Making Sense of Blockchain in Food Supply-Chains

Blockchain is a potentially disruptive and game-changing technology that has created excitement about its potential applications. The agriculture industry in New Zealand is facing increased pressure to be able to accurately track and trace their produce in order to provide higher levels of proof to their customers. This study used a q-methodology approach to examine whether blockchain technology can be the solution to these issues and provides recommendations as to what businesses need to in order to make this a reality. The empirical research revealed four distinct groups within the industry; each with different perspectives of blockchain and its potential. Results also found that while industry experts believe blockchain implementation is inevitable and it will solve the current issues, factors such as high set-up costs and the complexity of technology may be inhibitors. Based on these findings, key recommendations on how the industry should proceed in order to overcome these factors that are preventing adoption are derived. Further research is suggested on how the challenges of food safety and security may be overcome with emerging technologies such as Blockchain, IoT and AI

Health care deprivation profiles in the measurement of inequality and inequity: an application to GP fundholding in the English NHS

This paper proposes a new approach to the measurement of inequality and inequity in the delivery of health care based on contributions from the literature on poverty and deprivation. This approach has some appealing characteristics: (1) inequity is additively decomposable by population subgroups; (2) the approach does not rely on socio-economic ranks; (3) it provides a graphical representation of the distribution of inequity; (4) it offers a range of indices consistent with dominance. An empirical application is provided investigating the effect of the GP fundholding reform on equity in English NHS. The results show that the most equitable GP practices self-selected into the scheme in 1991; evidence of an inequity-reducing treatment effect as well as a self-selection effect are found in 1992 and 1993; the self-selection process reduces and no evidence of a treatment effect is present thereafter

"She's gone now." A mixed methods analysis of the experiences and perceptions around the deaths of children who died unexpectedly in health care facilities in Cape Town, South Africa.

PURPOSE:The sudden death of a child is a catastrophic event for both the family and the healthcare workers involved. Confidential enquiries provide a biomedical depiction of the processes and quality of care delivered and drive improvements in care. However, these rarely include an assessment of the patient/caregiver experience which is increasingly regarded as a key measure of quality of care. METHODS:A parallel convergent mixed methods design was used to compare and contrast medically-assessed clinical quality of care with caregiver perceptions of quality and care in a cohort of sudden childhood deaths in emergency facilities in Cape Town, South Africa. RESULTS:Amongst the 29 sudden childhood deaths, clinical quality of care was assessed as poor in 11 (38%) and the death was considered avoidable or potentially avoidable in 16 (55%). The main themes identified from the caregivers were their perception of the quality of care delivered (driven by perceived healthcare worker effort, empathy and promptness), the way the family was dealt with during the final resuscitation, and communications at the time of and after the death. Ten (35%) caregivers were predominantly negative about the care delivered, of whom four received fair clinical quality of care; 13 (49%) of caregivers had predominantly positive experiences, one of whom received poor clinical quality of care. CONCLUSIONS:Caregivers' experiences of the healthcare service around their child's death are influenced largely by the way healthcare workers communicate with them, as well as the perceived clinical effort. This is not always concordant with the clinically assessed quality of care. Simple interventions such as protocols and education of healthcare workers in dealing with families of a dying or deceased child could improve families' experiences at a time when they are most vulnerable

Accelerating the Evolution of Nonhuman Primate Neuroimaging

© 2019 Elsevier Inc. Nonhuman primate neuroimaging is on the cusp of a transformation, much in the same way its human counterpart was in 2010, when the Human Connectome Project was launched to accelerate progress. Inspired by an open data-sharing initiative, the global community recently met and, in this article, breaks through obstacles to define its ambitions