How Will the General Data Protection Regulation Affect Healthcare?

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Design and Development of a Knowledge Modelling Approach to Govern the Use of Electronic Health Records for Research

There is now increasing commitment internationally to using electronic healthcare records collected during routine care delivery to conduct clinical research. This must be rigorously controlled by an extensive set of information governance requirements defining the legal, ethical and practical guidelines to respect the privacy rights of the people about whom the records are kept, uphold the clinical profession’s duty of confidentiality and protect the interests of participants, practitioners and researchers. The development of information security policies is a highly regarded method of meeting these requirements. This is hampered by the need to interpret a complex framework of legislation and guidelines, lack of clear advice and inconsistency in authoring, interpretation and understanding amongst the people whose behaviour they are expected to guide. By using the results of several UK and European research and information platform development projects in which the author has participated and by gathering requirements from stakeholders in the clinical and research communities, this thesis defines a knowledge management representation to specify policy requirements in a computable form. The work provides the first set of knowledge requirements for governing research uses of electronic healthcare records, and a knowledge model that describes information security policies and generates a web application tool. The tool allows policy control authoring that provides a consistent, clear and unambiguous view of governance requirements to researchers and service providers. The model and tool have been evaluated in a laboratory setting to explore their effects on behaviour and understanding of invited participants when authoring policy about handling healthcare records in research and making decisions about sharing information. The work has resulted in a validation of the model and demonstrated the potential positive effects of this new approach on practice. It makes recommendations about how it should be used in working practice and for educating people about information governance when performing clinical research to improve care provision

Comparison of Squat Strength and Muscle Activity Between Female Athletes With Varus Versus Valgus Knee Angles During Jumping

This investigation examined squat strength and muscle activation during jump landings between female athletes who landed with a varus knee position versus a valgus knee position. Twenty-one female athletes were recruited from Appalachian State University. Subjects had at least two years of resistance training experience, and played basketball or volleyball at least 4 hours per week. All subjects performed a one repetition maximum (1RM) in the back squat and performed three of each of the following jumps: countermovement jump, 20 cm, 40 cm, and 60 cm drop jumps. Knee position was calculated using 3D videography at the moment of peak knee flexion. EMG activity was collected on the Vastus Lateralis (VL), Vastus Medialis (VM), Biceps Femoris (BF), and Gluteus Maximus (GM) using wireless electrodes. Average muscle activity for 100 ms prior to peak knee flexion was averaged for the left and right leg and EMG activity of the VL and VM were averaged together to represent quadriceps activity. Activation of quadriceps, BF, GM, absolute 1 RM and relative 1RM were not significantly different between the valgus versus varus knee angle groups. Significant differences were observed in knee angles between the valgus and varus groups in all jump conditions (p =0.05)

Enabling the formation of native mAb, Fab ' and Fc-conjugates using a bis-disulfide bridging reagent to achieve tunable payload-to-antibody ratios (PARs)

Either as full IgGs or as fragments (Fabs, Fc, etc.), antibodies have received tremendous attention in the development of new therapeutics such as antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs). The production of ADCs involves the grafting of active payloads onto an antibody, which is generally enabled by the site-selective modification of native or engineered antibodies via chemical or enzymatic methods. Whatever method is employed, controlling the payload-antibody ratio (PAR) is a challenge in terms of multiple aspects including: (i) obtaining homogeneous protein conjugates; (ii) obtaining unusual PARs (PAR is rarely other than 2, 4 or 8); (iii) using a single method to access a range of different PARs; (iv) applicability to various antibody formats; and (v) flexibility for the production of heterofunctional antibody-conjugates (e.g. attachment of multiple types of payloads). In this article, we report a single pyridazinedione-based trifunctional dual bridging linker that enables, in a two-step procedure (re-bridging/click), the generation of either mAb-, Fab′-, or Fc-conjugates from native mAb, (Fab′)2 or Fc formats, respectively. Fc and (Fab′)2 formats were generated via enzymatic digestion of native mAbs. Whilst the same reduction and re-bridging protocols were applied to all three of the protein formats, the subsequent click reaction(s) employed to graft payload(s) drove the generation of a range of PARs, including heterofunctional PARs. As such, exploiting click reactivity and/or orthogonality afforded mAb-conjugates with PARs of 6, 4, 2 or 4 + 2, and Fab′- and Fc-conjugates with a PAR of 3, 2, 1 or 2 + 1 on-demand. We believe that the homogeneity, novelty and variety in accessible PARs, as well as the applicability to various antibody-conjugate formats enabled by our non-recombinant method could be a suitable tool for antibody-drug conjugates optimisation (optimal PAR value, optimal payloads combination) and boost the development of new antibody therapeutics (Fab′- and Fc-conjugates)

Creating a Nursing Mother’s Room at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro [Poster]

Poster presented at the 4th Annual Breastfeeding and Feminism Symposium, held at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, March 26-27, 2009

Librarians as Teaching Partners in the Health Sciences [Slides]

Slides from a presentation on library instruction and nursing education given at the 2008 Metrolina Library Association Information Literacy Conference in Charlotte, North Carolin

Finding and Evaluating Online Information for Well Being [Slides]

Slides from a presentation given March 8, 2019 at the 2019 Hot Topics in Higher Education Conference held at UNC Greensboro

Liaison Librarian Roles in Promoting Affordable Textbook Alternatives [Slides]

Slides from "Liaison Librarian Roles in Promoting Affordable Textbook Alternatives." This online talk was part of the UNCG - East Carolina University symposium titled "Discussions of Textbook Affordability" held on an April 20, 2018

Supporting Online Kinesiology Graduate Students [Poster]

Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the Medical Libraries Association in Asheville, NC on Monday, 10/19/2015

Ultrasonic vocalization in prairie voles (Microtus ochrogaster) : evidence for begging behavior in infant mammals?

This research examines ultrasonic vocalization (USV) emission by infant prairie voles (Microtus ochrogaster). Rodent pups of many species emit USVs (Anderson, 1954), commonly in response to stressors such as isolation and hypothermic conditions (Allin & Banks, 1971; Oswalt & Meier, 1975). Much research has been conducted to examine the use of these ultrasounds as the basis of a communication system between offspring and parents (Zippelius & Schleidt, 1956), and the malleability of USV production by infant rodents (Bell, et al., 1972; Blake, 1992) suggests high susceptibility of ultrasounds to ontogenetic selection. USV production by prairie voles has been compared to a sympatric species, the montane vole (Microtus montanus), in several studies (Blake, 2002; Rabon, et al., 2001; Shapiro & Insel, 1990) and prairie voles have been found to produce ultrasounds at a higher rate, a finding which has been attributed to the different mating systems of the two species. Prairie voles exhibit a monogamous mating system, biparental care of pups, tenacious nipple attachment by pups, and litter overlap, all contributing to sibling competition among the young of this species (Gilbert (1995). In contrast, montane voles mate polygynously, only the dam cares for the pups, and there is no tenacious nipple attachment or litter overlap, suggesting reduced sibling competition. In the current study, data indicate that prairie voles show no differences in ultrasound production by the heaviest and lightest pups in a small litter. However, in large litters, where pup number may exceed the number of functional nipples the dam provides, the lightest pup produces USVs at a much higher rate than the heaviest pup. It is suggested that this difference is reflective of the relatively large difference in deprivation level in large litters between the pups at the two weight extremes. This finding is related to the avian begging literature, which also includes some examples of mammalian begging. It is hypothesized that prairie voles may beg by using ultrasounds as an honest signal of need to the dam and then by engaging in a scramble competition with littermates for access to nipples when the dam nurses