1,137 research outputs found
Thailandās universal coverage scheme and its impact on health-seeking behavior
Background: Thailandās Universal Coverage Scheme (UCS) has improved healthcare access and utilization since its initial introduction in 2002. However, a substantial proportion of beneficiaries has utilized care outside the UCS boundaries. Because low utilization may be an indication of a policy gap between peopleās health needs and the services available to them, we investigated the patterns of health-seeking behavior and their social/contextual determinants among UCS beneficiaries in the year 2013. Results: The study findings from the outpatient analysis showed that the use of designated facilities for care was significantly higher in low-income, unemployed, and chronic status groups. The findings from the inpatient analysis showed that the use of designated facilities for care was significantly higher in the low-income, older, and female groups. Particularly, for the low-income group, we found that they (1) had greater health care needs, (2) received a larger number of services from designated facilities, and (3) paid the least for both inpatient and outpatient services. Conclusions: This pro-poor impact indicated that the UCS could adequately respond to beneficiariesā needs in terms of vertical equity. However, we also found that a considerable proportion of beneficiaries utilized out-of-network services, which implied a lack of universal access to policy services from a horizontal equity point of view. Thus, the policy should continue expanding and diversifying its service benefits to strengthen horizontal equity. Particularly, private sector involvement for those who are employed as well as the increased unmet health needs of those in rural areas may be important policy priorities for that. Lastly, methodological issues such as severity adjustment and a detailed categorization of health-seeking behaviors need to be further considered for a better understanding of the policy impact
Antioxidative Activities of Alfalfa and Timothy Varieties
The term functional foods is often used as a generic description for the beneficial effects of ingested foods that go beyond their traditional nutritive value (Bauman et al., 2001). Milk and dairy products are important dietary sources of nutrients, providing energy, high quality protein, and a variety of vitamins and minerals. Recent research has focused on altering the fat and protein content of milk and other dairy products in order to improve their nutrient content to more aptly reflect current dietary recommendations and trends. As a result, additional focus is being given to designing foods that have beneficial effects on human health. This study was carried out to investigate the antioxidative activities of forages grown in Korea
Yield and Nutritive Value of Heading and Headless Sorghum x Sudangrass Hybrids in Response to Cutting Frequency
Summer annual forages contribute greatly toward solving the problem of roughage supply for cattle in Korea. These forages support high levels of dairy and beef production during hot summer months when the quality and production of perennial herbage decreases due to unfavourable climatic conditions (Olson, 1971). This study investigated the effects of cutting frequency on dry matter (DM) yield and nutritive value of heading versus headless varieties of sorghum x sudangrass hybrid
Arabidopsis ABCG34 contributes to defense against necrotrophic pathogens by mediating the secretion of camalexin
Plant pathogens cause huge yield losses. Plant defense often depends on toxic secondary metabolites that inhibit pathogen growth. Because most secondary metabolites are also toxic to the plant, specific transporters are needed to deliver them to the pathogens. To identify the transporters that function in plant defense, we screened Arabidopsis thaliana mutants of full-size ABCG transporters for hypersensitivity to sclareol, an antifungal compound. We found that atabcg34 mutants were hypersensitive to sclareol and to the necrotrophic fungi Alternaria brassicicola and Botrytis cinerea. AtABCG34 expression was induced by A. brassicicola inoculation as well as by methyl-jasmonate, a defense-related phytohormone, and AtABCG34 was polarly localized at the external face of the plasma membrane of epidermal cells of leaves and roots. atabcg34 mutants secreted less camalexin, a major phytoalexin in A. thaliana, whereas plants overexpressing AtABCG34 secreted more camalexin to the leaf surface and were more resistant to the pathogen. When treated with exogenous camalexin, atabcg34 mutants exhibited hypersensitivity, whereas BY2 cells expressing AtABCG34 exhibited improved resistance. Analyses of natural Arabidopsis accessions revealed that AtABCG34 contributes to the disease resistance in naturally occurring genetic variants, albeit to a small extent. Together, our data suggest that AtABCG34 mediates camalexin secretion to the leaf surface and thereby prevents A. brassicicola infection.117Ysciescopu
Race, Digital and Traditional Media, and Public Relations Health Campaigns
Applying situational theory to adolescent health contexts, this study examines whether race,
medium use, and involvement may serve as significant determinants of information seeking and
processing in conjunction with constraint and problem recognition. Analysis of a cross-sectional
survey among 452 adolescents showed that problem recognition was positively related to information
processing and seeking. Constraint recognition was positively related to information seeking, but not
information processing. Involvement was positively related to information seeking and both media
and interpersonal information processing. Findings support the importance of considering racial
diversity in audience segmentation. Non-whites were more likely than were whites to actively seek
information. Print media use was more predictive of information seeking and processing than was
Internet, television, or radio use. Implications for audience segmentation in public health campaigns
are discussed
Gravitational-wave Electromagnetic Counterpart Korean Observatory (GECKO): GECKO Follow-up Observation of GW190425
One of the keys to the success of multimessenger astronomy is the rapid
identification of the electromagnetic wave counterpart, kilonova (KN), of the
gravitational-wave (GW) event. Despite its importance, it is hard to find a KN
associated with a GW event, due to a poorly constrained GW localization map and
numerous signals that could be confused as a KN. Here, we present the
Gravitational-wave Electromagnetic wave Counterpart Korean Observatory (GECKO)
project, the GECKO observation of GW190425, and prospects of GECKO in the
fourth observing run (O4) of the GW detectors. We outline our follow-up
observation strategies during O3. In particular, we describe our
galaxy-targeted observation criteria that prioritize based on galaxy
properties. Armed with this strategy, we performed an optical and/or
near-infrared follow-up observation of GW190425, the first binary neutron star
merger event during the O3 run. Despite a vast localization area of 7460 deg^2,
we observed 621 host galaxy candidates, corresponding to 29.5% of the scores we
assigned, with most of them observed within the first 3 days of the GW event.
Ten transients were discovered during this search, including a new transient
with a host galaxy. No plausible KN was found, but we were still able to
constrain the properties of potential KNe using upper limits. The GECKO
observation demonstrates that GECKO can possibly uncover a GW170817-like KN at
a distance less than 200 Mpc if the localization area is of the order of
hundreds of square degrees, providing a bright prospect for the identification
of GW electromagnetic wave counterparts during the O4 run.Comment: 35 pages, 19 figures Accepted for publication in Ap
Evaluating implicit feedback models using searcher simulations
In this article we describe an evaluation of relevance feedback (RF) algorithms using searcher simulations. Since these algorithms select additional terms for query modification based on inferences made from searcher interaction, not on relevance information searchers explicitly provide (as in traditional RF), we refer to them as implicit feedback models. We introduce six different models that base their decisions on the interactions of searchers and use different approaches to rank query modification terms. The aim of this article is to determine which of these models should be used to assist searchers in the systems we develop. To evaluate these models we used searcher simulations that afforded us more control over the experimental conditions than experiments with human subjects and allowed complex interaction to be modeled without the need for costly human experimentation. The simulation-based evaluation methodology measures how well the models learn the distribution of terms across relevant documents (i.e., learn what information is relevant) and how well they improve search effectiveness (i.e., create effective search queries). Our findings show that an implicit feedback model based on Jeffrey's rule of conditioning outperformed other models under investigation
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