Using Administrative Data to Count Local Populations

There is growing evidence that official population statistics based on the decennial census are inaccurate at the local authority level—the fundamental administrative unit of the UK. This paper investigates the use of locally available administrative data sets for counting populations. The method uses truth tables for combining different data sources with different population coverage according to a defined and therefore replicable set of rules. The result is timelier and geographically more flexible data which is more cost-effective to produce than a survey-based census. Associated techniques for linking diverse data sources at individual and household level are briefly discussed. The methodology is then applied to administrative data from a London borough with about 170,000 people. The results are evaluated and compared with other population sources. The paper concludes by discussing potential improvements including scaling up the work to cover multiple local authorities. The practicalities of using alternative central government data sets are briefly considered. A sequel paper in this journal provides examples of key applications of this approach at local level

RESPOND – A patient-centred programme to prevent secondary falls in older people presenting to the emergency department with a fall: Protocol for a mixed methods programme evaluation.

Background Programme evaluations conducted alongside randomised controlled trials (RCTs) have potential to enhance understanding of trial outcomes. This paper describes a multi-level programme evaluation to be conducted alongside an RCT of a falls prevention programme (RESPOND). Objectives 1) To conduct a process evaluation in order to identify the degree of implementation fidelity and associated barriers and facilitators. 2) To evaluate the primary intended impact of the programme: participation in fall prevention strategies, and the factors influencing participation. 3) To identify the factors influencing RESPOND RCT outcomes: falls, fall injuries and ED re-presentations. Methods/ Design Five hundred and twenty eight community-dwelling adults aged 60–90 years presenting to two EDs with a fall will be recruited and randomly assigned to the intervention or standard care group. All RESPOND participants and RESPOND clinicians will be included in the evaluation. A mixed methods design will be used and a programme logic model will frame the evaluation. Data will be sourced from interviews, focus groups, questionnaires, clinician case notes, recruitment records, participant-completed calendars, hospital administrative datasets, and audio-recordings of intervention contacts. Quantitative data will be analysed via descriptive and inferential statistics and qualitative data will be interpreted using thematic analysis. Discussion The RESPOND programme evaluation will provide information about contextual and influencing factors related to the RCT outcomes. The results will assist researchers, clinicians, and policy makers to make decisions about future falls prevention interventions. Insights gained are likely to be transferable to preventive health programmes for a range of chronic conditions

Mechanical suppression of osteolytic bone metastases in advanced breast cancer patients: A randomised controlled study protocol evaluating safety, feasibility and preliminary efficacy of exercise as a targeted medicine

Background: Skeletal metastases present a major challenge for clinicians, representing an advanced and typically incurable stage of cancer. Bone is also the most common location for metastatic breast carcinoma, with skeletal lesions identified in over 80% of patients with advanced breast cancer. Preclinical models have demonstrated the ability of mechanical stimulation to suppress tumour formation and promote skeletal preservation at bone sites with osteolytic lesions, generating modulatory interference of tumour-driven bone remodelling. Preclinical studies have also demonstrated anti-cancer effects through exercise by minimising tumour hypoxia, normalising tumour vasculature and increasing tumoural blood perfusion. This study proposes to explore the promising role of targeted exercise to suppress tumour growth while concomitantly delivering broader health benefits in patients with advanced breast cancer with osteolytic bone metastases. Methods: This single-blinded, two-armed, randomised and controlled pilot study aims to establish the safety, feasibility and efficacy of an individually tailored, modular multi-modal exercise programme incorporating spinal isometric training (targeted muscle contraction) in 40 women with advanced breast cancer and stable osteolytic spinal metastases. Participants will be randomly assigned to exercise or usual medical care. The intervention arm will receive a 3-month clinically supervised exercise programme, which if proven to be safe and efficacious will be offered to the control-arm patients following study completion. Primary endpoints (programme feasibility, safety, tolerance and adherence) and secondary endpoints (tumour morphology, serum tumour biomarkers, bone metabolism, inflammation, anthropometry, body composition, bone pain, physical function and patient-reported outcomes) will be measured at baseline and following the intervention. Discussion: Exercise medicine may positively alter tumour biology through numerous mechanical and nonmechanical mechanisms. This randomised controlled pilot trial will explore the preliminary effects of targeted exercise on tumour morphology and circulating metastatic tumour biomarkers using an osteolytic skeletal metastases model in patients with breast cancer. The study is principally aimed at establishing feasibility and safety. If proven to be safe and feasible, results from this study could have important implications for the delivery of this exercise programme to patients with advanced cancer and sclerotic skeletal metastases or with skeletal lesions present in haematological cancers (such as osteolytic lesions in multiple myeloma), for which future research is recommended. Trial registration: anzctr.org.au, ACTRN-12616001368426. Registered on 4 October 2016

Unpulsed UBV Optical Emission from the Crab Pulsar

Based on observations of the Crab pulsar using the TRIFFID high speed imaging photometer in the UBV bands using the Special Astrophysical Observatory's 6m telescope in the Russian Caucasus, we report the detection of pronounced emission during the so-called `off' phase of emission. Following de-extinction, this unpulsed component of emission is shown to be consistent with a power law with an exponent of alpha = -0.60 +/- 0.37, the uncertainty being dominated by the error associated with the independent CCD photometry used to reference the TRIFFID data. This suggests a steeper power law form than that reported elsewhere in the literature for the total integrated spectrum, which is essentially flat with alpha ~ 0.1, although the difference in this case is only significant at the ~ 2 sigma level. Deeper reference integrated and TRIFFID phase-resolved photometry in these bands in conjunction with further observations in the UV and R region would constrain this fit further.Comment: 26 pages, 2 figures, uses aasms4.sty, accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journa

First-principles study of orthorhombic CdTiO3 perovskite

In this work we perform an ab-initio study of CdTiO3 perovskite in its orthorhombic phase using FLAPW method. Our calculations help to decide between the different cristallographic structures proposed for this perovskite from X-Ray measurements. We compute the electric field gradient tensor (EFG) at Cd site and obtain excellent agreement with available experimental information from a perturbed angular correlation (PAC) experiment. We study EFG under an isotropic change of volume and show that in this case the widely used "point charge model approximation" to determine EFG works quite well.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure. Accepted in Physical Review

RESPOND – A patient-centred program to prevent secondary falls in older people presenting to the emergency department with a fall: Protocol for a multi-centre randomised controlled trial

Introduction: Participation in falls prevention activities by older people following presentation to the Emergency Department (ED) with a fall is suboptimal. This randomised controlled trial (RCT) will test the RESPOND program which is designed to improve older persons’ participation in falls prevention activities through delivery of patient-centred education and behaviour change strategies. Design and setting: An RCT at two tertiary referral EDs in Melbourne and Perth, Australia. Participants: Five-hundred and twenty eight community-dwelling people aged 60-90 years presenting to the ED with a fall and discharged home will be recruited. People who: require an interpreter or hands-on assistance to walk; live in residential aged care or >50 kilometres from the trial hospital; have terminal illness, cognitive impairment, documented aggressive behaviour or history of psychosis; are receiving palliative care; or are unable to use a telephone will be excluded. Methods: Participants will be randomly allocated to the RESPOND intervention or standard care control group. RESPOND incorporates: (1) home-based risk factor assessment; (2) education, coaching, goal setting, and follow-up telephone support for management of one or more of four risk factors with evidence of effective intervention; and (3) healthcare provider communication and community linkage delivered over six months. Primary outcomes are falls and fall injuries per-person-year. Discussion: RESPOND builds on prior falls prevention learnings and aims to help individuals make guided decisions about how they will manage their falls risk. Patient-centred models have been successfully trialled in chronic and cardiovascular disease however evidence to support this approach in falls prevention is limited. Trial registration. The protocol for this study is registered with the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (ACTRN12614000336684)

A new survey of variability in the core of M15 with TRIFFID-2

A two-week campaign of high-resolution imaging of the centre of M15 using the tip/tilt correcting TRIFFID-2 camera, followed by analysis with ISIS (image matching & subtraction software), has produced the most sensitive survey to date of variable stars in the central ~1x1 arcmin^2 - a total of 48 were detected -, and constrains the size of the dwarf nova population

FLORA: a novel method to predict protein function from structure in diverse superfamilies

Predicting protein function from structure remains an active area of interest, particularly for the structural genomics initiatives where a substantial number of structures are initially solved with little or no functional characterisation. Although global structure comparison methods can be used to transfer functional annotations, the relationship between fold and function is complex, particularly in functionally diverse superfamilies that have evolved through different secondary structure embellishments to a common structural core. The majority of prediction algorithms employ local templates built on known or predicted functional residues. Here, we present a novel method (FLORA) that automatically generates structural motifs associated with different functional sub-families (FSGs) within functionally diverse domain superfamilies. Templates are created purely on the basis of their specificity for a given FSG, and the method makes no prior prediction of functional sites, nor assumes specific physico-chemical properties of residues. FLORA is able to accurately discriminate between homologous domains with different functions and substantially outperforms (a 2–3 fold increase in coverage at low error rates) popular structure comparison methods and a leading function prediction method. We benchmark FLORA on a large data set of enzyme superfamilies from all three major protein classes (α, β, αβ) and demonstrate the functional relevance of the motifs it identifies. We also provide novel predictions of enzymatic activity for a large number of structures solved by the Protein Structure Initiative. Overall, we show that FLORA is able to effectively detect functionally similar protein domain structures by purely using patterns of structural conservation of all residues

Growth of (110) Diamond using pure Dicarbon

We use a density-functional based tight-binding method to study diamond growth steps by depositing dicarbon species onto a hydrogen-free diamond (110) surface. Subsequent C_2 molecules are deposited on an initially clean surface, in the vicinity of a growing adsorbate cluster, and finally, near vacancies just before completion of a full new monolayer. The preferred growth stages arise from C_2n clusters in near ideal lattice positions forming zigzag chains running along the [-110] direction parallel to the surface. The adsorption energies are consistently exothermic by 8--10 eV per C_2, depending on the size of the cluster. The deposition barriers for these processes are in the range of 0.0--0.6 eV. For deposition sites above C_2n clusters the adsorption energies are smaller by 3 eV, but diffusion to more stable positions is feasible. We also perform simulations of the diffusion of C_2 molecules on the surface in the vicinity of existing adsorbate clusters using an augmented Lagrangian penalty method. We find migration barriers in excess of 3 eV on the clean surface, and 0.6--1.0 eV on top of graphene-like adsorbates. The barrier heights and pathways indicate that the growth from gaseous dicarbons proceeds either by direct adsorption onto clean sites or after migration on top of the existing C_2n chains.Comment: 8 Pages, 7 figure