“Do I need exercise?” A Qualitative Study on Factors Affecting Leisure-Time Physical Activity in India

Physical activity can reduce the risk of premature mortality from various chronic diseases. Previous research in Kerala, India indicates several barriers which can impact physical activity levels. Perceptions about the importance of health-promoting physical activity were examined among adults in Kerala and various facilitators, motivators and barriers to physical activity were identified using focus group discussions and interviews with key informants. At present, the attitude of people and health professionals is that physical activity has to be taken up when diagnosed with a disease (obesity, diabetes) and advised by a health professional. Men were more likely to start exercising after being advised by a health worker compared to women who were restricted by family roles and gender norms. Hence, there is an urgent need to include physical activity in all health communications to increase awareness about the role of physical activity in health promotion and disease prevention

Parameterized Complexity of Biclique Contraction and Balanced Biclique Contraction

In this work, we initiate the complexity study of Biclique Contraction and Balanced Biclique Contraction. In these problems, given as input a graph G and an integer k, the objective is to determine whether one can contract at most k edges in G to obtain a biclique and a balanced biclique, respectively. We first prove that these problems are NP-complete even when the input graph is bipartite. Next, we study the parameterized complexity of these problems and show that they admit single exponential-time FPT algorithms when parameterized by the number k of edge contractions. Then, we show that Balanced Biclique Contraction admits a quadratic vertex kernel while Biclique Contraction does not admit any polynomial compression (or kernel) under standard complexity-theoretic assumptions

Subspecialty surveillance of long-term course of small and moderate muscular ventricular septal defect: heterogenous practices, low yield.

BACKGROUND: No expert consensus guides practice for intensity of ongoing pediatric cardiology surveillance of hemodynamically insignificant small and moderate muscular ventricular septal defect (mVSD). Therefore, despite the well-established benign natural history of mVSD, there is potential for widely divergent follow up practices. The purpose of this investigation was to evaluate (1) variations in follow up of mVSD within an academic children\u27s hospital based pediatric cardiology practice, and (2) the frequency of active medical or surgical management resulting from follow up of mVSD. METHODS: We retrospectively reviewed records of 600 patients with isolated mVSD echocardiographically diagnosed between 2006 and 2012. Large mVSD were excluded (n = 4). Patient age, gender, echocardiographic findings, provider, recommendations for follow up, and medical and surgical management were tabulated at initial and follow up visits. Independent associations with follow up recommendations were sought using multivariate analysis. RESULTS: Initial echocardiography showed small single mVSD in 509 (85%), multiple small mVSD in 60 (10%), and small-to-moderate or moderate single mVSD in 31 (5%). The mean age at diagnosis was 15.9 months (0-18.5 years) and 25.7 months (0-18.5 years) at last follow up. There was slight female predominance (56.3%). Fourteen pediatric cardiology providers recommended 316 follow up visits, 259 of which were actually accomplished. There were 37 other unplanned follow up visits. No medical or surgical management changes were associated with any of the follow up visits. The proportion of patients for whom follow up was advised varied among providers from 11 to 100%. Independent associations with recommendation for follow up were limited to the identity and clinical volume of the provider, age of the patient, and the presence of multiple, small-to-moderate, or moderate mVSD. CONCLUSIONS: In this large series of moderate or smaller mVSD, pediatric cardiology follow up was commonly recommended but resulted in no active medical or surgical management. Major provider based inconsistency in intensity of follow up of mVSD was identified, but is difficult to justify

Extending indoor open street mapping environments to navigable 3D citygml building models: Emergency response assessment

© Authors 2018. Disaster scenarios in high-rise buildings such as the Address Downtown, Dubai or Grenfell Tower, London have showed ones again the importance of data information availability for emergency management in buildings. 3D visualization of indoor routing services using extensive and high quality geographic data sources is essential for spatial analysis in emergency responses. In order to facilitate emergency response simulations, a combination of geometrical, graphical and semantic information is essential. Successful and efficient emergency evacuation responses is facilitated by the availability of both digital static and dynamic information of the incident site. However, interruptions may be encountered with the availability of dynamic data, where static data developed using indoor navigation ontologies serve as an alternative to inform the first responders. Thus, it is necessary to obtain a firm, interactive and quasi-realistic virtual simulation of the building environments. Voxelized CityGML models imported into voxel based hazard simulation systems fits well into the simulation algorithm requirements (Groger et al., 2008; Moreno et.al, 2010). Therefore, the research investigates an alternative platform for generating CityGML spatial analysis models. LoD4 models are developed using Computer Aided Design (Auto CAD) 2D files, crowdsourced geo-data (OpenStreetMap) and open source tools. A combination of software packages is utilized for 3D reconstruction of building interiors. This process is achieved through a Java application developed by researchers at Heidelberg University. Conclusions drawn from the research validate the 3D CityGML model generation process as an international standard to effectively enhance the outcome of emergency evacuation simulations of high rise buildings

Radiation resistance of gadolinium zirconate pyrochlore

The pyrochlore structure-type is a proposed host phase for the immobilization of plutonium. Previous studies have shown that a wide variety of actinide pyrochlores can be synthesized. Gadolinium zirconate with the pyrochlore structure has been shown to be remarkably radiation resistant. We report additional results of ion-beam irradiation studies. © 2000 American Institute of Physics.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/87570/2/15_1.pd

Endoglycosidase treatment abrogates IgG arthritogenicity: Importance of IgG glycosylation in arthritis.

The glycosylation status of IgG has been implicated in the pathology of rheumatoid arthritis. Earlier, we reported the identification of a novel secreted endo-beta-N-acetylglucosaminidase (EndoS), secreted by Streptococcus pyogenes that specifically hydrolyzes the beta-1,4-di-N-acetylchitobiose core of the asparagine-linked glycan of human IgG. Here, we analyzed the arthritogenicity of EndoS-treated collagen type II (CII) -specific mouse mAb in vivo. Endoglycosidase treatment of the antibodies inhibited the induction of arthritis in (BALB/c x B10.Q) F1 mice and induced a milder arthritis in B10.RIII mice as compared with the severe arthritis induced by non-treated antibodies. Furthermore, EndoS treatment did not affect the binding of IgG to CII and their ability to activate complement, but it resulted in reduced IgG binding to Fc gamma R and disturbed the formation of stable immune complexes. Hence, the asparagine-linked glycan on IgG plays a crucial role in the development of arthritis

Can Abbreviated Cardiac Magnetic Resonance Imaging Adequately Support Clinical Decision Making After Repair of Tetralogy of Fallot?

Quantification of pulmonary regurgitation (PR), pulmonary flow distribution, and ventricular function is important for clinical surveillance in repaired Tetralogy of Fallot (TOF). Cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) is the established reference, but cost, test duration, and patient discomfort are potential limitations to its serial use. We investigated whether an Abbreviated CMR protocol would alter clinical decisions in TOF from those that would have been made using a full protocol. Patients > 7 years with repaired TOF were identified. CMR was performed according to standard complete imaging protocol. CMRs were prepared in two ways, Full and Abbreviated and submitted for review by two imaging specialists. In conjunction with clinical information and case-specific quantitative CMR data (PR fraction, ventricular volumes, ejection fraction, branch pulmonary artery flow), Full and Abbreviated image sets were anonymized and uploaded for review. For the first half, Imager 1 received Abbreviated, and Imager 2 Full and for the remaining, Imager 1 received Full and Imager 2 received Abbreviated. Blinded to the other’s choices, Imagers provided clinical decisions. Inter-rater agreement for each decision was measured. In all, 124 studies from 80 patients (mean 17.8 years) were analyzed. For ‘intervention versus no-intervention’ decision, the inter-rater agreement was strong [κ 0.75, p < 0.0001, 95% CI (0.630, 0.869)]. Agreement for recommended timing of follow-up imaging was good (κ 0.64, p < 0.0001, 95% CI (0.474, 0.811)] in the ‘no-intervention’ group. When raters were asked whether or not further imaging was necessary, agreement was modest [κ 0.363 (p < 0.0001), 95% CI (0.038, 0.687)]. In conclusion, Abbreviated CMR yield decisions for clinical care similar to those made using the standard full protocol. These results suggest a potential enhancement of clinical practice in which efficiency and cost saving might be achieved using Abbreviated CMR for routine follow-up surveillance of TOF

Measuring childhood socioeconomic position in health research:Development and validation of childhood socioeconomic position questionnaire using mixed method approach

Background: There is no single best indicator to assess the childhood socioeconomic position (CSEP) in public health research. The aim of the study is to develop and validate a new questionnaire, with adequate psychometric properties, to measure the childhood SEP of the young adults. Methods: The first phase consisted of a qualitative phase to identify the variables to measure childhood SEP through the in-depth interviews among 15 young adults (18-45 years) of rural Kerala. The second phase was a quantitative phase to validate the questionnaire through a cross sectional survey among 200 young adults of Kerala. We did content validity, reliability tests and construct validity by using exploratory factor analysis of the questionnaire to demonstrate its psychometric properties. Results: The qualitative analysis reported 26 variables spread across 5 domains to measure the CSEP. Finally, the questionnaire has 11 questions with 3 domains named as value added through paternity, maternal occupation-related factors and parental education. The questionnaire has good reliability (Cronbach's α=0.88) also. Conclusion: We have developed a reliable and valid questionnaire to measure the childhood SEP of younger adults and can be used in various public health research

A compact cryogenic configurable slit unit for a multi-object infrared spectrograph:Design and Development of a prototype at TIFR

We present a cryogenic configurable slit unit (CSU) for a multi object infrared spectrograph with an effective field of view of 9.1 arcmin x 9.1 arcmin that was completely conceived and designed in the laboratory at TIFR. Several components of the CSU including the controller for the commercially procured piezo-walkers, controlled loop position sensing mechanism using digital slide callipers and a cryogenic test facility for the assembled prototype were also developed in-house. The principle of the CSU involves division of the field of view of the spectrometer into contiguous and parallel spatial bands, each one associated with two opposite sliding metal bars that can be positioned to create a slit needed to make spectroscopic observations of one astronomical object. A three-slit prototype of the newly designed CSU was built and tested extensively at ambient and cryogenic temperatures. The performance of the CSU was found to be as per specifications.Comment: 7 pages, Accepted for publication in the Journal of Astronomical Instrumentatio

Advancing the application of systems thinking in health: understanding the growing complexity governing immunization services in Kerala, India

The study calls for greater consideration of dynamics of vaccine acceptability while formulating immunization policies and program strategies. Governing immunization services in a way that achieves and maintains desired population coverage levels is complex, as it involves interactions of multiple actors and contexts. A complex adaptive system lens helped to uncover the ‘real’ drivers for change in an immunization program experiencing declining coverage in northern districts of Kerala. The analytical approaches adopted in this study are not only applicable to immunization or Kerala but to all complex interventions, health systems problems, and contexts