analyzed for application agroclimatic in olive cultivation. The frequency of frost as the period of frost is higher in the town of Faro, the variability of spring frosts and annual rigor makes that date represents a major risk factor for the success of an olive grove in our region. It was demonstrated the temporal and spatial variability between the two stations. Analysis of the temperature it is concluded that the area of Coronel Dorrego is more suitable for olive cultivation compared to the Faro. These differences between areas as close as Faro and Coronel Dorrego, evidence the need for a mesoclimático type analysis, and the analysis of local agro-climatic differences

Weak gauge principle and electric charge quantization

Starting from a weak gauge principle we give a new and critical revision of the argument leading to charge quantization on arbitrary spacetimes. The main differences of our approach with respect to previous works appear on spacetimes with non trivial torsion elements on its second integral cohomology group. We show that in these spacetimes there can be topologically non-trivial configurations of charged fields which do not imply charge quantization. However, the existence of a non-exact electromagnetic field always implies the quantization of charges. Another consequence of the theory for spacetimes with torsion is the fact that it gives rise to two natural quantization units that could be identified with the electric quantization unit (realized inside the quarks) and with the electron charge. In this framework the color charge can have a topological origin, with the number of colors being related to the order of the torsion subgroup. Finally, we discuss the possibility that the quantization of charge may be due to a weak non-exact component of the electromagnetic field extended over cosmological scales.Comment: Latex2e, 24 pages, no figure

Utilização do índice de vegetação da diferença normalizada (NDVI) com indicador de degradação ambiental.

Neste trabalho e apresentado a evolucao temporal da vegetacao e suas relacoes com a degradacao ambiental numa area localizada no nordeste da comunidade de Madrid (Espanha). O metodo de estudo foi baseado na analise de duas imagens de satelite Landsat-5 sensor TM, integrando sensoriamento remoto, Sistema de Informacao Geografica e dados de campo na aplicacao do Indice de Vegetacao da Diferenca Normaliza (NDVI). As mudancas ocorridas no Indice de Vegetacao entre as duas datas estudadas revelam um processo de deterioracao de cobertura vegetal. Os resultados mostram que, atraves do Indice de Vegetacao, as classes associadas as estruturas antropicas aunentaram suas superficies em torno de 48%. A classe de capoeiras experimentou uma mudanca significativa com uma reducao relativa as outras classes de 53%

Magnetic vortex filament flows

We exhibit a variational approach to study the magnetic flow associated with a Killing magnetic field in dimension 3. In this context, the solutions of the Lorentz force equation are viewed as Kirchhoff elastic rods and conversely. This provides an amazing connection between two apparently unrelated physical models and, in particular, it ties the classical elastic theory with the Hall effect. Then, these magnetic flows can be regarded as vortex filament flows within the localized induction approximation. The Hasimoto transformation can be used to see the magnetic trajectories as solutions of the cubic nonlinear Schrödinger equation showing the solitonic nature of those.Ministerio de Educación y CienciaFondo Europeo de Desarrollo RegionalJunta de Andalucí

Viticultural climate and climatic groups in Ibero-American wine producer regions.

A produção de vinhos constitui-se numa importante atividade sócio-econômica em diversos países Ibero-Americanos. As regiões vitivinícolas nestes países localizam-se em diversos tipos de clima