A Review of Generalizability and Transportability

When assessing causal effects, determining the target population to which the results are intended to generalize is a critical decision. Randomized and observational studies each have strengths and limitations for estimating causal effects in a target population. Estimates from randomized data may have internal validity but are often not representative of the target population. Observational data may better reflect the target population, and hence be more likely to have external validity, but are subject to potential bias due to unmeasured confounding. While much of the causal inference literature has focused on addressing internal validity bias, both internal and external validity are necessary for unbiased estimates in a target population. This paper presents a framework for addressing external validity bias, including a synthesis of approaches for generalizability and transportability, the assumptions they require, as well as tests for the heterogeneity of treatment effects and differences between study and target populations.Comment: 30 pages, 3 figure

Estimating Causal Impacts of Scaling a Voluntary Policy Intervention

Evaluations often inform future program implementation decisions. However, the implementation context may differ, sometimes substantially, from the evaluation study context. This difference leads to uncertainty regarding the relevance of evaluation findings to future decisions. Voluntary interventions pose another challenge to generalizability, as we do not know precisely who will volunteer for the intervention in the future. We present a novel approach for estimating target population average treatment effects among the treated by generalizing results from an observational study to projected volunteers within the target population (the treated group). Our estimation approach can accommodate flexible outcome regression estimators such as Bayesian Additive Regression Trees (BART) and Bayesian Causal Forests (BCF). Our generalizability approach incorporates uncertainty regarding target population treatment status into the posterior credible intervals to better reflect the uncertainty of scaling a voluntary intervention. In a simulation based on real data, we demonstrate that these flexible estimators (BCF and BART) improve performance over estimators that rely on parametric regressions. We use our approach to estimate impacts of scaling up Comprehensive Primary Care Plus, a health care payment model intended to improve quality and efficiency of primary care, and we demonstrate the promise of scaling to a targeted subgroup of practices.Comment: 26 pages, 5 figures, appendi

Мorphology of the rat knee joint after intraarticular injection of hydroxymethyl-quinoxaline dioxide

Topical antiseptics are widely used in orthopedics and traumatology. However, studies highlighting the effects of antiseptics during long-term use on joint tissues are limited. In the performed work, the peculiarities of the structure of intra-articular tissues of the knee joint and muscles in rats in two series of experiments were noted: control group (saline injection into the joint) and experimental group (hydroxymethyl-quinoxaline dioxide injection into the joint) daily for 5 days. Histological methods with semi-quantitative assessment of articular cartilage and synovial membrane were used. During the first day after the drug administration, similar reactive changes to the injection of saline and hydroxymethyl-quinoxaline dioxide were observed in the joint tissues of the two groups of rats. The synovial membrane of the capsule was thickened, and synoviocytes were hypertrophied. The articular cartilage contains single cells with dense nuclei only in the superficial parts, but in general, the cytoarchitectonics of articular cartilage was preserved. In 5 days after injection, no statistically significant differences between saline and hydroxymethyl-quinoxaline dioxide were observed for the study periods. According to the studies the safety of long-term use of the drug as an antiseptic for articular tissues was confirme

Conditional Cross-Design Synthesis Estimators for Generalizability in Medicaid

While much of the causal inference literature has focused on addressing internal validity biases, both internal and external validity are necessary for unbiased estimates in a target population of interest. However, few generalizability approaches exist for estimating causal quantities in a target population when the target population is not well-represented by a randomized study but is reflected when additionally incorporating observational data. To generalize to a target population represented by a union of these data, we propose a class of novel conditional cross-design synthesis estimators that combine randomized and observational data, while addressing their respective biases. The estimators include outcome regression, propensity weighting, and double robust approaches. All use the covariate overlap between the randomized and observational data to remove potential unmeasured confounding bias. We apply these methods to estimate the causal effect of managed care plans on health care spending among Medicaid beneficiaries in New York City.Comment: 25 pages, 4 figures; supplement of 31 pages, 12 figures, and 4 table

Regional choreographic schools in Ukraine: the socio-cultural and pedagogical aspects

It is very important to preserve and develop folk choreographic culture in the modern socio-cultural space research of regional dance traditions. This is especially true for those territories, which are now only fragmentarily represented in Ukrainian art history. The aim of this study was to identify the main trends and establish the peculiarities of socio-cultural and pedagogical aspects of regional dance schools in Ukraine. This cross-sectional study was carried out on a sample of 264 scientific and pedagogical employees engaged in scientific and teaching activities in the field of choreography at higher education institutions in Ukraine, namely Kyiv University of Culture, Kyiv National University of Culture and Arts (KNUCA), Volyn National University named after Lesya Ukrainka, and Kyiv Municipal Academy of Variety and Circus Arts. While writing this article, we also analyzed the works of international researchers. A questionnaire consisting of 4 questions was used for data collection and the analytical methods were descriptive statistics (percentage). According to the study results, the features of the formation of choreographic schools in different geographical and cultural regions of Ukraine highlight promising areas of their development from the perspective of scholars of choreography engaged in scientific and teaching activities in higher education institutions. In conclusion, Ukrainian regional choreography is a creative and multidimensional phenomenon. In each region of Ukraine, folk ethnography is characterized by its authentic features and way of performance due to geographical, historical, social, political, economic, and other factors

Place of information technologies of training at the process of medical education

Місце інформаційних технологій навчання в процесі медичної освіти. Сьогодні складно уявити галузь, професію, спеціальність без участі, в більшій чи меншій мірі, інформаційних технологій з різним ступенем їх інтеграції в процеси діяльності. Активний розвиток інформаційних потоків в свою чергу вимагає адаптації моделі освіти та інформаційно-освітніх середовищ. Одне з визначень основної мети інформатизації - це глобальна раціоналізація інтелектуальної діяльності. Ми хочемо розкрити потенціал інформатизації стосовно навчання в вищих медичних установах, показати можливості і поділитися власними думками та досвідом. Але при цьому хочемо нагадати, що не дивлячись на видимі позитивні ефекти інформатизації, необхідно розуміти, що запорукою успіху освітньої роботи залишається цілеспрямована спільна діяльність викладача та самого учня. Today it is difficult to imagine the branch, profession, specialty without participation, in the majority of cases, of information technologies with various extent of their integration into activity processes. Active development of information streams in a turn demands adaptation a model of educational-information and education environments. One of definitions main objective of informatization is a global rationalization of the intellectual activity, which provides autoformalization of the subject domains and autonomy process of knowledge of each individual, towards with free access to all types, forms and levels of educational knowledge We want to reveal the potential of informatization in relation to training in higher medical institutions, to show opportunities and share experiences, but finally, despite on the quickly developing of modern technologies, visible positive effects of informatization, it is necessary to understand, that purposeful common activity of the teacher and trainee is a key to success of educational work

Структурно-параметрическое представление данных на основе методов оптимизации второго порядка

Для роботи з різного типу даними в режимі реального часу виникає потреба використовувати адаптивні підходи, що здатні налаштовувати параметри моделі у міру надходження нової інформації. Запропоновано алгоритми подання динамічних потоків даних у заданих структурах, що базуються на оптимізації певних типів нев’язок. Для побудови моделей використано метод Ньютона як ефективний через його високу збіжність. Такі підходи мають на меті коригування вектора невідомих параметрів на підставі нових спостережень шляхом розв’язання систем звичайних диференціальних рівнянь. Початкові дані обрано з урахуванням оцінок, виведених на основі теорії практичної стійкості. Проведено обчислювальний експеримент, у якому порівнюються моделі, побудовані на методах оптимізації першого та другого порядків, що підтверджує доцільність використання розроблених підходів.Working with various data sources in real-time requires approaches capable of adaptive parameters tuning. We propose algorithms that represent dynamic data streams in apriori defined structures. The algorithms are based on the certain error minimization. The used method is Newton's method, which is appropriate because of its high convergence. At every step, when the new data are received we make corrections to the unknown parameters vector by solving differential equations systems. Initial values are selected using estimates obtained from the practical stability theory. The computational experiment was conducted to compare models based on the first and second order optimization approaches. It confirms the effectiveness of our approach.Для работы с разного типа данными в режиме реального времени возникает необходимость использовать адаптивные подходы, которые дают возможность настраивать параметры модели по мере поступления новой информации. Предложены алгоритмы представления динамических потоков данных в заданных структурах, основанные на оптимизации некоторых типов невязок. Для построения моделей предлагается использовать метод Ньютона, эффективность которого обусловлена его высокой сходимостью. Такие подходы нацелены на коррекцию вектора неизвестных параметров на основании новых наблюдений посредством решения систем обыкновенных дифференциальных уравнений. Начальные данные выбраны с учетом оценок, выведенных на основе теории практической устойчивости. Проведен вычислительный эксперимент, в котором сравниваются модели, построенные на методах оптимизации первого и второго порядка, что подтверждает целесообразность использования разработанных подходов

Cognitive decline and healthy aging: an online activities and psychoeducational program for older adults in the context of COVID-19 Pandemic: preliminary results

AbstractBackground: The preventive and compulsory social isolation regulations due to COVID-19 affected the entire population, but this became more emphasized in the group of older adults. Many older adults who attended workshops, retirement centers and clubs had to interrupt their activities. This has impacted negatively on their activity level, socialization, and emotional state. The aim of the present study is to present preliminary results of the implementation of an online activities and psychoeducational program to prevent cognitive decline and promote healthy aging habits on older adults who live in Argentina in the context of Covid-19 Pandemic.Method. Design: Descriptive study. Subjects: 396 self-validated older adults, male and female. Instruments: socio-demographic and social participation questionnaire. Procedure: The intervention consists of a series of workshops (yoga, meditation, gym, singing lessons, memory, preparation for retirement and reflection about grief) and monthly specialist ´s talks on different topics about healthy aging. All the activities where done through zoom platform. All participants where offer one to one capacitation and written material about how to use this platform. Older adults could choose in how many activities they would take part in.Results. Data of 396 older adults who have taken part in the on-line version of the program on 2020 indicate that median age was 70.66 years old (ds= 8,7) of which 86 % were women. 79 % took part in specialists talks and 68 % on workshops and talks.Discussion: These results provide empirical evidence regarding the need to implement online intervention programs for older adults. Participating in an online educational program could increase participant?s cognitive healthy habits literacy, empowerment and engagement in brain health promotion activities, which in turn could reduce their dementia risk and feeling of loneliness in pandemic context.Fil: Feldberg, Carolina. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Tartaglini, María Florencia. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Hermida, Paula Daniela. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Investigaciones Cardiológicas. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Medicina. Instituto de Investigaciones Cardiológicas; ArgentinaFil: Somale, Maria Veronica. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Orellano, Anabel. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Ortiz, Juan Pablo. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Teran, Claudio. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Kasten, Sergio. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: De Cara, Josefina. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Degtiar, Marina. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Langer, Camilo. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Benetti, Laureana. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Redoni, Emiliano. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaFil: Gracia, Claudia. Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires S. A.; ArgentinaAlzheimer's Association International ConferenceDenverEstados UnidosAlzheimer's Associatio