6,495 research outputs found
Confidential genetic testing and electronic health records: A survey of current practices among Huntington disease testing centers
BACKGROUND: Clinical care teams providing presymptomatic genetic testing often employ advanced confidentiality practices for documentation and result storage. However, patient requests for increased confidentiality may be in conflict with the legal obligations of medical providers to document patient care activities in the electronic health record (EHR). Huntington disease presents a representative case study for investigating the ways centers currently balance the requirements of EHRs with the privacy demands of patients seeking presymptomatic genetic testing.
METHODS: We surveyed 23 HD centers (53% response rate) regarding their use of the EHR for presymptomatic HD testing.
RESULTS: Our survey revealed that clinical care teams and laboratories have each developed their own practices, which are cumbersome and often include EHR avoidance. We found that a majority of HD care teams record appointments in the EHR (91%), often using vague notes. Approximately half of the care teams (52%) keep presymptomatic results of out of the EHR.
CONCLUSION: As genetic knowledge grows, linking more genes to late-onset conditions, institutions will benefit from having professional recommendations to guide development of policies for EHR documentation of presymptomatic genetic results. Policies must be sensitive to the ethical differences and patient demands for presymptomatic genetic testing compared to those undergoing confirmatory genetic testing
Knowledge-Based Client-Server Approach to Structural Information Retrieval: The Digital Anatomist Browser
Structural information can be defined as data and knowledge about biological objects ranging in size
from molecules to the whole body. A framework is described for organizing structural information
around a well-defined set of terminology and semantic relationships, and for disseminated
multimedia structural information by means of a wide-area information server that is accessible over
the internet. A Macintosh-based client of this server, called the Digital Anatomist Browser, has
been used to teach neuroanatomy for the last 2 years. The client-server approach provides each
student unlimited access to a rapidly growing knowledge base of structral biology that, while
immediately useful for anatomy teaching, has the potential to be an organizing framework for other
kinds of medial knowledge as well
Human rights, human development, and peace: inseparable ingredients in Africa's quest for prosperity
Despite decades of foreign aid, abundance of natural and human resources,
and numerous development initiatives, the African continent remains largely
underdeveloped, marginalised and excluded from major decision-making
processes that shape today’s world. The purpose of this research is to
examine the reasons for the continuous underdevelopment and
marginalisation of the African continent and to advance pragmatic measures
to be put in place to reverse the situation.
The thesis demonstrates that Africa’s underdevelopment and marginalisation
cannot be divorced from the effects of centuries of exploitation, domination,
and exclusion through the slave trade, colonialism, and neo-colonialism on
the one hand, and decades of poor socio-economic and political governance
that have characterised the continent since independence, on the other. One
of the main findings of the research is that, over the years, African leaders
have consciously or unconsciously failed to recognise the fundamental link
between human rights, human development, and peace as a foundation for
development, and this failure has resulted in their inability to craft sustainable
development initiatives for the continent.
Given the prominent place human rights, good governance, democracy,
peace and stability occupy in both the Constitutive Act of the African Union
(CA-AU)1 and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development2 (referred
throughout this thesis as the NEPAD Document), the thesis further
demonstrates that there is an intrinsic relationship between human rights,
human development, and peace which is necessary for development. It
analyses the extent to which this relationship has been taken into account in
1 The Constitutive Act of the African Union, OAU Doc. CAB/LEG/23.15, was adopted
11 July 2000 in Lomé, Togo and entered into force May 26, 2001.
2 The New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD or the NEPAD Document)
2001. The NEPAD is an economic development program of the African Union. The
NEPAD was adopted at the 37th Session of the Assembly of Heads of State and
Government in July 2001 in Lusaka, Zambia.
PhD Thesis Human Rights, Human Development and Peace – inseparable ingredients in Africa’s quest for prosperity
xvi
the conception, formulation, and implementation of the objectives of both the
AU and the NEPAD; and concludes that the NEPAD and the AU initiatives
provide a strong foundation and offer an excellent opportunity for Africans to
begin to reverse centuries of exploitation, domination, and decades of socioeconomic
and political exclusion, as well as re-orientate the governance and
development strategy of the continent.
The thesis is premised on the realisation that respect for human rights, the
promotion of human development, and the consolidation of peace, coupled
with good political and economic governance are conditions sine qua non for
any meaningful development. It further reveals that respect for human rights
provides a foundation upon which rests the political structures of human
freedoms. The achievement of human freedom generates the will as well as
the capacity for economic and social progress. The attainment of economic
and social progress provides the basis for durable peace.
The thesis concludes that human rights, human development, and peace are
interdependent, interrelated, indivisible and mutually reinforcing, and thus
inseparable ingredients in Africa’s quest for prosperity
Limits on WWgamma and WWZ Couplings from W Boson Pair Production
The results of a search for W boson pair production in pbar-p collisions at
sqrt{s}=1.8 TeV with subsequent decay to emu, ee, and mumu channels are
presented. Five candidate events are observed with an expected background of
3.1+-0.4 events for an integrated luminosity of approximately 97 pb^{-1}.
Limits on the anomalous couplings are obtained from a maximum likelihood fit of
the E_T spectra of the leptons in the candidate events. Assuming identical
WWgamma and WWZ couplings, the 95 % C.L. limits are -0.62<Delta_kappa<0.77
(lambda = 0) and -0.53<lambda<0.56 (Delta_kappa = 0) for a form factor scale
Lambda = 1.5 TeV.Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure, submitted to Physical Review
The Search for Supersymmetry at the Tevatron Collider
We review the status of searches for Supersymmetry at the Tevatron Collider.
After discussing the theoretical aspects relevant to the production and decay
of supersymmetric particles at the Tevatron, we present the current results for
Runs Ia and Ib as of the summer of 1997. To appear in the book "Perspectives in
Supersymmetry", edited by G.L. Kane, World Scientific.Comment: 84 pages with 31 figures imbedded using psfig.tex. Uses sprocl.st
Search for a Fourth-Generation Quark More Massive than the Z0 Boson in ppbar Collisions at sqrt(s) = 1.8 TeV
We present the results of a search for pair production of a fourth-generation
charge -1/3 quark (b') in sqrt(s)=1.8 TeV ppbar collisions using 88 pb^(-1) of
data obtained with the Collider Detector at Fermilab. We assume that both
quarks decay via the flavor-changing neutral current process b' -> bZ and that
the b' mass is greater than m_Z + m_b. We studied the decay mode b'b'bar -> ZZ
b bbar where one Z0 decays into e^+e^- or mu^+ mu^- and the other decays
hadronically, giving a signature of two leptons plus jets. An upper limit on
the cross section of ppbar -> b'b'bar times [BR (b' -> bZ)]^2 is established as
a function of the b' mass. We exclude at 95% confidence level a b' quark with
mass between 100 and 199 GeV/c^2 for BR(b' -> bZ) = 100%.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. Letters on 9/12/9
Search for a Fourth Generation Charge -1/3 Quark via Flavor Changing Neutral Current Decay
We report on a search for pair production of a fourth generation charge -1/3
quark (b') in pbar p collisions at sqrt(s) = 1.8 TeV at the Fermilab Tevatron
using an integrated luminosity of 93 pb^-1. Both quarks are assumed to decay
via flavor changing neutral currents (FCNC). The search uses the signatures
gamma + 3 jets + mu-tag and 2 gamma + 2 jets. We see no significant excess of
events over the expected background. We place an upper limit on the production
cross section times branching fraction that is well below theoretical
expectations for a b' quark decaying exclusively via FCNC for b' quark masses
up to m(Z) + m(b).Comment: Eleven pages, two postscript figures, submitted to Physical Review
Letter
A search for W bb and W Higgs production in ppbar collisions at sqrt(s)=1.96 TeV
We present a search for W b \bar{b} production in p \bar{p} collisions at
sqrt{s}=1.96 TeV in events containing one electron, an imbalance in transverse
momentum, and two b-tagged jets. Using 174 pb-1 of integrated luminosity
accumulated by the D0 experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron collider, and the
standard-model description of such events, we set a 95% C.L. upper limit on W b
\bar{b}WH--$135
GeV.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures, 1 table, submitted to Physical Review Letter
The Azimuthal Decorrelation of Jets Widely Separated in Rapidity
This study reports the first measurement of the azimuthal decorrelation
between jets with pseudorapidity separation up to five units. The data were
accumulated using the D{\O}detector during the 1992--1993 collider run of the
Fermilab Tevatron at 1.8 TeV. These results are compared to
next--to--leading order (NLO) QCD predictions and to two leading--log
approximations (LLA) where the leading--log terms are resummed to all orders in
. The final state jets as predicted by NLO QCD
show less azimuthal decorrelation than the data. The parton showering LLA Monte
Carlo {\small HERWIG} describes the data well; an analytical LLA prediction
based on BFKL resummation shows more decorrelation than the data.Comment: 6 pages with 4 figures, all uuencoded and gzippe
- …