Efficacy of a micro-prompting technology in reducing support needed by people with severe acquired brain injury in activities of daily living

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of an automated interactive prompting technology in supporting the morning routine of persons with acquired brain injury. The morning routine included maintaining personal hygiene and dressing. Setting: An inpatient neurorehabilitation hospital. Participants: Persons with acquired brain injury who required prompting when following their morning routine (n = 24), but were not limited by physical disability or dysphasia, took part in the study. Participants (67% with traumatic brain injury) had impairment on indices of memory and executive function. Design: A randomized control trial evaluated the effect of an automated interactive micro-prompting device on the number of prompts by trained staff required for successful completion of the morning routine. Main Measures: Study-specific checklists assessed sequence performance, errors, and verbal prompts required over baseline, rehabilitation as usual, intervention, and return to baseline conditions. Results: The intervention significantly reduced the support required to complete the task compared with usual rehabilitation. Conclusions: Micro-prompting technology is an effective assistive technology for cognition, which reduces support needs in people with significant cognitive impairments

Regularity for harmonic maps into certain Pseudo-Riemannian manifolds

In this article, we investigate the regularity for certain elliptic systems without a $L^2$-antisymmetric structure. As applications, we prove some $\epsilon$-regularity theorems for weakly harmonic maps from the unit ball $B= B(m) \subset \mathbb{R}^m$ $(m\geq2)$ into certain pseudo-Riemannian manifolds: standard stationary Lorentzian manifolds, pseudospheres $\mathbb{S}^n_\nu \subset \mathbb{R}^{n+1}_\nu$ $(1\leq\nu \leq n)$ and pseudohyperbolic spaces $\mathbb{H}^n_\nu \subset \mathbb{R}^{n+1}_{\nu+1}$ $(0\leq\nu \leq n-1)$. Consequently, such maps are shown to be H\"{o}lder continuous (and as smooth as the regularity of the targets permits) in dimension $m=2$. In particular, we prove that any weakly harmonic map from a disc into the De-Sitter space $\mathbb{S}^n_1$ or the Anti-de-Sitter space $\mathbb{H}^n_1$ is smooth. Also, we give an alternative proof of the H\"{o}lder continuity of any weakly harmonic map from a disc into the Hyperbolic space $\mathbb{H}^n$ without using the fact that the target is nonpositively curved. Moreover, we extend the notion of generalized (weakly) harmonic maps from a disc into the standard sphere $\mathbb{S}^n$ to the case that the target is $\mathbb{S}^n_\nu$ $(1\leq\nu \leq n)$ or $\mathbb{H}^n_\nu$ $(0\leq\nu \leq n-1)$, and obtain some $\epsilon$-regularity results for such generalized (weakly) harmonic maps.Comment: to appear in J. Math. Pures App

Progress in the Theory of Singular Riemannian Foliations

A singular foliation is called a singular Riemannian foliation (SRF) if every geodesic that is perpendicular to one leaf is perpendicular to every leaf it meets. A typical example is the partition of a complete Riemannian manifold into orbits of an isometric action. In this survey, we provide an introduction to the theory of SRFs, leading from the foundations to recent developments in research on this subject. Sketches of proofs are included and useful techniques are emphasized. We study the local structure of SRFs in general and under curvature conditions. We review the solution of the Palais-Terng problem on integrability of the horizontal distribution. Important special classes of SRFs, like polar and variationally complete foliations and their connections, are treated. A characterisation of SRFs whose leaf space is an orbifold is given. Moreover, desingularizations of SRFs are studied and applications, e.g., to Molino's conjecture, are presented

Early identification of first-year students at risk of dropping out of high-school entry medical school: the usefulness of teachers' ratings of class participation

Dropping out from undergraduate medical education is costly for students, medical schools, and society in general. Therefore, the early identification of potential dropout students is important. The contribution of personal features to dropout rates has merited exploration. However, there is a paucity of research on aspects of student experience that may lead to dropping out. In this study, underpinned by theoretical models of student commitment, involvement, and engagement, we explored the hypothesis of using inferior participation as an indicator of a higher probability of dropping out in year 1. Class participation was calculated as an aggregate score based on teachers' daily observations in class. The study used a longitudinal dataset of six cohorts of high-school entry students (N = 709, 67% females) in one medical school with an annual intake of 120 students. The findings confirmed the initial hypothesis and showed that lower scores of class participation in year 1 added predictive ability to pre-entry characteristics (Pseudo-R2 raised from 0.22 to 0.28). Even though the inclusion of course failure in year 1 resulted in higher explanatory power than participation in class (Pseudo-R2 raised from 0.28 to 0.63), ratings of class participation may be advantageous to anticipate dropout identification, as those can be collected prior to course failure. The implications for practice are that teachers' ratings of class participation can play a role in indicating medical students who may eventually drop out. We conclude that the scores of class participation can contribute to flagging systems for the early detection of student dropouts.(undefined)info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Evidence for the Onset of Color Transparency in ρ0\rho^0 Electroproduction off Nuclei

We have measured the nuclear transparency of the incoherent diffractive $A(e,e'\rho^0)$ process in $^{12}$C and $^{56}$Fe targets relative to $^2$H using a 5 GeV electron beam. The nuclear transparency, the ratio of the produced $\rho^0$'s on a nucleus relative to deuterium, which is sensitive to $\rho A$ interaction, was studied as function of the coherence length ($l_c$), a lifetime of the hadronic fluctuation of the virtual photon, and the four-momentum transfer squared ($Q^2$). While the transparency for both $^{12}$C and $^{56}$Fe showed no $l_c$ dependence, a significant $Q^2$ dependence was measured, which is consistent with calculations that included the color transparency effects.Comment: 6 pages and 4 figure

The impact of heat waves on mortality.

BACKGROUND: Heat waves have been linked with an increase in mortality, but the associated risk has been only partly characterized. METHODS: We examined this association by decomposing the risk for temperature into a "main effect" due to independent effects of daily high temperatures, and an "added" effect due to sustained duration of heat during waves, using data from 108 communities in the United States during 1987-2000. We adopted different definitions of heat-wave days on the basis of combinations of temperature thresholds and days of duration. The main effect was estimated through distributed lag nonlinear functions of temperature, which account for nonlinear delayed effects and short-time harvesting. We defined the main effect as the relative risk between the median city-specific temperature during heat-wave days and the 75th percentile of the year-round distribution. The added effect was defined first using a simple indicator, and then a function of consecutive heat-wave days. City-specific main and added effects were pooled through univariate and multivariate meta-analytic techniques. RESULTS: The added wave effect was small (0.2%-2.8% excess relative risk, depending on wave definition) compared with the main effect (4.9%-8.0%), and was apparent only after 4 consecutive heat-wave days. CONCLUSIONS: Most of the excess risk with heat waves in the United States can be simply summarized as the independent effects of individual days' temperatures. A smaller added effect arises in heat waves lasting more than 4 days

A Direct Experimental Comparison of Back Array and Waist-Belt Tactile Interfaces for Indicating Direction

ABSTRACT Research has shown that two popular types of wearable tactile displays, a back array and a waist belt, have successfully aided pedestrian navigation. Each type has its proponents and each has been reported as successful in experimental trials. However, it is not clear which of the two is more effective for tactile-based navigation. In this short paper, we summarise the results from a direct experimental comparison of the back array and waist belt approaches. Results indicated that the tactile belt allowed participants to perform significantly faster and more accurately than the tactile back array

The Serotonin Syndrome in a Patient Receiving Sertraline After an Ankle Block

Sertraline is a new antidepressant categorized as a selective serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine; 5-HT) reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) (1).This class of drugs reversibly blocks the reuptake of 5-HT in the synaptic cleft (1). Sertraline is efficacious in the treatment of depression, obsessive-compulsive, eating, and personality disorders (2). It is safe and well tolerated based upon worldwide experience (3). We report, however, a case of prolonged myoclonus in a patient who underwent a minor orthopedic procedure under an ankle regional anesthetic block and sedation and who was taking sertraline for depression. We propose that she exhibited the serotonin syndrome, a disorder of 5-HT hyperstimulation, most commonly associated with serotonergic drugs (4)