The Demand for Preventive Activities Among Older Adults and its Association With Medicare Expenditures

In recent years, certain health policy makers have emphasized the need for an increase in preventive services interventions as means to improve health outcomes and cut health care costs. Oftentimes, the debate around the purported benefits of prevention centers on the need to cut the costs of highly costly systems such as Medicare. However, little is known about the factors that might actually influence the demand for preventive services among older adults, neither do we know much about how the dynamic for the demand for prevention plays out among older adults within the context of a household. Moreover, there is little evidence to support the belief that all preventive activities necessarily translate in cost savings. This dissertation examines the theoretical and empirical factors that influence the demand for prevention at the individual and household level. It also analyzes the associations between a diverse set of preventive services and Medicare expenditures in older adults. Using a panel data set from the Health and Retirement study linked to Medicare claims data, I find evidence that while lifestyle prevention such as physical activity, non-smoking and normal weight status maintenance are negatively associated with Medicare expenditures at ages 65-69, clinical preventive activities such as flu shot, cholesterol screening, mammography, Pap smears test and prostate cancer screening have at best no effect on expenditures, at worst they are positively associated; yet these findings may be biased due to uncontrolled unobservables. Also, I find that education, risk aversion, and long term planning are significantly associated with a higher demand for all preventive services. Finally, I find large bargaining effects between household members whereby spouses initiate and terminate preventive activities together. This result leaves room for policy makers to take advantage of spillover effects in the design of interventions designed with the purpose of increasing the demand for prevention

COVID-19 and endocrine diseases. A statement from the European Society of Endocrinology

ESE has issued a statement about the role and responsibilities of endocrinologists worldwide during the current COVID-19 outbreak, prepared by Manuel Puig-Domingo, Mónica Marazuela and Andrea Giustina also includes a ‘decalogue’ for endocrinologists in midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. This statement is the "draft" document for the Springer articl

Generation of All-in-Focus Images by Noise-Robust Selective Fusion of Limited Depth-of-Field Images

The limited depth-of-field of some cameras prevents them from capturing perfectly focused images when the imaged scene covers a large distance range. In order to compensate for this problem, image fusion has been exploited for combining images captured with different camera settings, thus yielding a higher quality all-in-focus image. Since most current approaches for image fusion rely on maximizing the spatial frequency of the composed image, the fusion process is sensitive to noise. In this paper, a new algorithm for computing the all-in-focus image from a sequence of images captured with a low depth-of-field camera is presented. The proposed approach adaptively fuses the different frames of the focus sequence in order to reduce noise while preserving image features. The algorithm consists of three stages: 1) focus measure; 2) selectivity measure; 3) and image fusion. An extensive set of experimental tests has been carried out in order to compare the proposed algorithm with state-of-the-art all-in-focus methods using both synthetic and real sequences. The obtained results show the advantages of the proposed scheme even for high levels of noise

Análisis de los indicadores en criminología

Treball Final de Grau en Criminologia i Seguretat. Codi: CS1044. Curs: 2014/2015El presente trabajo, “Análisis de los Indicadores en Criminología”, se subdivide en tres partes: Indicadores, Indicadores en Criminología y Elaboración de un indicador. En la primera parte se explica el proceso de medición en las ciencias sociales y como surge la necesidad de concretar los conceptos abstractos para hacer efectiva su medición. Por concreción se entiende el proceso de traducir los conceptos no observables en indicadores o variables empíricas observables que midan las propiedades latentes enmarcadas en el concepto, y posteriormente, el proceso de operacionalización que consiste en la conversión de conceptos teóricos a indicadores. En la segunda parte se concreta la teoría de los indicadores en el ámbito de la Criminología y se relaciona con la Sociología Criminal ya que es la ciencia encargada de recoger los datos de la sociedad que interesan a la Criminología. Posteriormente se analizan algunos de los indicadores criminológicos más relevantes como el Indice de Criminalidad Organizada o el Indice Global de terrorismo y finalmente se aplica la teoría en la creación de un indicador, el NSB “Nivel de Seguridad en la población de Benasal”.indicators, Criminology and Development of an indicator. In the first part explains the measurement process in the social sciences and as the need arises to realize the abstract concepts to establish its measurement. Concreteness is the process of translating concepts unobservable or observable empirical indicators to measure latent variables properties framed in the concept, and subsequently the operationalization process which involves the conversion of theoretical concepts to indicators. In the second part is concrete the theory of indicators in the field of criminology and it relates to the Criminal Sociology because it is the science responsible for collecting the data of the society that interest to criminology. 11 Later analize some of the most relevant criminological indicators such a “Organized Crime Index”, “Global Terrorism Index” and finally theory applies in creating an indicator, the NSB

Tidal Synchronization and Differential Rotation of Kepler Eclipsing Binaries

Few observational constraints exist for the tidal synchronization rate of late-type stars, despite its fundamental role in binary evolution. We visually inspected the light curves of 2278 eclipsing binaries (EBs) from the Kepler Eclipsing Binary Catalog to identify those with starspot modulations, as well as other types of out-of-eclipse variability. We report rotation periods for 816 EBs with starspot modulations, and find that 79% of EBs with orbital periods less than ten days are synchronized. However, a population of short period EBs exists with rotation periods typically 13% slower than synchronous, which we attribute to the differential rotation of high latitude starspots. At 10 days, there is a transition from predominantly circular, synchronized EBs to predominantly eccentric, pseudosynchronized EBs. This transition period is in good agreement with the predicted and observed circularization period for Milky Way field binaries. At orbital periods greater than about 30 days, the amount of tidal synchronization decreases. We also report 12 previously unidentified candidate $\delta$ Scuti and $\gamma$ Doradus pulsators, as well as a candidate RS CVn system with an evolved primary that exhibits starspot occultations. For short period contact binaries, we observe a period-color relation, and compare it to previous studies. As a whole, these results represent the largest homogeneous study of tidal synchronization of late-type stars.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal. EB rotation periods and classifications available at https://github.com/jlurie/decatur/blob/master/decatur/data/final_catalog.cs

Diagnosis of Icing and Actuator Faults in UAVs Using LPV Unknown Input Observers

This paper proposes a discrete-time linear parameter varying (LPV) unknown input observer (UIO) for the diagnosis of actuator faults and ice accretion in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The proposed approach, which is suited to an implementation on-board, exploits a complete 6-degrees of freedom (DOF) UAV model, which includes the coupled longitudinal/lateral dynamics and the impact of icing. The LPV formulation has the advantage of allowing the icing diagnosis scheme to be consistent with a wide range of operating conditions. The developed theory is supported by simulations illustrating the diagnosis of actuator faults and icing in a small UAV. The obtained results validate the effectiveness of the proposed approach

Role of Operating Conditions on Energetic Pathways in a Microbial Fuel Cell

AbstractThe electric performance of a Microbial Fuel Cell (MFC) fed with swine manure, and specifically the interactions between different coexisting bacterial populations are examined in relationship to the Organic Loading Rate (OLR) and External Resistance applied to the cell. Feasibility of swine manure treatment using MFCs was already demonstrated by previous studies, however low Coulombic efficiencies were attained due to a competing methanogenic degradation occurring in the same cells. External resistance (Rext) and Organic Loading Rate have been identified as two of the key parameters affecting the balance between exoelectrogenic and methanogenic bacterial populations in a MFC system; despite this, virtually no attention had been paid to the study of OLR influence on MFCs performance. This study evaluates the performance of a MFC, treating swine manure, in this perspective, demonstrating that high OLRs (up to 11.2kg COD m3/d) have a limiting effect on MFCs electrochemical losses, and increase absolute values of ORR (4.6kg COD m3/d) and current production (14.9mA). On the other hand, adoption of low OLR (as low as 0.7kg COD m3/d) translates in an increase of both organic matter removal efficiency (52%) and Coulombic efficiency (higher than 70%). These improvements can be directly connected with the shifting balance between exoelectrogenic and methanogenic biomass populations, as confirmed by the cell's anode off-gas analysis. Hence, by adopting the appropriate design value of ORL and operating conditions, the MFC's biofilm exoelectrogenic population fraction, and thus its overall activity, can be improved considerably

Storm-induced sediment gravity flows at the head of the Eel submarine canyon, northern California margin

10 pages, 5 figuresAs part of the STRATAFORM program, a bottom-boundary layer (BBL) tripod was deployed at 120 m depth in the northern thalweg of the Eel Canyon during winter 2000. Increases of the near-bottom suspended-sediment concentrations (SSC) recorded at the canyon head were not directly related to the Eel River discharge, but were clearly linked to the occurrence of storms. BBL measurements revealed that during intensifications of the wave orbital velocity, sediment transport at the head of the canyon occurred as sediment gravity flows directed down-canyon. Observational evidence for near-bed sediment gravity-flow transport included an increase toward the bed of the down-canyon component of wave-averaged velocity and high estimated SSC. At higher sampling frequencies (1 Hz), the current components during these events fluctuated at the same periodicity as the pressure, reflecting a clear influence of the surface-wave activity on the generation and maintenance of the sediment gravity flows. The origin of such flows is not related to the formation of fluid muds on the shelf or to intense wave-current sediment resuspension around the canyon head region. Rather, liquefaction of sediment deposited at the head of the canyon (induced by wave-load excess pore water pressures during storms) combined with elevated slopes around the canyon head appear to be the mechanisms initiating sediment transport. The resulting fluidized-sediment layer can easily be eroded, entrained into the water column, and transported down-canyon as a sediment gravity flow. Results from this study reveal that storm-induced sediment gravity flows occur periodically in the Eel Canyon head, and suggest that this kind of sediment transport process can occur in other submarine canyons more frequently than previously expected. Copyright 2004 by the American Geophysical UnionThis work has been funded by the Office of Naval Research, Marine Geology and Geophysics Program, grants N00014-95-1-0418 and N00014-99-1-0028, as part of the STRATAFORM program. P. Puig received financial support from a Fulbright scholarship provided by the Spanish Ministry of Education and CulturePeer Reviewe

Revisión bibliográfica: Intervenciones de enfermería para acompañar y facilitar el proceso de duelo tras una muerte perinatal.

INTRODUCCIÓNSe denomina muerte perinatal a la muerte fetal ocurrida entre la semana 22 degestación (o más de 500 g de peso) y siete días después de nacer. Tras lamuerte perinatal, las familias presentan un sentimiento subjetivo denominadoduelo.Según el Instituto Nacional de Estadística (INE) el número de muertesperinatales en España ha descendido, sin embargo sigue siendo un problemaactual.OBJETIVOEl objetivo principal de dicha revisión bibliográfica consiste en el análisis de laevidencia disponible sobre la eficacia de las intervenciones enfermeras paraayudar y facilitar el proceso de duelo por una muerte perinatal.METODOLOGÍASe realizó una búsqueda bibliográfica de la literatura en las distintas bases dedatos, mediante las palabras clave y criterios de inclusión y exclusión.DESARROLLOLas intervenciones analizadas según el acrónimo “LAST”: “L” significa escuchar(listen, en inglés), “A” significa reconocimiento de emociones (acknowledgment,en inglés), “S” significa apoyo (support, en inglés) y “T” significa tacto (touch, eninglés); podrían ayudar a comprender dicho duelo, y por lo tanto a conocer loscuidados que debe realizar el personal de enfermería ante dicha situación.CONCLUSIONESEstas intervenciones son efectivas si se realizan durante y después de la pérdidaperinatal, y si van precedidas de una buena formación enfermera especializada.PALABRAS CLAVEMuerte perinatal, privación del duelo, adaptación psicológica, asistentes deEnfermería, personal de Enfermería, Enfermería<br /