Quality assessment of expert answers to lay questions about cystic fibrosis from various language zones in Europe: the ECORN-CF project

Background: The European Centres of Reference Network for Cystic Fibrosis (ECORN-CF) established an Internet forum which provides the opportunity for CF patients and other interested people to ask experts questions about CF in their mother language. The objectives of this study were to: 1. develop a detailed quality assessment tool to analyze quality of expert answers, 2. evaluate the intra- and inter-rater agreement of this tool, and 3. explore changes in the quality of expert answers over the time frame of the project. Methods: The quality assessment tool was developed by an expert panel. Five experts within the ECORN-CF project used the quality assessment tool to analyze the quality of 108 expert answers published on ECORN-CF from six language zones. 25 expert answers were scored at two time points, one year apart. Quality of answers was also assessed at an early and later period of the project. Individual rater scores and group mean scores were analyzed for each expert answer. Results: A scoring system and training manual were developed analyzing two quality categories of answers: content and formal quality. For content quality, the grades based on group mean scores for all raters showed substantial agreement between two time points, however this was not the case for the grades based on individual rater scores. For formal quality the grades based on group mean scores showed only slight agreement between two time points and there was also poor agreement between time points for the individual grades. The inter-rater agreement for content quality was fair (mean kappa value 0.232+/-0.036, p<0.001) while only slight agreement was observed for the grades of the formal quality (mean kappa value 0.105+/-0.024, p<0.001). The quality of expert answers was rated high (four language zones) or satisfactory (two language zones) and did not change over time. Conclusions: The quality assessment tool described in this study was feasible and reliable when content quality was assessed by a group of raters. Within ECORN-CF, the tool will help ensure that CF patients all over Europe have equal possibility of access to high quality expert advice on their illness

Perception of the Object or Seeing the Thing?

The thesis follows the development of the As-Structure as it is presented in Heidegger's Logic (GA 21) and shows that this abstract structure has been developed based on Brentano's Psychology 1 and Husserl's Logical Investigations. I describe how the As-Structure develops from the Brentano's distinction of physical and mental phenomena. The mental phenomena represent the basic sphere of our recognition, and the knowledge of the object as it is immanent to them. The object represents a stable counterpart to the course of experience (Objekt - Erlebnis relation). Therefore, only in the mental phenomena the object is being experienced just as it appears. This is the standpoint of Brentano, and it is adopted by Husserl who explicitly divides the structure of an intentional act into its constituents; the meant and the given. The object is accomplished when it is carried out by the intentional act. When the relation between the meant and the given is fully congruent, the given is given just as it is meant. Heidegger elaborates on this given as meant structure by transferring it outside the sphere of consciousness. He claims that the As-structure is the abstract constitutive element of the relation between the human (Dasein) and the thing; what is being encountered in the world is always given as something..

Humanity of Man. Topic of Mankind in Heidegger's Selected Texts from the 50's

Liberal Arts and Humanities - Philosophical ModuleStudium humanitní vzdělanosti - Filosofický modulFakulta humanitních studiíFaculty of Humanitie

Operation, operative or operational production management

The integration of determinant functions of value forming chain is solved by the subsystem of operational control of manufacturing. It is based on an operational plan, which represents the com- plex control instrument formed by the closely tied plans of sales, manufacturing and purchase. The system of operational plans has to be supplemented by the operational recording of manufactu- ring process, the actual methods of production control and the management of changes so that the operational control of manufacturing may fulfil the function of the complex instrument of the management that is capable to use all managerial principles and instruments in the basic sphere of value creation. Viewed from the standpoint of the relation marketing – production, by analogy production – purchasing or production – technical preparation of manufacturing (design and technology), the conception of the operational control of production constitutes the system basis that leads to solving latent and actual discrepancies between these functional spheres. The decisive section is the sub-system of planning. That concerns the systematically up-dated planning that ranges within the given dispositional conditions of a relatively short period. That is to say, in such basic spheres which participate directly in the generation of a final product and its assurance by supplier chain in relation to the external environment and inside a company. That means the operational planning of marketing (sales), operational planning of manufacturing and operational planning of purchasing. The standardization is the assumption of the integration and flexibility of planning and control, namely, the exertion of system of standards, normative specifications and restrictions. The system of operational control of production is linked up directly with the economic management of inter- plant departments. The operational control of production has also the own checking system