2,036 research outputs found
Impact of passive and active promotional strategies on patient acceptance of medication therapy management services
Objectives
To assess the impact of passive and active promotional strategies on patient acceptance of medication therapy management (MTM) services, and to identify reasons for patient acceptance or refusal.
Methods
Four promotional approaches were developed to offer MTM services to eligible patients, including letters and bag stuffers (“passive” approaches), and face-to-face offers and telephone calls (“active” approaches). Thirty pharmacies in a grocery store chain were randomized to one of the four approaches. Patient acceptance rates were compared among the four groups, and between active and passive approaches using hierarchical logistic regression techniques. Depending on their decision to accept or decline the service, patients were invited to take part in one of two brief telephone surveys.
Results
No significant differences were identified among the four promotional methods or between active and passive methods in the analyses. Patients’ most frequent reasons for accepting MTM services were potential cost savings, review of how the medications were working, the expert opinion of the pharmacist, and education about medications. Patients’ most frequent reasons for declining MTM services were that the participant already felt comfortable with their medications and felt their pharmacist provides these services on a regular basis.
Conclusion
No significant difference was found among any of the four groups or between active or passive approaches. Further research is warranted to identify strategies for improving patient engagement in MTM services
Diversity in perception and management of farming risks in southern Mali
A deeper understanding of how smallholder farmers perceive and manage risks is crucial to identify options that
increase farmers' adaptive capacity. We investigated a broad range of risks that play a role in farmers' decision making processes. In the cotton zone of Mali opportunities and constraints vary with the resource endowment of
farms. Furthermore, as households are large in this region, often comprising 20–50 family members, intra household
diversity may influence perceptions and risk management. For this reason, we analysed diversity both
among and within farms. Information was gathered through focus group discussions and a survey with 250
people from 58 households. Risk was assessed as the combination of the perceived frequency of occurrence of
hazards and the impact on food availability and income. Farmers faced a diversity of risks, with hazards related
to animal and personal health, and climate variability of highest concern. Resource endowment of farms was
related to risk perception to a limited extent. Differences within the household were related to the generational
factor and decision power, and not to gender. Household members with decision power worried most about
risks. Almost a quarter of described hazards occurred with a high frequency and led to a high impact on food
availability and income. Low resource-endowed farms were more often exposed to high risks than other farm
types. Farmers applied a variety of actions to cope with hazards, yet in many cases farmers lacked a response.
Medical actions were targeted to human and animal health hazards. Changes in field and animal management
practices, adapted consumption rates and calls on social interactions, were combined for a diversity of hazards.
By assessing the diversity of risks encountered by farmers and the diversity of risk management actions taken by
farmers, this study goes beyond common risk research that focuses on a single hazard. Our results suggest that
development interventions should not focus on either agronomic or economic options separately, but combine
both to strengthen social well-being and agricultural production
Polymorphous Si thin films from radio frequency plasmas of SiH4 diluted in Ar: A study by transmission electron microscopy and Raman spectroscopy
In this study, we present a detailed structural characterization by means of transmission electron microscopy and Raman spectroscopy of polymorphous silicon (pm-Si:H) thin films deposited using radio-frequency dust-forming plasmas of SiH4 diluted in Ar. Square-wave modulation of the plasma and gas temperature was varied to obtain films with different nanostructures. Transmission electron microscopy and electron diffraction have shown the presence of Si crystallites of around 2 nm in the pm-Si:H films, which are related to the nanoparticles formed in the plasma gas phase coming from their different growth stages, named particle nucleation and coagulation. Raman scattering has proved the role of the film nanostructure in the crystallization process induced ¿in situ¿ by laser heating
Effective theories for real-time correlations in hot plasmas
We discuss the sequence of effective theories needed to understand the
qualitative, and quantitative, behavior of real-time correlators
in ultra-relativistic plasmas. We analyze in detail the case where A is a
gauge-invariant conserved current. This case is of interest because it includes
a correlation recently measured in lattice simulations of classical, hot,
SU(2)-Higgs gauge theory. We find that simple perturbation theory, free kinetic
theory, linearized kinetic theory, and hydrodynamics are all needed to
understand the correlation for different ranges of time. We emphasize how
correlations generically have power-law decays at very large times due to
non-linear couplings to long-lived hydrodynamic modes.Comment: 28 pages, Latex, uses revtex, epsf macro packages [Revised version: t
-> sqrt{t} in a few typos on p. 10.
Polymorphous Si thin films from radio frequency plasmas of SiH4 diluted in Ar: A study by transmission electron microscopy and Raman spectroscopy
P07-11 LB. Impact of highly active antiretroviral therapy on cell-free and cell-associated HIV-1 in cervicovaginal secretions and blood
On Bubble Growth and Droplet Decay in Cosmological Phase Transitions
We study spherically symmetric bubble growth and droplet decay in first order
cosmological phase transitions, using a numerical code including both the
complete hydrodynamics of the problem and a phenomenological model for the
microscopic entropy producing mechanism at the phase transition surface. The
small-scale effects of finite wall width and surface tension are thus
consistently incorporated. We verify the existence of the different
hydrodynamical growth modes proposed recently and investigate the problem of a
decaying quark droplet in the QCD phase transition. We find that the decaying
droplet leaves behind no rarefaction wave, so that any baryon number
inhomogeneity generated previously should survive the decay.Comment: 10 pages (revtex), 10 figures as uuencoded postscrip
K-Space at TRECVID 2008
In this paper we describe K-Space’s participation in
TRECVid 2008 in the interactive search task. For 2008
the K-Space group performed one of the largest interactive
video information retrieval experiments conducted
in a laboratory setting. We had three institutions participating
in a multi-site multi-system experiment. In
total 36 users participated, 12 each from Dublin City
University (DCU, Ireland), University of Glasgow (GU,
Scotland) and Centrum Wiskunde and Informatica (CWI,
the Netherlands). Three user interfaces were developed,
two from DCU which were also used in 2007 as well as
an interface from GU. All interfaces leveraged the same
search service. Using a latin squares arrangement, each
user conducted 12 topics, leading in total to 6 runs per
site, 18 in total. We officially submitted for evaluation 3
of these runs to NIST with an additional expert run using
a 4th system. Our submitted runs performed around
the median. In this paper we will present an overview of
the search system utilized, the experimental setup and a
preliminary analysis of our results
Irreversible Quantum Mechanics in the Neutral K-System
The neutral Kaon system is used to test the quantum theory of resonance
scattering and decay phenomena. The two dimensional Lee-Oehme-Yang theory with
complex Hamiltonian is obtained by truncating the complex basis vector
expansion of the exact theory in Rigged Hilbert space. This can be done for K_1
and K_2 as well as for K_S and K_L, depending upon whether one chooses the
(self-adjoint, semi-bounded) Hamiltonian as commuting or non-commuting with CP.
As an unexpected curiosity one can show that the exact theory (without
truncation) predicts long-time 2 pion decays of the neutral Kaon system even if
the Hamiltonian conserves CP.Comment: 36 pages, 1 PostScript figure include
Hydrodynamic Stability Analysis of Burning Bubbles in Electroweak Theory and in QCD
Assuming that the electroweak and QCD phase transitions are first order, upon
supercooling, bubbles of the new phase appear. These bubbles grow to
macroscopic sizes compared to the natural scales associated with the Compton
wavelengths of particle excitations. They propagate by burning the old phase
into the new phase at the surface of the bubble. We study the hydrodynamic
stability of the burning and find that for the velocities of interest for
cosmology in the electroweak phase transition, the shape of the bubble wall is
stable under hydrodynamic perturbations. Bubbles formed in the cosmological QCD
phase transition are found to be a borderline case between stability and
instability.Comment: preprint # SLAC-PUB-5943, SCIPP 92/56 38 pages, 10 figures (submitted
via `uufiles'), phyzzx format minor snafus repaire
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