Capturing creative practice

This paper will map the initial research surrounding capturing creative practice for the improvement of supervision and learning experiences in higher degree creative arts research in the School of Communications and Arts and the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts at Edith Cowan University. Despite differences in what constitutes ‘practice’ across creative disciplines, the difficulties in representing practice-led research processes in an academic context are shared. Through interviews and focus groups, this research explored how the failure to capture the creative process impacts on supervision and learning experiences for creative arts Higher Degree by Research (HDR) candidates and their supervisors. One of the biggest challenges for supervisors of creative arts HDR candidates is providing students with guidance on how to document the tacit knowledge that informs and underpins their creative process. As supervisors of HDR candidates in the creative arts at ECU, we see the problems that arise when key aspects of the creative process cannot be written down. The first aim of this research was to gather more concrete data on how the failure to document tacit knowledge in creative research processes can impact on supervision and learning experiences. This data was gathered from interviews with a selection of creative arts HDR supervisors and focus groups with HDR candidates at ECU

Messy never-endings: Curating inConversation as interdisciplinary collaborative dialogue

This paper will explore the curation of a collaborative exhibition amongst creative higher degree by research candidates (from the School of Communications and Arts and the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts), arts practitioners and researchers from different art forms and discipline backgrounds. It will look at the conversations between artists and researcher collaborators working together to produce a broad range of creative works, culminating in an exhibition titled In Conversation, to be staged at Edith Cowan University’s Spectrum Project Space in October 2014. The context of the inConversation exhibition aims to inform and expand on current debates about the challenges and benefits of inter- and cross-disciplinary collaboration in the arts. While collaboration within discrete artistic disciplines has been quite common, it is now becoming increasingly important for artists to look beyond their silos and invite interactions with researchers in other disciplines and art forms. The curation of this exhibition proposes to explore what complexity may mean in terms of the processes of practice-led research in probing how the push and pull of the collaborative process, by which the outcomes become more than the sum of the parts, plays out in a cross-disciplinary, creative context

Public support for tobacco control policy extensions in Western Australia: a cross-sectional study

Objectives: Policy makers seeking to introduce new tobacco control measures need to anticipatecommunity support to assist them in planning appropriate implementation strategies. This studyassessed community support for plain packaging and smoking bans in outdoor locations in Australia.Design: Analytical cross-sectional survey. Setting and participants: 2005 Western Australianadults participated in a computer-assisted telephone interview. Random household telephone numberswere used to obtain a representative sample. Outcome measures: Support for plain packaging ofcigarettes and smoking bans at outdoor venues by demographic characteristics. Results: Around half of the survey respondents supported plain packaging and almost a further quarter reported being neutral on the issue. Only one in three smokers disagreed with the introduction of a plain packaging policy. A majority of respondents supported smoking bans at five of the six nominated venues, with support being strongest among those with children under the age of 15 years. The venues with the highest levels of support were those where smoke-free policies had already been voluntarily introduced by the venuemanagers, where children were most likely to be in attendance, and that were more limited in size.Conclusions: The study results demonstrate community support for new tobacco control policies.This evidence can be used by public policy makers in their deliberations relating to the introduction of more extensive tobacco control regulations

A review of the evaluation of healthway sponsorships

This study reviewed the methods used by Healthway to assess sponsorship implementation/value and to explore complimentary or alternative evaluation measures... Interview questions related to sponsorship activities, procedures, requirements and evaluation. Suggestions for practical and alternative ways of assessing sponsorship implementation and conducting evaluations were also asked. In addition, the perceived value of sponsorship investments to Healthway and satisfaction with the existing evaluation framework were also sought..

Ideal cardiovascular health in urban Jamaica: Prevalence estimates and relationship to community property value, household assets and educational attainment: A cross-sectional study

Objective Ideal cardiovascular health (ICH) is associated with greater longevity and reduced morbidity, but no research on ICH has been conducted in Jamaica. We aimed to estimate the prevalence of ICH in urban Jamaica and to evaluate associations between ICH and community, household, and individual socioeconomic status (SES). Design Cross-sectional study. Setting Urban communities in Jamaica. Participants 360 men and 665 women who were urban residents aged ≥20 years from a national survey, the Jamaica Health and Lifestyle Survey 2016-2017. Exposures Community SES, using median land values (MLV); household SES, using number of household assets; and individual SES, using education level. Primary outcome The main outcome variable was ICH, defined as having five or more of seven ICH characteristics (ICH-5): current non-smoking, healthy diet, moderate physical activity, normal body mass index, normal blood pressure, normal glucose and normal cholesterol. Prevalence was estimated using weighted survey design and logistic regression models were used to evaluate associations. Results The prevalence of overall ICH (seven characteristics) was 0.51%, while the prevalence of ICH-5 was 22.9% (male 24.5%, female 21.5%, p=0.447). In sex-specific multivariable models adjusted for age, education, and household assets, men in the lower tertiles of community MLV had lower odds of ICH-5 compared with men in the upper tertile (lowest tertile: OR 0.33, 95% CI 0.12 to 0.91, p=0.032; middle tertile: OR 0.46, 95% CI 0.20 to 1.04, p=0.062). Women from communities in the lower and middle tertiles of MLV also had lower odds of ICH-5, but the association was not statistically significant. Educational attainment was inversely associated with ICH-5 among men and positively associated among women. Conclusion Living in poorer communities was associated with lower odds of ICH-5 among men in Jamaica. The association between education level and ICH-5 differed in men and women

Multiple breath washout in bronchiectasis clinical trials:is it feasible?

Background: Evaluation of Multiple Breath Washout (MBW) set-up including staff training, certification and central “over-reading” for data quality control is essential to determine the feasibility of MBW in future bronchiectasis studies. Aims: To assess the outcomes of a MBW training, certification and central over-reading programme. Methods: MBW training and certification was conducted in European sites collecting LCI data in the BronchUK clinimetrics and/or i-BEST-1 studies. The blended training programme included the use of an eLearning tool and a 1-day face-to-face session. Sites submitted MBW data to trained central over-readers who determined validity and quality. Results: Thirteen training days were delivered to 56 participants from 22 sites. 18/22 (82%) were MBW naïve. Participant knowledge and confidence increased significantly (p<0.001). By the end of the study recruitment, 15/22 sites (68%) had completed certification with a mean (range) time since training of 6.2 (3-14) months. In the BronchUK clinimetrics study, 468/589 (79%) tests met45 the quality criteria following central over-reading, compared with 137/236 (58%) tests in the i-BEST-1 study. Conclusions: LCI is feasible in a bronchiectasis multicentre clinical trial setting however, consideration of site experience in terms of training as well as assessment of skill drift and the need for re-training may be important to reduce time to certification and optimise data quality. Longer times to certification, a higher percentage of naive sites and patients with worse lung function may have contributed to the lower success rate in the i-BEST-1 study

Eradication of common pathogens at days 2, 3 and 4 of moxifloxacin therapy in patients with acute bacterial sinusitis

BACKGROUND: Acute bacterial sinusitis (ABS) is a common infection in clinical practice. Data on time to bacteriologic eradication after antimicrobial therapy are lacking for most agents, but are necessary in order to optimize therapy. This was a prospective, single-arm, open-label, multicenter study to determine the time to bacteriologic eradication in ABS patients (maxillary sinusitis) treated with moxifloxacin. METHODS: Adult patients with radiologically and clinically confirmed ABS received once-daily moxifloxacin 400 mg for 10 days. Middle meatus secretion sampling was performed using nasal endoscopy pre-therapy, and repeated on 3 consecutive days during treatment. Target enrollment was 30 bacteriologically evaluable patients (pre-therapy culture positive for Streptococcus pneumoniae, Haemophilus influenzae or Moraxella catarrhalis and evaluable cultures for at least Day 2 and Day 3 during therapy visits), including at least 10 each with S. pneumoniae or H. influenzae. RESULTS: Of 192 patients enrolled, 42 were bacteriologically evaluable, with 48 pathogens isolated. Moxifloxacin was started on Day 1. Baseline bacteria were eradicated in 35/42 (83.3%) patients by day 2, 42/42 (100%) patients by day 3, and 41/42 (97.6%) patients by day 4. In terms of individual pathogens, 12/18 S. pneumoniae, 22/23 H. influenzae and 7/7 M. catarrhalis were eradicated by day 2 (total 41/48; 85.4%), and 18/18 S. pneumoniae and 23/23 H. influenzae were eradicated by day 3. On Day 4, S. pneumoniae was isolated from a patient who had negative cultures on Days 2 and 3. Thus, the Day 4 eradication rate was 47/48 (97.9%). Clinical success was achieved in 36/38 (94.7%) patients at the test of cure visit. CONCLUSION: In patients with ABS (maxillary sinusitis), moxifloxacin 400 mg once daily for 10 days resulted in eradication of baseline bacteria in 83.3% of patients by Day 2, 100% by Day 3 and 97.6% by Day 4

Isolation and Characterization of Pluripotent Human Spermatogonial Stem Cell-Derived Cells

Several reports have documented the derivation of pluripotent cells (multipotent germline stem cells) from spermatogonial stem cells obtained from the adult mouse testis. These spermatogonia-derived stem cells express embryonic stem cell markers and differentiate to the three primary germ layers, as well as the germline. Data indicate that derivation may involve reprogramming of endogenous spermatogonia in culture. Here, we report the derivation of human multipotent germline stem cells (hMGSCs) from a testis biopsy. The cells express distinct markers of pluripotency, form embryoid bodies that contain derivatives of all three germ layers, maintain a normal XY karyotype, are hypomethylated at the H19 locus, and express high levels of telomerase. Teratoma assays indicate the presence of human cells 8 weeks post-transplantation but limited teratoma formation. Thus, these data suggest the potential to derive pluripotent cells from human testis biopsies but indicate a need for novel strategies to optimize hMGSC culture conditions and reprogramming