Currency Unions and Irish External Trade

Ireland has participated in two currency unions - a bilateral union with the United Kingdom that lasted until 1979 and as a founder member of European Monetary Union that began in 1999. This paper investigates whether currency unions have influenced Irish trade patterns.

Rare and undiagnosed: Daunting challenges for patients, doctors, and researchers alike

This personal narrative identifies several challenges for patients, doctors, and researchers posed by rare illnesses and difficult to diagnose/long-term undiagnosed patients. In it, I describe several observations on my experiences as a long-time undiagnosed patient and now as one with multiple rare conditions. Rare conditions are all too often missed in diagnosis or dismissed, and treatment is often significantly delayed, such as it was in my case for nearly two years. Adding rare symptoms into the mix makes the challenges of diagnosis and treatment even greater, and I had some extremely rare symptoms. The only way I was able to identify my symptoms as being associated with my suspected diagnosis was by researching assiduously until I finally found a one-off case study describing two women with the same symptoms and with a diagnosis akin to the one my doctor was considering for me. I was able to rely on this case study; but when we consider that many medical practitioners, even medical specialists, don’t submit research papers for publication, it is clear there are holes in the reporting system when it comes to rare conditions. My neurologist, for example, does not publish, and so my case study is not in the medical literature. There need to be outlets for posting of such anomalies as I experienced if rare illnesses and rare conditions are to be fully documented in the literature. Experience Framework This article is associated with the Quality & Clinical Excellence lens of The Beryl Institute Experience Framework (https://www.theberylinstitute.org/ExperienceFramework). Access other PXJ articles related to this lens. Access other resources related to this lens

Awakening from a medical mystery: one patient’s experience of being undiagnosed

This personal narrative pleads for a supportive and comprehensive system or sub-system similar to that which exists for cancer patients, to deal with undiagnosed illnesses. By describing the torment of living with a debilitating illness that medicine could not easily recognize, then by contrasting this experience with my wife’s experience of the cancer care system, and by referring along the way to lessons learned many years ago from reading the works of the inciteful neurologist, Dr. Oliver Sacks, I hope to inspire the medical system to develop a separate, supportive and comprehensive system to deal with the undiagnosed. As it turns out, my mystery illness was a spontaneous cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) leak. This condition is all too often missed in diagnosis or dismissed, and treatment is often significantly delayed, such as it was in my case for nearly two years. At the same time, my wife experienced the cancer system, allowing us to draw contrasts between the two experiences and leading me to implore the system to draw the two approaches together by identifying some of the missing elements for those with undiagnosed illnesses. To conclude, I make reference to the relatively new Undiagnosed Diseases Network as one possible model to accomplish the above goal across the medical system or within local medical systems. Experience Framework This article is associated with the Quality & Clinical Excellence lens of The Beryl Institute Experience Framework. (http://bit.ly/ExperienceFramework) Access other PXJ articles related to this lens. Access other resources related to this lens

Washington State Teacher-administrator Liability in Industrial Education Accidents

This paper presents the history and development of liability of teachers of industrial education in the State of Washington. The study was designed to give industrial education teachers a basic understanding of tort liability and the ways in which to prevent tort suits. Reconmendations included further investigation of teacher liability insurance and that teachers of industrial education in the State of Washington become more concerned and aware of the potentially hazardous situations in their teaching laboratories

Techniques in Studying the Effect of Self-Support Upon the Grades of College Students

Self-support has become a major interest on today\u27s campus, and there are many conflicting opinions regarding its advantages and disadvantages. Regardless of whether it has more advantages than disadvantages or vice versa, self-support is a living problem and must be faced. Hence we must be concerned with its relationships to the many aspects of the life of the student. The disagreements are chiefly concerned with the health, extra-curricular-activity participation, social life, happiness, schedule load, and scholastic standing of the students engaged in self-support. We shall confine our discussion to the relationship of self-support and the academic grades of college students

Problems of East Tennessee teachers of vocational agriculture and corrective measures they proposed

The purpose of this study was to determine the problems confronted by East Tennessee teachers of vocational agriculture in planning and conducting a vocational agriculture program and the in-service educational aids teachers proposed to help solve these problems. For purposes of analysis the study was divided into the following questions: 1. What areas of responsibility cause the greatest difficulty to teachers of vocational agriculture? 2. What problems do teachers of vocational agriculture encounter most frequently in each area of responsibility? 3. What in-service education aids do teachers of vocational agriculture propose most frequently to help solve their problems

More Than Just Dictionaries: Exploring the Incorporation and Use of Linguistically Inclusive Materials in a Middle School Library Media Center

The school library media center (SLMC) is a space in schools that can be overlooked when trying to reach students. The English language learner (ELL) population is a sector of the student population that is growing in the United States, and growing at faster rates in the state of South Carolina. With a growing population of ELL students, there are also misconceptions about the incorporation of native language materials in the academic setting. Being able to offer ELL students the opportunity to utilize their home languages can encourage the use of the SLMC. This study implemented an intervention to determine if the incorporation of native language materials for ELL students increased their participation in the SLMC. This study implemented a convergent parallel design with a mixed methods approach. The study included an observation of a middle school library media center to track movements through spaces created by the library media specialist (LMS). This study also relied on interviews with critical stakeholders in the school and circulation data for the SLMC\u27s literary collection, specifically the native language materials checked out during the observation. I also utilized a parental survey with ELL parents to include the perspective of this important population

Equity in maternal health in South Africa: analysis of health service access and health status in a national household survey

Background: South Africa is increasingly focused on reducing maternal mortality. Documenting variation in access to maternal health services across one of the most inequitable nations could assist in re-direction of resources. Methods: Analysis draws on a population-based household survey that used multistage-stratified sampling. Women, who in the past two years were pregnant (1113) or had a child (1304), completed questionnaires and HIV testing. Distribution of access to maternal health services and health status across socio-economic, education and other population groups was assessed using weighted data. Findings: Poorest women had near universal antenatal care coverage (ANC), but only 39.6% attended before 20 weeks gestation; this figure was 2.7-fold higher in the wealthiest quartile (95%CI adjusted odds ratio = 1.2-6.1). Women in rural-formal areas had lowest ANC coverage (89.7%), percentage completing four ANC visits (79.7%) and only 84.0% were offered HIV testing. Testing levels were highest among the poorest quartile (90.1% in past two years), but 10% of women above 40 or with low education had never tested. Skilled birth attendant coverage (overall 95.3%) was lowest in the poorest quartile (91.4%) and rural formal areas (85.6%). Around two thirds of the wealthiest quartile, of white and of formally-employed women had a doctor at childbirth, 11-fold higher than the poorest quartile. Overall, only 44.4% of pregnancies were planned, 31.7% of HIV-infected women and 68.1% of the wealthiest quartile. Self-reported health status also declined considerably with each drop in quartile, education level or age group. Conclusions: Aside from early ANC attendance and deficiencies in care in rural-formal areas, inequalities in utilisation of services were mostly small, with some measures even highest among the poorest. Considerably larger differences were noted in maternal health status across population groups. This may reflect differences between these groups in quality of care received, HIV infection and in social determinants of health

Is Physical Boar Exposure Required for Accurate Detection of Estrus in Gilts?

Accuracy of estrus detection in response to physical (PBE) vs fenceline (FBE) boar exposure was evaluated in 40 gilts during two successive estrous periods. Gilts heat checked with FBE expressed shorter estrous periods (.6 day) than PBE gilts. Estrus was detected within five minutes of boar exposure in 100 percent of gilts on both treatments except for PBE gilts on the first day of estrus. The first day of estrus was expressed after five minutes of boar exposure in 16.2 percent of PBE vs 0 percent of FBE gilts. The PBE gilts may be near the beginning of estrus. They are unresponsive to limited (15 min) FBE and slow to respond to PBE. Fertility was not compared in this study, but inseminations timed 12 to 24 hours after detection of estrus in these gilts (gilts not detected with FBE and slow to respond to PBE on their first day of estrus) will be too late to result in high fertility. Ovulation will occur or be in progress in these gilts at the time of insemination. Therefore, heat-detection with physical boar exposure rather than fence-line boar exposure is recommended to achieve proper timing of insemination and high fertility in gilts