An investigation into the experiences, and associated issues, concerning children and young people prescribed regular medication

There is little information concerning the treatment-related experiences when children or young people are prescribed long-term medication. To identify treatment-related problems following the initiation of a new medication, a telephone survey of parents or children/young people was undertaken. Participants were asked about information requirements, medication-related concerns, administration, adverse effects, adherence and their experiences of arranging medication supply. The role of community pharmacists in supporting children taking medication was explored through a postal survey. Pharmacists were asked about their experiences of undertaking medication review in this group and the types of medication-related support this cohort sought from them. These included: advice about adherence, requests for information and the type of problems reported to them including administration and supply issues. The treatment-related experiences of children, young people and their parents/carers when a child takes regular medication were identified through interviews with patients and their parents/carers. Participants were asked to describe their experiences of: the impact of medication on their daily lives, the formulation, adverse effects, negotiating the healthcare system around supply of medication and the social burden of medication. The first three studies identified that some parents made changes to their child’s medication without informing a healthcare professional. Therefore, a postal survey of parents/carers of children prescribed long-term medication was undertaken. Parents/carers were asked about delaying/with-holding/not initiating treatment, making changes to the administration, altering the dose and adjustments to the regimen to make it compatible with daily life. This research has identified that parents/carers and patients experience many challenges when a child is prescribed long-term medication. Greater engagement is required to ensure that the treatment choice and regimen are achievable for patients and their parents/carers. Further research is required to identify effective interventions to support this cohort, one of which could be a paediatric medication review

Eelgrass (Zostera marina) restoration in Puget Sound: restoration tools, successes and challenges

Eelgrass (Zostera marina) is one of 25 Vital Signs to track the health of Puget Sound and restoration of this critical nearshore habitat is part of the overall regional recovery strategy. Eelgrass restoration will provide a multitude of benefits, ranging from habitat for species to ameliorating the effects of climate change. Since 2013, the Washington State Department of Natural Resources has led regional evaluation of potential eelgrass restoration sites and transplanting in Washington State. Through collaborations we have developed and tested strategies to enhance transplant success and restore natural processes. We developed an eelgrass transplant suitability model to identify potential restoration sites using key variables essential for seagrass production and long-term resilience in a changing environment. Eelgrass was planted at five sites for initial model verification with an additional 81 test sites planted between 2013 and 2017 to identify areas suitable for large scale restoration. Eelgrass test transplant results varied and 15 sites with the highest success were selected for large-scale transplantation. A comparison of standard transplant methods was performed and preliminary results suggest that proper method selection plays an important role in transplant success. Long-term monitoring is scheduled with an emphasis on the success of specific donor stocks, the recovery of donor sites, and the effect seagrass restoration has on water chemistry. The restoration process has endured challenges that ranged from permitting issues to anthropogenic and environmental stressors. However, issue specific solutions and adaptive management allowed the restoration process to progress and contribute valuable information towards strategies to recover this valuable habitat in the region

Making alternative fuel vehicles work: Storage through absorption on Missouri corn cob

Abstract only availableThe USA's current demand for petroleum leads to many problems (many being global concerns as well): a dependence on foreign nations for our energy, an increase in pollution/global warming, and high gas prices. Each of those is the source of many more problems that will become worse if not addressed: Foreign dependence results in oil-effected politics and economic foreign dependence. Pollution and global warming result in an increase in the destruction of natural habitats due to changing climates, skin damage/cancer due to sun exposure, and natural disasters such as hurricanes and tornadoes that depend on higher temperatures. Along with gas prices increasing, so will the prices of goods and services as the cost of energy to produce them increases. My research with the Alliance for Collaborative Research in Alternative Fuel Technology addresses these issues by overcoming many of the hurdles that make current alternative fuels impractical. We have produced porous activated carbons that store high capacities of methane (natural gas) through physisorption for use in vehicle tanks. In optimizing storage capacity, we have studied production methods that vary the pore size distributions, surface areas, and densities of our carbons. We have found that the optimal pore size for methane is 1.1 nanometers and that it is best to maximize surface area and density. Our current best performers store 115-119 grams of methane per liter of carbon at ambient temperature and 34 bar, compared to the DOE target of 118 g/L. Our research is now expanding to include hydrogen storage.Alliance for Collaborative Research in Alternative Fuel Technolog

The US Program in Ground-Based Gravitational Wave Science: Contribution from the LIGO Laboratory

Recent gravitational-wave observations from the LIGO and Virgo observatories have brought a sense of great excitement to scientists and citizens the world over. Since September 2015,10 binary black hole coalescences and one binary neutron star coalescence have been observed. They have provided remarkable, revolutionary insight into the "gravitational Universe" and have greatly extended the field of multi-messenger astronomy. At present, Advanced LIGO can see binary black hole coalescences out to redshift 0.6 and binary neutron star coalescences to redshift 0.05. This probes only a very small fraction of the volume of the observable Universe. However, current technologies can be extended to construct "3rd Generation" (3G) gravitational-wave observatories that would extend our reach to the very edge of the observable Universe. The event rates over such a large volume would be in the hundreds of thousands per year (i.e. tens per hour). Such 3G detectors would have a 10-fold improvement in strain sensitivity over the current generation of instruments, yielding signal-to-noise ratios of 1000 for events like those already seen. Several concepts are being studied for which engineering studies and reliable cost estimates will be developed in the next 5 years

Hospital pharmacy response to COVID-19 at two UK teaching hospitals: a departmental review of actions implemented to inform future strategy.

OBJECTIVES To determine the views of pharmacy staff on a departmental response to wave 1 of the UK COVID-19 pandemic in order to inform a strategy for a second wave at two large UK National Health Service (NHS) hospitals. METHODS This study was undertaken at two large teaching hospitals in the UK. Pharmacy staff attended local departmental focus groups. Staff attendance included pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and pharmacy assistants representing all pharmacy services including aseptics, ward-based services, dispensary/distribution and procurement. Responses were transcribed and analysed using thematic analysis. RESULTS A total of 138 pharmacy staff attended the departmental focus groups. This study identified which pharmacy-related changes implemented in the first wave will be beneficial to take forward into a second wave. These included extending the hours of the pharmacy service to critical care, retaining the competence of pharmacists and pharmacy technicians redeployed to critical care during wave 1, development of standard operating procedures for changes in practice, delivering/posting of dispensed outpatient medication to patients' place of residence, maintenance of ward-based pharmacy services, use of the healthcare app PANDO to aid team communication, utilisation of remote-controlled drug ordering, deployment of a COVID-19 ward stocklist, procurement of ready-made bags/prefilled syringes of critical care medications, aligning the central intravenous additive service with critical care demand to reduce waste and establishment of a pharmacy response in line with the hospital's implementation plan. CONCLUSIONS This study has provided a number of recommendations for how hospital pharmacy departments may respond to a global pandemic. These experiences derived from the pharmacy departments at two large UK NHS Trusts may be used by other healthcare providers to help inform the pharmacy response to a global pandemic

The effect of harvest rates on eelgrass (Zostera marina L.) donor sites in Puget Sound: A project overview

Although not easily quantified, it is believed that eelgrass (Zostera marina), the predominant seagrass in Puget Sound, area has been lost because of increased shoreline development, periodic physical disturbances, and degradation in water quality. In response to that loss, the Puget Sound Partnership’s (PSP) Action Agenda specifically targets the restoration of 20% more eelgrass by 2020. This target equates to approximately 10,000 acres of eelgrass, which is about 2,500 acres larger than the largest existing meadow, Padilla Bay, on the west coast of the contiguous U.S. Restoring eelgrass will benefit a multitude of species valued in Puget Sound such as Pacific herring, Pacific cod, and Walleye pollock, as well as Federally and State-listed threatened and endangered species such as Chinook and Chum salmon, trout (steelhead), and Southern Resident Killer Whales (SRKW). Harvesting the amount of needed shoots (100,000s of shoots over time) to conduct restoration/transplanting could impact existing eelgrass meadows. The objective of this project was to conduct an assessment of how donor sites recover from varying degrees of harvest rates for eelgrass restoration projects in Puget Sound. The study assessed the effects of 0, 10, 20, 30, and 50% harvest rates in two donors sites: Anderson Island and north of Port Gamble Bay. This poster will describe the current project, discuss observed results from previous studies carried out in other locations in the US and show expected results and management implications from the current project

Eelgrass (Zostera marina) restoration in Puget Sound: obstacles, surprises, and lessons learned

Seagrasses are in decline globally causing concern for the impacts of losses on ecosystems and forcing managers to seek solutions to reverse the trend. Locally, eelgrass restoration has become a priority and many efforts are being taken throughout the Salish Sea to increase eelgrass abundance. While progress is being made, success is never guaranteed. The restoration process is continually evolving as we learn from each project – whether a success or a failure. Over time, potential difficulties have been identified at multiple scales that can hinder restoration efforts. For example, data to populate our Puget Sound restoration site selection model, both for water quality and eelgrass physiological responses, are often unavailable at the local or regional scales for making the best informed decisions when siting projects. At the site level, specific challenges with substrate suitability in habitat engineering or biological disturbances (e.g., crab burrowing and algal blooms) can reduce restoration success. The challenges also expand to difficulties in legal procedures (e.g., permitting), competition for land use (e.g., aquaculture leases), resource deficiencies (e.g., inadequate funds for monitoring), and environmental limitations (e.g., eutrophication and suspended sediments). Some of these obstacles can be addressed within the project but others will require collaborations and larger investments of time and resources. However, seeking solutions for individual problems, forcing the restoration process to evolve, and adaptively managing restoration activities continues to improve chances for success and meeting restoration objectives in the Salish Sea

Insect pollinators: linking research and policy. Workshop report.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Pollinators interact with plants to underpin wider biodiversity, ecosystem function, ecosystem services to agricultural crops and ultimately human nutrition. The conservation of pollinators is thus an important goal. Pollinators and pollination represent a tractable example of how biodiversity can be linked to an ecosystem service. This represents a case study for exploring the impacts of various policy instruments aiming to halt/reverse the loss of ecosystem services. There is a need to understand how multiple pressures (e.g. habitat loss, fragmentation and degradation, climate change, pests and diseases, invasive species and environmental chemicals) can combine or interact to affect diversity, abundance and health of different pollinator groups. Decision makers need to balance consideration of the effects of single pressures on pollinators against the suite of other pressures on pollinators. For instance, the threat from pesticide use (with its high public and media profile) also needs to be considered in the context of the other threats facing pollinators and balanced against the need for food security. An independent review of the balance of risks across pollinator groups from pesticide use would help synthesise current knowledge into an accessible form for decision makers. To manage or lessen these threats to pollinators (wild and managed) and pollination requires improved knowledge about their basic ecology. We still need to know where and in what numbers different pollinator species occur, how they use different environments, how they interact with each other through shared plants and diseases and how wild pollinator abundance is changing. Decision makers need clear factual evidence for i) the relative contribution of different managed and wild pollinator groups to wildflower and crop pollination and ii) how this varies across different land-uses, ecosystems and regions. Addressing these basic and applied questions will improve our ability to forecast impacts on pollination service delivery to agricultural crops arising from current and future environmental changes, pesticide use and emerging diseases. The development of a long-term, multi-scale monitoring scheme to monitor trends in pollinator (wild and managed) population size and delivery of pollination services (ideally tied to data collection on land-use, pesticide applications and disease incidence at relevant spatial scales) would provide the evidence base for developing the effectiveness of policy and management interventions over time. Such a monitoring scheme would benefit from including research council organisations (e.g. CEH), governmental departments (e.g. Fera), universities, museums and NGOs (e.g. BBKA,SBA, Bumblebee Conservation Trust etc) Insect Pollinators: linking research and policy Workshop Report | 5 In the context of agricultural intensification and conservation we need to establish what type, quality and quantity of interventions (e.g. agri-environment schemes, protected areas) are needed, where to place them and how they can sustain different pollinator populations and effective pollination services. Current monitoring of the risks from diseases and pesticides requires broadening to consider other insects aside from honey bees, unless we can demonstrate that honey bees are good surrogates for all other pollinators. There is a need to increase confidence in regulatory risk assessments pertaining to pathogens and pesticides by incorporating other pollinator species, investigating chronic exposure to multiple chemicals and using field relevant dosages (specific to regions, not using other data sources as surrogates). At present the effects of spatial, social and temporal scales on the benefits stakeholders receive from pollination services are only beginning to be understood. Economic valuation of pollination services can help optimise the cost-effectiveness of service management measures and offer new opportunities to incentivise action or raise awareness among stakeholders. Novel tools and instruments (e.g. education and training) are needed to translate broad international (e.g. CBD, EU Biodiversity Strategy) and national (e.g. England‟s Biodiversity Strategy) policies into local actor (e.g. beekeeper, farmer, citizen scientist) contributions to meet biodiversity commitments Refocusing some public funding to link basic science to development of practical solutions (e.g. better crop protection products, improved disease resistance or treatment) could help science deliver better-targeted evidence for pollinator protection. Scientists need to make more use of opportunities (e.g. POSTnotes1; practitioner guides) to transfer knowledge to a broad audience in order to better influence decision maker and practitioner behaviours. Improved knowledge exchange between scientists and decision makers is important to combating threats to pollination. Central to this is improved understanding of the respective positions of policy makers and scientists. For instance, policy-makers usually need to be presented with a range of options to balance against other areas of policy. Science does not always arrive at a consensus due to uncertainties in data or models. Policy-makers need to understand that scientists are communicating the “best available knowledge at present” and that consequently it is not always possible to give a definitive answer