Predictors of Repeat Winery Visitation in North Carolina

Wine tourism is a relatively fledging industry with a range of important economic development issues. One issue is the identification of key drivers of repeat business, in this case, intention to pay a return visit to a winery or wine region. The purpose of this study is to identify specific factors that may influence wine tourists’ intentions to revisit a winery or wine region in North Carolina. Exhaustive CHAID decision tree analysis was used to identify statistically significant visitor characteristics influencing respondents’ intentions to revisit a winery or wine region in North Carolina. Customer service and the importance it has to the visitors was found to be the best predictor of their intention to revisit

AN ASSESSMENT OF PRE-PRIMARY SCHOOL PROGRAMME ACTIVITIES IN KWARA STATE, NIGERIA

In the current National Policy on Education (NPE, 2004) Pre-primary education or early childhood education has taken a centre stage as a process of educating young children in educational institutions prior to their entry into primary schools. This study thus assesses Preprimary schools programme activities across Kwara State, Nigeria. The objective is to determine the extent to which the programme on the ground has met with the stipulated policy statement as contained in the National Policy on Education. The study used a descriptive survey design and used researchers’ design questionnaire (design along likert-type) to collect its data. Using a simple random technique, the study sampled responses from 265 teachers (males and females) drawn from the three senatorial districts of Kwara State, Nigeria. It answered four (4) research questions. The findings revealed the jeopardy due to: the lack of government adherence to the objectives of the policy in respect of adequate funding, infrastructural development, material and non – material resources and standard curriculum guidelines as stipulated in the policy statement. It thus recommended that the Federal, State and Local governments should be more committed and proactive to contribute positively to the implementation and enforcement of the policy in Kwara State, Nigeria. The findings in this study would thus serve as a yardstick for success or otherwise of the policy statement as contained in the National Policy on Pre-primary education which would serve in facilitating actions toward improving Pre-primary education in Kwara State and in Nigeria in general

En-Gendering the Police: Women\u27s Police Stations and Feminism in São Paulo

This article contributes to feminist state theory and studies of women\u27s police stations in Latin America by examining the processes shaping the multiple and changing positions of explicit alliance, opposition, and ambiguous alliance assumed by policewomen regarding feminists since the creation of the world\u27s first women\u27s police station in 1985 in São Paulo. While studies of women\u27s police stations tend to overlook the political conjuncture, much of the literature on the state and gender explains the relationship between the state and women\u27s movements as a function of the political regime. I argue for a more grounded feminist state theory, taking into account interactive macro and micro, local and international forces. As this case study demonstrates, policewoman-feminist relations evolve due to interactions between the political conjuncture, the hegemonic masculinist police culture, developments in the feminist discourse on violence against women, and the impact of the contact policewomen sustain with women clients

The immunological advantage of owned cats over stray cats: a comparative study of perforin and granzymes gene expressions

Some cats live at home with their owners while others live unattended on the streets or in shelters. One might expect that the owned cats would be better prepared for diseases with vaccinations, and good care and feeding conditions whereas the stray cats would be prepared for diseases by constant exposure to microbial factors. However, no study has investigated which group has the stronger immune response against diseases. Cytotoxic T cells and NK cells are known to initiate an immune response that causes apoptosis of the affected cells when stimulated by various factors. This immune response occurs due to an influx of perforin and granzyme proteins into the affected cell. Accordingly, this study compared owned and stray cats in terms of perforin and granzymes gene expression. Blood samples were collected from 30 owned and 30 stray cats, whose health conditions were checked. The samples were analyzed by qPCR for perforin, and granzyme A and granzyme B gene expression. All genes were expressed at a higher level in owned cats, although only the granzyme A gene showed a significant difference (p<0.05). This indicates that this gene plays a more active and significant role in cats than perforin and granzyme B, and that owned cats have a stronger immune response to diseases than stray cats

A subset of patients with acquired partial lipodystrophy developing severe metabolic abnormalities

###EgeUn###Purpose/Aim of the study: Acquired partial lipodystrophy (APL) is a rare disease characterized by selective loss of adipose tissue. In this study, we aimed to present a subset of patients with APL, who developed severe metabolic abnormalities, from our national lipodystrophy registry. Materials and Methods: Severe metabolic abnormalities were defined as: poorly controlled diabetes (HbA1c above 7% despite treatment with insulin more than 1 unit/kg/day combined with oral antidiabetics), severe hypertriglyceridemia (triglycerides above 500 mg/dL despite treatment with lipid-lowering drugs), episodes of acute pancreatitis, or severe hepatic involvement (biopsy-proven non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH)). Results: Among 140 patients with all forms of lipodystrophy (28 with APL), we identified 6 APL patients with severe metabolic abnormalities. The geometric mean for age was 37 years (range: 27-50 years; 4 females and 2 males). Five patients had poorly controlled diabetes despite treatment with high-dose insulin combined with oral antidiabetics. Severe hypertriglyceridemia developed in five patients, of those three experienced episodes of acute pancreatitis. Although all six patients had hepatic steatosis at various levels on imaging studies, NASH was proven in two patients on liver biopsy. Our data suggested that APL patients with severe metabolic abnormalities had a more advanced fat loss and longer disease duration. Conclusions: We suggest that these patients represent a potential subgroup of APL who may benefit from metreleptin or investigational therapies as standard treatment strategies fail to achieve a good metabolic control