Productivity, Product Differentiation And Profitability In The Greek Chemical Industry: An Empirical Analysis, 1991 And 2001

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between the profitability of the firm and its R&D expenditures. We separate R&D expenditures in two main categories, R&D that focuses on the product differentiation and R&D that concerns improvements in production process. The latter leads to more efficient production, which can be measured by labour productivity. We estimate our model using cross section analysis and test the significance of each one of rhe R&D expenditures in firms profitability. Our model was applied to the Greek chemical industry, for a data set of 124 enterprises, in two distinct years, 1991 and 2001. Our findings support that the role of productivity is growing within time

Acute Heart Failure in a Healthy Young Patient after Severe Carbon Monoxide Poisoning

Introduction: Carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning may cause severe cellular hypoxia. Materials and methods: A 28-year-old male presented reduced levels of consciousness and dyspnoea after CO exposure. Clinical examination revealed tachypnoea, bilateral rales, dilated jugular veins and confusion. Troponin I, lactate and carboxyhaemoglobin levels were increased. Thoracic X-ray depicted pulmonary oedema and an echocardiogram, severe heart failure (HF; EF<25%). He was intubated due to clinical deterioration. Results: He remained intubated for 5 days with excellent improvement of left ventricular function (EF>55%). He was discharged 1 week later with full recovery. Discussion: Acute HF is a rare serious complication of CO poisoning, even in healthy young individuals

Strange homelands: encountering the migrant on the contemporary Greek stage

This article examines three examples from recent Greek theatre which stage experiences of migrants and refugees against the backdrop of Greece’s growing internationalism and multiculturalism. In allowing migrants to author their own narratives of border-crossing and encountering their new “homeland”, those theatrical endeavours, I argue, attempt to break the monologism of Greek theatre and monolithic understandings of national identity thus opening up spaces for encountering diverse voices. In acknowledging the risks and tensions underpinning the migrant’s presence on stage, the article also applies pressure to questions of encounter, authenticity, representation and self-expression of migratory subjects and interrogates some ways in which they navigate their precarious space of belonging and author themselves in the context of contemporary Greek theatre

Consumers’ Trust in Greek Traditional Foods in the Post COVID-19 Era

We are entering a new, unprecedented global economic and social era following the COVID-19 pandemic, in which there will be opportunities and threats for the goods and services provided. Traditional foods (TFs) could have their chances in the new food chain which will be developed, as long as they become the food of choice for the consumers of the future. This paper investigates consumers’ trust in Greek TFs, and northwest Greek TFs, in order to assess their potential consumption in the new economy. Trust was tested using the variables of safety, healthiness, sustainability, authenticity and taste, assessing consumers’ confidence and satisfaction with the TFs, their raw materials, and the technologies used for their production. A self-response questionnaire survey was carried out in May and June 2021 on a sample of 548 participants through the Google platform. In order to analyze the data, basic descriptive statistical tools were used, combined with crosstabs and chi-square tests. The results show that the participants trust the Greek TFs because they “strongly agree” by an average of 20%, and “agree” by an average of 50% that they are safe, healthy, sustainable, authentic and tasty. A similar pattern was recorded for the regional northwest Greek TFs as well. These results indicate that TFs could be the food of choice because they bear consumers’ trust in the coming “new normality”, where trust will be a major factor of choice for the purchase of goods and services.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Consumers’ Trust in Greek Traditional Foods in the Post COVID-19 Era

We are entering a new, unprecedented global economic and social era following the COVID-19 pandemic, in which there will be opportunities and threats for the goods and services provided. Traditional foods (TFs) could have their chances in the new food chain which will be developed, as long as they become the food of choice for the consumers of the future. This paper investigates consumers’ trust in Greek TFs, and northwest Greek TFs, in order to assess their potential consumption in the new economy. Trust was tested using the variables of safety, healthiness, sustainability, authenticity and taste, assessing consumers’ confidence and satisfaction with the TFs, their raw materials, and the technologies used for their production. A self-response questionnaire survey was carried out in May and June 2021 on a sample of 548 participants through the Google platform. In order to analyze the data, basic descriptive statistical tools were used, combined with crosstabs and chi-square tests. The results show that the participants trust the Greek TFs because they “strongly agree” by an average of 20%, and “agree” by an average of 50% that they are safe, healthy, sustainable, authentic and tasty. A similar pattern was recorded for the regional northwest Greek TFs as well. These results indicate that TFs could be the food of choice because they bear consumers’ trust in the coming “new normality”, where trust will be a major factor of choice for the purchase of goods and services

Information System for Symptom Diagnosis and Improvement of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: Protocol for a Nonrandomized Controlled Pilot Study

BackgroundAttention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common neurodevelopmental disorders during childhood; however, the diagnosis procedure remains challenging, as it is nonstandardized, multiparametric, and highly dependent on subjective evaluation of the perceived behavior. ObjectiveTo address the challenges of existing procedures for ADHD diagnosis, the ADHD360 project aims to develop a platform for (1) early detection of ADHD by assessing the user’s likelihood of having ADHD characteristics and (2) providing complementary training for ADHD management. MethodsA 2-phase nonrandomized controlled pilot study was designed to evaluate the ADHD360 platform, including ADHD and non-ADHD participants aged 7 to 16 years. At the first stage, an initial neuropsychological evaluation along with an interaction with the serious game developed (“Pizza on Time”) for approximately 30-45 minutes is performed. Subsequently, a 2-week behavior monitoring of the participants through the mADHD360 app is planned after a telephone conversation between the participants’ parents and the psychologist, where the existence of any behaviors characteristic of ADHD that affect daily functioning is assessed. Once behavior monitoring is complete, the research team invites the participants to the second stage, where they play the game for a mean duration of 10 weeks (2 times per week). Once the serious game is finished, a second round of behavior monitoring is performed following the same procedures as the initial one. During the study, gameplay data were collected and preprocessed. The protocol of the pilot trials was initially designed for in-person participation, but after the COVID-19 outbreak, it was adjusted for remote participation. State-of-the-art machine learning (ML) algorithms were used to analyze labeled gameplay data aiming to detect discriminative gameplay patterns among the 2 groups (ADHD and non-ADHD) and estimate a player’s likelihood of having ADHD characteristics. A schema including a train-test splitting with a 75:25 split ratio, k-fold cross-validation with k=3, an ML pipeline, and data evaluation were designed. ResultsA total of 43 participants were recruited for this study, where 18 were diagnosed with ADHD and the remaining 25 were controls. Initial neuropsychological assessment confirmed that the participants in the ADHD group showed a deviation from the participants without ADHD characteristics. A preliminary analysis of collected data consisting of 30 gameplay sessions showed that the trained ML models achieve high performance (ie, accuracy up to 0.85) in correctly predicting the users’ labels (ADHD or non-ADHD) from their gameplay session on the ADHD360 platform. ConclusionsADHD360 is characterized by its notable capacity to discriminate player gameplay behavior as either ADHD or non-ADHD. Therefore, the ADHD360 platform could be a valuable complementary tool for early ADHD detection. Trial RegistrationClinicalTrials.gov NCT04362982; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04362982 International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID)RR1-10.2196/4018