Student Pharmacists and Street Children: A Mutually Beneficial Relationship

The Tumaini Children’s Drop-In Center is a daytime drop-in center for the street children of Eldoret, Kenya. It is part of a partnership between the Purdue University College of Pharmacy, the Academic Model Providing Access to Healthcare program, Eldoret community members, and numerous individuals in both Kenya and the US. Through the efforts of local staff and Purdue student pharmacists, who work at the local hospital on an eight-week clinical rotation, the center has helped a population of nearly 400 local street children by providing a safe haven from life on the streets. Purdue student pharmacists aid the center by applying for grants to fund service-learning projects. These projects, run by the students, help provide the children with basic necessities in addition to screening and education sessions regarding local health issues. In turn, the street children aid the students by providing a break from the stress of the hospital and by providing a broader view of what health care should look like

Using a disciplinary discourse lens to explore how representations afford meaning making in a typical wave physics course

We carried out a case study in a wave physics course at a Swedish university in order to investigate the relations between the representations used in the lessons and the experience of meaning making in interview–discussions. The grounding of these interview–discussions also included obtaining a rich description of the lesson environment in terms of the communicative approaches used and the students’ preferences for modes of representations that best enable meaning making. The background for this grounding was the first two lessons of a 5-week course on wave physics (70 students). The data collection for both the grounding and the principal research questions consisted of video recordings from the first two lessons: a student questionnaire of student preferences for representations (given before and after the course) and video-recorded interview–discussions with students (seven pairs and one on their own). The results characterize the use of communicative approaches, what modes of representation were used in the lectures, and the trend in what representations students’ preferred for meaning making, all in order to illustrate how students engage with these representations with respect to their experienced meaning making. Interesting aspects that emerged from the study are discussed in terms of how representations do not, in themselves, necessarily enable a range of meaning making; that meaning making from representations is critically related to how the representations get situated in the learning environment; and how constellations of modes of disciplinary discourse may be necessary but not always sufficient. Finally, pedagogical comments and further research possibilities are presented.Web of Scienc

Long-term pulse wave velocity outcomes with aerobic and resistance training in kidney transplant recipients - A pilot randomised controlled trial

Background This pilot study examined long-term pulse wave velocity (PWV) and peak oxygen uptake (VO2peak) outcomes following a 12-week moderate-intensity aerobic or resistance training programme in kidney transplant recipients. Method Single-blind, bi-centre randomised controlled parallel trial. 42 out of 60 participants completed a 9-month follow-up assessment (Aerobic training = 12, Resistance training = 10 and usual care = 20). Participants completed 12 weeks of twice-weekly supervised aerobic or resistance training. Following the 12-week exercise intervention, participants were transitioned to self-managed community exercise activity using motivational interviewing techniques. Usual care participants received usual encouragement for physical activity during routine clinical appointments in the transplant clinic. PWV, VO2peak, blood pressure and body weight were assessed at 12 weeks and 12 months, and compared to baseline. Results ANCOVA analysis, covarying for baseline values, age, and length of time on dialysis pretransplantation, revealed a significant mean between-group difference in PWV of -1.30 m/ sec (95%CI -2.44 to -0.17, p = 0.03) between resistance training and usual care groups. When comparing the aerobic training and usual care groups at 9-month follow-up, there was a mean difference of -1.05 m/sec (95%CI -2.11 to 0.017, p = 0.05). A significant mean between-group difference in relative VO2peak values of 2.2 ml/kg/min (95% CI 0.37 to 4.03, p = 0.02) when comparing aerobic training with usual care was revealed. There was no significant between group differences in body weight or blood pressure. There were no significant adverse effects associated with the interventions. Conclusions Significant between-group differences in 9-month follow-up PWV existed when comparing resistance exercise intervention with usual care. A long-term between-group difference in VO2peak was only evident when comparing aerobic intervention with usual care. This pilot study, with a small sample size, did not aim to elucidate mechanistic mediators related to the exercise interventions. It is however suggested that a motivational interviewing approach, combined with appropriate transition to community training programmes, could maintain the improvements gained from the 12-week exercise interventions and further research in this area is therefore warranted. 2017 O'Connor et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.sch_phy12pub4670pub

Pleasure and meaningful discourse: an overview of research issues

The concept of pleasure has emerged as a multi-faceted social and cultural phenomenon in studies of media audiences since the 1980s. In these studies different forms of pleasure have been identified as explaining audience activity and commitment. In the diverse studies pleasure has emerged as a multi-faceted social and cultural concept that needs to be contextualized carefully. Genre and genre variations, class, gender, (sub-)cultural identity and generation all seem to be instrumental in determining the kind and variety of pleasures experienced in the act of viewing. This body of research has undoubtedly contributed to a better understanding of the complexity of audience activities, but it is exactly the diversity of the concept that is puzzling and poses a challenge to its further use. If pleasure is maintained as a key concept in audience analysis that holds much explanatory power, it needs a stronger theoretical foundation. The article maps the ways in which the concept of pleasure has been used by cultural theorists, who have paved the way for its application in reception analysis, and it goes on to explore the ways in which the concept has been used in empirical studies. Central to our discussion is the division between the ‘public knowledge’ and the ‘popular culture’ projects in reception analysis which, we argue, have major implications for the way in which pleasure has come to be understood as divorced from politics, power and ideology. Finally, we suggest ways of bridging the gap between these two projects in an effort to link pleasure to the concepts of hegemony and ideology

Increasing condom use in heterosexual men: development of a theory-based interactive digital intervention

Increasing condom use to prevent sexually transmitted infections is a key public health goal. Interventions are more likely to be effective if they are theory- and evidence-based. The Behaviour Change Wheel (BCW) provides a framework for intervention development. To provide an example of how the BCW was used to develop an intervention to increase condom use in heterosexual men (the MenSS website), the steps of the BCW intervention development process were followed, incorporating evidence from the research literature and views of experts and the target population. Capability (e.g. knowledge) and motivation (e.g. beliefs about pleasure) were identified as important targets of the intervention. We devised ways to address each intervention target, including selecting interactive features and behaviour change techniques. The BCW provides a useful framework for integrating sources of evidence to inform intervention content and deciding which influences on behaviour to target

Translational pharmacology of an inhaled small molecule αvβ6 integrin inhibitor for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis

The αvβ6 integrin plays a key role in the activation of transforming growth factor-β (TGFβ), a pro-fibrotic mediator that is pivotal to the development of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). We identified a selective small molecule αvβ6 RGD-mimetic, GSK3008348, and profiled it in a range of disease relevant pre-clinical systems. To understand the relationship between target engagement and inhibition of fibrosis, we measured pharmacodynamic and diseaserelated end points. Here we report, GSK3008348 binds to αvβ6 with high affinity in human IPF lung and reduces downstream pro-fibrotic TGFβ signaling to normal levels. In human lung epithelial cells, GSK3008348 induces rapid internalization and lysosomal degradation of the αvβ6 integrin. In the murine bleomycin-induced lung fibrosis model, GSK3008348 engages αvβ6, induces prolonged inhibition of TGFβ signaling and reduces lung collagen deposition and serum C3M, a marker of IPF disease progression. These studies highlight the potential of inhaled GSK3008348 as an anti-fibrotic therapy

Effects of antiplatelet therapy on stroke risk by brain imaging features of intracerebral haemorrhage and cerebral small vessel diseases: subgroup analyses of the RESTART randomised, open-label trial

Background Findings from the RESTART trial suggest that starting antiplatelet therapy might reduce the risk of recurrent symptomatic intracerebral haemorrhage compared with avoiding antiplatelet therapy. Brain imaging features of intracerebral haemorrhage and cerebral small vessel diseases (such as cerebral microbleeds) are associated with greater risks of recurrent intracerebral haemorrhage. We did subgroup analyses of the RESTART trial to explore whether these brain imaging features modify the effects of antiplatelet therapy