Feelings of burden among family caregivers of people with spinal cord injury in Turkey

Study design: The study was designed as a cross-sectional survey. Objectives: The purpose of the study was to examine the level of feelings of burden in family caregivers of people with spinal cord injury (SCI) in Turkey, and to explore its predictors. Setting: Turkey. Methods: One hundred family caregivers of people with SCI completed measures of burden of caregiving, depression, social support and physical health. The SCI participants completed a measure of functional independence. Multivariate statistics and structural equation modeling (SEM) were conducted to identify significant predictors of caregiver burden. Results: Caregiver burden was significantly related to caregivers’ feelings of depression. SEM analysis showed that social support from family and from friends predicted caregiver burden via depression. Caregivers’ age, sex, educational level, physical health and household income did not significantly predict their feelings of depression or burden. Conclusions: Our findings revealed that support received from both families and friends is an important source for alleviating the depressive feelings of caregivers and, in return, their burden in the caregiving. In Turkey, high support from family members is expected and is important for psychological well-being, yet the current study showed that the support received from friends also has unique contribution to the well-being of the caregivers of persons with SCI. Overall, our findings highlight the importance of supportive relationships between family as well as friends for the caregivers who may have to provide lifetime care for their family member with special needs.WOS:000407265700012Scopus - Affiliation ID: 60105072PMID: 28169295Science Citation Index Expanded - Social Sciences Citation IndexQ2 - Q3ArticleUluslararası işbirliği ile yapılan - EVETAğustos2017YÖK - 2016-1

Measurement and modelling of deep sea sediment plumes and implications for deep sea mining

Deep sea mining concerns the extraction of poly-metallic nodules, cobalt-rich crusts and sulphide deposits from the ocean floor. The exploitation of these resources will result in adverse ecological effects arising from the direct removal of the substrate and, potentially, from the formation of sediment plumes that could result in deposition of fine sediment on sensitive species or entrainment of sediment, chemicals and nutrients into over-lying waters. Hence, identifying the behaviour of deep-sea sediment plumes is important in designing mining operations that are ecologically acceptable. Here, we present the results of novel in situ deep sea plume experiments undertaken on the Tropic seamount, 300 nautical miles SSW of the Canary Islands. These plume experiments were accompanied by hydrographic and oceanographic field surveys and supported by detailed numerical modelling and high resolution video settling velocity measurements of the in situ sediment undertaken in the laboratory. The plume experiments involved the controlled formation of benthic sediment plumes and measurement of the plume sediment concentration at a specially designed lander placed at set distances from the plume origin. The experiments were used as the basis for validation of a numerical dispersion model, which was then used to predict the dispersion of plumes generated by full-scale mining. The results highlight that the extent of dispersion of benthic sediment plumes, resulting from mining operations, is significantly reduced by the effects of flocculation, background turbidity and internal tides. These considerations must be taken into account when evaluating the impact and extent of benthic sediment plumes

Environmental impacts of nodule, crust and sulphide mining: an overview

The new industry of deep-sea mining (DSM) potentially offers abundant supplies of several metals from the deep ocean, but the ores will need to be recovered from pristine environments in which the ecosystems are often poorly known. Information that is available for some of these environments suggests that organisms may struggle to recover from the impacts of DSM, whilst in other areas the impacts may be somewhat less. Deep-sea mining is focussed on three distinct resources – manganese nodules (also known as polymetallic nodules), cobalt crusts and seafloor massive sulphides (SMS) (sometimes called polymetallic sulphides). These occur in different seafloor settings, each hosting very different ecosystems and each with its own set of environmental issues. Manganese nodules occur in the deep basins of the ocean where lack of sediment supply results in very slow sediment accumulation – rates that can be as low as 1 mm per thousand years – thus allowing nodules to form from slow precipitation of metals. Interest in mining manganese nodules is focussed mainly on the Clarion Clipperton Zone in the eastern equatorial Pacific and Central Indian Basin in the Indian Ocean. Here the seabed faunas are sparsely distributed but are very varied in composition. Many different species live in the upper few centimetres of the sediment or attached to the nodules. The mining process will disrupt this surface sediment layer and remove the nodules. Experiments have shown that species are very slow to return to the disrupted areas. Combined with the large areas that will need to be mined for manganese nodules, this gives rise to potentially a high environmental and ecological impact. Cobalt crusts occur as layers up to 26 cm thick coating the rocky tops and upper flanks of seamounts, with the most promising deposits occurring between 800 and 2500 m water depth. The absence of sedimentation due to currents in these areas allows the slow growth of the crust via the precipitation of minerals from seawater. Seamount faunas are not well studied but they include a large number of species, many of which are slow-growing, long-lived and slow to reproduce. This makes it difficult for the ecosystem to recover from disruption. Large areas will need to be mined because the ore occurs in a very thin layer and whole seamounts may be affected. The third resource – seafloor massive sulphides – differs from the previous two, being formed from precipitation of metals from hydrothermal fluids at oceanic plate boundaries. This process creates three-dimensional ore bodies extending metres into the seabed which are similar to some ore bodies that occur on land. Ecosystems comprising specialist organisms that can tolerate and make use of the harsh biochemical conditions are often found at active hydrothermal vents. These vent sites are probably too hot to ever be mined, so ore bodies are being sought some distance away from the active ridge axis in areas where venting is weaker or has stopped. The species occurring ‘off axis’ are more akin to those from the surrounding rocky slopes and possibly on the continental slopes in the same ocean basin. The species may occur over wide areas, and the impact of localised mining may be relatively small. In all types of deep-sea mining, the generation of plumes of sediment-laden water, both by the mining process and the transport of ores to a support ship, will have an impact on benthic and mid-water ecosystems away from the mining site. If uncontrolled, such impacts could be comparable to or of greater scale to impacts in the mined areas