He Scores Through a Screen: Mediating Masculinities Through Hockey Video Games

Hockey video games highlight the ways in which the video game medium shapes and conditions the experience of producing and/or performing the sport “in real life.” Indeed, the accumulation of advanced statistics in and through the constant evaluation, measurement, and surveillance which are inherent to video games—and increasingly seen as foundational for sport—reveals important contradictions not only in the way the embodied sport is played and understood, but also in terms of the proofs of masculinity upon which the sport is built. It then becomes clear that the building of masculinity and the empowerment of the character become one and the same. The ludic function reinforces the cultural imperative and vice versa. Thus, our chapter prizes apart the conflation of masculinity with hockey while showing the ways that video game studies can contribute to existing disciplines

Relevance similarity: an alternative means to monitor information retrieval systems

BACKGROUND: Relevance assessment is a major problem in the evaluation of information retrieval systems. The work presented here introduces a new parameter, "Relevance Similarity", for the measurement of the variation of relevance assessment. In a situation where individual assessment can be compared with a gold standard, this parameter is used to study the effect of such variation on the performance of a medical information retrieval system. In such a setting, Relevance Similarity is the ratio of assessors who rank a given document same as the gold standard over the total number of assessors in the group. METHODS: The study was carried out on a collection of Critically Appraised Topics (CATs). Twelve volunteers were divided into two groups of people according to their domain knowledge. They assessed the relevance of retrieved topics obtained by querying a meta-search engine with ten keywords related to medical science. Their assessments were compared to the gold standard assessment, and Relevance Similarities were calculated as the ratio of positive concordance with the gold standard for each topic. RESULTS: The similarity comparison among groups showed that a higher degree of agreements exists among evaluators with more subject knowledge. The performance of the retrieval system was not significantly different as a result of the variations in relevance assessment in this particular query set. CONCLUSION: In assessment situations where evaluators can be compared to a gold standard, Relevance Similarity provides an alternative evaluation technique to the commonly used kappa scores, which may give paradoxically low scores in highly biased situations such as document repositories containing large quantities of relevant data

How patients understand depression associated with chronic physical disease - A systematic review

Background: Clinicians are encouraged to screen people with chronic physical illness for depression. Screening alone may not improve outcomes, especially if the process is incompatible with patient beliefs. The aim of this research is to understand peoples beliefs about depression, particularly in the presence of chronic physical disease. Methods: A mixed method systematic review involving a thematic analysis of qualitative studies and quantitative studies of beliefs held by people with current depressive symptoms. MEDLINE, EMBASE, PSYCHINFO, CINAHL, BIOSIS, Web of Science, The Cochrane Library, UKCRN portfolio, National Research Register Archive, Clinicaltrials.gov and OpenSIGLE were searched from database inception to 31st December 2010. A narrative synthesis of qualitative and quantitative data, based initially upon illness representations and extended to include other themes not compatible with that framework. Results: A range of clinically relevant beliefs was identified from 65 studies including the difficulty in labeling depression, complex causal factors instead of the biological model, the roles of different treatments and negative views about the consequences of depression. We found other important themes less related to ideas about illness: the existence of a self-sustaining depression spiral; depression as an existential state; the ambiguous status of suicidal thinking; and the role of stigma and blame in depression. Conclusions: Approaches to detection of depression in physical illness need to be receptive to the range of beliefs held by patients. Patient beliefs have implications for engagement with depression screening

Would school closure for the 2009 H1N1 influenza epidemic have been worth the cost?: a computational simulation of Pennsylvania

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>During the 2009 H1N1 influenza epidemic, policy makers debated over whether, when, and how long to close schools. While closing schools could have reduced influenza transmission thereby preventing cases, deaths, and health care costs, it may also have incurred substantial costs from increased childcare needs and lost productivity by teachers and other school employees.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A combination of agent-based and Monte Carlo economic simulation modeling was used to determine the cost-benefit of closing schools (vs. not closing schools) for different durations (range: 1 to 8 weeks) and symptomatic case incidence triggers (range: 1 to 30) for the state of Pennsylvania during the 2009 H1N1 epidemic. Different scenarios varied the basic reproductive rate (R₀) from 1.2, 1.6, to 2.0 and used case-hospitalization and case-fatality rates from the 2009 epidemic. Additional analyses determined the cost per influenza case averted of implementing school closure.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>For all scenarios explored, closing schools resulted in substantially higher net costs than not closing schools. For R₀= 1.2, 1.6, and 2.0 epidemics, closing schools for 8 weeks would have resulted in median net costs of $21.0 billion (95$8.0 - $45.3 billion). The median cost per influenza case averted would have been$14,185 ($5,423 -$30,565) for R₀= 1.2, $25,253 ($9,501 - $53,461) for R₀= 1.6, and$23,483 ($8,870 -$50,926) for R₀= 2.0.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our study suggests that closing schools during the 2009 H1N1 epidemic could have resulted in substantial costs to society as the potential costs of lost productivity and childcare could have far outweighed the cost savings in preventing influenza cases.</p

Protein Kinase Cδ Stimulates Proteasome-Dependent Degradation of C/EBPα during Apoptosis Induction of Leukemic Cells

BACKGROUND:The precise regulation and maintenance of balance between cell proliferation, differentiation and death in metazoan are critical for tissue homeostasis. CCAAT/enhancer-binding protein alpha (C/EBPalpha) has been implicated as a key regulator of differentiation and proliferation in various cell types. Here we investigated the potential dynamic change and role of C/EBPalpha protein during apoptosis induction. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS:Upon onset of apoptosis induced by various kinds of inducers such as NSC606985, etoposide and others, C/EBPalpha expression presented a profound down-regulation in leukemic cell lines and primary cells via induction of protein degradation and inhibition of transcription, as assessed respectively by cycloheximide inhibition test, real-time quantitative RT-PCR and luciferase reporter assay. Applying chemical inhibition, forced expression of dominant negative mutant and catalytic fragment (CF) of protein kinase Cdelta (PKCdelta), which was proteolytically activated during apoptosis induction tested, we showed that the active PKCdelta protein contributed to the increased degradation of C/EBPalpha protein. Three specific proteasome inhibitors antagonized C/EBPalpha degradation during apoptosis induction. More importantly, ectopic expression of PKCdelta-CF stimulated the ubiquitination of C/EBPalpha protein, while the chemical inhibition of PKCdelta action significantly inhibited the enhanced ubiquitination of C/EBPalpha protein under NSC606985 treatment. Additionally, silencing of C/EBPalpha expression by small interfering RNAs enhanced, while inducible expression of C/EBPalpha inhibited NSC606985/etoposide-induced apoptosis in leukemic cells. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE:These observations indicate that the activation of PKCdelta upon apoptosis results in the increased proteasome-dependent degradation of C/EBPalpha, which partially contributes to PKCdelta-mediated apoptosis

Ancillary human health benefits of improved air quality resulting from climate change mitigation

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation policies can provide ancillary benefits in terms of short-term improvements in air quality and associated health benefits. Several studies have analyzed the ancillary impacts of GHG policies for a variety of locations, pollutants, and policies. In this paper we review the existing evidence on ancillary health benefits relating to air pollution from various GHG strategies and provide a framework for such analysis.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We evaluate techniques used in different stages of such research for estimation of: (1) changes in air pollutant concentrations; (2) avoided adverse health endpoints; and (3) economic valuation of health consequences. The limitations and merits of various methods are examined. Finally, we conclude with recommendations for ancillary benefits analysis and related research gaps in the relevant disciplines.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We found that to date most assessments have focused their analysis more heavily on one aspect of the framework (e.g., economic analysis). While a wide range of methods was applied to various policies and regions, results from multiple studies provide strong evidence that the short-term public health and economic benefits of ancillary benefits related to GHG mitigation strategies are substantial. Further, results of these analyses are likely to be underestimates because there are a number of important unquantified health and economic endpoints.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Remaining challenges include integrating the understanding of the relative toxicity of particulate matter by components or sources, developing better estimates of public health and environmental impacts on selected sub-populations, and devising new methods for evaluating heretofore unquantified and non-monetized benefits.</p