The Use of an Online Module to Increase Occupational Therapy Practitioners’ Evidence-based Practice Knowledge and Skills

Purpose: To evaluate the effectiveness of an optional, self-paced, online module to increase occupational therapy practitioners’ knowledge and skills related to evidence-based practice (EBP). Method: Participants’ EBP knowledge and skills were evaluated using the Adapted Fresno Test (AFT) after they completed the online module. Results: Twenty-nine occupational therapy practitioners (25 OTR/L, 4 COTA/L) completed the entire 17-month initiative. Nineteen practitioners (65.5%) used the supplemental online module and 10 (34.5%) did not. Analyses of AFT scores revealed a mean test score of 83.00 (n = 19, SD + 31.11) for participants who utilized the online EBP module and a mean test score of 56.20 (n = 10, SD + 36.67) for participants who did not use the module. An independent sample t test (equal variances assumed) revealed that participants who used the online module achieved statistically significantly higher scores ( p = 0.048, \u3c 0.05) on the AFT. Discussion: The findings from this study suggest that the online EBP module was a useful support in significantly improving occupational therapy practitioners’ knowledge and skills related to evidence-based practice. Conclusions: Online modules may be an effective tool to teach practitioners about EBP. More research is needed to identify particular features of online learning modules that are the most effective in increasing practitioners’’ EBP knowledge and skills

Cost-effectiveness of age-related macular degeneration study supplements in the UK: combined trial and real-world outcomes data

Aims To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of Age-Related Eye Disease Study (AREDS) 1 & 2 supplements in patients with either bilateral intermediate age-related macular degeneration, AREDS category 3, or unilateral neovascular age-related macular degeneration AMD (nAMD), AREDS category 4. Methods A patient-level health state transition model based on levels of visual acuity in the better-seeing eye was constructed to simulate the costs and consequences of patients taking AREDS vitamin supplements. Setting: UK National Health Service (NHS). The model was populated with data from AREDS and real-world outcomes and resource use from a prospective multicentre national nAMD database study containing 92 976 ranibizumab treatment episodes. Interventions Two treatment approaches were compared: immediate intervention with AREDS supplements or no supplements. Main outcome measures: quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) and healthcare costs were accrued for each strategy, and incremental costs and QALYs were calculated for the lifetime of the patient. One-way and probabilistic sensitivity analyses were employed to test the uncertainty of the model. Results For AREDS category 3, the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio was £30 197. For AREDS category 4 compared with no intervention, AREDS supplements are more effective (10.59 vs 10.43 QALYs) and less costly (£52 074 vs 54 900) over the lifetime of the patient. Conclusions The recommendation to publicly fund AREDS supplements to category 3 patients would depend on the healthcare system willingness to pay. In contrast, initiating AREDS supplements in AREDS category 4 patients is both cost saving and more effective than no supplement use and should therefore be considered in public health policy

Rectified Asteroid Albedos and Diameters from IRAS and MSX

Rectified diameters and albedo estimates of 1517 main belt asteroid selected from the IRAS and MSX asteroid photometry catalogues are derived from updated infrared thermal models, the Standard Thermal Model (STM) and the Near Earth Asteroid Thermal Model (NEATM), and Monte Carlo simulations, using new Minor Planet Center (MPC) compilations of absolute magnitudes (H-values) constrained by occultation and radar derived parameters. The NEATM approach produces a more robust estimate of albedos and diameters, yielding albedos of $p_{v}$(NEATM mean)$=0.081 \pm 0.064$. The asteroid beaming parameter ($\eta$) for the selected asteroids has a mean value of $1.07 \pm 0.27$, and the smooth distribution of $\eta$ suggests that this parameter is independent of asteroid properties such as composition. No trends in $\eta$ due to size-dependent rotation rates are evident. Comparison of derived $\eta$'s as a function of taxonomic type indicates the beaming parameter values for S-type and C-type asteroids are identical within the standard deviation of the population of beaming parameters.Comment: 43 pages in manuscript layout, 9 figures. Submitted to The Astronomical Journa

Copy number variants and selective sweeps in natural populations of the house mouse (Mus musculus domesticus)

Copy–number variants (CNVs) may play an important role in early adaptations, potentially facilitating rapid divergence of populations. We describe an approach to study this question by investigating CNVs present in natural populations of mice in the early stages of divergence and their involvement in selective sweeps. We have analyzed individuals from two recently diverged natural populations of the house mouse (Mus musculus domesticus) from Germany and France using custom, high–density, comparative genome hybridization arrays (CGH) that covered almost 164 Mb and 2444 genes. One thousand eight hundred and sixty one of those genes we previously identified as differentially expressed between these populations, while the expression of the remaining genes was invariant. In total, we identified 1868 CNVs across all 10 samples, 200 bp to 600 kb in size and affecting 424 genic regions. Roughly two thirds of all CNVs found were deletions. We found no enrichment of CNVs among the differentially expressed genes between the populations compared to the invariant ones, nor any meaningful correlation between CNVs and gene expression changes. Among the CNV genes, we found cellular component gene ontology categories of the synapse overrepresented among all the 2444 genes tested. To investigate potential adaptive significance of the CNV regions, we selected six that showed large differences in frequency of CNVs between the two populations and analyzed variation in at least two microsatellites surrounding the loci in a sample of 46 unrelated animals from the same populations collected in field trappings. We identified two loci with large differences in microsatellite heterozygosity (Sfi1 and Glo1/Dnahc8 regions) and one locus with low variation across the populations (Cmah), thus suggesting that these genomic regions might have recently undergone selective sweeps. Interestingly, the Glo1 CNV has previously been implicated in anxiety–like behavior in mice, suggesting a differential evolution of a behavioral trai

Shotgun metagenome data of a defined mock community using Oxford Nanopore, PacBio and Illumina technologies.

Metagenomic sequence data from defined mock communities is crucial for the assessment of sequencing platform performance and downstream analyses, including assembly, binning and taxonomic assignment. We report a comparison of shotgun metagenome sequencing and assembly metrics of a defined microbial mock community using the Oxford Nanopore Technologies (ONT) MinION, PacBio and Illumina sequencing platforms. Our synthetic microbial community BMock12 consists of 12 bacterial strains with genome sizes spanning 3.2-7.2 Mbp, 40-73% GC content, and 1.5-7.3% repeats. Size selection of both PacBio and ONT sequencing libraries prior to sequencing was essential to yield comparable relative abundances of organisms among all sequencing technologies. While the Illumina-based metagenome assembly yielded good coverage with few misassemblies, contiguity was greatly improved by both, Illumina + ONT and Illumina + PacBio hybrid assemblies but increased misassemblies, most notably in genomes with high sequence similarity to each other. Our resulting datasets allow evaluation and benchmarking of bioinformatics software on Illumina, PacBio and ONT platforms in parallel

The Reliability and Validity of the Clinical Perfectionism Questionnaire in Eating Disorder and Community Samples

Background: Clinical perfectionism is a risk and maintaining factor for anxiety disorders, depression and eating disorders. Aims: The aim was to examine the psychometric properties of the 12-item Clinical Perfectionism Questionnaire (CPQ). Method: The research involved two samples. Study 1 comprised a nonclinical sample (n = 206) recruited via the internet. Study 2 comprised individuals in treatment for an eating disorder (n = 129) and a community sample (n = 80). Results: Study 1 factor analysis results indicated a two-factor structure. The CPQ had strong correlations with measures of perfectionism and psychopathology, acceptable internal consistency, and discriminative and incremental validity. The results of Study 2 suggested the same two-factor structure, acceptable internal consistency, and construct validity, with the CPQ discriminating between the eating disorder and control groups. Readability was assessed as a US grade 4 reading level (student age range 9–10 years). Conclusions: The findings provide evidence for the reliability and validity of the CPQ in a clinical eating disorder and two separate community samples. Although further research is required the CPQ has promising evidence as a reliable and valid measure of clinical perfectionism

Hierarchical Fragmentation and Jet-like Outflows in IRDC G28.34+0.06, a Growing Massive Protostar Cluster

We present Submillimeter Array (SMA) \lambda = 0.88mm observations of an infrared dark cloud (IRDC) G28.34+0.06. Located in the quiescent southern part of the G28.34 cloud, the region of interest is a massive ($>10^3$\,\msun) molecular clump P1 with a luminosity of $\sim 10^3$ \lsun, where our previous SMA observations at 1.3mm have revealed a string of five dust cores of 22-64 \msun\ along the 1 pc IR-dark filament. The cores are well aligned at a position angle of 48 degrees and regularly spaced at an average projected separation of 0.16 pc. The new high-resolution, high-sensitivity 0.88\,mm image further resolves the five cores into ten compact condensations of 1.4-10.6 \msun, with sizes a few thousands AU. The spatial structure at clump ($\sim 1$ pc) and core ($\sim 0.1$ pc) scales indicates a hierarchical fragmentation. While the clump fragmentation is consistent with a cylindrical collapse, the observed fragment masses are much larger than the expected thermal Jeans masses. All the cores are driving CO(3-2) outflows up to 38 km/s, majority of which are bipolar, jet-like outflows. The moderate luminosity of the P1 clump sets a limit on the mass of protostars of 3-7 \msun. Because of the large reservoir of dense molecular gas in the immediate medium and ongoing accretion as evident by the jet-like outflows, we speculate that P1 will grow and eventually form a massive star cluster. This study provides a first glimpse of massive, clustered star formation that currently undergoes through an intermediate-mass stage.Comment: 24 pages, 4 figures, 4 tables, accepted to Ap

Submillimeter Observations of Dense Clumps in the Infrared Dark Cloud G049.40-00.01

We obtained 350 and 850 micron continuum maps of the infrared dark cloud G049.40-00.01. Twenty-one dense clumps were identified within G049.40-00.01 based on the 350 micron continuum map with an angular resolution of about 9.6". We present submillimeter continuum maps and report physical properties of the clumps. The masses of clumps range from 50 to 600 M_sun. About 70% of the clumps are associated with bright 24 micron emission sources, and they may contain protostars. The most massive two clumps show extended, enhanced 4.5 micron emission indicating vigorous star-forming activity. The clump size-mass distribution suggests that many of them are forming high mass stars. G049.40-00.01 contains numerous objects in various evolutionary stages of star formation, from pre-protostellar clumps to HII regions.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures; accepted for publication in Ap

Rapid and efficient construction of markerless deletions in the Escherichia coli genome

We have developed an improved and rapid genomic engineering procedure for the construction of custom-designed microorganisms. This method, which can be performed in 2 days, permits restructuring of the Escherichia coli genome via markerless deletion of selected genomic regions. The deletion process was mediated by a special plasmid, pREDI, which carries two independent inducible promoters: (i) an arabinose-inducible promoter that drives expression of λ-Red recombination proteins, which carry out the replacement of a target genomic region with a marker-containing linear DNA cassette, and (ii) a rhamnose-inducible promoter that drives expression of I-SceI endonuclease, which stimulates deletion of the introduced marker by double-strand breakage-mediated intramolecular recombination. This genomic deletion was performed successively with only one plasmid, pREDI, simply by changing the carbon source in the bacterial growth medium from arabinose to rhamnose. The efficiencies of targeted region replacement and deletion of the inserted linear DNA cassette were nearly 70 and 100%, respectively. This rapid and efficient procedure can be adapted for use in generating a variety of genome modifications