Exploring Occupational Therapy’s Role in Equine-Assisted Therapy with Veterans

Equine-assisted therapy (EAT) is a treatment that incorporates activities with a horse and the equine environment to reach rehabilitative goals specific to the client\u27s needs and the medical professional\u27s standards of practice (Meregillano, 2004; Path Int, 2021). There are many methods of using a horse in treatment. Therapeutic riding is a component of EAT, as well as horsemanship, groundwork, horse care, and stable management. Hippotherapy is a healthcare professional (OT, PT, SLP) treatment tool that occupational therapists (OT) use the horse\u27s movement to facilitate change (Meregillano, 2004). Some research has demonstrated veterans who work with horses show improvement in quality of life and lower PTSD symptoms, leading to positive changes in self-care, productivity, and leisure (Johnson et al., 2018; Lanning & Krenek, 2013; Olenick et al., 2018). Using the Model of Human Occupation and Person-Environment-Occupation Model, the purpose of this capstone project was to determine OT\u27s role in EAT with veterans to increase occupational engagement in a safe and supportive equine environment, which will allow the veteran to heal. There is a gap in the research related to OT\u27s role in EAT with the veteran population. Using EAT, OTs can individualize treatment sessions to provide benefits in physical, mental, and emotional aspects of veteran lives. This capstone project consisted of three phases of data collection. Phase one was the scoping literature review focused on answering the question: What was the occupational impact of working with equines on the veteran population. Five electronic databases were searched with search terms including equine-assisted therapy and veterans and acceptable related terms such as hippotherapy, therapeutic riding, and EAGALA. Due to the fact, there is little occupational therapy-based research, the OTPF was used as a guide to identifying terms related to OT practice to determine any impact on occupational performance in veterans who participate in EAT. Twelve articles were reviewed after meeting the inclusion criteria. Phase two consisted of a mixed-methods survey to learn the perspective of 11 participants, which included OTs using hippotherapy, veterans, and therapeutic riding staff. Phase three consisted of conducting four informal interviews with stakeholders to perform a needs assessment relative to EAT and veterans. Three main themes were revealed following a thorough thematic analysis process. Veterans who participated in EAT experienced a positive impact on occupational performance. Occupational therapists do have a role in EAT with veterans to contribute to the success of programs and client occupational performance. However, several barriers to practice include funding, reimbursement, and governing equine organization disagreement. This capstone project attempts to promote advocacy for EAT and veterans via a fieldwork proposal to allow opportunities for OT students at USAHS to develop clinical skills in a non-traditional treatment setting with veterans and horses. Further research is needed on the impact of occupations in an equine environment relative to OT practice and research related to finding solutions to the identified barriers found in this project. Advocating to the American Hippotherapy Association to establish supported veteran programming to ensure OTs can use the power of horses to provide care to veterans in need.https://soar.usa.edu/otdcapstonesspring2021/1010/thumbnail.jp

An Extended TOE Framework for Cybersecurity-adoption Decisions

High-profile cybersecurity incidents, such as the 2019 Capital One data breach and the 2017 Equifax breach, have engendered doubts about firms’ trustworthiness and resulted cybersecurity becoming a critical risk factor firms must address. Breaches can precipitate extreme consequences for affected firms’ managers, shareholders, and customers. Unsurprisingly, data breaches represent IT leaders’ biggest concern. In this paper, we report on a qualitative field study in which we interviewed C-level executives and IT consultants to investigate cybersecurity concerns and factors that influence adoption decisions for cybersecurity. We found that the traditional technology-organization-environment (TOE) framework does not fully capture the range of issues in the cybersecurity context. Thus, we propose a new extended TOE framework that pertains specifically to cybersecurity-adoption decisions. This extended framework includes new dimensions, cyber catalysts, practice standards, and new factors under the traditional technology, organization, and environment dimensions

Consistent valuation of project finance and LBO's using the flow-to-equity method

The flows-to-equity method is often used to value highly leveraged projects, or transactions, where debt typically amortises over time according to a fixed schedule. This requires a formula that links the changing leverage over time with a time-varying equity discount rate. We show that the extant formulas in the literature and in textbooks yield incorrect discount rates and valuations because they are inconsistent with fixed debt plans. They result in values that are at odds with the Miller and Modigliani result that levered value equals unlevered value plus financing side effects (adjusted present value). The error from using the wrong formula can be large at the currently low levels of interest rates. We derive an equity discount rate formula that captures the effects of a fixed debt plan, potentially expensive debt, and costs of financial distress that, when applied in the flows-to-equity method, yield values that are consistent with adjusted present value. In short, our formula allows for the correct implementation of the flows-to-equity method under fixed debt plans. In the formula, the cost of debt is the promised yield rather than the expected rate of return of debt

NGC 839: Shocks in an M82-like Superwind

We present observations of NGC 839 made with the Wide Field Spectrograph (WiFeS) on the ANU 2.3m telescope. Our data cover a region 25" x 60" at a spatial resolution of ~1.5". The long axis of the field is aligned with the superwind we have discovered in this starburst galaxy. The data cover the range of 3700-7000 {\AA}, with a spectral resolution R~7000 in the red, and R~3000 in the blue. We find that the stellar component of the galaxy is strongly dominated by a fast rotating intermediate-age (~400 Myr) A-Type stellar population, while the gas is concentrated in a bi-conical polar funnel. We have generated flux distributions, emission line ratio diagnostics and velocity maps in both emission and absorption components. We interpret these in the context of a new grid of low-velocity shock models appropriate for galactic-scale outflows. These models are remarkably well fit to the data, providing for the first time model diagnostics for shocks in superwinds and strongly suggesting that shock excitation is largely responsible for the extended LINER emission in the outflowing gas in NGC 839. Our work may have important implications both for extended LINER emission seen in other galaxies, as well as in the interpretation of objects with "composite" spectra. Finally, we present a scenario for the formation of E+A galaxies based upon our observations of NGC 839, and its relation to M82.Comment: 12 pages and 13 figures. Accepted for publication in Ap

Ethyl 5-[6-(furan-2-yl)-1,2,4-triazolo[3,4-b][1,3,4]thia­diazol-3-yl]-2,6-di­methylnicotinate

In the title compound, C17H15N5O3S, the plane of the triazolo–thia­diazole system forms dihedral angles of 15.68 and 4.46° with the planes of the pyridine and furan rings, respectively. In the mol­ecule, there is an intra­molecular C—H⋯N inter­action. The crystal structure also contains other inter­molecular inter­actions, such as C—H⋯O hydrogen bonds, π–π stacking (centroid–centroid distances = 3.746 and 3.444 Å), non-bonded S⋯N [3.026 (2) Å] and C—H⋯π inter­actions

Cutting Edge: Lessons from fraxinus, a crowd-sourced citizen science game in genomics

In 2013, in response to an epidemic of ash dieback disease in England the previous year, we launched a Facebook-based game called Fraxinus to enable non-scientists to contribute to genomics studies of the pathogen that causes the disease and the ash trees that are devastated by it. Over a period of 51 weeks players were able to match computational alignments of genetic sequences in 78% of cases, and to improve them in 15% of cases. We also found that most players were only transiently interested in the game, and that the majority of the work done was performed by a small group of dedicated players. Based on our experiences we have built a linear model for the length of time that contributors are likely to donate to a crowd-sourced citizen science project. This model could serve a guide for the design and implementation of future crowd-sourced citizen science initiatives

Neuronal deletion of the circadian clock gene Bmal1 induces cell-autonomous dopaminergic neurodegeneration

Circadian rhythm dysfunction is a hallmark of Parkinson disease (PD), and diminished expression of the core clock gene Bmal1 has been described in patients with PD. BMAL1 is required for core circadian clock function but also serves nonrhythmic functions. Germline Bmal1 deletion can cause brain oxidative stress and synapse loss in mice, and it can exacerbate dopaminergic neurodegeneration in response to the toxin MPTP. Here we examined the effect of cell type-specific Bmal1 deletion on dopaminergic neuron viability in vivo. We observed that global, postnatal deletion of Bmal1 caused spontaneous loss of tyrosine hydroxylase+ (TH+) dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra pars compacta (SNpc). This was not replicated by light-induced disruption of behavioral circadian rhythms and was not induced by astrocyte- or microglia-specific Bmal1 deletion. However, either pan-neuronal or TH neuron-specific Bmal1 deletion caused cell-autonomous loss of TH+ neurons in the SNpc. Bmal1 deletion did not change the percentage of TH neuron loss after α-synuclein fibril injection, though Bmal1-KO mice had fewer TH neurons at baseline. Transcriptomics analysis revealed dysregulation of pathways involved in oxidative phosphorylation and Parkinson disease. These findings demonstrate a cell-autonomous role for BMAL1 in regulating dopaminergic neuronal survival and may have important implications for neuroprotection in PD

Blow-up profile of rotating 2D focusing Bose gases

We consider the Gross-Pitaevskii equation describing an attractive Bose gas trapped to a quasi 2D layer by means of a purely harmonic potential, and which rotates at a fixed speed of rotation $\Omega$. First we study the behavior of the ground state when the coupling constant approaches $a\_*$ , the critical strength of the cubic nonlinearity for the focusing nonlinear Schr{\"o}dinger equation. We prove that blow-up always happens at the center of the trap, with the blow-up profile given by the Gagliardo-Nirenberg solution. In particular, the blow-up scenario is independent of $\Omega$, to leading order. This generalizes results obtained by Guo and Seiringer (Lett. Math. Phys., 2014, vol. 104, p. 141--156) in the non-rotating case. In a second part we consider the many-particle Hamiltonian for $N$ bosons, interacting with a potential rescaled in the mean-field manner $--a\_N N^{2\beta--1} w(N^{\beta} x), with$w$a positive function such that$\int\_{\mathbb{R}^2} w(x) dx = 1$. Assuming that$\beta < 1/2$and that$a\_N \to a\_*$sufficiently slowly, we prove that the many-body system is fully condensed on the Gross-Pitaevskii ground state in the limit$N \to \infty$