National Survey to Identify Mental Health Topics in Entry-level OT and OTA Curricula: Implications for Occupational Therapy Education

Mental health has been identified as a priority practice area for occupational therapy. However, recent research suggests that the number of occupational therapy practitioners working in mental health is declining. The purpose of this survey research study was to examine the extent to which occupational therapy (OT) and occupational therapy assistant (OTA) programs include mental health topics in their curricula. A link to an on-line survey was sent to program directors of OT and OTA programs in the United States. A total of 105 programs fully completed the survey (33% response rate). All of the respondents (n=105) reported that their curricula included content related to adult mental health conditions and interventions and 98.1% (n=103) included content related to 11 child and adolescent mental health conditions. Programs varied in how explicitly they focused on specific intervention strategies to support or improve mental health. Focused pre-service curricular content and intentional fieldwork experiences may help to ensure that OT practitioners are inducted into mental health settings and equipped to meet practice demands. Entry-level OT and OTA programs cover a broad range of mental health-related topics. More research is needed to understand why some topics are included in curricula at greater rates than others

Perceptions of Occupational Therapy Involvement in School Mental Health: A Pilot Study

Background: Mental health providers outside of occupational therapy, including those who work in school systems practice, often do not fully understand the contribution that occupational therapy practitioners can make to the delivery of mental health services. Method: The purpose of this mixed methods pilot study is to describe how instructional support staff from one special education cooperative learned about occupational therapy’s role in school mental health and to explain how this education changed the instructional support staff members’ perceptions regarding the involvement of occupational therapy practitioners in school-based mental health services. Results: Instructional support staff\u27s perceptions about occupational therapy changed as a result of the training. Discussion: Occupational therapy practitioners can be viewed as valuable members of the school mental health team if other practitioners are educated about their scope of practice

An Integrated Object Model and Method Framework for Subject-Centric e-Research Applications

A framework that integrates an object model, research methods (workflows), the capture of experimental data sets and the provenance of those data sets for subject-centric research is presented. The design of the Framework object model draws on and extends pre-existing object models in the public domain. In particular the Framework tracks the state and life cycle of a subject during an experimental method, provides for reusable subjects, primary, derived and recursive data sets of arbitrary content types, and defines a user-friendly and practical scheme for citably identifying information in a distributed environment. The Framework is currently used to manage neuroscience Magnetic Resonance and microscopy imaging data sets in both clinical and basic neuroscience research environments. The Framework facilitates multi-disciplinary and collaborative subject-based research, and extends earlier object models used in the research imaging domain. Whilst the Framework has been explicitly validated for neuroimaging research applications, it has broader application to other fields of subject-centric research

Why you shouldn't start beta-blockers before surgery

A new meta-analysis finds that initiating beta-blockers before surgery increases patiens' risk of death. Practice changer: Do not routinely initiate beta-blockers in patients undergoing intermediate- or high-risk noncardiac surgery. Beta-blockers appear to increase the 30-day risk of all-cause mortality

The Cosmic Coincidence as a Temporal Selection Effect Produced by the Age Distribution of Terrestrial Planets in the Universe

The energy densities of matter and the vacuum are currently observed to be of the same order of magnitude: $(\Omega_{m 0} \approx 0.3) \sim (\Omega_{\Lambda 0} \approx 0.7)$. The cosmological window of time during which this occurs is relatively narrow. Thus, we are presented with the cosmological coincidence problem: Why, just now, do these energy densities happen to be of the same order? Here we show that this apparent coincidence can be explained as a temporal selection effect produced by the age distribution of terrestrial planets in the Universe. We find a large ($\sim 68$) probability that observations made from terrestrial planets will result in finding $\Omega_m$ at least as close to $\Omega_{\Lambda}$ as we observe today. Hence, we, and any observers in the Universe who have evolved on terrestrial planets, should not be surprised to find $\Omega_m \sim \Omega_{\Lambda}$. This result is relatively robust if the time it takes an observer to evolve on a terrestrial planet is less than $\sim 10$ Gyr.Comment: Submitted to Ap

Going Beyond the One-Shot: Spiraling Information Literacy Across Four Year

Many institutions overwhelm the first year seminar with “one-shot” library instruction sessions, which are not necessarily linked to any form of assignment or assessment. So how can librarians maintain information literacy instruction throughout a student\u27s academic career? Data collected by the Rivier University librarians showcases the ability to implement information literacy more effectively by streamlining and leveling it out over a four-year period

Low-Frequency Radio Transients in the Galactic Center

We report the detection of a new radio transient source, GCRT J1746-2757, located only 1.1 degrees north of the Galactic center. Consistent with other radio transients toward the Galactic center, this source brightened and faded on a time scale of a few months. No X-ray counterpart was detected. We also report new 0.33 GHz measurements of the radio counterpart to the X-ray transient source, XTE J1748-288, previously detected and monitored at higher radio frequencies. We show that the spectrum of XTE J1748-288 steepened considerably during a period of a few months after its peak. We also discuss the need for a more efficient means of finding additional radio transients

Dark-Energy Dynamics Required to Solve the Cosmic Coincidence

Dynamic dark energy (DDE) models are often designed to solve the cosmic coincidence (why, just now, is the dark energy density $\rho_{de}$, the same order of magnitude as the matter density $\rho_m$?) by guaranteeing $\rho_{de} \sim \rho_m$ for significant fractions of the age of the universe. This typically entails ad-hoc tracking or oscillatory behaviour in the model. However, such behaviour is neither sufficient nor necessary to solve the coincidence problem. What must be shown is that a significant fraction of observers see $\rho_{de} \sim \rho_m$. Precisely when, and for how long, must a DDE model have $\rho_{de} \sim \rho_{m}$ in order to solve the coincidence? We explore the coincidence problem in dynamic dark energy models using the temporal distribution of terrestrial-planet-bound observers. We find that any dark energy model fitting current observational constraints on $\rho_{de}$ and the equation of state parameters $w_0$ and $w_a$, does have $\rho_{de} \sim \rho_m$ for a large fraction of observers in the universe. This demotivates DDE models specifically designed to solve the coincidence using long or repeated periods of $\rho_{de} \sim \rho_m$.Comment: 16 pages, 8 figures, Submitted to Phys. Rev.

Late-Type Red Supergiants: Too Cool for the Magellanic Clouds?

We have identified seven red supergiants (RSGs) in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) and four RSGs in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), all of which have spectral types that are considerably later than the average type observed in their parent galaxy. Using moderate-resolution optical spectrophotometry and the MARCS stellar atmosphere models, we determine their physical properties and place them on the H-R diagram for comparison with the predictions of current stellar evolutionary tracks. The radial velocities of these stars suggest that they are likely all members of the Clouds rather than foreground dwarfs or halo giants. Their locations in the H-R diagram also show us that those stars are cooler than the current evolutionary tracks allow, appearing to the right of the Hayashi limit, a region in which stars are no longer in hydrodynamic equilibrium. These stars exhibit considerable variability in their V magnitudes, and three of these stars also show changes in their effective temperatures (and spectral types) on the time-scales of months. One of these stars, [M2002] SMC 055188, was caught in an M4.5 I state, as late as that seen in HV 11423 at its recent extreme: considerable later, and cooler, than any other supergiant in the SMC. In addition, we find evidence of variable extinction due to circumstellar dust and changes in the stars' luminosities, also consistent with our recent findings for HV 11423 - when these stars are hotter they are also dustier and more luminous. We suggest that these stars have unusual properties because they are in an unstable (and short-lived) evolutionary phase.Comment: 26 pages, 6 figures; submitted to the Astrophysical Journa