Postpartum Patients Reports of Satisfaction with a Welcome Meal after a Vaginal Delivery

Objective: The purpose of this research study was to assess patient perspectives regarding a special Welcome Meal. The focus was on patients\u27 feeling welcomed and important because prior research has shown that when a patient\u27s expectations are exceeded, patient satisfaction increases. This study suggests that receiving a Welcome Meal may improve their experience on a postpartum unit. Design: Prior to discharge, each patient on the maternity unit was served a special Welcome Meal. A questionnaire was given to patients that consisted of six questions. The six questions incorporated six themes found in research literature on improving patient satisfaction. These themes included exceeding one\u27s expectations, feeling important, feeling welcome, having a positive experience, increasing one\u27s morale and providing good quality food. Patients/Participants: The sample consist~d of 30 postpartum patients between the ages of 20-47 whom had undergone a vaginal delivery of a live infant. Results: The highest rated question indicated that the Welcome Meal made the patients feel welcome (96.6%). The second highest rated question shows the Welcome Meal to be of good quality (96.6%). The Welcome Meal not only made the patient feel important, but also created a more pleasant hospital experience. Overall 86.6% agreed that it gave a positive experience and exceeded their expectations (90%). Conc1usion: The research indicated that the six themes found in improving patient satisfaction were also present when asked about the Welcome Meal. The limitations to the study include having a small non-random sample of 30 patients. This study suggests that having such a meal implemented on the maternity unit may have a positive impact on patient satisfaction. Future studies should provide a larger sample size. Further research is needed to correlate improved patient satisfaction and the Welcome Meal in a pre and post test design

Apuntes sobre moros y turcos en el imaginario andino virreinal

El autor plantea como en las Crónicas de Indias se identificó a los indios del Perú virreinal con los moriscos en España quienes ocultaron sus verdaderas creencias religiosas bajo la práctica de un falso cristianismo. Utilizando la iconografía andina del turco infiel como enemigo de la Eucaristía, se sugiere que la monarquía hispana utilizó la teología providencialista y profética tardío medieval como herramienta doctrinal para definir su propia función mesiánica y apostólica en el Nuevo Mundo. A su vez, la visión del turco como enemigo de la fe y castigo de Dios sirvió en el Perú virreinal como motivo reivindicador criollista que, desde el siglo XVI, se asoció a ciclos proféticos en los que la guerra del turco contra la Eucaristía era un rasgo de la futura religión del Anticristo al Final de los Tiempos

Globalization and natural resources: the expansion of the Spanish agrifood trade and its impact on water consumption, 1965–2010

Beginning in 1960, the Spanish agricultural sector underwent an intensive process of development, resulting in important structural changes, not only in the sector itself, but also in the relationship of the agrarian system to natural resources. These changes were closely related to the growth of per capita income and Spain’s increasing integration into international markets. In the last five decades, the volume of Spanish agricultural trade has increased strongly, with a concomitant increase in the consumption of domestic water resources, requiring the construction of water infrastructure for irrigation. This paper examines the impact on water use in Spain during a period of economic modernization and trade liberalization. More specifically, we are interested in obtaining virtual water trade flow trends and identifying the major drivers responsible for these trajectories, via a decomposition analysis. Our results point to a large increase in virtual water exports and imports, primarily driven by the scale effect, that is, by the growing integration into international markets. The composition effect and changes in water intensity entailed a moderation in water consumption

The Spanish food industry on global supply chains and its impact on water resources

The study of the impact of economic activities on natural resources through global supply chains is increasingly demanded in the context of the growing globalization of economies and product fragmentation. Taking Spain as a case study and a sector with significant economic and environmental impacts, the agri-food industry, the objective of this work is two-fold. First, we estimate the associated water impact, both from the production and consumption perspectives, paying special attention to the water embodied in production exchanges among countries and sectors. To that aim, we use an environmentally-extended multiregional input-output model (MRIO). Second, we assess the main driving factors behind changes in direct and embodied water consumption between the years 1995 and 2009 by means of a structural decomposition analysis. The MRIO model provides a comprehensive estimate of the economic linkages among regions and economic sectors and, therefore, allows calculating the environmental impacts over international value chains. The results indicate that the food industry exerts large impacts on global water resources, particularly given the remarkable interactions with the domestic and foreign agricultural sectors, These growing linkages show how consumption patterns, and, therefore, lifestyles, involve large environmental impacts through the whole and global supply chains

Income, economic structure and trade: Impacts on recent water use trends in the European Union

From the mid-1990s to the recent international economic crisis, the European Union (EU27) experienced a significant economic growth and a flat population increase. During these years, the water resources directly used by the EU countries displayed a growing but smooth trend. However, European activities intensively demanded water resources throughout the whole global supply chain. The growth rate of embodied water use was three times higher than the growth in water directly used by these economies. This was mainly due to the large upsurge of virtual water imports in the EU (e.g., about 25% of the change in water imports in the world was directly linked to the increasing imports in the EU27 countries). In this context, we analyze water use changes in the EU27 from 1995 to 2009, combining the production and consumption perspectives. To that aim, we use the environmentally extended input-output approach to obtain the volume of water embodied in domestic production and in trade flows at the sector and country levels. In the empirical analysis, we utilize multi-regional input-output data from the World Input Output Database. In addition, by means of a structural decomposition analysis we identify and quantify the factors explaining changes in these trends. We focus both on the role of domestic production and trade and estimate the associated intensity, technology and scale effects. This analysis is done for different clusters, identifying singular patterns depending on income criteria. Our results confirm the boost of demand growth in that period, the positive but negligible effect of structural change, and the decline in water intensity which, however, was not enough to compensate the effects on water associated to the economic expansion in the period. These findings also point at a gradual substitution of domestic water use for virtual water imports. More concretely, in most countries the food industry tended to reduce its backward linkages with the domestic agricultural sector, increasing the embodied water in agricultural imports from non-European regions