Bathrooms, Incontinence, and Withholding OH MY: Occupational Therapy’s Role in Pediatric Constipation Management

The purpose of this project was to gain advanced clinical experience in pediatric constipation and incontinence management through application of mounting evidence of occupational therapy’s role in fostering improved interoceptive awareness, tolerance of toileting stimuli, and independence in toileting tasks. This capstone was completed at the outpatient LifeScape Rehabilitation Center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The student collaborated with a primary occupational therapist serving as a site mentor, other occupational therapists, physical therapists, and clinical psychologists all specialized in constipation and incontinence management. Advanced clinical practice was demonstrated by student management of the site mentor’s constipation and incontinence caseload, completed continuing education, an online constipation and incontinence resource guide, and theory to practice paper. The online resource guide was created containing quick information for covering occupational therapists, created handouts, novel interventions, and demonstration of interactive digestive system model entrusted to the host site. As occupational therapy’s role in addressing constipation, incontinence, and interoceptive difficulties in relation to the vital activity of daily living (ADL) of toileting is emerging, further research regarding the efficacy of related interoceptive, sensory processing, and skill acquisition are warranted. Keywords: occupational therapy, pediatric constipation, pediatric incontinence, interoceptio

Trapping of dielectric particles with light-induced space-charge fields

Light-induced space-charge fields in lithium niobate crystals are used to trap and manipulate dielectric particles on the surface of such crystals. Without any external voltage source, strong field gradients are present in the proximity of the crystal surface. These are used to trap particles with diameters in the range between 100 nm and some tens of micrometers

The Making of Cloud Applications An Empirical Study on Software Development for the Cloud

Cloud computing is gaining more and more traction as a deployment and provisioning model for software. While a large body of research already covers how to optimally operate a cloud system, we still lack insights into how professional software engineers actually use clouds, and how the cloud impacts development practices. This paper reports on the first systematic study on how software developers build applications in the cloud. We conducted a mixed-method study, consisting of qualitative interviews of 25 professional developers and a quantitative survey with 294 responses. Our results show that adopting the cloud has a profound impact throughout the software development process, as well as on how developers utilize tools and data in their daily work. Among other things, we found that (1) developers need better means to anticipate runtime problems and rigorously define metrics for improved fault localization and (2) the cloud offers an abundance of operational data, however, developers still often rely on their experience and intuition rather than utilizing metrics. From our findings, we extracted a set of guidelines for cloud development and identified challenges for researchers and tool vendors

Switching to Once-Daily Liraglutide From Twice-Daily Exenatide Further Improves Glycemic Control in Patients With Type 2 Diabetes Using Oral Agents

OBJECTIVETo evaluate efficacy and safety of switching from twice-daily exenatide to once-daily liraglutide or of 40 weeks of continuous liraglutide therapy.RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODSWhen added to oral antidiabetes drugs in a 26-week randomized trial (Liraglutide Effect and Action in Diabetes [LEAD]-6), liraglutide more effectively improved A1C, fasting plasma glucose, and the homeostasis model of β-cell function (HOMA-B) than exenatide, with less persistent nausea and hypoglycemia. In this 14-week extension of LEAD-6, patients switched from 10 μg twice-daily exenatide to 1.8 mg once-daily liraglutide or continued liraglutide.RESULTSSwitching from exenatide to liraglutide further and significantly reduced A1C (0.32%), fasting plasma glucose (0.9 mmol/l), body weight (0.9 kg), and systolic blood pressure (3.8 mmHg) with minimal minor hypoglycemia (1.30 episodes/patient-year) or nausea (3.2%). Among patients continuing liraglutide, further significant decreases in body weight (0.4 kg) and systolic blood pressure (2.2 mmHg) occurred with 0.74 episodes/patient-year of minor hypoglycemia and 1.5% experiencing nausea.CONCLUSIONSConversion from exenatide to liraglutide is well tolerated and provides additional glycemic control and cardiometabolic benefits

Influence of sulphide Cu (I) promoting additives concentration on acid and catalytic properties of high-silica zeolites in straight-run gasoline conversion

In present article the influence of Cu[2]S promoting additives concentration on acid and catalytic properties of high silica MFI-type zeolites is investigated in the process of conversion of straight-run gasoline fractions of gas condensate into high octane components of motor fuels. It was shown that zeolite modified with 1% of Cu[2]S nanoscaled powder possesses the highest acid centers concentration and highest catalytic activity

Unpacking ‘women’s health’ in the context of PPPs: a return to instrumentalism in development policy and practice?

There has been a significant increase in funding for health programmes in development over the last two decades, partly due to the formation of public–private partnerships. This article examines the impact of public–private partnerships from the perspective of women’s health, asks whether the current culture of funding has led to an increased instrumentalism in women’s health programming and what effects this has on how women’s health is addressed at the level of practice. The article is based on research carried out with UK-based non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and its conclusions raise further challenges for improving women’s health policies and programmes in development