Developing a scalable training model in global mental health: pilot study of a video-assisted training Program for Generalist Clinicians in Rural Nepal.

BackgroundIn low- and middle-income countries, mental health training often includes sending few generalist clinicians to specialist-led programs for several weeks. Our objective is to develop and test a video-assisted training model addressing the shortcomings of traditional programs that affect scalability: failing to train all clinicians, disrupting clinical services, and depending on specialists.MethodsWe implemented the program -video lectures and on-site skills training- for all clinicians at a rural Nepali hospital. We used Wilcoxon signed-rank tests to evaluate pre- and post-test change in knowledge (diagnostic criteria, differential diagnosis, and appropriate treatment). We used a series of 'Yes' or 'No' questions to assess attitudes about mental illness, and utilized exact McNemar's test to analyze the proportions of participants who held a specific belief before and after the training. We assessed acceptability and feasibility through key informant interviews and structured feedback.ResultsFor each topic except depression, there was a statistically significant increase (Δ) in median scores on knowledge questionnaires: Acute Stress Reaction (Δ = 20, p = 0.03), Depression (Δ = 11, p = 0.12), Grief (Δ = 40, p < 0.01), Psychosis (Δ = 22, p = 0.01), and post-traumatic stress disorder (Δ = 20, p = 0.01). The training received high ratings; key informants shared examples and views about the training's positive impact and complementary nature of the program's components.ConclusionVideo lectures and on-site skills training can address the limitations of a conventional training model while being acceptable, feasible, and impactful toward improving knowledge and attitudes of the participants

Advances in Complex Oxide Quantum Materials Through New Approaches to Molecular Beam Epitaxy

Molecular beam epitaxy (MBE), a workhorse of the semiconductor industry, has progressed rapidly in the last few decades in the development of novel materials. Recent developments in condensed matter and materials physics have seen the rise of many novel quantum materials that require ultra-clean and high-quality samples for fundamental studies and applications. Novel oxide-based quantum materials synthesized using MBE have advanced the development of the field and materials. In this review, we discuss the recent progress in new MBE techniques that have enabled synthesis of complex oxides that exhibit "quantum" phenomena, including superconductivity and topological electronic states. We show how these techniques have produced breakthroughs in the synthesis of 4d and 5d oxide films and heterostructures that are of particular interest as quantum materials. These new techniques in MBE offer a bright future for the synthesis of ultra-high quality oxide quantum materials.Comment: 29 pages, 7 figure

First evidence of coherent K+K^{+} meson production in neutrino-nucleus scattering

Neutrino-induced charged-current coherent kaon production, $\nu_{\mu}A\rightarrow\mu^{-}K^{+}A$, is a rare, inelastic electroweak process that brings a $K^+$ on shell and leaves the target nucleus intact in its ground state. This process is significantly lower in rate than neutrino-induced charged-current coherent pion production, because of Cabibbo suppression and a kinematic suppression due to the larger kaon mass. We search for such events in the scintillator tracker of MINERvA by observing the final state $K^+$, $\mu^-$ and no other detector activity, and by using the kinematics of the final state particles to reconstruct the small momentum transfer to the nucleus, which is a model-independent characteristic of coherent scattering. We find the first experimental evidence for the process at $3\sigma$ significance.Comment: added ancillary file with information about the six kaon candidate

Enhancing Federated Cloud Management with an Integrated Service Monitoring Approach

Cloud Computing enables the construction and the provisioning of virtualized service-based applications in a simple and cost effective outsourcing to dynamic service environments. Cloud Federations envisage a distributed, heterogeneous environment consisting of various cloud infrastructures by aggregating different IaaS provider capabilities coming from both the commercial and the academic area. In this paper, we introduce a federated cloud management solution that operates the federation through utilizing cloud-brokers for various IaaS providers. In order to enable an enhanced provider selection and inter-cloud service executions, an integrated monitoring approach is proposed which is capable of measuring the availability and reliability of the provisioned services in different providers. To this end, a minimal metric monitoring service has been designed and used together with a service monitoring solution to measure cloud performance. The transparent and cost effective operation on commercial clouds and the capability to simultaneously monitor both private and public clouds were the major design goals of this integrated cloud monitoring approach. Finally, the evaluation of our proposed solution is presented on different private IaaS systems participating in federations. © 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

A test of the automaticity assumption of compliance tactics: discouraging undergraduate binge drinking by appealing to consistency and reciprocity

The mindfulness of compliance with requests making use of the commitment/consistency or the reciprocity principle was investigated. Participants (N = 129) received a foot-in-the-door (FITD) request (commitment/consistency application), a door-in-the-face (DITF) request (reciprocity application), or no request. Next, participants read either a weak or neutral message about the importance of moderate alcohol consumption then reported the likelihood of not drinking excessively for one week (target request). When accompanied by a weak message, the target request elicited less compliance if preceded by the DITF or FITD requests than by no initial request, suggesting compliance tactics sometimes increase thoughtfulness