Best Practices in Training Caregivers to Implement Behavioral Interventions

It has been well documented in the literature that behavioral interventions are effective in reducing a wide variety of maladaptive behaviors such as aggression, self-injury and destructive behaviors (Allen & Warzak, 2000; Campbell, 2003). Despite the success of these interventions, they are often implemented in tightly controlled settings with third party individuals that are able to implement procedures with a high degree of integrity (Fryling, 2014). Due to the complexities of the natural environment, caregivers may be less likely to implement behavioral interventions with the same degree of integrity and have limited available time for training on procedures. Therefore, it is important to evaluate efficient and effective strategies for caregiver training. This presentation will review common challenges to caregiver training and outline procedures for caregiver training that are aimed at decreasing the time needed as well as increasing caregiver treatment integrity. Specifically, the advantages and disadvantages of didactics, role play and in vivo instruction will be discussed

Brief Home-Based Data Collection of Low Frequency Behaviors

Data-based decision making, an important component of positive behavior support, can be difficult in brief in-home therapy due to the limited amount of time a therapist has to directly observe the child. This difficulty is exacerbated when problem behavior occurs infrequently. When a therapist cannot reliably observe problem behavior, it is often necessary to rely on parental report. The current study evaluated three approaches for parental report of low frequency problem behavior: antecedent-behavior-consequence records, incident data, and interview. Each method was analyzed with clients in home-based therapy with 2-hour weekly appointments. All clients exhibited low-frequency (i.e., less than daily) and high-intensity (i.e., causes physical harm to self/others, damage to the environment, or severe decrement to family’s quality of life) problem behavior. The treatment goal for all clients was to reduce problem behavior (most commonly aggression, disruption, or self-injury). The number of instances of problem behavior captured by each method of data-collection, quality of the data (i.e., ability to detect treatment effects using the data), and therapist and parent acceptability of each measure were analyzed. Results are discussed in terms of the relative advantages and disadvantages of each measure, clinical application of the methods, and avenues for future research

Surgical and medical second trimester abortion in South Africa: A cross-sectional study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>A high percentage of abortions performed in South Africa are in the second trimester. However, little research focuses on women's experiences seeking second trimester abortion or the efficacy and safety of these services.</p> <p>The objectives are to document clinical and acceptability outcomes of second trimester medical and surgical abortion as performed at public hospitals in the Western Cape Province.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We performed a cross-sectional study of women undergoing abortion at 12.1-20.9 weeks at five hospitals in Western Cape Province, South Africa in 2008. Two hundred and twenty women underwent D&E with misoprostol cervical priming, and 84 underwent induction with misoprostol alone. Information was obtained about the procedure and immediate complications, and women were interviewed after recovery.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Median gestational age at abortion was earlier for D&E clients compared to induction (16.0 weeks vs. 18.1 weeks, p < 0.001). D&E clients reported shorter intervals between first clinic visit and abortion (median 17 vs. 30 days, p < 0.001). D&E was more effective than induction (99.5% vs. 50.0% of cases completed on-site without unplanned surgical procedure, p < 0.001). Although immediate complications were similar (43.8% D&E vs. 52.4% induction), all three major complications occurred with induction. Early fetal expulsion occurred in 43.3% of D&E cases. While D&E clients reported higher pain levels and emotional discomfort, most women were satisfied with their experience.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>As currently performed in South Africa, second trimester abortions by D&E were more effective than induction procedures, required shorter hospital stay, had fewer major immediate complications and were associated with shorter delays accessing care. Both services can be improved by implementing evidence-based protocols.</p

The CTSA Consortium's Catalog of Assets for Translational and Clinical Health Research (CATCHR)

The 61 CTSA Consortium sites are home to valuable programs and infrastructure supporting translational science and all are charged with ensuring that such investments translate quickly to improved clinical care. Catalog of Assets for Translational and Clinical Health Research (CATCHR) is the Consortium's effort to collect and make available information on programs and resources to maximize efficiency and facilitate collaborations. By capturing information on a broad range of assets supporting the entire clinical and translational research spectrum, CATCHR aims to provide the necessary infrastructure and processes to establish and maintain an open‐access, searchable database of consortium resources to support multisite clinical and translational research studies. Data are collected using rigorous, defined methods, with the resulting information made visible through an integrated, searchable Web‐based tool. Additional easy‐to‐use Web tools assist resource owners in validating and updating resource information over time. In this paper, we discuss the design and scope of the project, data collection methods, current results, and future plans for development and sustainability. With increasing pressure on research programs to avoid redundancy, CATCHR aims to make available information on programs and core facilities to maximize efficient use of resources.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/106893/1/cts12144.pd

The CTSA Consortium's Catalog of Assets for Translational and Clinical Health Research (CATCHR): The Ctsa Consortium's Catchr

The 61 CTSA Consortium sites are home to valuable programs and infrastructure supporting translational science and all are charged with ensuring that such investments translate quickly to improved clinical care. CATCHR (Catalog of Assets for Translational and Clinical Health Research) is the Consortium’s effort to collect and make available information on programs and resources to maximize efficiency and facilitate collaborations. By capturing information on a broad range of assets supporting the entire clinical and translational research spectrum, CATCHR aims to provide the necessary infrastructure and processes to establish and maintain an open-access, searchable database of consortium resources to support multi-site clinical and translational research studies. Data is collected using rigorous, defined methods, with the resulting information made visible through an integrated, searchable web-based tool. Additional easy to use web tools assist resource owners in validating and updating resource information over time. In this article, we discuss the design and scope of the project, data collection methods, current results, and future plans for development and sustainability. With increasing pressure on research programs to avoid redundancy, CATCHR aims to make available information on programs and core facilities to maximize efficient use of resources

Access, accommodation, and science: Knowledge in an “open” world

The rising popularity of open access (OA) publishing in scholarly communities is purportedly leading to increased public knowledge. At least, that’s a key piece of the OA moral argument. This is especially true for discussions of scientific research. We argue, however, that while there have been significant moves to provide better material/technological access to research, OA advocates must still tackle the issue of making original scientific research conceptually accessible. Despite being freely available on the Internet, articles are not also by default linguistically, conceptually, or ideologically accessible to the global public(s) they are intended to reach. In this article, we examine how OA coupled with innovative scientific communication practices can help align the ideals of OA with the realities of complex, specialized genres of writing to provide better, more “open,” access to research. We look to PLOS ONE and the PLOS Blog Network to discuss how the innovative material access of PLOS ONE coupled with the communication strategies of PLOS Bloggers can work together toward more openly accessible original scientific research articles