INFORMING SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE THROUGH THE ENHANCEMENT OF THE BIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE: A COURSE INTERVENTION MODEL FOR HUMAN SERVICE PROFESSIONALS WORKING WITH YOUTH AND PROBLEMS OF CONDUCT.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of an intervention model designed to enhance practitioners’ biological lens when using a biopsychosocial-spiritual model of holistic assessment and planning. The specific intervention utilized is a course curriculum developed to broaden human service professionals’ (including clinical social work professionals) understanding of attachment theory, neuroscience and trauma informed methods of practice. The course teaches professionals how to apply this knowledge to clinical assessment and intervention planning with youth who have experienced significant trauma in their lives and exhibit problems of conduct. Using an experimental design, participants from a large private mental health organization were asked to evaluate the impact of curriculum on their 1) knowledge of attachment theory, trauma informed practice and neurobiology; 2) attitudes concerning the relevance of trauma-informed practice, the biological perspective and consequence focused models of intervention; and 3) assessment and intervention planning strategies. The curriculum focused its application on youth who have experienced significant levels of trauma and display conduct related behavior problems. Group differences for the workshop intervention group and waitlist control group are discussed. Additionally, a preliminary evaluation of differences between two different intervention groups (participants in the Distance Learning version of the course and the Workshop Seminar version of the course) was conducted

Leveraging 3D Technology for Students with Autism: An innovative university-community collaboration for skill development and vocational exploration

This article describes a university-community collaboration in which an inter-professional team partnered to provide students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) a paid job opportunity to apply 3D modelling skills for a local construction company. Providing meaningful vocational opportunities to improve the transition to adulthood for individuals with ASD is imperative, as individuals with ASD have unemployment rates that are some of the highest of all disabilities. This novel evidence-supported educational program was designed to develop 3D technology skills, explore vocational careers and promote social engagement through shared interests for transition-age youth with ASD. Both parents and students reported many successful outcomes, including increase in student self-confidence, social and technology skill development and the opportunity for vocational exploration by these young people. Implications of the case study are reported in relation to university-community partnerships and the critical role of community collaboration in addressing the high rates of unemployment in individuals with autism

In Silico Derivation of HLA-Specific Alloreactivity Potential from Whole Exome Sequencing of Stem Cell Transplant Donors and Recipients: Understanding the Quantitative Immuno-biology of Allogeneic Transplantation

Donor T cell mediated graft vs. host effects may result from the aggregate alloreactivity to minor histocompatibility antigens (mHA) presented by the HLA in each donor-recipient pair (DRP) undergoing stem cell transplantation (SCT). Whole exome sequencing has demonstrated extensive nucleotide sequence variation in HLA-matched DRP. Non-synonymous single nucleotide polymorphisms (nsSNPs) in the GVH direction (polymorphisms present in recipient and absent in donor) were identified in 4 HLA-matched related and 5 unrelated DRP. The nucleotide sequence flanking each SNP was obtained utilizing the ANNOVAR software package. All possible nonameric-peptides encoded by the non-synonymous SNP were then interrogated in-silico for their likelihood to be presented by the HLA class I molecules in individual DRP, using the Immune-Epitope Database (IEDB) SMM algorithm. The IEDB-SMM algorithm predicted a median 18,396 peptides/DRP which bound HLA with an IC50 of <500nM, and 2254 peptides/DRP with an IC50 of <50nM. Unrelated donors generally had higher numbers of peptides presented by the HLA. A similarly large library of presented peptides was identified when the data was interrogated using the Net MHCPan algorithm. These peptides were uniformly distributed in the various organ systems. The bioinformatic algorithm presented here demonstrates that there may be a high level of minor histocompatibility antigen variation in HLA-matched individuals, constituting an HLA-specific alloreactivity potential. These data provide a possible explanation for how relatively minor adjustments in GVHD prophylaxis yield relatively similar outcomes in HLA matched and mismatched SCT recipients.Comment: Abstract: 235, Words: 6422, Figures: 7, Tables: 3, Supplementary figures: 2, Supplementary tables:

Ambidexterity, Alliances and Environmental Management System Adoption in Spanish Hotels

Competitiveness in the hotel sector and its effect on the environment involves integrating environmental issues in hotel management. Current environmental challenges often require firms to cope with contradictory processes. Ambidexterity is a firm’s capability to deal with conflicting demands and could be helpful in increasing a firm’s environmental management system (EMS) adoption. Furthermore, given the complexity of technological advances, environmental requirements demand inter-firm collaboration. The aim of this study is to further an understanding of how hotels can increase EMS adoption by providing a framework of the contributing effect of alliances and ambidexterity. Results from tests using logistic regression and bootstrapping techniques on a sample of 306 Spanish hotels confirm the importance of ambidexterity because of its positive and direct effect on EMS adoption, and because of the mediating effect, which helps transform the benefits of firms’ participation in strategic alliances into their adoption of EMS. This study contributes to the literature on ambidexterity by highlighting the importance for firms to develop this capability. It also contributes to a better understanding of the drivers of EMS adoption, introducing the integrated effect of hotel participation in alliances and ambidexterity. Hotel managers should endeavor to develop ambidexterity capability to facilitate EMS adoption

VOLUNTARY ORGANIZATIONS AND NEIGHBORHOOD CRIME: A DYNAMIC PERSPECTIVE*

Although numerous theories suggest that voluntary organizations contribute to lower crime rates in neighborhoods, the evidence for this proposition is weak. Consequently, we propose a dynamic perspective for understanding the relationship between voluntary organizations and neighborhood crime that involves longitudinal analyses and the measurement of the age of organizations. By using longitudinal data on a sample of census blocks (N = 87,641) located across 10 cities, we test the relationship between age-graded measures of different types of voluntary organizations and neighborhood crime rates. We use fixed-effects negative binomial regression models that focus on change within neighborhoods of the relationship between voluntary organizations and neighborhood crime. Our results show that although each type of voluntary organization is found to exhibit crime-reducing behavior in neighborhoods, we find that many of them are consistent with what we refer to as the "delayed impact scenario"-there is a pronounced delay between the placement of a voluntary organization and a neighborhood subsequently experiencing a reduction in crime. With protective effects of organizations typically not demonstrated until several years after being in the neighborhood, these patterns suggest a need for long-term investment strategies when examining organizations

Fusion Assessment by MRI in Comparison With CT in Anterior Lumbar Interbody Fusion: A Prospective Study

Copyright The Author(s) 2018 Creative Commons Non Commercial No Derivs CC BY-NC-ND: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-NoDerivs 4.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work as published without adaptation or alteration, without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).Study Design: Prospective cohort study. Objectives: To evaluate the role of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in evaluation of fusion status following anterior lumbar interbody fusion (ALIF) and compare agreement and confidence in assessing fusion or its absence on MRI to the current standard computed tomography (CT). Methods: A prospective follow up of patients undergoing surgery by 2 spine surgeons between 2012 and 2015 at a single institution. Fusion was assessed at different time points in these patients by 2 independent musculoskeletal radiologists. Fusion was analyzed in coronal and sagittal planes using both imaging modalities, with confidence being attributed on a scale of 0 to 3. Assessors were blinded to patient data. Results: Fourteen patients (25 levels) with mean follow-up of 10.2 months (range 2.4-20.3 years) and age of 41 years (range 20.7-61.5 years) were assessed. MRI within the interbody cage in coronal (κ = .58) and sagittal (κ = .50) planes had the highest interobserver agreement. CT anterior to the cage in coronal (κ = .48) and sagittal (κ = .44) planes, as well as within the cage in coronal (κ = .50) and sagittal planes (κ = .44) showed moderate agreement. Confidence anterior to the interbody cage using MRI scan was reduced when compared with remaining angles and imaging modalities. Conclusions: The study demonstrates that MRI may be a useful tool in the assessment of fusion following ALIF with results comparable to CT, and that it may have a useful role in select patients especially considering marked radiation exposure reduction

Global, regional, and national prevalence and risk factors for peripheral artery disease in 2015: an updated systematic review and analysis

BACKGROUND:Peripheral artery disease is a major cardiovascular disease that affected 202 million people worldwide in 2010. In the past decade, new epidemiological data on peripheral artery disease have emerged, enabling us to provide updated estimates of the prevalence and risk factors for peripheral artery disease globally and regionally and, for the first time, nationally. METHODS:For this systematic review and analysis, we did a comprehensive literature search for studies reporting on the prevalence of peripheral artery disease in the general population that were published between Jan 1, 2011, and April 30, 2019, in PubMed, MEDLINE, Embase, the Global Health database, CINAHL, the Global Health Library, the Allied and Complementary Medicine Database, and ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global. We also included the Global Peripheral Artery Disease Study of 2013 and the China Peripheral Artery Disease Study as sources. Peripheral artery disease had to be defined as an ankle-brachial index lower than or equal to 0·90. With a purpose-built data collection form, data on study characteristics, sample characteristics, prevalence, and risk factors were abstracted from all the included studies identified from the sources. Age-specific and sex-specific prevalence of peripheral artery disease was estimated in both high-income countries (HICs) and low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). We also did random-effects meta-analyses to pool the odds ratios of 30 risk factors for peripheral artery disease in HICs and LMICs. UN population data were used to generate the number of people affected by the disease in 2015. Finally, we derived the regional and national numbers of people with peripheral artery disease on the basis of a risk factor-based model. FINDINGS:We included 118 articles for systematic review and analysis. The prevalence of peripheral artery disease increased consistently with age. At younger ages, prevalence was slightly higher in LMICs than HICs (4·32%, 95% CI 3·01-6·29, vs 3·54%, 1·17-10·24, at 40-44 years), but the increase with age was greater in HICs than LMICs, leading to a higher prevalence in HICs than LMICs at older ages (21·24%, 15·22-28·90, vs 12·04%, 8·67-16·60, at 80-84 years). In HICs, prevalence was slightly higher in women than in men up to age 75 years (eg, 7·81%, 3·97-14·77, vs 6·60%, 3·74-11·38, at 55-59 years), whereas in LMICs little difference was found between women and men (eg, 6·40%, 5·06-8·05, vs 6·37%, 4·74-8·49, at 55-59 years). Overall, the global prevalence of peripheral artery disease in people aged 25 years and older was 5·56%, 3·79-8·55, and the prevalence estimate was higher in HICs than that in LMICs (7·37%, 4·35-13·66, vs 5·09%, 3·64-7·24). Smoking, diabetes, hypertension, and hypercholesterolaemia were major risk factors for peripheral artery disease. Globally, a total of 236·62 million people aged 25 years and older were living with peripheral artery disease in 2015, among whom 72·91% were in LMICs. The Western Pacific Region had the most peripheral artery disease cases (74·08 million), whereas the Eastern Mediterranean Region had the least (14·67 million). More than two thirds of the global peripheral artery disease cases were concentrated in 15 individual countries in 2015. INTERPRETATION:Peripheral artery disease continues to become an increasingly serious public health problem, especially in LMICs. With the demographic trend towards ageing and projected rise in important risk factors, a larger burden of peripheral artery disease is to be expected in the foreseeable future. FUNDING:None

Whole Exome Sequencing to Estimate Alloreactivity Potential Between Donors and Recipients in Stem Cell Transplantation

Whole exome sequencing was performed on HLA-matched stem cell donors and transplant recipients to measure sequence variation contributing to minor histocompatibility antigen differences between the two. A large number of nonsynonymous single nucleotide polymorphisms were identified in each of the nine unique donor-recipient pairs tested. This variation was greater in magnitude in unrelated donors as compared with matched related donors. Knowledge of the magnitude of exome variation between stem cell transplant recipients and donors may allow more accurate titration of immunosuppressive therapy following stem cell transplantation.Comment: 12 pages- main article, 29 pages total, 5 figures, 1 supplementary figur