533 research outputs found
An exploratory randomised controlled trial of a premises-level intervention to reduce alcohol-related harm including violence in the United Kingdom
<b>Background</b><p></p>
To assess the feasibility of a randomised controlled trial of a licensed premises intervention to reduce severe intoxication and disorder; to establish effect sizes and identify appropriate approaches to the development and maintenance of a rigorous research design and intervention implementation.<p></p>
<b>Methods</b><p></p>
An exploratory two-armed parallel randomised controlled trial with a nested process evaluation. An audit of risk factors and a tailored action plan for high risk premises, with three month follow up audit and feedback. Thirty-two premises that had experienced at least one assault in the year prior to the intervention were recruited, match paired and randomly allocated to control or intervention group. Police violence data and data from a street survey of study premisesâ customers, including measures of breath alcohol concentration and surveyor rated customer intoxication, were used to assess effect sizes for a future definitive trial. A nested process evaluation explored implementation barriers and the fidelity of the intervention with key stakeholders and senior staff in intervention premises using semi-structured interviews.<p></p>
<b>Results</b><p></p>
The process evaluation indicated implementation barriers and low fidelity, with a reluctance to implement the intervention and to submit to a formal risk audit. Power calculations suggest the intervention effect on violence and subjective intoxication would be raised to significance with a study size of 517 premises.<p></p>
<b>Conclusions</b><p></p>
It is methodologically feasible to conduct randomised controlled trials where licensed premises are the unit of allocation. However, lack of enthusiasm in senior premises staff indicates the need for intervention enforcement, rather than voluntary agreements, and on-going strategies to promote sustainability
photoproduction on the proton for photon energies from 0.725 to 2.875 GeV
Differential cross sections for the reaction have been
measured with the CEBAF Large Acceptance Spectrometer (CLAS) and a tagged
photon beam with energies from 0.725 to 2.875 GeV. Where available, the results
obtained here compare well with previously published results for the reaction.
Agreement with the SAID and MAID analyses is found below 1 GeV. The present set
of cross sections has been incorporated into the SAID database, and exploratory
fits have been made up to 2.7 GeV. Resonance couplings have been extracted and
compared to previous determinations. With the addition of these cross sections
to the world data set, significant changes have occurred in the high-energy
behavior of the SAID cross-section predictions and amplitudes.Comment: 18 pages, 10 figure
Differential cross sections and spin density matrix elements for the reaction gamma p -> p omega
High-statistics differential cross sections and spin density matrix elements
for the reaction gamma p -> p omega have been measured using the CLAS at
Jefferson Lab for center-of-mass (CM) energies from threshold up to 2.84 GeV.
Results are reported in 112 10-MeV wide CM energy bins, each subdivided into
cos(theta_CM) bins of width 0.1. These are the most precise and extensive omega
photoproduction measurements to date. A number of prominent structures are
clearly present in the data. Many of these have not previously been observed
due to limited statistics in earlier measurements
photoproduction on the proton for photon energies from 0.675 to 2.875 GeV
Differential cross sections for the reaction have been
measured with the CEBAF Large Acceptance Spectrometer (CLAS) and a tagged
photon beam with energies from 0.675 to 2.875 GeV. The results reported here
possess greater accuracy in the absolute normalization than previous
measurements. They disagree with recent CB-ELSA measurements for the process at
forward scattering angles. Agreement with the SAID and MAID fits is found below
1 GeV. The present set of cross sections has been incorporated into the SAID
database, and exploratory fits have been extended to 3 GeV. Resonance couplings
have been extracted and compared to previous determinations.Comment: 18 pages, 48 figure
Observation of an Exotic Baryon in Exclusive Photoproduction from the Deuteron
In an exclusive measurement of the reaction , a
narrow peak that can be attributed to an exotic baryon with strangeness
is seen in the invariant mass spectrum. The peak is at
GeV/c with a measured width of 0.021 GeV/c FWHM, which is largely
determined by experimental mass resolution. The statistical significance of the
peak is . The mass and width of the observed peak are
consistent with recent reports of a narrow baryon by other experimental
groups.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
A comparison between the APACHE II and Charlson Index Score for predicting hospital mortality in critically ill patients
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Risk adjustment and mortality prediction in studies of critical care are usually performed using acuity of illness scores, such as Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation II (APACHE II), which emphasize physiological derangement. Common risk adjustment systems used in administrative datasets, like the Charlson index, are entirely based on the presence of co-morbid illnesses. The purpose of this study was to compare the discriminative ability of the Charlson index to the APACHE II in predicting hospital mortality in adult multisystem ICU patients.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>This was a population-based cohort design. The study sample consisted of adult (>17 years of age) residents of the Calgary Health Region admitted to a multisystem ICU between April 2002 and March 2004. Clinical data were collected prospectively and linked to hospital outcome data. Multiple regression analyses were used to compare the performance of APACHE II and the Charlson index.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The Charlson index was a poor predictor of mortality (C = 0.626). There was minimal difference between a baseline model containing age, sex and acute physiology score (C = 0.74) and models containing either chronic health points (C = 0.76) or Charlson index variations (C = 0.75, 0.76, 0.77). No important improvement in prediction occurred when the Charlson index was added to the full APACHE II model (C = 0.808 to C = 0.813).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The Charlson index does not perform as well as the APACHE II in predicting hospital mortality in ICU patients. However, when acuity of illness scores are unavailable or are not recorded in a standard way, the Charlson index might be considered as an alternative method of risk adjustment and therefore facilitate comparisons between intensive care units.</p
Search for the pentaquark in the reaction
A search for the \thp in the reaction was completed
using the CLAS detector at Jefferson Lab. A study of the same reaction,
published earlier, reported the observation of a narrow \thp resonance. The
present experiment, with more than 30 times the integrated luminosity of our
earlier measurement, does not show any evidence for a narrow pentaquark
resonance. The angle-integrated upper limit on \thp production in the mass
range of 1.52 to 1.56 GeV/c for the reaction is
0.3 nb (95% CL). This upper limit depends on assumptions made for the mass and
angular distribution of \thp production. Using \lamstar production as an
empirical measure of rescattering in the deuteron, the cross section upper
limit for the elementary reaction is estimated to be
a factor of 10 higher, {\it i.e.}, nb (95% CL).Comment: 5 figures, submitted to PRL, revised for referee comment
Measurement of Beam-Spin Asymmetries for Deep Inelastic Electroproduction
We report the first evidence for a non-zero beam-spin azimuthal asymmetry in
the electroproduction of positive pions in the deep-inelastic region. Data have
been obtained using a polarized electron beam of 4.3 GeV with the CLAS detector
at the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (JLab). The amplitude of
the modulation increases with the momentum of the pion relative to
the virtual photon, , with an average amplitude of for range.Comment: 5 pages, RevTEX4, 3 figures, 2 table
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