What future the cane industry: is training a vehicle for change?

This paper summarised research into the training needs of cane growers in Queensland and Northern New South Wales for the Sugar Research and Development Corporation (SRDC). The full report supplied comprehensive insights into industry training needs from the perspective of those most directly involved in the production side. As a result of historically low price returns and in some areas, lingering effects of lower than average rainfall, many cane growers are faced with difficult prospects: exiting the industry, seeking to augment incomes by off-farm employment, or diversifying their farming operations. Prior research has shown that farmers undertaking training in other farm business sectors have markedly higher gross operating surpluses when compared with those who did not train. Findings from this research revealed a significant unrecognised demand for competency-based training and a need for adoption strategies to be developed and championed at a whole of industry level. By adopting lessons learnt from other industry re-structures, cane growers can maintain their viability from high-level business management training which is not currently offered. The industry is challenged by a need to engage multiple stakeholders and to develop client designed training programs to enable them to remedy farming-related problems

Developing priorities to achieve health equity through diabetes translation research: A concept mapping study

Introduction: The goal of diabetes translation research is to advance research into practice and ensure equitable benefit from scientific evidence. This study uses concept mapping to inform and refine future directions of diabetes translation research with the goal of achieving health equity in diabetes prevention and control. Research design and methods: This study used concept mapping and input from a national network of diabetes researchers and public health practitioners. Concept mapping is a mixed-method, participant-based process. First, participants generated statements by responding to a focus prompt ( Results: Ten clusters were identified containing between 6 and 12 statements from 95 total generated statements. The ranges of average importance and feasibility ratings for clusters were fairly high and narrow (3.62-4.09; 3.10-3.93, respectively). Clusters with the most statements in the go-zone quadrant (above average importance/feasibility) were Conclusions: This study created a framework of 10 priority areas to guide current and future efforts in diabetes translation research to achieve health equity. Themes rated as highly important and feasible provide the basis to evaluate current research support. Future efforts should explore how to best support innovative-targets, those rated highly important but less feasible

A Shared Staffing Model for Research Data Curation

December 2018 DataONE Webinar presentation.“Launching the Data curation Network: A cross-institutional staffing model for curating research data” funded 2018-2021 by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation grant G-2018-10072

International nurse education leaders' experiences of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic:A qualitative study

AIMS: To explore the experiences of strategic leads for nurse education as they sought to respond to the COVID‐19 pandemic. DESIGN: We utilised a qualitative interpretative approach to explore education leaders’ experiences of leading during the early months of the pandemic. METHODS: Nineteen leaders with significant strategic responsibility for nurse education in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore and the United Kingdom were identified via purposive sampling and agreed to participate. Interviews were held between May and July 2020. RESULTS: Four overarching themes arose from the analysis: (1) Crisis driven adaptability & flexibility; (2) Responsive, complex and changing communication; (3) Making decisions for student and staff safety; (4) Looking to the future; stronger partnerships. CONCLUSION: Internationally, while nursing education leaders faced different problems, they shared a common goal amidst the crisis to remain student‐centred. They demonstrated they were able to face major challenges, respond to large scale logistical problems and make decisions under significant and ongoing pressure. IMPACT: In responding to the pandemic, nurse leaders shared knowledge and offered mutual support. This bodes well for future collaboration. The move to online learning accelerated an existing trend and it seems likely that this will continue. Given the pressures they experienced over an extended period, the sector may wish to consider how it prepares and supports existing and future leaders

Meal Timing Regulates the Human Circadian System

Circadian rhythms, metabolism and nutrition are intimately linked [1, 2], although effects of meal timing on the human circadian system are poorly understood. We investigated the effect of a 5-hour delay in meals on markers of the human master clock and multiple peripheral circadian rhythms. Ten healthy young men undertook a 13-day laboratory protocol. Three meals (breakfast, lunch, dinner) were given at 5-hour intervals, beginning either 0.5 (early) or 5.5 (late) hours after wake. Participants were acclimated to early meals and then switched to late meals for 6 days. After each meal schedule, participants' circadian rhythms were measured in a 37-hour constant routine that removes sleep and environmental rhythms while replacing meals with hourly isocaloric snacks. Meal timing did not alter actigraphic sleep parameters before circadian rhythm measurement. In constant routines, meal timing did not affect rhythms of subjective hunger and sleepiness, master clock markers (plasma melatonin and cortisol), plasma triglycerides, or clock gene expression in whole blood. Following late meals, however, plasma glucose rhythms were delayed by 5.69 ± 1.29 hours (p < 0.001) and average glucose concentration decreased by 0.27 ± 0.05 mM (p < 0.001). In adipose tissue, PER2 mRNA rhythms were delayed by 0.97 ± 0.29 hours (p < 0.01), indicating that human molecular clocks may be regulated by feeding time and could underpin plasma glucose changes. Timed meals therefore play a role in synchronising peripheral circadian rhythms in humans, and may have particular relevance for patients with circadian rhythm disorders, shift workers, and transmeridian travellers

Activation mapping in patients with coronary artery disease with multiple ventricular tachycardia configurations: Occurrence and therapeutic implications of widely separate apparent sites of origin

Catheter or intraoperative activation mapping studies, or both, were performed in 17 patients with coronary artery disease with two to four distinct configurations of ventricular tachycardia, resistant to a mean of 12.1 ± 6.0 antiarrhythmic drug trials per patient. Mapping studies were performed to guide anticipated surgical ablation of arrhythmias. Activation map data were adequate to determine sites of origin of 30 (64%) of 47 observed tachycardia configurations. These 30 ventricular tachycardias (26 observed clinically) were mapped to 22 separate endocardial sites of origin. Sites of origin of distinct tachycardias were identical or closely adjacent (within 3 cm) in six patients and widely separate (≥4 cm) in eight patients (47% of the group). Activation maps were not adequate to determine sites of origin of 17 (36%) of the 47 tachycardias, including all configurations in three patients.Fifteen patients underwent surgery for control of ventricular tachycardia: aggressive, map-guided endocardial resection (mean 26.5 ± 14.2 cm2) in 12 patients with identified sites of tachycardia origin and extensive resection of visible endocardial scar (2 patients) or encircling endocardial ventriculotomy (1 patient) in those in whom the sites of origin of all clinical tachycardias remained undetermined. Two inoperable patients were treated with amiodarone. During postoperative electrophysiologic tests (11 of 13 surgical survivors), ventricular tachyarrhythmias were initially uninducible in only 4 of 11 patients. However, in two patients only nonclinical arrhythmias (ventricular flutter) were induced. Six (21%) of 29 clinical tachycardias whose sites of origin were either not determined or not resected (right septum or papillary muscle) remained inducible in five patients. Using previously ineffective antiarrhythmic drugs, initially inducible arrhythmias became uninducible (two patients), or harder to induce than preoperatively (five patients). As a result of surgical resections alone or in combination with previously ineffective drugs (and amiodarone in two inoperable patients), there were no recurrences of ventricular tachycardia in 14 (93%) of 15 patients discharged during 19.0 ± 14.3 months of follow-up study.Thus, activation mapping may commonly reveal separate apparent sites of origin for clinically observed, morphologically distinct, highly drug-refractory ventricular tachycardias in patients with coronary artery disease with multiple tachycardia configurations. Extensive surgical resection of identified sites of origin may be required to ablate arrhythmias in these patients. Tachycardias whose sites of origin are not identified or resected may remain inducible. However, aggressive surgical excisions may alter regions involved in the genesis or maintenance of these arrhythmias because they become more difficult to induce postoperatively, more amenable to drug therapy and do not recur

Attitude change and increased confidence with management of chronic breathlessness following a health professional training workshop: a survey evaluation

Abstract: Background: Clinicians and people living with chronic breathlessness have expressed a need to better understand and manage this symptom. The aim of this study was to evaluate a 3-day health professional training workshop on the practical management of chronic breathlessness. Methods: Workshop design and delivery were based on current understandings and clinical models of chronic breathlessness management, principles of transformative learning, and included sessions co-designed with people living with breathlessness. Registrants were invited to complete pre and post-workshop surveys. Pre and 1-week post-workshop online questionnaires assessed familiarity and confidence about workshop objectives (0[lowest]-10[highest] visual analogue scale), attitudes and practices regarding chronic breathlessness (agreement with statements on 5-point Likert scales). Post-workshop, participants were asked to describe implementation plans and anticipated barriers. Baseline familiarity and confidence were reported as mean (SD) and change examined with paired t-tests. Pre-post attitudes and practices were summarised by frequency/percentages and change examined non-parametrically (5-point Likert scale responses) or using a McNemar test of change (binary responses). Results: Forty-seven of 55 registrants joined the study; 39 completed both pre and post-workshop questionnaires (35 female; 87% clinicians; median 8 years working with people with chronic breathlessness). Post-workshop, greatest gains in confidence were demonstrated for describing biopsychosocial concepts unpinning chronic breathlessness (mean change confidence = 3.2 points; 95% CI 2.7 to 4.0, p < 0.001). Respondents significantly changed their belief toward agreement that people are able to rate their breathlessness intensity on a scale (60 to 81% agreement) although only a minority strongly agreed with this statement at both time points (pre 11%, post 22%). The largest shift in attitude was toward agreement (z statistic 3.74, p < 0.001, effect size r = 0.6) that a person’s experience of breathlessness should be used to guide treatment decisions (from 43 to 73% strong agreement). Participants’ belief that cognitive behavioural strategies are effective for relief of breathlessness changed further toward agreement after the workshop (81 to 100%, McNemar test chi- square = 5.14, p = 0.02). Conclusion: The focus of this training on biopsychosocial understandings of chronic breathlessness and involvement of people living with this symptom were valued. These features were identified as facilitators of change in fundamental attitudes and preparedness for practice

KSU Chorale, Women\u27s Choir, and Northwestern Middle School 8th Grade Chorus

Kennesaw State University School of Music presents KSU Chorale, Women\u27s Choir, and Northwestern Middle School 8th Grade Chorus.https://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/musicprograms/1154/thumbnail.jp