Percepção de agentes comunitários de saúde sobre os riscos à saúde fonoaudiológica Perception of community health workers regarding risks for hearing and communication disorders

OBJETIVO: Investigar a percepção dos agentes comunitários sobre os aspectos relacionados à saúde fonoaudiológica da população usuária de um programa de saúde da família. MÉTODOS: Trata-se de estudo observacional transversal com aplicação de questionário a 85 agentes comunitários. Foram investigadas 20 situações hipotéticas abordando os temas fonoaudiológicos na rotina de trabalho dos agentes. As variáveis analisadas foram: idade, tempo de atuação, escolaridade, percepção dos riscos à saúde da população nas áreas de voz, motricidade orofacial, linguagem e audiologia. RESULTADOS: A média de idade dos agentes foi de 38 anos (±9,1), e o tempo de médio de atuação no programa 5,0 anos (±2,9). Observou-se que 80 profissionais (94%) possuíam pelo menos o Ensino Médio completo, e todos eram do gênero feminino. Entre as situações hipotéticas investigadas, os agentes demonstraram ter a percepção do risco e atitude de levá-lo para discussão da equipe em 49% das situações envolvendo o risco à saúde auditiva, 53% saúde vocal, 60% e 62% os riscos relacionados à motricidade orofacial e linguagem, respectivamente. Não foi encontrada relação entre o tempo de atuação e a percepção do risco à saúde fonoaudiológica. CONCLUSÃO: Os agentes comunitários mostraram ter percepção de muitas situações de risco à saúde fonoaudiológica dos usuários, especialmente no que se refere à saúde vocal e das estruturas e funções orofaciais. É necessário ao agente comunitário ir além das habilidades e competências conceituais e procedimentais no que se refere à saúde da comunicação humana, pois se almeja um profissional com habilidades atitudinais.<br>PURPOSE: To investigate the perception of community health workers about the aspects related to hearing and communication health of users of a family health program. METHODS: Cross-sectional observational study with questionnaire application to 85 community health workers. Twenty hypothetical situations were investigated, addressing issues related to Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology present in their routine. The variables analysed were: age, work experience, education, perception of health risks in the areas of voice, orofacial myology, language and audiology. RESULTS: The mean age of the agents was 38 years (±9.1), and their mean time of experience in the family health program was 5 years (±2.9). It was observed that 80 professionals (94%) had at least complete high school education, and all were female. Among the hypothetical situations investigated, the workers showed to have the perception of risk and attitude to take it to discussion with the team in 49% of the situations involving risks to hearing health, 53% risk to vocal health, 60% and 62% risks related to orofacial myology and language, respectively. There was no relationship between time of experience and the perception of risks. CONCLUSION: The community health workers have perception of many risk situations to hearing and communication health of the population, especially regarding voice and orofacial structures and functions. Community health workers need to go beyond the conceptual and procedural abilities and competencies regarding the health of human communication, because of the idea of professionals with attitudinal skills

Self-assembled quantum dots in a nanowire system for quantum photonics

Quantum dots embedded within nanowires represent one of the most promising technologies for applications in quantum photonics. Whereas the top-down fabrication of such structures remains a technological challenge, their bottom-up fabrication through self-assembly is a potentially more powerful strategy. However, present approaches often yield quantum dots with large optical linewidths, making reproducibility of their physical properties difficult. We present a versatile quantum-dot-innanowire system that reproducibly self-assembles in core-shell GaAs/AlGaAs nanowires. The quantum dots form at the apex of a GaAs/AlGaAs interface, are highly stable, and can be positioned with nanometre precision relative to the nanowire centre. Unusually, their emission is blue-shifted relative to the lowest energy continuum states of the GaAs core. Large-scale electronic structure calculations show that the origin of the optical transitions lies in quantum confinement due to Al-rich barriers. By emitting in the red and self-assembling on silicon substrates, these quantum dots could therefore become building blocks for solid-state lighting devices and third-generation solar cells

Many-Body Spin Excitations in Ferromagnets from First Principles

Electronic spin excitations are low-energy excitations that influence the properties of magnetic materials substantially. Two types of spin excitations can be identified, single-particle Stoner excitations and collective spin-wave excitations. They can be treated on the same footing within many-body perturbation theory. In this theory, the collective spin excitations arise from the correlated motion of electron-hole pairs with opposite spins. We present the theory in detail and discuss several aspects of an implementation within the full-potential linearized augmented plane-wave method. The pair propagation is described by the transverse magnetic susceptibility, which we calculate from first principles employing the ladder approximation for the T matrix. The four-point T matrix is represented in a basis of Wannier functions. By using an auxiliary Wannier set with suitable Bloch character, the magnetic response function can be evaluated for arbitrary k points, allowing fine details of the spin-wave spectra to be studied. The energy of the acoustic spin-wave branch should vanish in the limit k →0, which is a manifestation of the Goldstone theorem. However, this condition is often violated in the calculated acoustic magnon dispersion, which can partly be traced back to the choice of the Green function. In fact, the numerical gap error is considerably reduced when a renormalized Green function is used. As an alternative simple correction scheme, we suggest an adjustment of the Kohn-Sham exchange splitting. We present spin excitation spectra for the elementary ferromagnets Fe, Co, and Ni as illustrative examples and compare to model calculations of the homogeneous electron ga

Spin Excitations in Solid from Many-Body Perturbation Theory

Electronic spin excitations are low-energy excitations that influence the properties of magnetic materials substantially. Two types of spin excitations can be identified, single-particle Stoner excitations and collective spin-wave excitations. They can be treated on the same footing within many-body perturbation theory. In this theory, the collective spin excitations arise from the correlated motion of electron-hole pairs with opposite spins. We present the theory in detail and discuss several aspects of an implementation within the full-potential linearized augmented plane-wave method. The pair propagation is described by the transverse magnetic susceptibility, which we calculate from first principles employing the ladder approximation for the T matrix. The four-point T matrix is represented in a basis of Wannier functions. By using an auxiliary Wannier set with suitable Bloch character, the magnetic response function can be evaluated for arbitrary k points, allowing fine details of the spin-wave spectra to be studied. The energy of the acoustic spin-wave branch should vanish in the limit k →0, which is a manifestation of the Goldstone theorem. However, this condition is often violated in the calculated acoustic magnon dispersion, which can partly be traced back to the choice of the Green function. In fact, the numerical gap error is considerably reduced when a renormalized Green function is used. As an alternative simple correction scheme, we suggest an adjustment of the Kohn-Sham exchange splitting. We present spin excitation spectra for the elementary ferromagnets Fe, Co, and Ni as illustrative examples and compare to model calculations of the homogeneous electron gas