Older adults' evaluations of the standard and modified pedometer-based Green Prescription

INTRODUCTION: The Green Prescription is a primary care programme designed to increase physical activity in individuals with low activity levels. Older adults tend to engage in insufficient physical activity to obtain health-related gain. AIM: To examine participants’ ratings of the Healthy Steps intervention and to assess how participants rated the use of a pedometer-based Green Prescription in aiding their physical activity. METHODS: In total, 330 community-dwelling older adults who have low levels of activity were randomised to receive either a standard time-based Green Prescription or a modified pedometer-based Green Prescription. Post-intervention, 259 participants completed the participant evaluation questionnaire via postal survey. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics and Chi-squared analyses. RESULTS: The standard components of the Green Prescription (general practitioner consultations and telephone counselling) received similar and higher ratings across both allocation groups than the use of print materials. A pedometer-based Green Prescription was rated as being helpful in aiding physical activity. DISCUSSION: This study supports the importance of general practitioners’ initial role in prescribing physical activity for older adults and of ongoing telephone support for longer-term adherence. Incorporating a pedometer can be effective in helping low-active older adults initiate and maintain regular physical activity

Exercise for acute respiratory infections

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Flow compressibility effects around an open-wheel racing car

A numerical investigation has been conducted into the influence of flow compressibility effects around an open-wheeled racing car. A geometry was created to comply with 2012 F1 regulations. Incompressible and compressible CFD simulations were compared-firstly with models which maintained Reynolds number as Mach number increased, and secondly allowing Mach number and Reynolds number to increase together as they would on track. Results demonstrated significant changes to predicted aerodynamic performance even below Mach 0·15. While the full car coefficients differed by a few percent, individual components (particularly the rear wheels and the floor/ diffuser area) showed discrepancies of over 10% at higher Mach numbers when compressible and incompressible predictions were compared. Components in close ground proximity were most affected due to the ground effect. The additional computational expense required for the more physically-realistic compressible simulations would therefore be an additional consideration when seeking to obtain maximum accuracy even at low freestream Mach numbers

Piecewise Linear Representation Segmentation as a Multiobjective Optimization Problem

Proceedings of: Forth International Workshop on User-Centric Technologies and applications (CONTEXTS 2010). Valencia, September 7-10, 2010Actual time series exhibit huge amounts of data which require an unaffordable computational load to be processed, leading to approximate representations to aid these processes. Segmentation processes deal with this issue dividing time series into a certain number of segments and approximating those segments with a basic function. Among the most extended segmentation approaches, piecewise linear representation is highlighted due to its simplicity. This work presents an approach based on the formalization of the segmentation process as a multiobjetive optimization problem and the resolution of that problem with an evolutionary algorithm.This work was supported in part by Projects CICYT TIN2008-06742-C02-02/TSI, CICYT TEC2008-06732-C02-02/TEC, CAM CONTEXTS (S2009/TIC-1485) and DPS2008-07029-C02-02.Publicad

Leadership development in a faith-based non-profit organisation using a relational leadership model: A case study

This paper describes a case study of a Leadership Development Program (LDP) which has been developed and conducted at a large faith-based non-profit organization providing aged and community care in Australia. Walter Wright's Relational Leadership model which used insights from Jude, Philemon and Colossians was adopted by the organization. Started as a pilot in 2003 the LDP was implemented in 2007 and has been run regularly since then. The LDP was systematically evaluated by an independent researcher recently. The evaluation concluded that the program has been effective and recommended that it continue with some minor modifications. The organization in which this program was developed is a partner in an Australian Research Council (ARC) linkage grant started in 2010 between three universities and two faith-based non-profit organizations providing aged care and community care. This paper has been written by four researchers involved in the linkage grant. Four interviews on participants in the LDP were conducted by the authors to evaluate the effectiveness of the leadership program in order to prepare this paper. The study was carried out to clarify the research aim for the principal author (who is a PhD student in the ARC grant) by trying to understand what the LDP program was aiming to achieve and to be presented at the Spirituality at Work conference at the University of Arkansas

Weekend hospitalization and additional risk of death: An analysis of inpatient data

Objective To assess whether weekend admissions to hospital and/or already being an inpatient on weekend days were associated with any additional mortality risk.Design Retrospective observational survivorship study. We analysed all admissions to the English National Health Service (NHS) during the financial year 2009/10, following up all patients for 30 days after admission and accounting for risk of death associated with diagnosis, co-morbidities, admission history, age, sex, ethnicity, deprivation, seasonality, day of admission and hospital trust, including day of death as a time dependent covariate. The principal analysis was based on time to in-hospital death.Participants National Health Service Hospitals in England.Main Outcome Measures 30 day mortality (in or out of hospital).Results There were 14,217,640 admissions included in the principal analysis, with 187,337 in-hospital deaths reported within 30 days of admission. Admission on weekend days was associated with a considerable increase in risk of subsequent death compared with admission on weekdays, hazard ratio for Sunday versus Wednesday 1.16 (95% CI 1.14 to 1.18; P < .0001), and for Saturday versus Wednesday 1.11 (95% CI 1.09 to 1.13; P < .0001). Hospital stays on weekend days were associated with a lower risk of death than midweek days, hazard ratio for being in hospital on Sunday versus Wednesday 0.92 (95% CI 0.91 to 0.94; P < .0001), and for Saturday versus Wednesday 0.95 (95% CI 0.93 to 0.96; P < .0001). Similar findings were observed on a smaller US data set.Conclusions Admission at the weekend is associated with increased risk of subsequent death within 30 days of admission. The likelihood of death actually occurring is less on a weekend day than on a mid-week day