User evaluation outside the lab: the trial of Físchlár-News

A user study of Físchlár-News system was conducted in Spring 2004 with 16 users, each user using the system for a 1-month period. Físchlár-News is an experimental online news archive that incorporates various automatic content-based video indexing techniques and a news story recommender algorithm to process and index the daily 9 o’clock broadcast news from TV and allows its users to browse, search, be recommended, and play news stories on a conventional web browser. Pre and post-trial questionnaires, interaction logging and incident diary methods collected both qualitative and quantitative usage data during the trial period. While the details of the findings from this evaluation is reported elsewhere, in this paper we report the details of the methodology taken and our experience of conducting this evaluation

Interventions for the eradication of meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) in people with cystic fibrosis

Background: Cystic fibrosis is an inherited recessive disorder of chloride transport that is characterised by recurrent and persistent pulmonary infections from resistant organisms that result in lung function deterioration and early mortality in sufferers. Meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has emerged as, not only an important infection in long-term hospitalised patients, but also as a potentially harmful pathogen in cystic fibrosis, and has been increasing steadily in prevalence internationally. Chronic pulmonary infection with MRSA is thought to confer cystic fibrosis patients with a worse overall clinical outcome and, in particular, result in an increased rate of decline in lung function. Clear guidance for the eradication of MRSA in cystic fibrosis, supported by robust evidence from good quality trials, is urgently needed. Objectives: To evaluate the effectiveness of treatment regimens designed to eradicate MRSA and to determine whether the eradication of MRSA confers better clinical and microbiological outcomes for people with cystic fibrosis. Search methods: Randomised and quasi-randomised controlled trials were identified by searching the Cochrane Cystic Fibrosis and Genetic Disorders Group’s Cystic Fibrosis Trials Register, PUBMED, MEDLINE, Embase, handsearching article reference lists and through contact with local and international experts in the field. Date of the last search of the Group’s Cystic Fibrosis Trials Register: 04 September 2014. Selection criteria: Randomised or quasi-randomised controlled trials comparing any combinations of topical, inhaled, oral or intravenous antimicrobials with the primary aim of eradicating MRSA compared with placebo, standard treatment or no treatment

A systematic review of the use of Cochrane reviews in clinical guidelines, for lower respiratory disease, in children in the United Kingdom: analysis plan part 2

This is part 2 of a document giving the search strategy and statistical analysis plan for the following study. "A systematic review of the use of Cochrane reviews in clinical guidelines, for lower respiratory disease, in children in the United Kingdom"

Use of the Físchlár video library system

Físchlár is a shared video retrieval system that lets users record, browse and watch television programmes using their web browser. In Físchlár, the programmes users can watch and record are organised by channel, by theme and by personal recommendation as provided by the ChangingWorlds’ ClixSmart personalisation engine. Our initial results from user trials illustrate the usage of each of these features

Once-daily versus multiple-daily dosing with intravenous aminoglycosides for cystic fibrosis

Background: People with cystic fibrosis, who are chronically colonised with the organism Pseudomonas aeruginosa, often require multiple courses of intravenous aminoglycoside antibiotics for the management of pulmonary exacerbations. The properties of aminoglycosides suggest that they could be given in higher doses less often. Objectives: To assess the effectiveness and safety of once-daily versus multiple-daily dosing of intravenous aminoglycoside antibiotics for the management of pulmonary exacerbations in cystic fibrosis. Search methods: We searched the Cystic Fibrosis Specialist Register held at the Cochrane Cystic Fibrosis and Genetic Disorders Group’s editorial base, comprising references identified from comprehensive electronic database searches, handsearching relevant journals and handsearching abstract books of conference proceedings. Date of the most recent search: 25 November 2013. Selection criteria: All randomised controlled trials, whether published or unpublished, in which once-daily dosing of aminoglycosides has been compared with multiple-daily dosing in terms of efficacy or toxicity or both, in people with cystic fibrosis. Data collection and analysis: The two authors independently selected the studies to be included in the review and assessed the risk of bias of each study. Data were independently extracted by each author. Authors of the included studies were contacted for further information. As yet unpublished data were obtained for one of the included studies. Main results: Fifteen studies were identified for possible inclusion in the review. Four studies reporting results from a total of 328 participants were included in this review. All studies compared once-daily dosing with thrice-daily dosing. One study had a low risk of bias for all criteria assessed; the remaining three included studies had a high risk of bias from blinding, but for other criteria were judged to have either an unclear or a low risk of bias. There was no significant difference between treatment groups in: forced expiratory volume at one second, mean difference 0.33 (95% confidence interval -2.81 to 3.48); forced vital capacity, mean difference 0.29 (95% confidence interval -6.58 to 7.16); % weight for height, mean difference -0.82 (95% confidence interval -3.77 to 2.13); body mass index, mean difference 0.00 (95% confidence interval -0.42 to 0.42); or in the incidence of ototoxicity, relative risk 0.56 (95% confidence interval 0.04 to 7.96). The percentage change in creatinine significantly favoured once-daily treatment in children, mean difference -8.20 (95% confidence interval -15.32 to -1.08), but showed no difference in adults, mean difference 3.25 (95% confidence interval -1.82 to 8.33). Authors’ conclusions: Once- and three-times daily aminoglycoside antibiotics appear to be equally effective in the treatment of pulmonary exacerbations of cystic fibrosis. There is evidence of less nephrotoxicity in children

Cystic fibrosis microbiology: advances in antimicrobial therapy

Much of the improvement in the survival of individuals with cystic fibrosis (CF) is due to advancements in antimicrobial treatments. New aerosolized antibiotic formulations have recently been introduced (such as inhaled aztreonam), and others are in development (inhaled levofloxacin and liposomal amikacin). Licensed dry powder formulations include tobramycin inhalation powder and dry powder colistimethate (available in Europe). Although inhaled antibiotics have the advantage of being able to deliver high intrapulmonary concentrations of drug, antimicrobial resistance can still develop and is a concern in CF. Antimicrobial resistance might be mitigated by using non-antibiotic treatments, antibiotic adjuvants, which have activity against bacteria. Examples include agents such as gallium, antimicrobial peptides and anti-biofilm compounds such as alginate oligosaccharides (OligoG) and garlic. Vaccination strategies and antibody therapy (IgY) against Pseudomonas aeruginosa have also been attempted to prevent initial infection with this organism in CF. Although aggressive and long-term use of antibiotics has been crucial in slowing lung function decline and improving survival in people with CF, it has added a significant burden of care and associated toxicities in these individuals. Careful surveillance and the use of preventative strategies for antibiotic related toxicity (such as nephrotoxicity and ototoxicity) are essential. Continued development of effective antimicrobial agents that can function in the conditions encountered in the CF lung, such as against bacterial biofilm growth and under anaerobic conditions, is needed

Classifying public display systems: an input/output channel perspective

Public display screens are relatively recent additions to our world, and while they may be as simple as a large screen with minimal input/output features, more recent developments have introduced much richer interaction possibilities supporting a variety of interaction styles. In this paper we propose a framework for classifying public display systems with a view to better understanding how they differ in terms of their interaction channels and how future installations are likely to evolve. This framework is explored through 15 existing public display systems which use mobile phones for interaction in the display space

Improving the quality of the personalized electronic program guide

As Digital TV subscribers are offered more and more channels, it is becoming increasingly difficult for them to locate the right programme information at the right time. The personalized Electronic Programme Guide (pEPG) is one solution to this problem; it leverages artificial intelligence and user profiling techniques to learn about the viewing preferences of individual users in order to compile personalized viewing guides that fit their individual preferences. Very often the limited availability of profiling information is a key limiting factor in such personalized recommender systems. For example, it is well known that collaborative filtering approaches suffer significantly from the sparsity problem, which exists because the expected item-overlap between profiles is usually very low. In this article we address the sparsity problem in the Digital TV domain. We propose the use of data mining techniques as a way of supplementing meagre ratings-based profile knowledge with additional item-similarity knowledge that can be automatically discovered by mining user profiles. We argue that this new similarity knowledge can significantly enhance the performance of a recommender system in even the sparsest of profile spaces. Moreover, we provide an extensive evaluation of our approach using two large-scale, state-of-the-art online systems—PTVPlus, a personalized TV listings portal and Físchlár, an online digital video library system