Enhancing cultural competence in mental health settings: From undergraduate training to continuing education

New Zealand is a country of many cultures and ethnicities. With a growing Asian community, cultural capability of the mental health workforce is essential to ensure that Asians have equity in access to appropriate and high quality services. Literature indicates a growing need to develop resources and enhance knowledge on cultural competence to assist health service providers to address the needs of people from diverse backgrounds. Yet, at what stage of training and/or practice are health professionals gaining access to this knowledge? Consultation with local health services and tertiary education institutions revealed a gap in the knowledge of Asian mental health being taught in the curriculum of students undertaking training to become health professionals. Further research indicated a need and desire from tertiary institutions to have access to Asian mental health material for both enhancing students’ learning, and promoting the concept of continuing education following graduation. As a result, an interactive, selfadministrative CD-rom comprising three modules: self-reflection; Asian philosophies; and clinical issues was compiled.published_or_final_versio

New Low Resistance Respiratory Valve

Fabrication at DIPAS of a low resistance respiratory valve from totally indigenous materials costing Rs.500/- is reported here. Experimental data reveal that the dead space in the valve is 230 ml and the pressure drop across the valve (i.e. the resistance) at a flow rate of 240 litres per minute is 1 cm of water

Studies on the chemical quality of cured fish products from the west coast of India

Fish curing is one of the oldest industries of the coastal areas of India. It has been estimated that about 50 to 70% of the marine fish catches of India are at present being processed into cured products {Government of India Publication, 1951 a and b). Though fish curing is of this magnitude, it is one of the least developed industries of India, although efforts are being made in some of the maritime States such as Madras, Travancore-Cochin and Bombay, to improve curing by providing better facilities to the fishermen engaged in the industry. The methods practised are generally primitive and the attention paid to cleanliness and sanitation leaves much to be desired. Only 17-3% of the total fish landing is being cured through the Government fish curing yards {Government of India Marketing Report, 1951), the rest being processed in private yards which are not under the supervision of Government agencies

Soliton switching using cascaded nonlinear-optical loop mirrors

We demonstrate multiple-peaked switching in a nonlinear-optical loop mirror and present an experimental investigation of device cascading in the soliton regime based on a sequence of two independent nonlinear-optical loop mirrors. Cascading leads to an enhanced switching response with sharper switching edges, flattened peaks, and increased interpeak extinction ratios. We observe that pulses emerging from the cascade retain the sech2 temporal profile of a soliton with minimal degradation in the spectral characteristics

Larval rearing and production of spat of the oyster Crassostrea madrasensis (Preston) in an Experimental hatchery

The Indian backwater oyster, Crassostrea madrasensis, was spawned in the laboratory at Tuticorin. The larvae were reared and the spat settled in 15-20 days. Two species of jihytoflagellates, Isochrysis galbana and Pavlova sp. were isolated from the natural environment, cultured in mass scale and given as food throughout the larval period. Early stages of the development of fertilized egg, successive stages of developing larvae, and metamorphosis to the spat have been described. The methodology of the production of cultchless spat and rearing the post-set oysters are discussed

Pregnancy associated plasma protein-A (PAPP-A) as an early marker for the diagnosis of acute coronary syndrome.

Aims and objectives Pregnancy associated plasma protein-A (PAPP-A), a metalloproteinase plays a pivotal role in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. Recent studies have reported that elevated levels of PAPP-A, signal the onset of acute coronary syndrome (ACS). We, therefore, proposed to study the analytical competence of PAPP-A in patients admitted to the emergency department with chest pain and finally diagnosed as ACS. Methods and results Pregnancy associated plasma protein-A was measured using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) in 485 patients admitted to emergency care unit, of which 89 patients were diagnosed as Non-cardiac chest pain (NCCP). Elevated levels of PAPP-A were observed in patients diagnosed as ACS on comparison with the controls. Receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curve analysis showed PAPP-A to be a good discriminator between ischaemic and non-ischaemic patients. The area under the curve was found to be 0.904, 95% CI (0.874–0.929) with 90% sensitivity and 85% specificity (P< 0.0001). The cut-off value from the ROC curve was 0.55 μg/mL above which PAPP-A was considered to be positive. Conclusion Pregnancy associated plasma protein-A seems to be a promising biomarker for identification and risk stratification for patients with ACS

Compactness via Adherence Dominators

This talk is based on a joint work by T. A. Edwards, J. E. Joseph, M. H. Kwack and B. M. P. Nayar that apperared in the Journal of Advanced studies in Topology, Vol. 5 (4), 2014), 8 - 15. B An adherence dominator on a topological space X is a function π from the collection of filterbases on X to the family of closed subsets of X satisfying A(Ω) ⊆ π(Ω) where A(Ω) is the adherence of Ω. The notations π(Ω) and A(Ω) are used for the values of the functions π and A and π(Ω) =⋂_Ω π F= ⋂_O π V, where O represents the open members of Ω. The π -adherence may be adherence,θ- adherence, u-adherence s-adherence,f- adherence δ-adherence etc., of a filterbase. Many of the recent theorems by the authors and others on Hausdorff-closed, Urysohn-closed, and regular-closed spaces are subsumed in this paper. It is also shown that a space X is compact if and only if for each upper-semi-continuous relation β on X with π -strongly closed graph, the relation μ on X defined by μ = πβ has a maximal value with respect to set inclusion

A model of the reflection distribution in the vacuum ultra violet region

A reflection model with three components, a specular spike, a specular lobe and a diffuse lobe is discussed. This model was successfully applied to describe reflection of xenon scintillation light (175 nm) by PTFE and other fluoropolymers and can be used for Monte Carlo simulation and analysis of scintillation detectors. The measured data favors a Trowbridge-Reitz distribution function of ellipsoidal micro-surfaces. The intensity of the coherent reflection increases with increasing angle of incidence, as expected, since the surface appears smoother at grazing angles. The total reflectance obtained for PTFE is about 70% for VUV light at normal incidence in vacuum and estimated to be up to 100% in contact with liquid xenon

Biomimetic synthesis of hybrid nanocomposite scaffolds by freeze-thawing and freeze-drying

The aim of this study is to biomimetically synthesize hydroxyapatite - hydrophilic polymer scaffolds for biomedical applications. This organic-inorganic hybrid has been structurally characterized and reveals a good microstructural control as seen by the SEM analysis and the nanosize of the particulates is confirmed by AFM microscopy. The characterization of such nano-structured composites would allow researchers to design new systems, tailoring properties for different applications. © Indian Academy of Sciences

Rare earth Dy activated Li3PO4:Dy phosphors for lyoluminescence dosimetry of ionizing radiations

&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Rare earth Dy doped Li3PO4 phosphate based phosphors were prepared by high temperature solid state diffusion technique. The peak LL intensity initially increases with increasing mass of the sample, then tends to attain a saturation value for higher mass of the solute added to the solvent. Eaelier experiments on gamma irradiated crystals have proved that the light emission originates from the recombination of released F-centres with trapped holes (V2-centres) at the liquid-solid interface.In this paper lyoluminescence(LL) characteristics of Li3PO4:Dy phosphors have been reported . These LL characteristics of Li3PO4 phosphor may be useful for high radiation dosimetry using LL technique