Family support for stroke: one year follow up of a randomised controlled trial

Background: There is evidence that family support can benefit carers of stroke patients, but not the patients themselves. Objective: To extend the follow up of a single blind randomised controlled trial of family support for stroke patients and carers to one year to ascertain whether there were any late effects of the intervention. Methods: The study was a randomised controlled trial. Patients admitted to hospital with acute stroke who had a close carer were assigned to receive family support or normal care. Families were visited at home by a researcher 12 months after the stroke, and a series of questionnaires was administered to patient and carer. Results: The benefits to carers mostly persisted, though they were no longer statistically significant because some patients were lost to follow up. There was no evidence of any effects on patients. Conclusion: Family support is effective for carers, but different approaches need to be considered to alleviate the psychosocial problems of stroke patients. Abbreviations: FSO, family support organiser; SF-36, short form 36 item health assessment questionnaire Keywords: caregiver; family support; stroke In recognition of the impact that stroke has on carers as well as patients,1 services such as Stroke Association family support have been developed in the United Kingdom which provide information, emotional support, and liaison with other services. The service maintains contact through a combination of home and hospital visits and telephone calls. In the Oxford family support trial, we found that this service was associated with significantly improved quality of life of carers at follow up six months after the stroke, but had no effects on patients.2 Other randomised controlled trials of the service in other areas have also found no evidence of benefit to patients with follow up varying from four to nine months after recruitment.3,4 The lack of benefit to patients may be attributable to the short duration of follow up in these trials. The service usually maintains contact with a family for a year, and some patients spend a significant proportion of the first six months in hospital, during which time family support might be anticipated to have less impact. We carried out a second follow up of participants in the Oxford trial to investigate the effects of family support on patients and carers one year after the stroke

Subsystem Hazard Analysis Methodology for the Ares I Upper Stage Source Controlled Items

This article describes processes involved in developing subsystem hazard analyses for Source Controlled Items (SCI), specific components, sub-assemblies, and/or piece parts, of the NASA ARES I Upper Stage (US) project. SCIs will be designed, developed and /or procured by Boeing as an end item or an off-the-shelf item. Objectives include explaining the methodology, tools, stakeholders and products involved in development of these hazard analyses. Progress made and further challenges in identifying potential subsystem hazards are also provided in an effort to assist the System Safety community in understanding one part of the ARES I Upper Stage project

Farm poultry management : for 4-H poultry projects I and II

Accompanied by: Leader's guide : 4-H poultry project (to be used with Circular 75), March, 1945.Cover title.Includes "4-H Record" at end.I. Young stock production -- II. Flock management

Excitonic mobility edge and ultra-short photoluminescence decay time in n-type GaAsN

We use time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy to study the recombination dynamics in Si-doped GaAsN semiconductor alloys with a nitrogen content up to 0.2%. The PL decay is predominantly monoexponential and exhibits a strong energy dispersion. We find ultra-short decay times on the high-energy side and long decay times on the low-energy side of the photoluminescence spectrum. This asymmetry can be explained by the existence of an additional non-radiative energy transfer channel and is consistent with previous studies on intrinsic GaAsN epilayers. However, the determined maximum decay times of GaAsN:Si are significantly reduced in comparison to undoped GaAsN. The determined excitonic mobility edge energy constantly decreases with an increase in the N content, in agreement with the two-level band anticrossing model

Complex spatial language improves from 3 to 5 years: The role of prompting and overhearing in facilitating direction giving using between and middle.

The primary goal of this study was to specify age-related improvements in young children’s use of the complex spatial terms between and middle in response to prompting and overhearing supports. Three- to 5-year-old children described the location of a mouse hidden between two furniture items in a dollhouse. Three prompting conditions (Between Directive, Middle Directive, Nondirective) were compared with two overhearing conditions (Overhearing Between, Overhearing Middle). Children’s use of between and middle was much more frequent in response to directive prompting than in response to nondirective prompting or overhearing. Only 4-5-year-old children showed some evidence of using middle in response to nondirective prompting and overhearing, demonstrating developmental gains in sensitivity to subtle cues. The secondary goal was to assess young children’s production and comprehension of between and middle using tasks suitable for young children and parent report checklists. As expected, children’s spatial language showed strong developmental improvement and was related to direction-giving performance

Spatial and Size Distribution of Red Drum Caught and Released in Tampa Bay, Florida, and Factors Associated with Post-Release Hooking Mortality

The recreational fishery for red drum (Sciaenops ocellatus) in Florida is unusual in that most red drum targeted are immature and caught within estuarine waters. Current state regulations rely exclusively on bag and size limits, resulting in the release of a large proportion of captured individuals. This study employed hook-and-line sampling conducted monthly in Tampa Bay, Florida and catch-and-release mortality experiments to determine the spatial and size distribution of red drum and the mortality rate of released fish, respectively. Of the 1,405 red drum collected, more than 70% were smaller than the minimum legal size (457 mm standard length (SL)). Size structure of red drum varied spatially and reflected ontogenetic patterns of habitat use. Data collected during catch-and-release mortality experiments were analyzed to identify factors associated with mortality. A total of 251 red drum (203-618 mm SL) were caught and held for 48 h during 9 experiments, with an overall mortality rate of 5.6%. Higher water temperature and anatomical hook position were significantly correlated with mortality; lip-hooked fish had the lowest mortality rate, while throat-hooked fish had the highest. Although hook type was not correlated with mortality, it did influence whether a fish was deep-hooked. Fish caught by J-hooks were more likely to be deep-hooked than those caught by circle hooks. Catch-and-release fishing is an effective management tool for reducing take but may contribute to short-term mortality, especially in warm, subtropical estuaries

Poultry management : for 4-H poultry projects

November, 1952."University of Missouri College of Agriculture and the United States Department of Agriculture Cooperating"--Page 47.Title from caption

Effects of preservation methods of muscle tissue from upper-trophic level reef fishes on stable isotope values (δ13C and δ15N)

© The Author(s), 2015. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in PeerJ 3 (2015): e874, doi:10.7717/peerj.874.Research that uses stable isotope analysis often involves a delay between sample collection in the field and laboratory processing, therefore requiring preservation to prevent or reduce tissue degradation and associated isotopic compositions. Although there is a growing literature describing the effects of various preservation techniques, the results are often contextual, unpredictable and vary among taxa, suggesting the need to treat each species individually. We conducted a controlled experiment to test the effects of four preservation methods of muscle tissue from four species of upper trophic-level reef fish collected from the eastern Gulf of Mexico (Red Grouper Epinephelus morio, Gag Mycteroperca microlepis, Scamp Mycteroperca phenax, and Red Snapper Lutjanus campechanus). We used a paired design to measure the effects on isotopic values for carbon and nitrogen after storage using ice, 95% ethanol, and sodium chloride (table salt), against that in a liquid nitrogen control. Mean offsets for both δ13C and δ15N values from controls were lowest for samples preserved on ice, intermediate for those preserved with salt, and highest with ethanol. Within species, both salt and ethanol significantly enriched the δ15N values in nearly all comparisons. Ethanol also had strong effects on the δ13C values in all three groupers. Conversely, for samples preserved on ice, we did not detect a significant offset in either isotopic ratio for any of the focal species. Previous studies have addressed preservation-induced offsets in isotope values using a mass balance correction that accounts for changes in the isotope value to that in the C/N ratio. We tested the application of standard mass balance corrections for isotope values that were significantly affected by the preservation methods and found generally poor agreement between corrected and control values. The poor performance by the correction may have been due to preferential loss of lighter isotopes and corresponding low levels of mass loss with a substantial change in the isotope value of the sample. Regardless of mechanism, it was evident that accounting for offsets caused by different preservation methods was not possible using the standard correction. Caution is warranted when interpreting the results from specimens stored in either ethanol or salt, especially when using those from multiple preservation techniques. We suggest the use of ice as the preferred preservation technique for muscle tissue when conducting stable isotope analysis as it is widely available, inexpensive, easy to transport and did not impart a significant offset in measured isotopic values. Our results provide additional evidence that preservation effects on stable isotope analysis can be highly contextual, thus requiring their effects to be measured and understood for each species and isotopic ratio of interest before addressing research questions.Funding was provided by a grant to CD Stallings and TS Switzer from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Cooperative Research Program (NA12NMF4540081)

Chronic Daily Headache in Children and Adolescents: A Multi-Faceted Syndrome

AbstractChronic daily headache (CDH) is a multi-faceted, often complex pain syndrome in children and adolescents. Chronic daily headache may be primary or secondary. Chronic migraine and chronic tension-type are the most frequent subtypes. Chronic daily headache is co-morbid with adverse life events, anxiety and depressive disorders, possibly with other psychiatric disorders, other pain syndromes and sleep disorders; these conditions contribute to initiating and maintaining CDH. Hence, early management of episodic headache and treatment of associated conditions are crucial to prevention. There is evidence for the benefit of psychological therapies, principally relaxation and cognitive behavioral, and promising information on acupuncture for CDH. Data on drug treatment are based primarily on open label studies. The controversies surrounding CDH are discussed and proposals for improvement presented. The multifaceted nature of CDH makes it a good candidate for a multi-axial classification system. Such an approach should facilitate biopsychosocial management and enhance consistency in clinical research