Whole Crop Cereal Silage in Dairy Production

Whole-crop cereal silages (WCCS) are used to some extent in Sweden, but knowledge about the use of this feed for high yielding dairy cows is scarce. The crop is often harvested at different stages of maturity, from heading to yellow ripeness, which gives forages that differ in chemical composition. The purpose of this trial was to compare intake and milk production of dairy cows fed a WCCS based on barley harvested at three different stages of maturity

BETWEEN BROADCASTING POLITICAL MESSAGES AND INTERACTING WITH VOTERS

Politicians across Western democracies are increasingly adopting and experimenting with Twitter, particularly during election time. The purpose of this article is to investigate how candidates are using it during an election campaign. The aim is to create a typology of the various ways in which candidates behaved on Twitter. Our research, which included a content analysis of tweets (n = 26,282) from all twittering Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat candidates (n = 416) during the 2010 UK General Election campaign, focused on four aspects of tweets: type, interaction, function and topic. By examining candidates' twittering behaviour, the authors show that British politicians mainly used Twitter as a unidirectional form of communication. However, there were a group of candidates who used it to interact with voters by, for example, mobilizing, helping and consulting them, thus tapping into the potential Twitter offers for facilitating a closer relationship with citizens

Direct and cross-scheme effects in a research and development subsidy program

This study investigates the effects of an R&D subsidy scheme on participating firms’ net R&D investment. Making use of a specific policy design in Belgium that explicitly distinguishes between research and development grants, we estimate direct and cross-scheme effects on research versus development intensities in recipients firms. We find positive direct effects from research (development) subsidies on net research (development) spending. This direct effect is larger for research grants than for development grants. We also find cross-scheme effects that may arise due to complementarity between research and development activities. Finally, we find that the magnitude of the treatment effects depends on firm size and age and that there is a minimum effective grant size, especially for research projects. The results support the view that public subsidies induce higher additional investment particularly in research where market failures are larger, even when the subsidies are targeting development

Reducing Adverse Self-Medication Behaviors in Older Adults with Hypertension: Results of an e-health Clinical Efficacy Trial

A randomized controlled efficacy trial targeting older adults with hypertension (age 60 and over) provided an e-health, tailored intervention with the “next generation” of the Personal Education Program (PEP-NG). Eleven primary care practices with advanced practice registered nurse (APRN) providers participated. Participants (N = 160) were randomly assigned by the PEP-NG (accessed via a wireless touchscreen tablet computer) to either control (entailing data collection and four routine APRN visits) or tailored intervention (involving PEP-NG intervention and four focused APRN visits) group. Compared to patients in the control group, patients receiving the PEP-NG e-health intervention achieved significant increases in both self-medication knowledge and self-efficacy measures, with large effect sizes. Among patients not at BP targets upon entry to the study, therapy intensification in controls (increased antihypertensive dose and/or an additional antihypertensive) was significant (p = .001) with an odds ratio of 21.27 in the control compared to the intervention group. Among patients not at BP targets on visit 1, there was a significant declining linear trend in proportion of the intervention group taking NSAIDs 21–31 days/month (p = 0.008). Satisfaction with the PEP-NG and the APRN provider relationship was high in both groups. These results suggest that the PEP-NG e-health intervention in primary care practices is effective in increasing knowledge and self-efficacy, as well as improving behavior regarding adverse self-medication practices among older adults with hypertension

Incorporating clinical guidelines through clinician decision-making

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>It is generally acknowledged that a disparity between knowledge and its implementation is adversely affecting quality of care. An example commonly cited is the failure of clinicians to follow clinical guidelines. A guiding assumption of this view is that adherence should be gauged by a standard of conformance. At least some guideline developers dispute this assumption and claim that their efforts are intended to inform and assist clinical practice, not to function as standards of performance. However, their ability to assist and inform will remain limited until an alternative to the conformance criterion is proposed that gauges how evidence-based guidelines are incorporated into clinical decisions.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The proposed investigation has two specific aims to identify the processes that affect decisions about incorporating clinical guidelines, and then to develop ad test a strategy that promotes the utilization of evidence-based practices. This paper focuses on the first aim. It presents the rationale, introduces the clinical paradigm of treatment-resistant schizophrenia, and discusses an exemplar of clinician non-conformance to a clinical guideline. A modification of the original study is proposed that targets psychiatric trainees and draws on a cognitively rich theory of decision-making to formulate hypotheses about how the guideline is incorporated into treatment decisions. Twenty volunteer subjects recruited from an accredited psychiatry training program will respond to sixty-four vignettes that represent a fully crossed 2 × 2 × 2 × 4 within-subjects design. The variables consist of criteria contained in the clinical guideline and other relevant factors. Subjects will also respond to a subset of eight vignettes that assesses their overall impression of the guideline. Generalization estimating equation models will be used to test the study's principal hypothesis and perform secondary analyses.</p> <p>Implications</p> <p>The original design of phase two of the proposed investigation will be changed in recognition of newly published literature on the relative effectiveness of treatments for schizophrenia. It is suggested that this literature supports the notion that guidelines serve a valuable function as decision tools, and substantiates the importance of decision-making as the means by which general principles are incorporated into clinical practice.</p