2,530 research outputs found
The Impact of Extension Gardening Programs on Healthy Attitudes and Behaviors
Gardening programs have been increasing in popularity since 1995 when California enacted legislation with the goal of putting a garden in every school. Research has shown positive benefits of gardening programs include increasing a child’s academic skills, environmental awareness, and social skills, but little is known about their impact on healthy attitudes and behaviors. Considering childhood obesity rates are rapidly increasing, understanding how educational programs, such as gardening, can impact health has become important. The purpose of this study was to assess the impact Extension gardening programs had on participants’ healthy attitudes and behaviors. Using a pretest/posttest research design with a control group, the researchers found that only slight changes were occurring in participants’ attitudes and behaviors. However, when staff member open-ended responses were reviewed qualitatively, it was found that more is occurring within the program than was uncovered by the quantitative instrument. Recommendations for enhancing the school-based garden program as a result of the findings included teaching participants how to prepare and eat the vegetables they have produced in the garden, increasing instruction on how gardening is a physical activity, and including journaling about the nutritional values of fruits and vegetables to develop positive attitudes about health
Exploring the impact of an Aboriginal Health Worker on hospitalised Aboriginal experiences: lessons from cardiology.
To enhance Aboriginal inpatient care and improve outpatient cardiac rehabilitation utilisation, a tertiary hospital in Western Australia recruited an Aboriginal Health Worker (AHW). Interviews were undertaken with the cardiology AHW, other hospital staff including another AHW, and recent Aboriginal cardiac patients to assess the impact of this position. The impact of the AHW included facilitating culturally appropriate care, bridging communication divides, reducing discharges against medical advice, providing cultural education, increasing inpatient contact time, improving follow-up practices and enhancing patient referral linkages. Challenges included poor job role definition, clinical restrictions and limitations in AHW training for hospital settings. This study demonstrates that AHWs can have significant impacts on Aboriginal cardiac inpatient experiences and outpatient care. Although this study was undertaken in cardiology, the lessons are transferable across the hospital setting
Slip behavior in liquid films on surfaces of patterned wettability: Comparison between continuum and molecular dynamics simulations
We investigate the behavior of the slip length in Newtonian liquids subject
to planar shear bounded by substrates with mixed boundary conditions. The upper
wall, consisting of a homogenous surface of finite or vanishing slip, moves at
a constant speed parallel to a lower stationary wall, whose surface is
patterned with an array of stripes representing alternating regions of no-shear
and finite or no-slip. Velocity fields and effective slip lengths are computed
both from molecular dynamics (MD) simulations and solution of the Stokes
equation for flow configurations either parallel or perpendicular to the
stripes. Excellent agreement between the hydrodynamic and MD results is
obtained when the normalized width of the slip regions, , where is the (fluid) molecular diameter characterizing the
Lennard-Jones interaction. In this regime, the effective slip length increases
monotonically with to a saturation value. For and transverse flow configurations, the non-uniform interaction
potential at the lower wall constitutes a rough surface whose molecular scale
corrugations strongly reduce the effective slip length below the hydrodynamic
results. The translational symmetry for longitudinal flow eliminates the
influence of molecular scale roughness; however, the reduced molecular ordering
above the wetting regions of finite slip for small values of
increases the value of the effective slip length far above the hydrodynamic
predictions. The strong inverse correlation between the effective slip length
and the liquid structure factor representative of the first fluid layer near
the patterned wall illustrates the influence of molecular ordering effects on
slip in non-inertial flows.Comment: 12 pages, 10 figures Web reference added for animations:
http://www.egr.msu.edu/~priezjev/bubble/bubble.htm
Bulk and Interfacial Shear Thinning of Immiscible Polymers
Nonequilibrium molecular dynamics simulations are used to study the shear
thinning behavior of immiscible symmetric polymer blends. The phase separated
polymers are subjected to a simple shear flow imposed by moving a wall parallel
to the fluid-fluid interface. The viscosity begins to shear thin at much lower
rates in the bulk than at the interface. The entire shear rate dependence of
the interfacial viscosity is consistent with a shorter effective chain length
that also describes the width of the interface. This is independent
of chain length and is a function only of the degree of immiscibility of
the two polymers. Changes in polymer conformation are studied as a function of
position and shear rate.Shear thinning correlates more closely with a decrease
in the component of the radius of gyration along the velocity gradient than
with elongation along the flow. At the interface, this contraction of chains is
independent of and consistent with the bulk behavior for chains of length
. The distribution of conformational changes along chains is also studied.
Central regions begin to stretch at a shear rate that decreases with increasing
, while shear induced changes at the ends of chains are independent of .Comment: 8 pages, 8 figure
Lessons from a West Australian statewide assessment of the implementation of the NHMRC recommendations for strengthening cardiac rehabilitation and secondary prevention of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people
Development of the Aboriginal Communication Assessment After Brain Injury (ACAABI): A screening tool for identifying acquired communication disorders in Aboriginal Australians
Purpose: Acquired communication disorders (ACD), following stroke and traumatic brain injury, may not be correctly identified in Aboriginal Australians due to a lack of linguistically and culturally appropriate assessment tools. Within this paper we explore key issues that were considered in the development of the Aboriginal Communication Assessment After Brain Injury (ACAABI) – a screening tool designed to assess the presence of ACD in Aboriginal populations.
Method: A literature review and consultation with key stakeholders were undertaken to explore directions needed to develop a new tool, based on existing tools and recommendations for future developments.
Result: The literature searches revealed no existing screening tool for ACD in these populations, but identified tools in the areas of cognition and social-emotional wellbeing. Articles retrieved described details of the content and style of these tools, with recommendations for the development and administration of a new tool. The findings from the interview and focus group views were consistent with the approach recommended in the literature.
Conclusions: There is a need for a screening tool for ACD to be developed but any tool must be informed by knowledge of Aboriginal language, culture and community input in order to be acceptable and valid
Pickleball for Inactive Mid-Life and Older Adults in Rural Utah: A Feasibility Study
Many diseases, disabilities, and mental health conditions associated with aging can be delayed or prevented through regular exercise. Several barriers to exercise, many of which are exacerbated in rural communities, prevent mid-life and older adults from accessing its benefits. However, recently, a racquet sport named pickleball has become popular among older adults, and it appears to overcome some of these barriers. We conducted a feasibility study to evaluate the impact of a six-week pickleball intervention on measures of muscle function, cognitive function, perceived pain, and cardio-metabolic risk, as well as several psychosocial factors contributing to adherence in sedentary rural participants. Participants improved their vertical jump, cognitive performance, and reported a decrease in self-reported pain, suggesting improved physical and cognitive health across the sample. Participants also reported high levels of satisfaction and demonstrated good adherence over the duration of the study. Perhaps of greatest value was the overwhelmingly positive response from participants to the intervention and follow-up interviews reporting a desire to continue pickleball play beyond the study period. Overall, pickleball appears to be a promising intervention to, (1) elicit functional- and cognitive-related improvements, and (2) motivate mid-life and older adults to adhere to exercise sufficiently long to benefit their health
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