Assessing organizations collaboration readiness: a behavioral approach

Dissertation presented at the Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the New University of Lisbon to obtain the degree of Doctor in Electrical Engineering, specialty of Robotics and Integrated ManufacturingThis thesis presents an approach for assessing organizations‘ readiness to collaborate. This assessment is based in three fundamental aspects, namely (1) on collaboration preparedness, which aims at assessing whether a partner has adequate collaboration-related character traits; (2) on competencies fitness which is predominantly aimed at assessing how well an organization is able to use its competencies in a collaboration context; and (3) on willingness to collaborate, which is a concept applied to assess whether an organization is, or is not, really interested to engage in concrete collaboration opportunities. The proposed approach contributes to the formation of improved collaborative networks, increasing their likelihood of success. The principal characteristic of the model lies in the fact that it follows a behavioral perspective. As such, collaboration preparedness is based on the idea of the organizations‘ character, traits and behavioral patterns. Competencies fitness is in turn based on the so-called soft competencies, exploring the performance influences/effects of the soft competencies on the hard ones in a collaboration context. Finally, willingness to collaborate is based on the organization‘s planned behavior, attitudes and intentions that are perceived in/from a partner. The work involved in the conceptualization of readiness to collaborate includes the utilization of text data mining to discover the behavioral aspects, namely the collaboration-related organization‘s traits which are relevant for assessing collaboration readiness. Bayesian belief networks are proposed as a way to deal with the underlying uncertainty in assessing collaboration readiness. A soft versus hard competencies dichotomy is used to develop the concept of competencies fitness, proposing the adjusted competencies profile and the fitness level, as the way to assess whether a partner‘s competencies fit in a collaboration opportunity. The Theory of the Planned Behavior is adapted from social sciences and used in organizations in collaboration contexts. Various modeling experiments were performed to assist in the development of this readiness concept. The validation through some cases of partnerships is proposed to evaluate the underlying collaboration readiness assessment model

Approach to Adapt a Legacy Manufacturing System Into the IoT Paradigm

This work has been supported by Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, by Uninova-CTS research unit and by national funds through FCT -Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia within the research unit CTS - Centro de Tecnologia e Sistemas (project UID/EEA/00066/2013). The authors would like to thank all the institutions.Enterprises are adopting the Internet of Things paradigm as a strategy to improve competitiveness. But enterprises also need to rely on their legacy systems, which are of vital importance to them and normally difficult to reconfigure or modify, their mere replacement being usually not affordable. These systems constitute, therefore, barriers to agility and competitiveness, raising the need to develop cost-effective ways for IoT adaptation. An approach for adapting legacy manufacturing systems into the IoT realm is proposed in this research. The methodology is twofold: an adaptation board is firstly designed to provide IoT connectivity, allowing to remotely invoke the “legacy” functionality as services. Then, the board itself can leverage the legacy system by developing additional functionalities inside it, as the update process is usually triggered by the need of new functionality from these systems. An experiment, which consists of adapting to IoT a small distribution line that is controlled by an aged Programmable Logic Controller, is developed to illustrate how straightforward, affordable and cost effective the adaptation approach is, allowing to holistically achieve a new system with more sophisticated functionality.publishersversionpublishe

Evaluation of appendicitis risk prediction models in adults with suspected appendicitis

Background Appendicitis is the most common general surgical emergency worldwide, but its diagnosis remains challenging. The aim of this study was to determine whether existing risk prediction models can reliably identify patients presenting to hospital in the UK with acute right iliac fossa (RIF) pain who are at low risk of appendicitis. Methods A systematic search was completed to identify all existing appendicitis risk prediction models. Models were validated using UK data from an international prospective cohort study that captured consecutive patients aged 16–45 years presenting to hospital with acute RIF in March to June 2017. The main outcome was best achievable model specificity (proportion of patients who did not have appendicitis correctly classified as low risk) whilst maintaining a failure rate below 5 per cent (proportion of patients identified as low risk who actually had appendicitis). Results Some 5345 patients across 154 UK hospitals were identified, of which two‐thirds (3613 of 5345, 67·6 per cent) were women. Women were more than twice as likely to undergo surgery with removal of a histologically normal appendix (272 of 964, 28·2 per cent) than men (120 of 993, 12·1 per cent) (relative risk 2·33, 95 per cent c.i. 1·92 to 2·84; P < 0·001). Of 15 validated risk prediction models, the Adult Appendicitis Score performed best (cut‐off score 8 or less, specificity 63·1 per cent, failure rate 3·7 per cent). The Appendicitis Inflammatory Response Score performed best for men (cut‐off score 2 or less, specificity 24·7 per cent, failure rate 2·4 per cent). Conclusion Women in the UK had a disproportionate risk of admission without surgical intervention and had high rates of normal appendicectomy. Risk prediction models to support shared decision‐making by identifying adults in the UK at low risk of appendicitis were identified

Effects of pre-operative isolation on postoperative pulmonary complications after elective surgery: an international prospective cohort study an international prospective cohort study

We aimed to determine the impact of pre-operative isolation on postoperative pulmonary complications after elective surgery during the global SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. We performed an international prospective cohort study including patients undergoing elective surgery in October 2020. Isolation was defined as the period before surgery during which patients did not leave their house or receive visitors from outside their household. The primary outcome was postoperative pulmonary complications, adjusted in multivariable models for measured confounders. Pre-defined sub-group analyses were performed for the primary outcome. A total of 96,454 patients from 114 countries were included and overall, 26,948 (27.9%) patients isolated before surgery. Postoperative pulmonary complications were recorded in 1947 (2.0%) patients of which 227 (11.7%) were associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection. Patients who isolated pre-operatively were older, had more respiratory comorbidities and were more commonly from areas of high SARS-CoV-2 incidence and high-income countries. Although the overall rates of postoperative pulmonary complications were similar in those that isolated and those that did not (2.1% vs 2.0%, respectively), isolation was associated with higher rates of postoperative pulmonary complications after adjustment (adjusted OR 1.20, 95%CI 1.05–1.36, p = 0.005). Sensitivity analyses revealed no further differences when patients were categorised by: pre-operative testing; use of COVID-19-free pathways; or community SARS-CoV-2 prevalence. The rate of postoperative pulmonary complications increased with periods of isolation longer than 3 days, with an OR (95%CI) at 4–7 days or ≥ 8 days of 1.25 (1.04–1.48), p = 0.015 and 1.31 (1.11–1.55), p = 0.001, respectively. Isolation before elective surgery might be associated with a small but clinically important increased risk of postoperative pulmonary complications. Longer periods of isolation showed no reduction in the risk of postoperative pulmonary complications. These findings have significant implications for global provision of elective surgical care. We aimed to determine the impact of pre-operative isolation on postoperative pulmonary complications after elective surgery during the global SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. We performed an international prospective cohort study including patients undergoing elective surgery in October 2020. Isolation was defined as the period before surgery during which patients did not leave their house or receive visitors from outside their household. The primary outcome was postoperative pulmonary complications, adjusted in multivariable models for measured confounders. Pre-defined sub-group analyses were performed for the primary outcome. A total of 96,454 patients from 114 countries were included and overall, 26,948 (27.9%) patients isolated before surgery. Postoperative pulmonary complications were recorded in 1947 (2.0%) patients of which 227 (11.7%) were associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection. Patients who isolated pre-operatively were older, had more respiratory comorbidities and were more commonly from areas of high SARS-CoV-2 incidence and high-income countries. Although the overall rates of postoperative pulmonary complications were similar in those that isolated and those that did not (2.1% vs 2.0%, respectively), isolation was associated with higher rates of postoperative pulmonary complications after adjustment (adjusted OR 1.20, 95%CI 1.05–1.36, p = 0.005). Sensitivity analyses revealed no further differences when patients were categorised by: pre-operative testing; use of COVID-19-free pathways; or community SARS-CoV-2 prevalence. The rate of postoperative pulmonary complications increased with periods of isolation longer than 3 days, with an OR (95%CI) at 4–7 days or ≥ 8 days of 1.25 (1.04–1.48), p = 0.015 and 1.31 (1.11–1.55), p = 0.001, respectively. Isolation before elective surgery might be associated with a small but clinically important increased risk of postoperative pulmonary complications. Longer periods of isolation showed no reduction in the risk of postoperative pulmonary complications. These findings have significant implications for global provision of elective surgical care