Linking employee burnout to medical aid provider expenditure

Background. Healthcare has become a major expense. Burnout and its connection with psychological and physical health is well researched,yet little research has been done on the connection between burnout and financial outcomes, specifically as indicated by the costs incurredby medical aid providers as a result of members’ claims.Objective. To investigate the connection between employee burnout and medical aid claims and expenditure data in a sample from theprivate sector.Method. A cross-sectional design was used. The sample comprised 3 182 participants. The available objective medical aid expendituredata connected with each participant were: total insured benefits, general practitioner visits, specialist visits, general practitioner insuredbenefits, and claims for medicine. A low and a high burnout group were extracted, based on comorbidity of the two core components ofburnout. Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was then applied to investigate the differences in estimated marginal means of the expenditureson the low and the high burnout contrast groups, while controlling for age and gender.Results. The high burnout group frequented a general practitioner more often, and the medical aid provider expenditure was nearly doublethat of the low burnout group, on all the variables. Specialist visits did not show a significant result.Conclusion. High burnout is associated with a higher expenditure by a medical aid provider, compared with low burnout, per member.Stakeholders should therefore address burnout to reduce expenditure and promote health

Grain boundaries in polycrystalline materials for energy applications: First principles modeling and electron microscopy

\ua9 2024 Author(s). Polycrystalline materials are ubiquitous in technology, and grain boundaries have long been known to affect materials properties and performance. First principles materials modeling and electron microscopy methods are powerful and highly complementary for investigating the atomic scale structure and properties of grain boundaries. In this review, we provide an introduction to key concepts and approaches for investigating grain boundaries using these methods. We also provide a number of case studies providing examples of their application to understand the impact of grain boundaries for a range of energy materials. Most of the materials presented are of interest for photovoltaic and photoelectrochemical applications and so we include a more in depth discussion of how modeling and electron microscopy can be employed to understand the impact of grain boundaries on the behavior of photoexcited electrons and holes (including carrier transport and recombination). However, we also include discussion of materials relevant to rechargeable batteries as another important class of materials for energy applications. We conclude the review with a discussion of outstanding challenges in the field and the exciting prospects for progress in the coming years

Stress appraisal, coping, and work engagement among police recruits: an exploratory study.

This study investigated the influence of stress appraisal and coping on work engagement levels (Absorption, Vigour, and Dedication) of police recruits. Participants were 387 men, ages 20 to 33 yr. (M = 24.1, SD = 2.4), in their last month of academy training before becoming police officers. Partially in support of predictions, work engagement was associated with Stressor control perceived, but not Stress intensity experienced over a self-selected stressor. Although the three dimensions of work engagement were explained by Stressor control and coping, Absorption was the dimension better explained by these variables. Police recruits reporting higher Absorption, Vigour, and Dedication reported using more Active coping and less Behavioural disengagement. Results showed that stress appraisal and coping are important variables influencing work engagement among police recruits. Findings suggested that future applied interventions fostering work engagement among police recruits should reinforce perceptions of control over a stressor as well as Active coping strategies

Concepts of health and well-being in managers: An organizational study

Global changes and new managerial challenges require new concepts of health and well-being in organizational contexts. In the South African context, health and well-being of managers have gained relevance in organizations and in management sciences. International organizations, in particular, attempt to address the increasing demand for health care and the delivery of health services to their managers. Careful and appropriate health management requires research to evaluate context-specific health concepts and strategies. The purpose and aim of this article is to assess managerial concepts on health and well-being that could be used by the organization to contribute to managerial well-being by implementing health promotion according to managerial needs. At the same time, this article contributes to salutogenetic health research that is very rare with regard to the South African organizational management research

Grain boundaries in polycrystalline materials for energy applications : First principles modeling and electron microscopy

Polycrystalline materials are ubiquitous in technology, and grain boundaries have long been known to affect materials properties and performance. First principles materials modeling and electron microscopy methods are powerful and highly complementary for investigating the atomic scale structure and properties of grain boundaries. In this review, we provide an introduction to key concepts and approaches for investigating grain boundaries using these methods. We also provide a number of case studies providing examples of their application to understand the impact of grain boundaries for a range of energy materials. Most of the materials presented are of interest for photovoltaic and photoelectrochemical applications and so we include a more in depth discussion of how modeling and electron microscopy can be employed to understand the impact of grain boundaries on the behavior of photoexcited electrons and holes (including carrier transport and recombination). However, we also include discussion of materials relevant to rechargeable batteries as another important class of materials for energy applications. We conclude the review with a discussion of outstanding challenges in the field and the exciting prospects for progress in the coming years

HiRel: Hybrid Automated Reliability Predictor (HARP) integrated reliability tool system, (version 7.0). Volume 1: HARP introduction and user's guide

The Hybrid Automated Reliability Predictor (HARP) integrated Reliability (HiRel) tool system for reliability/availability prediction offers a toolbox of integrated reliability/availability programs that can be used to customize the user's application in a workstation or nonworkstation environment. HiRel consists of interactive graphical input/output programs and four reliability/availability modeling engines that provide analytical and simulative solutions to a wide host of reliable fault-tolerant system architectures and is also applicable to electronic systems in general. The tool system was designed to be compatible with most computing platforms and operating systems, and some programs have been beta tested, within the aerospace community for over 8 years. Volume 1 provides an introduction to the HARP program. Comprehensive information on HARP mathematical models can be found in the references

Through the looking glass: understanding non-inferiority

Non-inferiority trials test whether a new product is not unacceptably worse than a product already in use. This paper introduces concepts related to non-inferiority, and discusses the regulatory views of both the European Medicines Agency and the United States Food and Drug Administration

Letter to editor

No abstract availabl