Prison makes us and them: the views of prison officers in Singapore working with young offenders

Purpose: The aim of this paper was explore the nature of the prison officer – youth offender relationship in Singapore Background: Given the evolution of theory and practice surrounding offender rehabilitation, external responsivity factors in the Risk, Need and Responsivity model of offender rehabilitation remain arguably less understood than offender risk and need. Youth offenders are viewed as a population requiring formal treatment provision, and the relationship between prison officer and youth offender has been viewed as one that can be harnessed for positive change. It is therefore important to understand how attitudes inform relational frameworks for prison officers working with youth offenders. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 13 prison officers and interview data were transcribed and analysed using thematic analysis. Findings & Conclusions: Analysis revealed two superordinate themes; Youth is a Shared Human Experience and Prison Makes Us and Them; and seven subthemes; Officers were Young Once, Young Offender is Human, Hope for the Young, Inmates are Inmates, A Relationship built on (Mis)trust, Para-families, and Officers Change too. Relationships were likened to that of a big brother and the themes described the paradox of forming supportive and empathic relationships with young offenders within the context of institutional roles and expectations of discipline and control. Findings have implications for a more targeted approach to the selection and training of officers who work with this unique offender group to maximise the responsiveness of young offenders to rehabilitation approaches in prison settings

Additive and Transcript-Specific Effects of KPAP1 and TbRND Activities on 3′ Non-Encoded Tail Characteristics and mRNA Stability in Trypanosoma brucei

Short, non-encoded oligo(A), oligo(U), or A/U tails can impact mRNA stability in kinetoplastid mitochondria. However, a comprehensive picture of the relative effects of these modifications in RNA stability is lacking. Furthermore, while the U-preferring exoribonuclease TbRND acts on U-tailed gRNAs, its role in decay of uridylated mRNAs has only been cursorily investigated. Here, we analyzed the roles of mRNA 3′ tail composition and TbRND in RNA decay using cells harbouring single or double knockdown of TbRND and the KPAP1 poly(A) polymerase. Analysis of mRNA abundance and tail composition reveals dramatic and transcript-specific effects of adenylation and uridylation on mitochondrial RNAs. Oligo(A) and A-rich tails can stabilize a proportion of edited and never-edited RNAs. However, non-tailed RNAs are not inherently unstable, implicating additional stability determinants and/or spatial segregation of sub-populations of a given RNA in regulation of RNA decay. Oligo(U) tails, which have been shown to contribute to decay of some never-edited RNAs, are not universally destabilizing. We also show that RNAs display very different susceptibility to uridylation in the absence of KPAP1, a factor that may contribute to regulation of decay. Finally, 3′ tail composition apparently impacts the ability of an RNA to be edited

Midlife suicide:A systematic review and meta-analysis of socioeconomic, psychiatric and physical health risk factors

Suicide is an increasing contributing cause of mortality in middle-aged adults; however, knowledge to guide prevention is limited. This first systematic review and meta-analysis of studies on midlife suicide has provided an overview of published research on this issue and synthesized the evidence on socioeconomic and physical and mental health factors associated with this mortality. Using PRISMA guidelines MEDLINE, Embase, PsycINFO, Scopus and Web of Science were searched for English-language publications that involved persons aged 35 to 65, used individual-level data, and reported prevalence of exposure(s) or relative risks. The search identified 62 studies on midlife suicides and associated factors (28 for SES, 22 for psychiatric disorder and 23 for physical illness). All studies were from high income countries, and most (80.6%) used data from population registries. Meta-analyses showed that the pooled prevalence of exposure in suicide decedents was 57.8% for psychiatric disorder, 56.3% for low income, 43.2% for unemployment, and 27.3% for physical illness. The associated pooled risk ratio was 11.68 (95% confidence intervals: 5.82–23.47) for psychiatric illness of any type, 12.59 (8.29–19.12) for mood disorders, 3.91 (2.72–5.59) for unemployment, 3.18 (2.72–3.72) for being separated or divorced, 2.64 (2.26–3.10) for cancer, 2.50 (0.96–6.38) for central nervous system illness, and 2.26 (1.16–4.41) for low income. In conclusion, midlife suicide is strongly associated with socioeconomic difficulties and physical and psychiatric illnesses that are common in this age population. Future investigations should consider the interactions between risk factors, the intersectionality of sex and ethnicity, and include data from low- and middle-income countries

Avoiding the road to nowhere: Policy insights on scaling up and sustaining digital health

The Principles for Digital Development, launched in 2017, outline 9 items to consider in designing digital health programs to mitigate predictable and preventable factors contributing to program failure (Principles for Digital Development 2020). These items include design with the user, understanding the existing ecosystem, scale design, building for sustainability, being data-driven, using open standards/data/source/ innovation, reuse, and improvement, addressing privacy and security, and being collaborative. This commentary has sought to be more specific than the broader principles and give a range of examples to provide a clearer path to action. As researchers and implementers, we draw on experiences of designing, implementing, and evaluating digital health solutions at a scale in several settings across Asia and Africa, while providing examples from India and South Africa to illustrate ten considerations to support the scale and sustainability of digital health solutions in LMICs. These can be categorized as (1) drivers of equity and unforeseen innovation; (2) foundations for a digital health ecosystem; and(3) elements for systems integration as detailed in Figur

北川民次とメキシコ版画--1920年代から30年代を中心に

Indicators of family care for development are essential for ascertaining whether families are providing their children with an environment that leads to positive developmental outcomes. This project aimed to develop indicators from a set of items, measuring family care practices and resources important for caregiving, for use in epidemiologic surveys in developing countries. A mixed method (quantitative and qualitative) design was used for item selection and evaluation. Qualitative and quantitative analyses were conducted to examine the validity of candidate items in several country samples. Qualitative methods included the use of global expert panels to identify and evaluate the performance of each candidate item as well as in-country focus groups to test the content validity of the items. The quantitative methods included analyses of item-response distributions, using bivariate techniques. The selected items measured two family care practices (support for learning/stimulating environment and limit-setting techniques) and caregiving resources (adequacy of the alternate caregiver when the mother worked). Six play-activity items, indicative of support for learning/stimulating environment, were included in the core module of UNICEF’s Multiple Cluster Indictor Survey 3. The other items were included in optional modules. This project provided, for the first time, a globally-relevant set of items for assessing family care practices and resources in epidemiological surveys. These items have multiple uses, including national monitoring and cross-country comparisons of the status of family care for development used globally. The obtained information will reinforce attention to efforts to improve the support for development of children

Indicators of Family Care for Development for Use in Multicountry Surveys

Indicators of family care for development are essential for ascertaining whether families are providing their children with an environment that leads to positive developmental outcomes. This project aimed to develop indicators from a set of items, measuring family care practices and resources important for caregiving, for use in epidemiologic surveys in developing countries. A mixed method (quantitative and qualitative) design was used for item selection and evaluation. Qualitative and quantitative analyses were conducted to examine the validity of candidate items in several country samples. Qualitative methods included the use of global expert panels to identify and evaluate the performance of each candidate item as well as in-country focus groups to test the content validity of the items. The quantitative methods included analyses of item-response distributions, using bivariate techniques. The selected items measured two family care practices (support for learning/stimulating environment and limit-setting techniques) and caregiving resources (adequacy of the alternate caregiver when the mother worked). Six play-activity items, indicative of support for learning/stimulating environment, were included in the core module of UNICEF\u2019s Multiple Cluster Indictor Survey 3. The other items were included in optional modules. This project provided, for the first time, a globally-relevant set of items for assessing family care practices and resources in epidemiological surveys. These items have multiple uses, including national monitoring and cross-country comparisons of the status of family care for development used globally. The obtained information will reinforce attention to efforts to improve the support for development of children

Avoiding the Road to Nowhere: Policy Insights on Scaling up and Sustaining Digital Health.

Digital health solutions offer tremendous potential to enhance the reach and quality of health services and population-level outcomes in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). While the number of programs reaching scale increases yearly, the long-term sustainability for most remains uncertain. In this article, as researchers and implementors, we draw on experiences of designing, implementing and evaluating digital health solutions at scale in Africa and Asia, and provide examples from India and South Africa to illustrate ten considerations to support scale and sustainability of digital health solutions in LMICs. Given the investments being made in digital health solutions and the urgent concurrent needs to strengthen health systems to ensure their responsiveness to marginalized populations in LMICs, we cannot afford to go down roads that 'lead to nowhere'. These ten considerations focus on drivers of equity and innovation, the foundations for a digital health ecosystem, and the elements for systems integration. We urge technology enthusiasts to consider these issues before and during the roll-out of large-scale digital health initiatives to navigate the complexities of achieving scale and enabling sustainability

Diet Complexity and Estrogen Receptor β Status Affect the Composition of the Murine Intestinal Microbiota

ABSTRACT Intestinal microbial dysbiosis contributes to the dysmetabolism of luminal factors, including steroid hormones (sterones) that affect the development of chronic gastrointestinal inflammation and the incidence of sterone-responsive cancers of the breast, prostate, and colon. Little is known, however, about the role of specific host sterone nucleoreceptors, including estrogen receptor β (ERβ), in microbiota maintenance. Herein, we test the hypothesis that ERβ status affects microbiota composition and determine if such compositionally distinct microbiota respond differently to changes in diet complexity that favor Proteobacteria enrichment. To this end, conventionally raised female ERβ +/+ and ERβ −/− C57BL/6J mice (mean age of 27 weeks) were initially reared on 8604, a complex diet containing estrogenic isoflavones, and then fed AIN-76, an isoflavone-free semisynthetic diet, for 2 weeks. 16S rRNA gene surveys revealed that the fecal microbiota of 8604-fed mice and AIN-76-fed mice differed, as expected. The relative diversity of Proteobacteria , especially the Alphaproteobacteria and Gammaproteobacteria , increased significantly following the transition to AIN-76. Distinct patterns for beneficial Lactobacillales were exclusive to and highly abundant among 8604-fed mice, whereas several Proteobacteria were exclusive to AIN-76-fed mice. Interestingly, representative orders of the phyla Proteobacteria , Bacteroidetes , and Firmicutes , including the Lactobacillales , also differed as a function of murine ERβ status. Overall, these interactions suggest that sterone nucleoreceptor status and diet complexity may play important roles in microbiota maintenance. Furthermore, we envision that this model for gastrointestinal dysbiosis may be used to identify novel probiotics, prebiotics, nutritional strategies, and pharmaceuticals for the prevention and resolution of Proteobacteria -rich dysbiosis

Multiple RSV strains infecting HEp-2 and A549 cells reveal cell line-dependent differences in resistance to RSV infection

Background: Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is the major viral driver of a global pediatric respiratory disease burden disproportionately borne by the poor1. Thus, RSV, like SARS-CoV-2, combines with congenital and environmental and host-history-dependent factors to create a spectrum of disease with greatest severity most frequently occurring in those least able to procure treatment. Methods: Here we apply whole genome sequencing and a suite of other molecular biological techniques to survey host-virus dynamics in infections of two distinct cell lines (HEp2 and A549) with four strains representative of known RSV genetic diversity. Results: We observed non-gradient patterns of RSV gene expression and a single major difference in transcriptional readthrough correlating with a deep split in the RSV phylogenetic tree. We also observed increased viral replication in HEp2 cells along with a pro-inflammatory host-response; and decreased viral replication in A549 cells with a more potent antiviral response in host gene expression and levels of secreted cytokines. Conclusions: Our findings suggest HEp2 and A549 cell lines can be used as complementary models of host response leading to more or less severe RSV disease. In vitro perturbations inspired by actual environmental and host-history-dependent factors associated with greater disease can be tested for their ability to shift the antiviral response of A549 cells to the more pro-inflammatory response of HEp2 cells. Such studies would help illuminate the tragic costs of poverty and suggest public health-level interventions to reduce the global disease burden from RSV and other respiratory viruses

Symptom dimensions of the psychotic symptom rating scales in psychosis: a multisite study

The Psychotic Symptom Rating Scales (PSYRATS) is an instrument designed to quantify the severity of delusions and hallucinations and is typically used in research studies and clinical settings focusing on people with psychosis and schizophrenia. It is comprised of the auditory hallucinations (AHS) and delusions subscales (DS), but these subscales do not necessarily reflect the psychological constructs causing intercorrelation between clusters of scale items. Identification of these constructs is important in some clinical and research contexts because item clustering may be caused by underlying etiological processes of interest. Previous attempts to identify these constructs have produced conflicting results. In this study, we compiled PSYRATS data from 12 sites in 7 countries, comprising 711 participants for AHS and 520 for DS. We compared previously proposed and novel models of underlying constructs using structural equation modeling. For the AHS, a novel 4-dimensional model provided the best fit, with latent variables labeled Distress (negative content, distress, and control), Frequency (frequency, duration, and disruption), Attribution (location and origin of voices), and Loudness (loudness item only). For the DS, a 2-dimensional solution was confirmed, with latent variables labeled Distress (amount/intensity) and Frequency (preoccupation, conviction, and disruption). The within-AHS and within-DS dimension intercorrelations were higher than those between subscales, with the exception of the AHS and DS Distress dimensions, which produced a correlation that approached the range of the within-scale correlations. Recommendations are provided for integrating these underlying constructs into research and clinical applications of the PSYRATS