Psychosocial risk factors and work (engagement) in a health care institution in the city of, Cali - Colombia

El presente artículo describe los resultados de una investigación cuyo objetivo fue evaluar e identificar la relación entre los Factores Psicosociales Intralaborales y la experiencia de Engagement en el trabajo, en una organización privada del sector salud de la ciudad de Cali, Colombia. Participaron 111 trabajadores. Se utilizó el Cuestionario de Factores de Riesgo Psicosocial Intralaboral (Ministerio de la Protección Social, 2010) y la versión en español de la Encuesta de Bienestar y Trabajo (Utrech Work Engagement Scale (UWES)), elaborada por Shaufeli y Bakker (2003). El puntaje total en la evaluación de Factores de Riesgo Psicosocial permite inferir que la organización se encuentra en un nivel de riesgo medio. Las dimensiones que indican un nivel de riesgo alto son: Demandas emocionales en el trabajo y Retroalimentación del desempeño. En la evaluación del Engagement se encontraron puntajes altos y medios en sus tres dimensiones (vigor, dedicación y absorción), mostrando relaciones estadísticamente significativas con los factores psicosociales: Control sobre el trabajo, Recompensas, y Liderazgo y relaciones sociales en el trabajo. Como conclusión, la investigación logró evidenciar relaciones significativas entre los Factores Psicosociales Intralaborales y la experiencia de Engagement en el trabajo, por lo cual se destaca la pertinencia de incluir la mirada de la Psicología Positiva en el estudio de las condiciones de trabajo y su impacto en la salud de los trabajadores.O presente artigo descreve os resultados de uma pesquisa cujo objetivo foi avaliar e identificar a relação entre os Fatores Psicossociais Intratrabalhistas e a experiência de Engagement no trabalho, em uma organização particular do setor da saúde da cidade de Cali na Colômbia. Participaram 111 trabalhadores. Utilizou-se o Questionário de Fatores de Risco Psicossocial Intralaboral (Ministério de Proteção Social, 2010) e a versão em espanhol da Pesquisa de Bem-estar e Trabalho (Utrech Work Engagement Scale (UWES)), elaborada por Shaufeli e Bakker (2003). A pontuação total na avaliação de Fatores de Risco Psicossocial permite inferir que a organização encontra-se em um nível de risco médio. As dimensões que indicam um nível de risco alto são: Demandas emocionais no trabalho e Retroalimentação do desempenho. Na avaliação do Engagement encontraram-se pontuações altas e médias em suas três dimensões (vigor, dedicação e absorção), mostrando relações estatisticamente significativas com os fatores psicossociais Controle sobre o trabalho, Recompensas, e Liderança e relações sociais no trabalho. Como conclusão, a pesquisa conseguiu evidenciar relações significativas entre os Fatores Psicossociais Intratrabalhistas e a experiência de Engagement no trabalho, pelo qual destaca-se pertinência de incluir o olhar da Psicologia Positiva no estudo das condições de trabalho e seu impacto na saúde dos trabalhadores.This paper describes the results and conclusions of a research whose main objective was to assess and identify the relationship between psychosocial factors at work and the experience of work Engagement in a private health care institution of the city of Cali, Colombia. Participants were 111 workers involved in care and administrative positions. The Cuestionario de Factores de Riesgo Psicosocial Intralaboral (Ministerio de la Protección Social, 2010). (Psycho-social risk factors at work Questionnaire) (Ministry of Social Protection, 2010) and the Spanish version of the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES), developed by Shaufeli and Bakker (2003) were used. The total score in the assessment of Psychosocial Risk Factors at work for the entire organization showed a medium level of risk. The higher risk levels were found in the dimensions of emotional demands at work and performance feedback. In the assessment of work Engagement, high and average scores were found for the three domains of this construct (vigor, dedication, and absorption), showing statistically significant relationships with the psychosocial factors of Control over work, Rewards, and Leadership and Social Relationships. As a conclusion, this research showed statistically significant relationships between Psychosocial Factors and work Engagement. Therefore, the importance of including a Positive Psychology view on the study of work conditions and their impact on workers' health and quality of life is highlighted

Relación entre la calidad de la cartera de los bancos y los ciclos económicos en Colombia entre 2002-2014

Teniendo en cuenta la importancia del sector financiero para la economía en la actualidad, y los altos costos generados por las crisis financieras en los últimos años, el estudio y control de dicho sector se convierte en un tema de amplio interés por partes de los economistas, dado que crisis que estén vinculadas con el dicho sector pueden afectar la estabilidad económica de un país -- En el presente trabajo se estudia la relación existente entre los ciclos económicos y la calidad de la cartera total y por modalidades entre los años 2002 y 2014, encontrando evidencia empírica de que existe una correlación entre dichas variables y que presentan diferentes periodos de rezago para cada una de las modalidades de carter

Psychosocial Risk Factors in a Food Industry in the City of Cali

Objetivo. El objetivo de esta investigación fue evaluar los factores de riesgo psicosocial intralaboral y extralaboral, así como las manifestaciones físicas y psicológicas ligadas al estrés en el trabajo, en trabajadores de una industria alimenticia en la ciudad de Cali (Colombia). Método. Para ello, se realizó una investigación descriptiva con diseño transversal. La información se recolectó a través del cuestionario de riesgos biopsicosociales asociados a la accidentalidad de Rentería, Fernández, Tenjo y Uribe (2008); adaptado por Zúñiga y Uribe (2009) a la totalidad de los trabajadores (43 sujetos, 72% mujeres y 28% hombres). Resultados. Los resultados evidenciaron manifestaciones físicas y psicológicas asociadas al estrés en los trabajadores y se presumieron exposiciones a factores de riesgo psicosocial, específicamente, en las dimensiones de condiciones de trabajo, disponibilidad de recursos, gestión de los líderes, alta carga laboral, ausencia de programas de capacitación y salud ocupacional. Conclusiones. Los principales hallazgos de este trabajo sugieren que es fundamental que diferentes instancias académicas, profesionales y legales atiendan la salud laboral de las pequeñas industrias alimenticias, pues sus trabajadores parecen estar expuestos a diferentes tipos de riesgo psicosocial y carecen de medidas de prevención entorno al estrés laboral.Escopo. O escopo de esta pesquisa foi avaliar os fatores do risco psicossocial intraloboral e extraboral, assim como as manifestações físicas e psicológicas ligadas ao stress no trabalho, nos trabalhadores de uma indústria alimentaria na cidade de Cali (Colômbia). Metodologia. Para isto, foi feita uma pesquisa descritiva com desenho transversal. A informação foi coletada através do questionário de riscos biopsicossociais associados à acidentalidade de Renteria, Fernández, Tenjo e Uribe (2008), adaptado por Zúñiga e Uribe (2009) à totalidade dos trabalhadores da empresa (43 sujeitos, 72% mulheres e 28% homens). Resultados. Os resultados evidenciaram manifestações físicas e psicológicas associadas ao stress nos trabalhadores e presumiram exposições a fatores de risco psicossocial, especificamente, nas dimensões de condições de trabalho, disponibilidade de recursos, gestão dos líderes, alta carga laboral, ausência de programas de capacitação e saúde ocupacional. Conclusão. As principais descobertas de este trabalho sugerem que é fundamental que diferentes instancias acadêmicas, profissionais e legais atendam a saúde laboral das pequenas industrias alimentarias, pois seus trabalhadores parecem estar expostos a diferentes tipos de risco psicossocial e carecem de medidas de prevenção em torno ao stress laboral.Objective. This article presents the results of the assessment of psychosocial risk factors within and outside the working environment, and the physical and psychological manifestations associated with job stress, conducted at a food industry in the city of Cali, Colombia. Method. Descriptive, non-experimental and cross-sectional research was carried out. Information was collected by means of the accident-related bio-psychosocial risk instrument developed by Renteria, Fernandez, Tenjo and Uribe (2008) and adapted by Zúñiga and Uribe (2009), which was applied to all employees (43 subjects 72% female, and 28% male), consisting of operational and administrative staff. Results. The results indicated stress-related manifestations of a physical and psychological nature among the workers, and what was seen to be exposure to psycho-social risk factors, especially with regard to working conditions, availability of resources, management on the part of their superiors, a heavy workload, and a lack of training and occupational health programs. Conclusion. These results support the call for academic, legal and other related institutions to attend to the need for occupational health care in food industries, which have been neglected in comparison with other economic sectors in the country, such as health and education, possibly because the social impact they generate is not as visible as the other two

Política Monetaria y Mecanismos de Transmisión: Nuevos Elementos para una Vieja Discusión

This article starts by reviewing the current state of the arts in monetary transmission, emphasizing the empirical evidence for the Chilean case. Then, it focuses on two aspects that have not been given much attention in previous studies, namely the evolution of the monetary policy impact on output and prices over the past decade, and its breakdown by sectors. A basic uniequational model is estimated, in order to study i) temporal shifts in the effectiveness of monetary policy and ii) shifts in regimes occurred in the late nineties. Then, VAR models are used—similar to those of previous studies—to analyze the temporal development of impulse-response functions. Finally, a comparative analysis is made on the impact of monetary policy on various productive sectors, for which output and price variables are incorporated into the traditional VAR model.

Developing an app to interpret chest X-rays to support the diagnosis of respiratory pathology with artificial intelligence

Background: Medical images, including results from X-rays, are an integral part of medical diagnosis. Their interpretation requires an experienced radiologist. One of the main problems in developing countries is access to timely medical diagnosis. Lack of investment in health care infrastructure, geographical isolation and shortage of trained specialists are common obstacles to providing adequate health care in many areas of the world. In this work we show how to build and deploy a Deep Learning computer vision application for the classification of 14 common thorax disease using X-rays images. Methods: We make use of the FAST.AI and pytorch framework to create and train the DenseNet-121 model to classify the X-ray images from the ChestX-ray14 data set which contains 112,120 frontal-view X-ray images of 30,805 unique patients. After training and validate our model we create a web-app using Heroku, this web-app can be accessed by any mobile device with internet connection. Results: We obtained 70% for detecting pneumothorax for the one-vs-all task. Meanwhile, for the multilabel-multiclass task we are able to achieve state-of-the-art accuracy with fewer epochs, reducing drastically the training time of the model. We also demonstrate the feature localization of our model by using the Grad-CAM methodologies, feature which can be useful for early diagnostic of dangerous illnesses. Conclusions: In this work we present our study of the use of machine learning techniques to identify diseases using X-ray information. We have used the new framework of Fast.AI, and imported the resulting model to an app which can be tested by any user. The app has an intuitive interface where the user can upload an image and obtain a likelihood for the given image be classified as one of the 14 labeled diseases. This classification could assist diagnosis by medical providers and broaden access to medical services to remote areas.publishe

Actividad antagónica de una cepa de Bacillus sp. aislada en Córdoba, Argentina contra Macrophomina phaseolina (Tassi) Goid

The antifungal activity of Bacillus spp.strains has been already reported against a different number of phytopathogenicfungi3. Some species belonging to thisgenus (i.e. B. subtilis, B. pumilus and B. licheniformis) are considered GRAS (generally regarding as safe) microorganisms and exhibit potential to enhance plant growth by the production of an amplenumber of beneficial substances1,portraying these species as an environmentally friendly alternative tochemical fungicides. Macrophomina phaseolina (Tassi) Goid is a wide range soil-bornephytopathogenic fungus causing charcoal rot to several significant plant crops in Argentina (i.e. soybean, common bean,peanuts and corn)5,6 and is also capableto affect more than five hundred plant species worldwide4. Its ability to infect these hostplants is commonly correlated to the production of viable sclerotia, anon-sporic resistance structure constituted by a mass of densely packed hyphae, in the field5. In this work, we report theisolation of a Bacillus sp. strain 11.1 obtained from soil samples from Córdoba Province,Argentina2exhibiting a strongantagonistic activity against M. phaseolina. In order to analyse thepotential antagonistic effect of strain 11.1, both microorganisms were grown on dual culture platescontained potato dextrose agar (PDA) and tryptone soya agar (TSA) (1:1 v/v) and incubated for 48-72hours at 28ºC (Figure 1). An important and irreversible inhibition of the fungal growth was showed (Figure1A). In addition, the fungal mycelium located at the edge of the inhibited region was analysed bymicroscopic examination. The most evident antagonistic effect over the fungus was depicted by the lack ofblack pigmentation and the reduced size of formed sclerotiain comparison with the control (Figure 1B and C).Fil: Felipe, Verónica. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Centro de Investigaciones y Transferencia de Villa María. Universidad Nacional de Villa María. Centro de Investigaciones y Transferencia de Villa María; ArgentinaFil: Palma, Leopoldo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Centro de Investigaciones y Transferencia de Villa María. Universidad Nacional de Villa María. Centro de Investigaciones y Transferencia de Villa María; ArgentinaFil: Yaryura, Pablo Marcelo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Centro de Investigaciones y Transferencia de Villa María. Universidad Nacional de Villa María. Centro de Investigaciones y Transferencia de Villa María; Argentin

Calificación Estadística para Aprobación de Créditos Comerciales mediante Modelos Aditivos Generalizados

This article presents the application of a methodological procedure for the construction of a statistical qualification model for the approval of commercial credits in a public financial institution. In this line, the main aim is to reveal the benefits of using generalized additive models (GAM), whose functional structures contemplate the possible non-linearity of the explanatory variables of credit risk in relation to compliance with the payment obligations of borrowers, compared to linear models like the logit. This topic becomes relevant in view of the need for financial institutions to have the right tools and information management systems that allow them to de-establish strategies to improve the placement of their loan portfolio with clients who can fulfill their agreed obligations within the established deadlines, without incurring partial or total delays; in short, minimizing your credit risk. Additionally, in order to meet the stated need, the methodological procedure is applied through programming in the R software, with which the modeling is easily replicable.El presente artículo presenta la aplicación de un procedimiento metodológico para la construcción de un modelo de calificación estadística para la aprobación de créditos comerciales en una institución financiera pública. En esta línea se pretende develar principalmente las bondades de utilizar modelos aditivos generalizados (GAM), cuyas estructuras funcionales contemplan la posible no linealidad de las variables explicativas del riesgo de crédito en su relación con el cumplimiento de las obligaciones de pago de los acreditados, frente a modelos lineales como el logit. Esta temática se torna relevante ante la necesidad de las instituciones financieras de contar con herramientas y sistemas de manejo de información acertados que les permita establecer estrategias para mejorar la colocación de su cartera de créditos en clientes que puedan cumplir con sus obligaciones pactadas en los plazos previstos, sin incurrir en retrasos parciales o totales; en definitiva, minimizando su riesgo de crédito. Adicionalmente, con la finalidad de atender la necesidad expuesta se realiza la aplicación del procedimiento metodológico mediante programación en el software R con lo cual el modelamiento es fácilmente replicable

Liderazgo pedagógico en directores nóveles en Chile: Prácticas de observación de clases y retroalimentación a profesores

El rol de los directores escolares es clave para movilizar la mejora de los centros escolares. A través de un enfoque cualitativo-longitudinal utilizando la técnica thin-slice, este artículo examinó la calidad de las prácticas asociadas con la observación en el aula y la retroalimentación proporcionada por 10 directores nóveles al final de su primer y su segundo año en el cargo. Los resultados de este estudio señalan que el patrón de observación de los directores nóveles experimenta cambios desde el primer al segundo año en el cargo, desde un foco en los docentes y el contenido hacia un foco en la interacción contenidos-estudiantes. Respecto del tipo de retroalimentación en el año 2 se observa mayor uso de una retroalimentación más descriptiva que evaluativa. Los resultados de esta investigación muestran cómo con más experiencia los directores fortalecen su liderazgo pedagógico. No obstante, las limitaciones observadas el año 1 y el escaso uso de retroalimentación que promueva la metacognición y reflexión en los docentes sugieren que la observación en aula y retroalimentación a los docentes son prácticas a desarrollar por los programas de formación para directores.The role of school principals is key to mobilizing the improvement of schools. Through a qualitative-longitudinal approach, using the thin-slice technique, this paper examined the quality of practices associated with classroom observation and the feedback provided by 10 novice principals at the end of their first and second year in office. Results show that from year 1 to year 2, participants changed the focus of their observation from greater attention to content and teachers to more attention to the interactions between content and students. They also changed the type of feedback they would provide to teachers, decreasing the use of evaluative feedback and increasing the use of descriptive feedback. The results of this study show how with more experience principals strengthen their pedagogical leadership. Notwithstanding, the limitations observed in year 1 and the limited use of feedback that promotes teachers’ metacognitive and reflective engagement suggest that classroom observation and feedback to teachers are practices that need to be explicitly developed by principal preparation programs

Probing CP-violating Higgs and gauge-boson couplings in the Standard Model effective field theory

We study the phenomenological consequences of several CP-violating structures that could arise in the Standard Model effective field theory framework. Focusing on operators involving electroweak gauge and/or Higgs bosons, we derive constraints originating from Run I LHC data. We then study the capabilities of the present and future LHC runs at higher energies to further probe associated CP-violating phenomena and we demonstrate how differential information can play a key role. We consider both traditional four-lepton probes of CP-violation in the Higgs sector and novel new physics handles based on varied angular and non-angular observables