Screening for markers of frailty and perceived risk of adverse outcomes using the Risk Instrument for Screening in the Community (RISC)

BACKGROUND: Functional decline and frailty are common in community dwelling older adults, increasing the risk of adverse outcomes. Given this, we investigated the prevalence of frailty-associated risk factors and their distribution according to the severity of perceived risk in a cohort of community dwelling older adults, using the Risk Instrument for Screening in the Community (RISC). METHODS: A cohort of 803 community dwelling older adults were scored for frailty by their public health nurse (PHN) using the Clinical Frailty Scale (CFS) and for risk of three adverse outcomes: i) institutionalisation, ii) hospitalisation and iii) death, within the next year, from one (lowest) to five (highest) using the RISC. Prior to scoring, PHNs stated whether they regarded patients as frail. RESULTS: The median age of patients was 80 years (interquartile range 10), of whom 64% were female and 47.4% were living alone. The median Abbreviated Mental Test Score (AMTS) was 10 (0) and Barthel Index was 18/20 (6). PHNs regarded 42% of patients as frail, while the CFS categorized 54% (scoring ≥5) as frail. Dividing patients into low-risk (score one or two), medium-risk (score three) and high-risk (score four or five) using the RISC showed that 4.3% were considered high risk of institutionalization, 14.5% for hospitalization, and 2.7% for death, within one year of the assessment. There were significant differences in median CFS (4/9 versus 6/9 versus 6/9, p < 0.001), Barthel Index (18/20 versus 11/20 versus 14/20, p < 0.001) and mean AMTS scores (9.51 versus 7.57 versus 7.00, p < 0.001) between those considered low, medium and high risk of institutionalisation respectively. Differences were also statistically significant for hospitalisation and death. Age, gender and living alone were inconsistently associated with perceived risk. Frailty most closely correlated with functional impairment, r = −0.80, p < 0.001. CONCLUSION: The majority of patients in this community sample were perceived to be low risk for adverse outcomes. Frailty, cognitive impairment and functional status were markers of perceived risk. Age, gender and social isolation were not and may not be useful indicators when triaging community dwellers. The RISC now requires validation against adverse outcomes

A strong ice cloud event as seen by a microwave satellite sensor: Simulations and Observations

In this article, brightness temperatures observed by channels of the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-B (AMSU-B) instrument are compared to those simulated by a radiative transfer model, which can take into account the multiple scattering due to ice particles by using a discrete ordinate iterative solution method. The input fields, namely, the pressure, temperature, humidity, and cloud water content are taken from the short range forecast from the Met Office mesoscale model (UKMES). The comparison was made for a case study on the 25 January 2002 when a frontal system associated with significant cloud was present over the UK. It is demonstrated that liquid clouds have maximum impact on channel 16 of AMSU whereas ice clouds have maximum impact on channel 20. The main uncertainty for simulating microwave radiances is the assumptions about microphysical properties, such as size distribution, shape and orientation of the cloud particles, which are not known in the mesoscale model. The article examines the impact of these parameters on the cloud signal. The polarisation signal due to oriented ice particles at these frequencies is also discussed

Multiple-scattering microwave radiative transfer for data assimilation applications.

International audienceA multiple-scattering radiative transfer model for microwave radiance data assimilation in global numerical weather-prediction models is presented. The model is part of the RTTOV software package and includes forward, tangent-linear, adjoint and Jacobian models. The model is based on the Eddington approximation to radiative transfer which produces mean errors of less than 0.5 K at the targeted microwave frequencies between 10 and 200 GHz. The simplified treatment of subgrid-scale cloud cover may produce biased model calculations that show a maximum at 0.5 cloud cover and may reach several degrees K. These errors may be corrected with a simple bias correction. Linearity tests indicate that, given a screening procedure that excludes situations in which the model responds nonlinearly to input perturbations, channels near 50.3, 19.35, 22.235 and 183.31 GHz may be used in global radiance data assimilation

Children’s Sport Participation and Physical Activity Study 2022

The Children’s Sport Participation and Physical Activity Study 2022 (CSPPA 2022) is an All-Island population research project that follows on from CSPPA in 2018 and 2010. A total of 8,881 school children and young people aged 10 to 19 on the island of Ireland were asked to report on various aspects related to sport participation and physical activity. CSPPA was a multi-centre study, undertaken by the University of Limerick, Dublin City University, University College Cork, and Ulster University. It was funded by Sport Ireland, Healthy Ireland and Sport Northern Ireland, with additional support from the Departments of Health and Education in the Republic of Ireland.</p