86 research outputs found
Challenging Global Advocacy of Biomedical Institution-Based Birth in Nepal: A Review with Reference to Nepal and South Asia
Based on findings from public health, demographic, and anthropological research, this review discusses biomedical institution-based birth in Nepal, in the process asserting that better understanding of maternal health determinants requires biomedical strategies be balanced with greater attention to local social realities and approaches. The paper begins with a summary of evolving international maternal health policies and their manifestations in Nepal, then discusses how recent public health research there indicates existing community support structures, including womenâs groups, to have had demonstrably positive impacts on maternal health. The subject of womenâs reproductive agency is subsequently considered. While public health and development-based research often equates this to womenâs decision-making ability, I draw here upon anthropological examples from the broader South Asian context to reveal a more nuanced appreciation of agency, illuminating the many shifting forces influencing womenâs use of available maternal health resources. A case study based on a short piece of ethnographic research I carried out in Nepal in 2011 follows. Findings from this provide further evidence of the significance and positive effects of community networks and groups in maternal health outcomes; they also reflect aspects of the foregoing discussion of agency. Overall, the case made here is that an important and growing body of research exists, which challenges dominant views within international public healthâand actively promoted by the Nepali stateâthat biomedically-managed, institution-based births are the most effective means to reduce maternal mortality. Thus suggest further research, that incorporates ethnographic explorations of Nepali womenâs agency in maternal health matters (including impact upon birth outcomes) is needed if more appropriate pregnancy and childbirth-related measures are to be enacted going forwards
Necessity Is the Mother of Invention: How Minimum Wages Affect Innovation
This master's thesis investigates the impact of minimum wages on innovation in the United States. I construct a panel dataset with minimum wages and patent production across US states between 1983 and 2015. My estimates are based on a difference-in-differences approach that exploits the different timing of minimum wage raises across US states and the fact that federal minimum wage is not inflation adjusted. Two-way fixed-effects' estimates suggest that a 1 USD increase in the minimum wage is associated with approximately a 9 percent increase in patent production. Accounting for heterogeneous treatment effects suggests that this effect is potentially larger. Altogether, my results provide support for the Habakkuk thesis that labor scarcity encourages technological innovation. It also provides insights into recent debates surrounding the causes of automation as well as calls for the minimum wage to be raised in the United States.MasteroppgĂ„veECON391PROF-SĂKMASV-SĂ
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Consuming Expectations : an exploration of foodways in relation to health and maternity among Nepalis living in Norway.
This thesis was submitted for the award of Doctor of Philosophy and was awarded by Brunel University LondonThis thesis focuses on Nepalis living in Oslo and Ă
s, Norway, and ethnographically explores
their food perceptions, habits and practices in relation to health and maternal health. With pre-existing
experience of both biomedical and other understandings of health and wellbeing, the
majority of my respondents could and did move between paradigms, on an individual basis
deciding which to apply and when. Consequently, several demonstrated certain reasoned
divergences from Norwegian state-endorsed dietary norms and expectations; differences that
were, however, not simply reducible to âcultureâ. âCultureâ is shown here to be a favoured
strategy of explanation within Norwegian public health research, which has dominated state
health perceptions of all South Asians.
Overall, four key arguments are advanced. Firstly, the need to disaggregate the category of
âSouth Asianâ, currently readily employed within public health research and policies worldwide
to describe and problematise the foodways of highly diverse diaspora populations. The middle-class
status of my Nepali respondents is delineated as a central example exposing the inaccuracy
of such a homogenising generalisation. Secondly, that despite the hegemony of biomedical
models of nutrition within health and ante-/postnatal wellbeing in Norway, my interlocutors
moved between these and other ideas and practices of health and wellbeing. Describing their
dietary habits and practices makes plain the narrowness of applying purely biomedically-predicated
thinking to understanding these Nepalisâ foodways. Thirdly, that in ante-/postnatal
care the biomedical model overprivileges the individual motherâs responsibility for her own
health in order to benefit her child, ignoring the potential for alternative distributions of
responsibility for, as well as emphasis on, both offspring and mother: the Nepalis I encountered
showed a notable commitment to the motherâs wellbeing and also sense of pregnancy and
postnatal care as a collective enterprise, relationally shaped. Fourthly, my Nepali respondentsâ
accounts provide a useful example demonstrating limitations to the perceived authority of
Norwegian state advice on health in general. Well-informed and often highly educated, these
Nepalis engaged only selectively with the state-endorsed guidance and services, instead drawing
on other (re)sources â Nepali family and friends especially â to maintain health and wellbeing
à bli levertransplantert grunnet kolorektalcancer : Pasientopplevelser ved levertransplantasjon pÄ grunn av levermetastaser etter kolorektalcancer
FormĂ„l: Ă
beskrive unike pasientopplevelser hos pasienter som har gjennomgÄtt levertransplantasjon grunnet levermetastaser etter kolorektalcancer.
Teoretisk forankring: Begrepsdefinisjon med aktuell teori og forskning rundt begrepene livskvalitet og hÄp.
Metode: Utforskende og beskrivende studie med dybdeintervju av informanter 6 mÄneder etter transplantasjonen. Totalt 9 intervjuer ble gjennomfÞrt. Datamaterialet ble transkribert verbatim kort tid etter at intervjuene fant sted. For analysen ble det brukt kvalitativ innholdsanalyse slik den beskrives av Kvale (1997).
Resultater: Median alder pÄ pasientene var 56 Är. Totalt 10 pasienter ble inkludert, hvorav 9 intervjuer ble gjennomfÞrt. En informant dÞde ved intervjutidspunktet grunnet spredning av kreftsykdom. Tre temaer fremkom gjennom analyseprosessen: Livet i gave pÄ nytt, Ä leve mellom hÄp og fortvilelse og tilbake til hverdagen. FÞrste temaet tar for seg gleden og takknemligheten respondentene fÞlte etter Ä ha fÄtt mulighet til Ä gÄ gjennom behandling som kunne forlenge deres liv. Det Ä fÄ behandling i en sÄ alvorlig situasjon resulterte blant annet i at de fikk et nytt perspektiv pÄ livet. Det andre temaet beskriver utfordringen respondentene opplevde i forhold til det Ä leve i et skifte mellom hÄp og fortvilelse. Det siste temaet omhandler respondentenes Þnske om Ä leve hverdagen som de tidligere hadde gjort. Det omhandler deres fysiske form, eventuelle bivirkninger av medisiner og deres forhold til sine nÊrmeste.
Konklusjon: Studien indikerer at de pasienter som blir levertransplantert grunnet kolorektalcancer og levermetastaser opplevde dette som en god erfaring. Pasientene opplevde Ä leve et godt liv etter transplantasjonen. Sjansen for et forlenget liv ble sett pÄ som mer betydningsfullt enn risikoen knyttet til transplantasjonen og bivirkninger grunnet medisinering
Opinions on dental erosive lesions, knowledge of diagnosis, and treatment strategies among Norwegian dentists: a questionnaire survey
This study aimed to investigate dentists' general experience, knowledge about diagnosis, and treatment of dental erosive wear in young adults. A questionnaire was sent to 1262 Norwegian public dental health-employed dentists. The response rate was 60%. Results indicated that most dentists recorded erosive wear, half of them used a specific scoring system, and half registered lesions at the tooth surface level. Lesions were reported most often on palatal surfaces of upper anterior teeth (79% of dentists), on occlusal surfaces of lower 1st molars (74%), and on upper 1st molars (32%). Half the dentists used clinical photographs for documentation and 60% made study models. While 40% reported more erosive lesions in males, 36% reported no gender differences. High intake of carbonated beverages and acidic juices were reported as the most common cause by 97% and 72% of the dentists, respectively. Only 21% of dentists recorded the patient's dietary history, and 73% never measured saliva secretion. The majority (78%) of the dentists treated patients with erosive wear themselves. In general, the survey suggests that the dentists are relatively up to date regarding the clinical recording, diagnosis, and treatment of dental erosive wear. However, dietary and salivary analyses were not given priority, and early, preventive treatment was lacking
"A bit of everything": Health literacy interventions in chronic conditions- a systematic review
Objective:
To systematically evaluate health literacy (HL) interventions in chronic conditions by exploring
theoretical perspectives, intervention content and effectiveness.
Method:
We searched MEDLINE, Cochrane, CINAHL, EMBASE, ERIC, Web of Science and PsycINFO. Standardised
systematic review methods were used, and sequences informing our research question were extracted and
analysed. The study includes a descriptive summary of the included papers.
Results: We included 39 unique interventions, with diabetes and heart disease as the most targeted chronic
conditions. Fifty-four percent of papers included a definition of HL, but the studies showed significant hetero-geneity of theoretical underpinnings, modes, measures and content. We identified 23 HL measures, mostlyassessing functional HL. The HL interventions were often more complex than the measures indicated. A significant change in HL was found in 28 studies. Study quality was generally poor.
Conclusions:
Interventions optimizing HL appear important to improve health outcomes in chronic conditions. To
ensure cumulative knowledge development of this field we need theory-based interventions, consistency in
methods and more tailored and comprehensive measures to capture the interventionsâ complexity.
Practice implications: A more valid understanding of HL interventions and measurements is needed to reach an agreed understanding of their components and intentions.publishedVersio
Posterior composites and new caries on adjacent surfaces - any association? Longitudinal study with a split-mouth design
Gradient descent algorithm incorporating stochastic pointlocation schemes and its application in multidimensional scaling analysis
Gradient descent (GD) is a popular approach for solving optimisation problems. A disadvantage
of the method is the di culties with choosing a proper learning rate that sets the step size for
the algorithm. If the learning rate is too small, the convergence is unnecessarily slow, whereas
if the learning rate is too large, the process will overshoot or even diverge. Solving optimisation
problems that are stochastic in nature introduces additional challenges to the GD algorithm
hindering the convergence process.
According to [7], the use of Stochastic Point Location (SPL) schemes can potentially improve
any optimisation algorithm by learning the best parameter (the learning rate for GD) during
optimisation. In this thesis we have enhanced the classical Gradient descent algorithm by
incorporation Linear SPL and Hierarchical SPL schemes. As a result, two new GD based
algorithms, GD-LSPL and GD-HSPL, have been developed. The new algorithms iteratively
determine the learning rate of the GD in stochastic environments.
To evaluate whether GD-LSPL and GD-HSPL algorithms improve the performance of the GD
based optimisation we have compared them with GD with constant learning rate (GD-Classic)
and with GD with Line search (GD-LS) algorithms. Three di erent environments have been used
for the empirical evaluation. They are minimising mathematical functions, arti cial Multidimen-
sional Scaling (MDS) problems as well as a practical MDS problem concerning the classi cation
of Word-Of-Mouth (WoM) discussions. MDS is a statistical technique used in information
visualisation for exploring similarities or dissimilarities in data.
Note that we have proposed and empirically evaluated three di erent schemes for applying GD-
LSPL and GD-HSPL algorithms when identifying the learning rate in the GD based MDS. In
brief, the schemes consist of either identifying a global learning rate that is applied to all the
points, an unique learning rate for each individual point, or an unique learning rate for every pair
of points. These proposed schemes have been rigorously evaluated for arti cial MDS problems
and for classifying WoM discussions.
The observed results are conclusive | GD-LSPL and GD-HSPL algorithms introduce a clear
improvement compared to GD-Classic. Since GD-LSPL and GD-HSPL regulate the learning
rate during execution, they achieve faster and more accurate convergence without any manual
adjustment of parameters.
While dealing with minimising mathematical functions, we have introduced randomness to the
problem data. In these environments GD-HSPL is the fastest and the most accurately converg-
ing, the least in
uenced by variation in the start value and the most frequently converging to the
global minimum algorithm. In solving arti cial MDS problems the most accurately converging
algorithms are GD-LS and GD-HSPL applying learning rate point-wise. These algorithms also
perform quite well in Classifying WoM discussions. However, in the latter environment, when
the number of points increases, GD-LSPL with the learning rate applied pair-wise has shown
the fastest performance.
In solving MDS problems randomness is located in the algorithm itself. GD-LS handles ran-
domness in the algorithm quite well and improvement achieved by GD-HSPL and GD-LSPL
is statistically insigni cant. However, under certain conditions GD-HSPL and GD-LSPL algo-
rithms have shown potential in improving the performance of GD-LS in solving MDS problems.
Moreover, they obviously have shown a great improvement in minimising mathematical func-
tions. We, therefore, believe that GD-HSPL and GD-LSPL algorithms can be utilised in various
GD based applications, particularly when randomness of the task is located in the problem data
Tekniske problemomrÄder ved bruk av honeynett for analyse av datainntrengere
Honeynett er en forholdsvis ny teknologi som kan benyttes for Ä innhente informasjon om datainntrengere. Det kan innhentes informasjon om blant annet motiver, taktikk, verktÞy og arbeidsmetoder. Denne teknologien er ikke et bestemt produkt, men er en arkitektur som kan ha mange forskjellige sammensetninger og funksjoner, og som kan brukes til ulike formÄl.
Oppgavens hensikt er Ă„ teste honeynett med hensyn til definerte kriterier for innhenting av informasjon om datainntrengere. Ettersom det i litteraturen ikke er funnet tilfredsstillende kriterier for testing av honeynett, defineres disse i oppgaven.
Forskjellige varianter av honeynett bygges opp, delt inn i faser. For hver fase testes honeynettet i forhold til kriteriene. Honeynettet testes ved hjelp av ubudne datainntrengere fra Internett.
Resultatene viser mangler ved funksjonalitet en i honeynett, og et stort forbedringspotensiale. En av de stÞrste utfordringene er Ä skjule funksjonene i honeynettet, slik at datainntrengere ikke finner ut at de har brutt seg inn i et honeynett. En lÞsning pÄ dette er Ä benytte programvare som ikke er publisert, enten ved Ä utvikle nytt, eller ved Ä modifisere eksisterende. Dette bidrar til at inntrengere ikke vet hva de skal se etter for Ä pÄvise et honeynett.
Det er behov for Ă„ utvikle bedre verktĂžy for bruk i honeynett. I tillegg er det mulig Ă„ definere andre, mer omfattende kriterier. Hvilke kriterier det er behov for avhenger i stor grad av hvilken funksjonalitet som kreves i hvert enkelt tilfelle, og hva honeynettet skal benyttes til
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