The Learning Skills Curriculum: An Eight-year Evaluation of a Complex Intervention

Learning to Learn is a field of educational theory and practice that aims to help children become more effective learners. The field has grown significantly through-out the last 40 years and a number of approaches have been implemented on a large scale in the UK as well as internationally. Research into metacognition and self-reg-ulation suggests that Learning to Learn programmes should help boost academic attainment. However, to date, large-scale evaluations of Learning to Learn initia-tives have found no clear impact on academic attainment. This paper presents the findings of an eight-year case study of Learning Skills, a new approach to Learning to Learn that was developed at a secondary school in the south of England, and eval-uated over eight years (2009 to 2017). Using an interventional design used widely in medicine and other fields, Learning Skills reconceptualises Learning to Learn as a ‘complex intervention’ comprised of multiple areas of evidence-informed practice. The rationale for complex interventions is that the ‘marginal gains’ to arise from each component stack up and interact to yield a larger effect size overall. This eval-uation found that Learning Skills led to significant gains in subject learning, with accelerated gains among pupils from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Further qualitative data analyses indicate a positive causal relationship between Learning Skills and academic attainment. As well as evaluating the impact of a promising new approach to Learning to Learn, this study generates new knowledge about the implementation and evaluation of complex interventions in education

Are carrion resources as scarce as we think?

As humans, we tend to focus on the greener, living aspects of the environment and often forget the other side filled with death and decay. Carrion, the decaying flesh of dead animals, is a nutrient-rich, spatially patchy ephemeral resource, relied upon as a food by a variety of organisms. As a patchy and finite resource, carrion\u27s availability and distribution are unpredictable. Some factors that can influence the availability and production of carrion include predation, old age, and anthropogenic causes. Feeding on these resources are many scavengers, both facultative and obligate, vertebrate and arthropod. A primary consumer of carrion are blow flies (Diptera: Calliphoridae); often the first organisms to arrive at a decaying carcass. There are at least 11 blow fly species in SW Ontario, all requiring carrion resources for immature larval development yet manage to co-exist on what has been stated to be a rare, patchy ephemeral resource. My thesis will be testing the hypothesis that carrion resources are not as rare as previously considered and may be predicted using land-use attributes. Specifically, I will be using geospatial technology to model land-use attributes in the urban and rural areas of Essex County, Ontario. Some distinct elements of land-use being examined include farm, residential, commercial, and conservation. Following this, sites will be randomly chosen to trap blow flies across the gradient of land-use predicted to influence carrion availability, measuring blow fly species diversity along this gradient. This knowledge furthers our understanding of blow fly co-existence across a spatial and temporal landscape

PainDroid: An android-based virtual reality application for pain assessment

Earlier studies in the field of pain research suggest that little efficient intervention currently exists in response to the exponential increase in the prevalence of pain. In this paper, we present an Android application (PainDroid) with multimodal functionality that could be enhanced with Virtual Reality (VR) technology, which has been designed for the purpose of improving the assessment of this notoriously difficult medical concern. Pain- Droid has been evaluated for its usability and acceptability with a pilot group of potential users and clinicians, with initial results suggesting that it can be an effective and usable tool for improving the assessment of pain. Participant experiences indicated that the application was easy to use and the potential of the application was similarly appreciated by the clinicians involved in the evaluation. Our findings may be of considerable interest to healthcare providers, policy makers, and other parties that might be actively involved in the area of pain and VR research

Patient safety culture in care homes for older people: a scoping review

Background: In recent years, there has been an increasing focus on the role of safety culture in preventing incidents such as medication errors and falls. However, research and developments in safety culture has predominantly taken place in hospital settings, with relatively less attention given to establishing a safety culture in care homes. Despite safety culture being accepted as an important quality indicator across all health and social care settings, the understanding of culture within social care settings remains far less developed than within hospitals. It is therefore important that the existing evidence base is gathered and reviewed in order to understand safety culture in care homes. Methods: A scoping review was undertaken to describe the availability of evidence related to care homes’ patient safety culture, what these studies focused on, and identify any knowledge gaps within the existing literature. Included papers were each reviewed by two authors for eligibility and to draw out information relevant to the scoping review. Results: Twenty-four empirical papers and one literature review were included within the scoping review. The collective evidence demonstrated that safety culture research is largely based in the USA, within Nursing Homes rather than Residential Home settings. Moreover, the scoping review revealed that empirical evidence has predominantly used quantitative measures, and therefore the deeper levels of culture have not been captured in the evidence base. Conclusions: Safety culture in care homes is a topic that has not been extensively researched. The review highlights a number of key gaps in the evidence base, which future research into safety culture in care home should attempt to address

Up-regulation of brain-derived neurotrophic factor in primary afferent pathway regulates colon-to-bladder cross-sensitization in rat

Background In humans, inflammation of either the urinary bladder or the distal colon often results in sensory cross-sensitization between these organs. Limited information is known about the mechanisms underlying this clinical syndrome. Studies with animal models have demonstrated that activation of primary afferent pathways may have a role in mediating viscero-visceral cross-organ sensitization. Methods Colonic inflammation was induced by a single dose of tri-nitrobenzene sulfonic acid (TNBS) instilled intracolonically. The histology of the colon and the urinary bladder was examined by hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) stain. The protein expression of transient receptor potential (TRP) ion channel of the vanilloid type 1 (TRPV1) and brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) were examined by immunohistochemistry and/or western blot. The inter-micturition intervals and the quantity of urine voided were obtained from analysis of cystometrograms. Results At 3 days post TNBS treatment, the protein level of TRPV1 was increased by 2-fold (p \u3c 0.05) in the inflamed distal colon when examined with western blot. TRPV1 was mainly expressed in the axonal terminals in submucosal area of the distal colon, and was co-localized with the neural marker PGP9.5. In sensory neurons in the dorsal root ganglia (DRG), BDNF expression was augmented by colonic inflammation examined in the L1 DRG, and was expressed in TRPV1 positive neurons. The elevated level of BDNF in L1 DRG by colonic inflammation was blunted by prolonged pre-treatment of the animals with the neurotoxin resiniferatoxin (RTX). Colonic inflammation did not alter either the morphology of the urinary bladder or the expression level of TRPV1 in this viscus. However, colonic inflammation decreased the inter-micturition intervals and decreased the quantities of urine voided. The increased bladder activity by colonic inflammation was attenuated by prolonged intraluminal treatment with RTX or treatment with intrathecal BDNF neutralizing antibody. Conclusion Acute colonic inflammation increases bladder activity without affecting bladder morphology. Primary afferent-mediated BDNF up-regulation in the sensory neurons regulates, at least in part, the bladder activity during colonic inflammation

Effective healthcare teams require effective team members: defining teamwork competencies

BACKGROUND: Although effective teamwork has been consistently identified as a requirement for enhanced clinical outcomes in the provision of healthcare, there is limited knowledge of what makes health professionals effective team members, and even less information on how to develop skills for teamwork. This study identified critical teamwork competencies for health service managers. METHODS: Members of a state branch of the professional association of Australian health service managers participated in a teamwork survey. RESULTS: The 37% response rate enabled identification of a management teamwork competency set comprising leadership, knowledge of organizational goals and strategies and organizational commitment, respect for others, commitment to working collaboratively and to achieving a quality outcome. CONCLUSION: Although not part of the research question the data suggested that the competencies for effective teamwork are perceived to be different for management and clinical teams, and there are differences in the perceptions of effective teamwork competencies between male and female health service managers. This study adds to the growing evidence that the focus on individual skill development and individual accountability and achievement that results from existing models of health professional training, and which is continually reinforced by human resource management practices within healthcare systems, is not consistent with the competencies required for effective teamwork