Setting the Table for Feast or Famine: How Education will Play a Deciding Role in the Future of Precision Agriculture

Precision agriculture has many names including satellite farming, or site-specific crop management. Early forms of precision agriculture involved creating fertilizer maps, yield measurements, grid sampling, and soil pH content monitoring. Roughly 25 years ago, the advent of global positioning systems, commonly known as GPS, enabled farmers to make more informed decisions about where to plant seed and how much seed to plant. Precision agriculture technologies typically utilize sensors that are placed on tractors, combines, and other farm equipment, and which measure various conditions including seeding rates, soil conditions, and other indicators of production. Over time, this technology has been expanded to provide a wide range of services like field mapping, tractor guidance, and yield monitoring. These technologies also help farmers make the most efficient use of pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers. As a result, farmers are no longer forced to treat fields uniformly or to make guesses about the best courses of action for their fields. Instead, precision agriculture enables farmers to micromanage their fields on a day-to day basis, or even minute-by-minute basis, while relying on highly accurate data

An Interview with Outgoing Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack: Reflections on His Legacy & Challenges Facing a New Era in American Agriculture Policy

In a special interview with Lauren Manning, former Secretary of Agricultural Tom Vilsack reflects on his eight-year tenure at the Department of Agriculture (USDA). Sec. Vilsack discusses such issues as the farm bill, opportunities for beginning and disadvantaged farmers, and trade. In addition to recounting the successes of the Obama administration’s USDA, Sec. Vilsack explains his hopes for the incoming Secretary of Agriculture and the Trump administration

Gendered occupations and career pursuit correlates : contribution of self-and other-directed attitudes for women

My thesis explored whether women???s career expectations for an average ingroup member depend on one or both of the following: (a) career type (stereotypical masculine vs. stereotypical feminine) and (b) attitudes about women in general. The sample (N = 155; all female, 154 cis women, 1 trans woman; all U.S. residents) completed explicit\ud measures of ambivalent sexism and gender-based stigma consciousness and ratings of career expectations of an average woman. Results indicated that women have more\ud negative career expectations for an average woman in a stereotypical masculine career\ud than in a stereotypical feminine career. Also, benevolent sexism may promote women???s\ud tendency to pursue gender stereotypical careers and stigma consciousness may interfere with women???s desire to pursue gender non-stereotypical careers. These findings highlight the role of women???s ingroup gender attitudes in predicting biased career expectations, contributing to the larger psychological understanding of women???s career development

Occupational Therapy Non-Pharmacological Interventions for Adults With Chronic Pain: A Rapid Systematic Review

Indiana University Purdue University IndianapolisPeople around the world, someone you know, or even a loved one experience chronic pain that impacts their ability to engage in meaningful activities. According to the World Health Organization, one in two adults in the United States lives with chronic pain. In recent years, prescribing opioids appeared to be a quick, easy fix for pain management. Opioid use, however, is associated with adverse effects to the mind and body and may become a financial burden or addiction for many users. Reducing opioid use while improving chronic pain and function is the leading rehabilitative objective of occupational therapy for chronic pain. Occupational therapy practitioners address and treat many conditions involving chronic pain and educate their clients about effectively managing that pain while participating in desired occupations. This article highlights the evidence of 25 chronic pain intervention studies so that occupational therapists and other healthcare professionals can make evidence-based decisions about the interventions they choose for adults with chronic pain who are working toward maximal occupational engagement.Occupational Therap

Evaluation of the Cwm Taf University Health Board Domiciliary Medicines Use Review (Dom-MUR) Service

The Medicines Use Review (MUR) Service is an Advanced Service in the community pharmacy contract in the United Kingdom (UK). It involves the pharmacist reviewing a patient’s use of their medication whose purpose is to improve patient understanding and adherence to medication and reduce medication waste. Since November 2012, the Cwm Taf University Health Board (UHB) in Wales has commissioned a domiciliary MUR (Dom-MUR) service, thereby providing housebound patients with equal access to MURs to those able to visit a community pharmacy. We aimed to identify the types of issues and interventions carried out by pharmacists as part of the Dom-MUR service. A database of Dom-MUR entries from December 2012 – March 2014 was obtained from the UHB. Issues and outcomes arising from Dom-MURs were categorised. Data was quantitatively analysed using Microsoft Excel® and GraphPad Prism®. Data from 194 Dom-MURs was included in the database. The mean number of issues identified per patient was 1.96 (SD±1.41). The three most commonly identified issues were related to ‘Patient Adherence (29%, n=110), ‘Patient Education/ Monitoring’ (21%, n=79) and ‘Medication Excess in Home’ (12%, n=47). The mean number of outcomes per patient was 1.97 (SD±1.48). Of the outcomes, 32% (n=122) involved the pharmacist contacting the GP surgery i.e. they could not resolve these issues themselves. Issues assigned to ‘Issues with Patient’s Condition’ were statistically less likely to be resolved by the pharmacist. The Cwm Taf UHB Dom-MUR service has the potential to be of value in terms of more appropriate and cost effective care. Developments within community pharmacy, such as access to patients’ health records and pharmacist independent prescribing, may benefit this service with the potential for pharmacists to resolve more issues themselves