Popular with the Robots: Accusation and Automation in the Argentine Presidential Elections, 2015

Accusations of dishonourable campaigning have featured in every Argentine presidential election since the return to democracy in 1983. Yet, allegations made in the elections this October and November looked different from earlier ones. The campaign team for the centre-leftist candidate Daniel Scioli argued that Cambiemos, the centre-right coalition led by Mauricio Macri, was abusing the political affordances of social media by running a Twitter campaign via ‘50,000’ fake accounts. This paper presents evidence suggesting that both teams promoted their campaigns through automation on Twitter. Although the Macri campaign was subtler, both teams appear to have used automation to the same end: maximizing the diffusion of party content and creating an inflated image of their popularity. Neither team attempted to muffle or engage with opposing voices through automation. We argue that in a political culture fixated on the appearance of popularity, the use of automation to simulate mass support appears an organic development as campaigning enters the still unregulated Twittersphere. We compare our findings to the uses of automation in the Russian Twittersphere and conclude that there may be greater variation in the political usage of Twitter between political contexts than between different types of political event occurring in the same country.This study was funded by the Leverhulme Trust (grant number RP2012-C-017).This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10767-016-9233-

Sparking debate? Political deaths and Twitter discourses in Argentina and Russia

The big question that pervades debate between techno-optimists and their detractors is whether social media are good for democracy. Do they help to produce or accelerate democratic change or, alternatively, might they hinder it? This article foregrounds an alternative perspective, arguing that individual social networking applications likely do not fulfil a single political function across national contexts. Their functionality may be mediated instead by language and by pre-existing relationships between the state and offline domestic media. We arrive at this conclusion through examining reactions on Twitter to two fatal events that occurred in early 2015: the death in suspicious and politically charged circumstances of the special prosecutor Alberto Nisman in Argentina, and the murder in Russia of opposition activist Boris Nemtsov. Several similarities between the two deaths facilitate a comparative analysis of the discourses around them in the Spanish-language and Russian-language Twitter spheres respectively. In Russia, a hostile social media environment polluted by high levels of automated content and other spam reduced the utility of Twitter for opposition voices working against an increasingly authoritarian state. In Argentina, a third-wave democracy, Twitter discourses appeared as predominantly coextensive with other pro-government and opposition online, print, and broadcast fora, thus consolidating and amplifying a highly polarized and repetitive wider public political conversation. Despite the potential for social media to help citizens circumvent restrictions to discursive participation in national public spheres, in both cases compared here language environment and domestic political structures contribute significantly to determining the uses and limitations of online spaces for expressing opinion on current affairs stories involving the state.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Taylor & Francis via http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2016.114080

Temporal Patterns of Medications Dispensed to Children and Adolescents in a National Insured Population

This study aimed to comprehensively describe prevalence and temporal dispensing patterns for medications prescribed to children and adolescents in the United States. Participants were 1.6 million children (49% female) under 18 years old enrolled in a nation-wide, employer-provided insurance plan. All medication claims from 1999–2006 were reviewed retrospectively. Drugs were assigned to 16 broad therapeutic categories. Effects of trend over time, seasonality, age and gender on overall and within category prevalence were examined. Results: Mean monthly prevalence for dispensed medications was 23.5% (range 19.4–27.5), with highest rates in winter and lowest in July. The age group with the highest prevalence was one-year-old children. On average each month, 17.1% of all children were dispensed a single drug and 6.4% were dispensed two or more. Over time, prevalence for two or more drugs did not change, but the proportion of children dispensed a single drug decreased (slope -.02%, p = .001). Overall, boys had higher monthly rates than girls (average difference 0.9%, p = .002). However, differences by gender were greatest during middle childhood, especially for respiratory and central nervous system agents. Contraceptives accounted for a large proportion of dispensed medication to older teenage girls. Rates for the drugs with the highest prevalence in this study were moderately correlated (average Pearson r.66) with those from a previously published national survey. Conclusion: On average, nearly one quarter of a population of insured children in the United States was dispensed medication each month. This rate decreased somewhat over time, primarily because proportionally fewer children were dispensed a single medication. The rate for two or more drugs dispensed simultaneously remained steady

Employment Is Associated with the Health-Related Quality of Life of Morbidly Obese Persons

Published version of an article in the journal: Obesity Surgery. The original publication is available at Springerlink. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11695-010-0289-6. Open AccessBackground  We aimed to investigate whether employment status was associated with health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in a population of morbidly obese subjects. Methods  A total of 143 treatment-seeking morbidly obese patients completed the Medical Outcome Study 36-Item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) and the Obesity and Weight-Loss Quality of Life (OWLQOL) questionnaires. The former (SF-36) is a generic measure of physical and mental health status and the latter (OWLQOL) an obesity-specific measure of emotional status. Multiple linear regression analyses included various measures of the HRQoL as dependent variables and employment status, education, marital status, gender, age, body mass index (BMI), type 2 diabetes, hypertension, obstructive sleep apnea, and treatment choice as independent variables. Results  The patients (74% women, 56% employed) had a mean (SD, range) age of 44 (11, 19–66) years and a mean BMI of 44.3 (5.4) kg/m2. The employed patients reported significantly higher HRQoL scores within all eight subscales of SF-36, while the OWLQOL scores were comparable between the two groups. Multiple linear regression confirmed that employment was a strong independent predictor of HRQoL according to the SF-36. Based on part correlation coefficients, employment explained 16% of the variation in the physical and 9% in the mental component summaries of SF-36, while gender explained 22% of the variation in the OWLQOL scores. Conclusion  Employment is associated with the physical and mental HRQoL of morbidly obese subjects, but is not associated with the emotional aspects of quality of life

Comparison of methods for the detection of biofilm production in coagulase-negative staphylococci

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The ability of biofilm formation seems to play an essential role in the virulence of coagulase-negative staphylococci (CNS). The most clearly characterized component of staphylococcal biofilms is the polysaccharide intercellular adhesin (PIA) encoded by the <it>icaADBC </it>operon. Biofilm production was studied in 80 coagulase-negative staphylococci (CNS) strains isolated from clinical specimens of newborns with infection hospitalized at the Neonatal Unit of the University Hospital, Faculty of Medicine of Botucatu, and in 20 isolates obtained from the nares of healthy individuals without signs of infection. The objective was to compare three phenotypic methods with the detection of the <it>icaA</it>, <it>icaD </it>and <it>icaC </it>genes by PCR.</p> <p>Findings</p> <p>Among the 100 CNS isolates studied, 82% tested positive by PCR, 82% by the tube test, 81% by the TCP assay, and 73% by the CRA method. Using PCR as a reference, the tube test showed the best correlation with detection of the <it>ica </it>genes, presenting high sensitivity and specificity.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The tube adherence test can be indicated for the routine detection of biofilm production in CNS because of its easy application and low cost and because it guarantees reliable results with excellent sensitivity and specificity.</p

Center Size and Glycemic Control: An International Study With 504 Centers From Seven Countries

The variance in glycemic control between different childhood diabetes centers is not fully understood. Although the International Society for Pediatric and Adolescent Diabetes guidelines from 2014 recommended center sizes of more than 150 patients (1), it has not been thoroughly investigated whether glycemic control is associated with center size (2–4). We have data from more than 500 childhood diabetes centers from seven different countries and thereby a unique opportunity to elaborate further on this association. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the relationship between center size and glycemic control in children with type 1 diabetes (T1D). Patient data have been described previously (5). Briefly, the population comprised children with T1D in the age-group 3 months from seven high-income countries during 2013–2014: Austria, Denmark, England, Germany, Norway, Sweden, and Wales. Data were anonymized and obtained from five national registries/audits on children with T1D (Austria and Germany use the same electronic health record and England and Wales have a common National Paediatric Diabetes Audit, while Denmark, Norway, and Sweden have national registries). Mean HbA1c was compared between groups after adjusting for sex, age (<6 years, 6 to <12 years, and 12–18 years), duration of diabetes (<2 years, 2 to <5 years, and ≥5 years), and minority status (yes/no) (HbA1c adj) before and after stratifying for treatment modality (insulin injection/pump). Center size was defined as the number of patients with diabetes reported to be cared for in a center. Center size groupings were 1) <20, 2) 20 to <50, 3) 50 to <100, 4) 100 to <200, and 5) ≥200 patients. In total 54,494 children (48% females) with T1D across 504 centers in seven countries were included in the study. The number of centers per country varied between 14 (Wales) and 219 (Germany). Mean (SD) for age was 12.5 (3.9) years, mean age at T1D onset was 7.5 (4.0) years, and mean T1D duration was 5.0 (3.7) years. A total of 21% of patients had minority status, which varied between 5% (Wales) and 28% (Austria). A total of 38.1% of patients were on pump treatment, and the percentage varied between 25% (England) and 69% (Denmark). National coverage of T1D patients was >95% in all countries, apart from Austria, which had ∼80% data coverage. Included patients had 100% data coverage for all of the following variables: sex, age, diabetes duration, minority status, and HbA1c. Data on treatment modality were not available for 2,428 patients (4.5%); of these, 2,130 were from England and 154 were from Sweden. A total of 23.2% of centers had 200 patients, representing 12.3% of all centers. The distribution of small and large centers in the seven countries varied. England and Sweden had few small centers (34%). HbA1c adj was significantly higher in the centers with 50 patients, in both pen users (P 50 patients managed equally well; therefore, centralizing to very-high-volume diabetes centers may not necessarily be an advantage. Future research should focus on identifying reasons leading to differences in glycemic control in T1D patients cared for in small and large centers, e.g., the lack or presence of an updated multidisciplinary diabetes team

Pilot study evaluating a brief mindfulness intervention for those with chronic pain: study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: The burden of chronic pain is a major challenge, impacting the quality of life of patients. Intensive programmes of mindfulness-based therapy can help patients to cope with chronic pain but can be time consuming and require a trained specialist to implement. The self-management model of care is now integral to the care of patients with chronic pain; home-based interventions can be very acceptable, making a compelling argument for investigating brief, self-management interventions. The aim of this study is two-fold: to assess the immediate effects of a brief self-help mindfulness intervention for coping with chronic pain and to assess the feasibility of conducting a definitive randomized controlled trial to determine the effectiveness of such an intervention. METHODS/DESIGN: A randomized controlled pilot study will be conducted to evaluate a brief mindfulness intervention for those with chronic pain. Ninety chronic pain patients who attend hospital outpatient clinics will be recruited and allocated randomly to either the control or treatment group on a 1:1 basis using the computer-generated list of random numbers. The treatment group receives mindfulness audios and the control group receives audios of readings from a non-fiction book, all of which are 15 minutes in length. Immediate effects of the intervention are assessed with brief psychological measures immediately before and after audio use. Mindfulness, mood, health-related quality of life, pain catastrophizing and experience of the intervention are assessed with standardized measures, brief ratings and brief telephone follow-ups, at baseline and after one week and one month. Feasibility is assessed by estimation of effect sizes for outcomes, patient adherence and experience, and appraisal of resource allocation in provision of the intervention. DISCUSSION: This trial will assess whether a brief mindfulness-based intervention is effective for immediately reducing perceived distress and pain with the side effect of increasing relaxation in chronic pain patients and will determine the feasibility of conducting a definitive randomized controlled trial. Patient recruitment began in January 2015 and is due to be completed in June 2016. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN61538090 Registered 20 April 2015