The Effect of an Educational Intervention on the Blood Culture Contamination Rate in Acutely Ill Adults

PURPOSE: The purpose of this project was to assess the knowledge of nurses that collect blood culture specimens at University of Louisville Hospital and to implement an educational intervention among those nurses. It was expected that the educational intervention implemented for this project would increase nurses’ knowledge regarding the proper technique for blood culture specimen collection and decrease in the rate of contaminated blood cultures. METHODS: This study included a prospective pre- and post-test of nursing knowledge followed by an educational intervention as well as a retrospective comparison of the pre- and post-education blood culture contamination rates. RESULTS: Of the 23 nurses that were eligible, 19 (82.6%) consented to participate in the educational intervention. The mean score of the pre-test was 9.7 and the mean score of the post-test was 13.5, indicating an increase in knowledge (p= \u3c .001). In the pre-education group the medical records of 70 patients over 110 admissions were reviewed from July 16, 2017 to October 18, 2017. In the post-education group the medical records of 91 patients over 123 admissions were reviewed from October 19, 2017 to January 18, 2018. The pre-education blood culture contamination rate was 1.9% and the post-education contamination rate was 0.4% (p=.312). CONCLUSION: A simple and inexpensive educational intervention can increase the knowledge among nurses that collect blood culture specimens. While the reduction in the contamination rate is not statistically significant, it is clinically significant with a cost avoidance of approximately $11,200 over the three month post-education period. The results of the pre- and post-test could be used to tailor future educational interventions and a retrospective analysis for a longer duration could include enough patients to yield statistically significant results

How the user views visual displays

Most designers are not schooled in the area of human-interaction psychology and therefore tend to rely on the traditional ergonomic aspects of human factors when designing complex human-interactive workstations. Unfortunately, by ignoring the importance of the integration of the user interface at the psychophysiological level, the result can be ineffective use of a system leading to an inherently error- and failure-prone system. Therefore, to minimize failures in a human-interactive system, it is essential that designers understand how each user`s processing characteristics affect how the user gathers and processes information. By understanding the significant processing characteristics of the user, designers can implement practical and effective visual displays (or any other type of system) that are more desirable to all users. The material presented in this paper is based on a general study that involved users` perspective views of how visual displays should be designed for effective use. The methodology used was Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), because of its applicability in expanding design choices from the users` ``model of the world.`` The findings of the study have provided a beginning in the development of user comfort parameters and visual displays

Designing visual displays and system models for safe reactor operations

The material presented in this paper is based on two studies involving the design of visual displays and the user`s prospective model of a system. The studies involve a methodology known as Neuro-Linguistic Programming and its use in expanding design choices from the operator`s perspective image. The contents of this paper focuses on the studies and how they are applicable to the safety of operating reactors

Impact of representational systems on color selections for graphic user interfaces

This paper is based on a study involving representational systems and color preference on graphic user interfaces (GUI). The study is an extension of a general exploratory experiment (GEE) conducted in October of 1993, wherein individuals` favored sensory representational systems (visual, auditory and kinesthetic) (FRS) were compared to their GUI comfort parameters. The results of the study show that an individual`s FRS is a significant factor in their acceptance of a GUI design, and that further in-depth study of the various display attributes to an individual`s FRS is required. This research is the first in the series of follow-up studies to be conducted regarding specific characteristics of GUI (i.e., fonts, character density, etc.) with respect to an individual`s FRS. The study focus on the attribute of color preferences for GUI design

’n Hermeneutiek vir Teologiese interpretasie van die Bybel: Metodologiese besinning

The publication of several series of theological commentaries since the year 2000 marked theentrance of the discipline Theological interpretation of the Bible on the hermeneutical front. Alack of well-developed methodological considerations, underlying the practice of Theologicalinterpretation of the Bible has, however, handicapped the theological interpretation of Bibletexts. It is the aim of this article to contribute to the development thereof. Three meta-hermeneutical aspects that make up the broad methodological foundation of Theologicalinterpretation of the Bible, namely metaphysics, epistemology and ethics are explored

Designing user models in a virtual cave environment

In this paper, the results of a first study into the use of virtual reality for human factor studies and design of simple and complex models of control systems, components, and processes are described. The objective was to design a model in a virtual environment that would reflect more characteristics of the user`s mental model of a system and fewer of the designer`s. The technology of a CAVE{trademark} virtual environment and the methodology of Neuro Linguistic Programming were employed in this study

Simulations of highway traffic with various degrees of automation

A traffic simulator to study highway traffic under various degrees of automation is being developed at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL). The key components of this simulator include a global and a local Expert Drive Mode, a human factor study and a graphical user interface. Further, an Autonomous Intelligent Cruise Control (AICC) which is based on a neural network controller is described and results for a typical driving scenario are given

Argonne simulation framework for intelligent transportation systems

A simulation framework has been developed which defines a high-level architecture for a large-scale, comprehensive, scalable simulation of an Intelligent Transportation System (ITS). The simulator is designed to run on parallel computers and distributed (networked) computer systems; however, a version for a stand alone workstation is also available. The ITS simulator includes an Expert Driver Model (EDM) of instrumented ``smart`` vehicles with in-vehicle navigation units. The EDM is capable of performing optimal route planning and communicating with Traffic Management Centers (TMC). A dynamic road map data base is sued for optimum route planning, where the data is updated periodically to reflect any changes in road or weather conditions. The TMC has probe vehicle tracking capabilities (display position and attributes of instrumented vehicles), and can provide 2-way interaction with traffic to provide advisories and link times. Both the in-vehicle navigation module and the TMC feature detailed graphical user interfaces that includes human-factors studies to support safety and operational research. Realistic modeling of variations of the posted driving speed are based on human factor studies that take into consideration weather, road conditions, driver`s personality and behavior and vehicle type. The simulator has been developed on a distributed system of networked UNIX computers, but is designed to run on ANL`s IBM SP-X parallel computer system for large scale problems. A novel feature of the developed simulator is that vehicles will be represented by autonomous computer processes, each with a behavior model which performs independent route selection and reacts to external traffic events much like real vehicles. Vehicle processes interact with each other and with ITS components by exchanging messages. With this approach, one will be able to take advantage of emerging massively parallel processor (MPP) systems

Wim J.C. Weren, studies in Matthew’s Gospel: Literary design, intertextuality, and social setting

This article summarises and comments on the book Studies in Matthew’s Gospel: Literary design, intertextuality, and social setting, by Wim Weren published during 2014. The essence of this book is all about meaning: the meaning of a structure, texts, and consequently the understanding of the Gospel of Matthew. For Weren, ‘Meaning is the result of the interplay between a textual unit and such other factors as language, literary context, and cultural setting’. This relates to the three parts of the content of this monograph. His approach in studying Matthew comes from three perspectives: firstly intratextuality, then intertextuality, and finally extratextuality. He has deliberately chosen this order of successive steps so that they complement each other.Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiolog

Reading the Bible in the 21st century: Some hermeneutical principles: Part 1

Many books and articles have been published over several decades on ‘biblical hermeneutics’ to capture the epistemology of biblical hermeneutics and the phenomenology of interpretation, communication and language in order to direct the Bible reader how to read the ancient texts, assembled in the Bible, sensibly. The first part of this essay looks briefly into the history of biblical hermeneutics of the past century in order to generate an orientation of how ‘biblical hermeneutics’ was regarded and applied as well as to constitute an environment for the investigation to follow in the rest of this essay and in a succeeding essay. In the second part of this essay, a few hermeneutical approaches are analysed in order to recommend a way forward for the dynamic analysis and interpretation (ἑρμηνεία) of biblical texts. This prepares the stage for the recommendation of two extra textures or aspects to be incorporated in the hermeneutical process, to be investigated in a succeeding essay.Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiolog