Quantitative Analysis of Impacts of Employee Engagement on Continuance and Normative Commitment

A positive relationship between employee engagement and affective commitment is already documented in the literature. However, we do not adequately know how engagement is associated with continuance and normative commitment. Using survey methodology we find that while engagement has a non–significant positive association with continuance commitment; it has a positive association with normative commitment. No negative association was found between engagement and continuance commitment. These results advance prior findings about the effect of employee engagement on different types of commitment and provide understandings in setting effective performance standards in the organization

Emergency admissions and subsequent inpatient care through an emergency oncology service at a tertiary cancer centre: service users’ experiences and views

Purpose Avoiding unnecessary emergency admissions and managing those that are admitted more effectively is a major concern for both patients and health services. To generate evidence useful for improving services for direct patient benefit, this study explores service users’ views and experiences of emergency admissions and subsequent inpatient care.Methods Participants were recruited during a cancer-related emergency admission from a tertiary cancer centre with an emergency oncology service and emergency department. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with fifteen patients and twelve carers post hospital discharge. Interview transcripts were analyzed using framework analysis.Results Twenty patients experienced 43 emergency admissions over six months. Most admissions (35/43) followed patients presenting acutely or as emergencies with cancer treatment side-effects. Most admissions (35/43) were directly to an oncology ward following specialist advice, review and triage and thus unavoidable. Participants experienced outstanding inpatient care because of: prompt and effective symptom control and stabilization of acute conditions; continuity of cancer care and coordination between acute and long-term treatment; satisfactory professional-patient communication and information sharing; responsive, motivated and competent staff; and less restrictive visiting times. Gaps in care were identified. Conclusions Many emergency admissions are necessary for people with cancer. Future work should focus on: improving easy access to specialist advice and triage, and the process of admission; providing rapid palliation of symptoms and prompt stabilization of acute conditions, and satisfactory inpatient care; closing the circle of care for patients by actively involving primary care and palliative/end-of-life care services to address the complex needs of patients and carers

Defining the regulation and function of SAFB1 and SAFB2 in human breast cancer cells

PhD ThesisScaffold attachment factor B1 (SAFB1) and SAFB2 are oestrogen receptor (ER) corepressors that bind and modulate ER activity through chromatin remodelling or interaction with the basal transcription machinery. However, little is known about the fundamental characteristics and function of SAFB1 and SAFB2 proteins in breast cancer. In this study, an investigation of the characteristics and function(s) of SAFB1 and SAFB2 was undertaken; their expression profile was first assessed in ER-positive (MCF-7) and ER-negative (MDA-MB-231) breast cancer cell lines. Results show that SAFB1 and SAFB2 are themselves regulated by an active metabolite of oestrogen, 17β-oestradiol, in both ER positive and ER negative breast cancer cells. Using a combined approach of RNA interference and gene expression profile studies, 12 novel targets closely linked to tumour progression were identified for SAFB1 and SAFB2. Expression levels of the following genes, CDKN2A, CLU, ESR1, IGFBP2, IL2RA, ITGB4, KIT, KLK5, MT3, NGFR and SPRR1B increased while IL-6 expression and secretion decreased when cells were depleted of SAFB proteins. This observation supports their primary role as transcriptional repressors with SAFB2 playing a prominent role in transcriptional regulation in MDA-MB-231 cells. This study has also established a novel link between SAFB proteins and ITGB4 and IL-6 expression. Both SAFB proteins have an internal RNA-recognition motif but little is known about the RNA-binding properties of SAFB1 or SAFB2. To investigate this, the concluding part of the project utilised crosslinking and immunoprecipitation (CLIP) coupled with high-throughput sequencing. This experimental approach enabled a transcriptome-wide mapping of SAFB1 protein-RNA interactions in breast cancer cells. SAFB1 crosslink sites are significantly enriched in ncRNAs, particularly within snRNAs. A putative RNA-binding motif for SAFB1 that contains adenine-rich sequences, highly similar to the RNA-binding motifs for SR proteins was also identified. In summary, this study has defined the characteristics of SAFB1 and SAFB2 in both ER positive and ER negative breast cancer cell lines. It has also identified transcriptional targets and the RNA-binding ability of SAFB1 and SAFB2 in human breast cancer cells

Comparison of the World Health Organization (WHO) Child Growth Standards and the National Center for Health Statistics/WHO international growth reference: implications for child health programmes

Abstract Objectives To compare growth patterns and estimates of malnutrition based on the World Health Organization (WHO) Child Growth Standards (‘the WHO standards') and the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS)/WHO international growth reference (‘the NCHS reference'), and discuss implications for child health programmes. Design Secondary analysis of longitudinal data to compare growth patterns (birth to 12 months) and data from two cross-sectional surveys to compare estimates of malnutrition among under-fives. Settings Bangladesh, Dominican Republic and a pooled sample of infants from North America and Northern Europe. Subjects Respectively 4787, 10 381 and 226 infants and children. Results Healthy breast-fed infants tracked along the WHO standard's weight-for-age mean Z-score while appearing to falter on the NCHS reference from 2 months onwards. Underweight rates increased during the first six months and thereafter decreased when based on the WHO standards. For all age groups stunting rates were higher according to the WHO standards. Wasting and severe wasting were substantially higher during the first half of infancy. Thereafter, the prevalence of severe wasting continued to be 1.5 to 2.5 times that of the NCHS reference. The increase in overweight rates based on the WHO standards varied by age group, with an overall relative increase of 34%. Conclusions The WHO standards provide a better tool to monitor the rapid and changing rate of growth in early infancy. Their adoption will have important implications for child health with respect to the assessment of lactation performance and the adequacy of infant feeding. Population estimates of malnutrition will vary by age, growth indicator and the nutritional status of index population

The use of video role play for teaching therapeutic communication skills

Background: Effective Communication is a fundamental skill for practice across health care settings and is a component ofundergraduate nursing programs around the world. Resource materials appropriate for the teaching of communication in an Asiancontext are lacking.Aim: The aim of this study was to evaluate the usefulness of a self-developed video using role play in facilitating teaching andlearning associated with therapeutic communication.Methods: Videos were produced which demonstrated the fundamental communication skills of listening, understanding,exploring and comforting/supporting, using role play. These were shown to Year 1 nursing students in tutorials over four weeks.Their usefulness was evaluated using a self-developed questionnaire. Among 74 questionnaires distributed at the end of thefourth tutorial, 72 were returned, with a 97% response rate.Results: Most students agreed that the video clips provided useful examples for role-playing the communication skills (89%),helped trigger them to perform role-playing (74%), were useful to improve understanding of different communication skills(93%) and helped them learn from other students’ role-playing performance (87%). Overall impression of using the videos in thetutorial teaching was very useful (27%) and useful (68%).Conclusions: Most students valued the videos developed purposely for teaching therapeutic communication and recommendedthat the videos be used in the future. Using video role plays facilitated the teaching and learning process and enhancedundergraduate nursing students’ understanding and application of communication skills. More video clips will be developed inthe future, with improved quality and with a broader range of health care communication scenarios demonstrated in order to beused more widely

iPad-mediated talk in young children’s learning and exploration of interests

Emerging evidence highlights the potential of mobile and tablet technologies such as the Apple iPad in facilitating more productive learning processes and outcomes in formal contexts. Very little research has however been conducted in the New Zealand context, especially in early childhood settings. This study is aimed at understanding the nature of the talk young children (3 and a half to 5 year olds) engaged in while using the iPad for free exploration and play in small group settings with teacher guidance. Data was collected from eight observations (one hour to one and half hours long) of child-directed iPad use (video and audio recordings and photographs). Analysis of the data was based on an adaptation of Mercer's (1994) ‘talk types' framework which discriminates between cumulative, exploratory and disputational talk. Findings indicated that children used different kinds of talk to support one another's attempts to work through an app on the iPad. The iPad further afforded a unique potential as a shared, public learning device, and enabled young children's ease of sharing content and working together. Additionally, teacher-child talk was crucial in children realising the iPad's potential, reminding ground rules for working with the iPad, supporting developing literacy and numeracy ideas when working on iPad apps, and acknowledging children’s success. Teachers therefore play an important role in scaffolding young children's ability to develop talk strategies valuable to their learning and exploration with the iPad in the ECE contexts

Skin Stem Cells Orchestrate Directional Migration by Regulating Microtubule-ACF7 Connections through GSK3β

SummaryHomeostasis and wound healing rely on stem cells (SCs) whose activity and directed migration are often governed by Wnt signaling. In dissecting how this pathway integrates with the necessary downstream cytoskeletal dynamics, we discovered that GSK3β, a kinase inhibited by Wnt signaling, directly phosphorylates ACF7, a > 500 kDa microtubule-actin crosslinking protein abundant in hair follicle stem cells (HF-SCs). We map ACF7's GSK3β sites to the microtubule-binding domain and show that phosphorylation uncouples ACF7 from microtubules. Phosphorylation-refractile ACF7 rescues overall microtubule architecture, but phosphorylation-constitutive mutants do not. Neither mutant rescues polarized movement, revealing that phospho-regulation must be dynamic. This circuitry is physiologically relevant and depends upon polarized GSK3β inhibition at the migrating front of SCs/progeny streaming from HFs during wound repair. Moreover, only ACF7 and not GSKβ-refractile-ACF7 restore polarized microtubule-growth and SC-migration to ACF7 null skin. Our findings provide insights into how this conserved spectraplakin integrates signaling, cytoskeletal dynamics, and polarized locomotion of somatic SCs

Human Tra2 proteins jointly control a CHEK1 splicing switch among alternative and constitutive target exons

Alternative splicing—the production of multiple messenger RNA isoforms from a single gene—is regulated in part by RNA binding proteins. While the RBPs transformer2 alpha (Tra2α) and Tra2β have both been implicated in the regulation of alternative splicing, their relative contributions to this process are not well understood. Here we find simultaneous—but not individual—depletion of Tra2α and Tra2β induces substantial shifts in splicing of endogenous Tra2β target exons, and that both constitutive and alternative target exons are under dual Tra2α–Tra2β control. Target exons are enriched in genes associated with chromosome biology including CHEK1, which encodes a key DNA damage response protein. Dual Tra2 protein depletion reduces expression of full-length CHK1 protein, results in the accumulation of the DNA damage marker γH2AX and decreased cell viability. We conclude Tra2 proteins jointly control constitutive and alternative splicing patterns via paralog compensation to control pathways essential to the maintenance of cell viability

Effect of parboiling on in vitro physiological antioxidant capacity of brown rice

Parboiling process has been widely implemented in brown rice processing, but its effect on in vitro physiological antioxidant capacity of brown rice was not known. In this study, an in vitro method simulating the human physiological conditions was used to investigate the effect of parboiling on antioxidant capacity of brown rice in three Bario rice varieties. In this method, bacterial inocula were prepared from rat cecal contents. Results showed that parboiling process gave significant impacts on in vitro physiological antioxidant capacity of brown rice. The process improved total phenolic content at small intestine (Adan Halus), DPPH scavenging activity at both small and large intestines (Adan Halus and Bario Merah) and ferrous ion-chelating activity at large intestine (Bario Hitam). However, changes in antioxidant capacity were variety dependent, possibly due to different bran pigmentation. These suggested that parboiling process could improve physiological antioxidant capacity with in vitro simulation at small and large intestines by selecting a suitable rice variety and parboiled brown rice could offer good antioxidant properties to maintain physiological health