Campaigning Beyond: Sepsis Awareness Among Non-clinical Staff

Problem: Sepsis stands as the foremost cause of illness and death among hospitalized patients globally, yet a considerable number remain oblivious to this critical condition. Based on the pre-implementation survey among non-clinical staff members of an urban hospital, awareness of sepsis must be heightened to ensure swift recognition and response. Context: The project conducted takes place in five distinct non-clinical departments at a large hospital organization in Northern California. Each department plays an essential role in the holistic and efficient functioning of the organization to provide quality patient care. Interventions: A sepsis awareness campaign was implemented throughout the month of September. To enhance the understanding and recognition of sepsis, information about sepsis, its risk factors, and the importance of early detection was disseminated through group discussions and the distribution of educational flyers. Measures: A pre-implementation assessment of each department was conducted before September. Clinical nurse leader (CNL) students conducted a verbal survey among non-clinical staff members to determine whether or not they were aware of the term “sepsis.” Evaluation of the campaign was executed through a post-intervention survey. Results: In the pre-intervention survey, 3% of non-clinical staff were aware of sepsis. Due to changes in departmental leadership, the post-intervention survey was only conducted in one department - environmental services (EVS)- in which 0% of employees were aware of sepsis. Conclusion: Non-clinical staff play a pivotal role in recognizing sepsis, facilitating timely interventions, and contributing to infection prevention. Fostering a heightened awareness through education, non-clinical staff can significantly enhance the hospital’s capacity to address sepsis

Building New Media Institutions in the MENA Region: A Roadmap towards Media Law and Policy Reform Summary Report

Building New Media Institutions in the MENA Region: A Roadmap towards Media Law and Policy Reform was the first in a multi-part series of workshops aimed at bringing together key stakeholders from the academic, law and policy and civil society communities interested in participating in a dialogue intended to aid the media transitions in the Middle East and North Africa. The workshop was organized by the Center for Global Communication Studies at the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania, with support from Internews Network. This synthesis report draws both from meeting discussions and draft reports submitted and presented at the meeting: Dr. Joan Barata, Draft Report on the Political Transition in Tunisia from the Point of View of Regulation of Communication Media (June 2011); Toby Mendel, Draft Report on Freedom of Expression in Egypt: Opportunities for Reform (June 2011); and Draft Report on the Internet Policy Framework in Egypt (June 2011). Click here to learn more about the workshop

Risk management implementation in small and medium enterprises in the UK construction industry

Purpose – The competition and challenges facing construction firms during the recent recession have brought risk management (RM) to the fore in people’s minds. Examination of the difficulties of implementing RM in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the UK construction industry has been relatively untouched. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach – As part of on-going research to facilitate RM processing aimed at improving the competitiveness of SMEs, the difficulties in RM implementation were identified through a literature review of RM implementation in SMEs. Postal questionnaire were sent to SMEs who have experience of construction management. Findings – Of the 153 of SMEs responding, most highlighted that the main difficulty experienced is how to scale RM process to meet their requirements. None of the available standards explain the fundamental principle of applying RM to the situations that SMEs find themselves in. This difficulty is further exacerbated by a lack of management skills and knowledge in the adoption of RM tools or techniques to identify and analyse the business’ risks. Originality/value – The identified difficulties can be considered to develop a process to facilitate RM process within SMEs. </jats:sec

If Engineers solve problems, why are there still so many problems to solve?: Getting beyond technical “solutions” in the classroom

This Evidence-Based Practice Paper describes implementation and assessment of an exercise bringing international perspectives, liberal arts, and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals into a first-year engineering program - challenging the arbitrary boundary between engineering and the liberal arts. First-year engineering students (Civil, Mechanical, and Electrical) participated in a role-playing game recreating the 2009 United Nations Climate Talks in Copenhagen, Denmark. The exercise is part of a series of published games called Reacting to the Past (RTTP), with the purpose of engaging students to enhance their understanding of a given event or topic, while improving their research and communication skills. In this case, the further goal was for students to broaden their understanding of the technical aspects of climate change, as well as the political and social reasons that technological solutions are not always implemented, despite the best intentions and technical knowledge. Students practiced researching a topic, selecting and evaluating resources, proper citation of works used, written and oral communication, and advancing a position in a professional manner. These skills, while crucial for practicing engineers, are often relatively weak in incoming students. Our initial success integrating international perspectives and traditional liberal arts concepts into a first-year engineering course was supported by several classroom innovations, including a classroom-embedded librarian and gamification. Benefits of this activity in the first-year classroom include: - Getting students to interact with each other in a substantive way, strengthening the cohort, and supporting retention. - Providing structure for learning library, writing, and presentation skills, etc. - Introducing how professionals handle concepts of politics, tact, and negotiating across boundaries. - Providing an experiential learning environment to understand how politics, both personal and professional, can interact with technical solutions, leading to improvement or disruption in the lives of all. - Starting a discussion about United Nations Sustainable Development Goals early in the careers of engineering students. Certainly, students will see these concepts again; there are multiple group projects and research projects in their time at our school, as well as courses on ethics and professionalism. However, introducing these concepts in their first semester prepares students for future courses, and helps them understand that engineering is not just problem sets and robotics

Resilience Within and Resilience Without: Mindfulness and Sustainability Programming Using an Embedded Engineering Librarian Approach

Students are facing an increasingly chaotic world in part due to global climate change and environmental degradation, causing rising levels of stress and anxiety. Mindfulness and sustainability programs were initiated over three years by a faculty-librarian collaborative team to assist first-year engineering students in building environmental literacy and personal resilience skills. The faculty-librarian team established in class and out of class themes, games, assignments, and programming using an embedded librarian approach. Sustainability programming included environmental movie nights with curricular links and conversations about climate change using the World Café methodology. These activities allowed students time outside of class to engage with topics in an interdisciplinary manner as they were open to students in all departments and the public. Mindfulness interventions were introduced in the fall 2019 semester and included thought awareness, breathing techniques, a Biodot® activity, and an introduction to meditation. Overall, 98% of the 58 students completing a survey in the fall 2019 semester felt the mindfulness techniques were at least a little bit helpful, and 64% felt the techniques would help them fairly well to a tremendous amount. Introducing first-year engineering students to mindfulness techniques and strategies along with sustainability topics, may help students cope with stress and anxiety about environmental challenges and their early college transition, in addition to providing strategies for resilience. These are skills that engineers can benefit from for the rest of their lives

If Engineers solve problems, why are there still so many problems to solve?: Getting beyond technical “solutions” in the classroom

This Evidence-Based Practice Paper describes implementation and assessment of an exercise bringing international perspectives, liberal arts, and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals into a first-year engineering program - challenging the arbitrary boundary between engineering and the liberal arts. First-year engineering students (Civil, Mechanical, and Electrical) participated in a role-playing game recreating the 2009 United Nations Climate Talks in Copenhagen, Denmark. The exercise is part of a series of published games called Reacting to the Past (RTTP), with the purpose of engaging students to enhance their understanding of a given event or topic, while improving their research and communication skills. In this case, the further goal was for students to broaden their understanding of the technical aspects of climate change, as well as the political and social reasons that technological solutions are not always implemented, despite the best intentions and technical knowledge. Students practiced researching a topic, selecting and evaluating resources, proper citation of works used, written and oral communication, and advancing a position in a professional manner. These skills, while crucial for practicing engineers, are often relatively weak in incoming students. Our initial success integrating international perspectives and traditional liberal arts concepts into a first-year engineering course was supported by several classroom innovations, including a classroom-embedded librarian and gamification. Benefits of this activity in the first-year classroom include: - Getting students to interact with each other in a substantive way, strengthening the cohort, and supporting retention. - Providing structure for learning library, writing, and presentation skills, etc. - Introducing how professionals handle concepts of politics, tact, and negotiating across boundaries. - Providing an experiential learning environment to understand how politics, both personal and professional, can interact with technical solutions, leading to improvement or disruption in the lives of all. - Starting a discussion about United Nations Sustainable Development Goals early in the careers of engineering students. Certainly, students will see these concepts again; there are multiple group projects and research projects in their time at our school, as well as courses on ethics and professionalism. However, introducing these concepts in their first semester prepares students for future courses, and helps them understand that engineering is not just problem sets and robotics

Resilience Within and Resilience Without: Mindfulness and Sustainability Programming Using an Embedded Engineering Librarian Approach

Students are facing an increasingly chaotic world in part due to global climate change and environmental degradation, causing rising levels of stress and anxiety. Mindfulness and sustainability programs were initiated over three years by a faculty-librarian collaborative team to assist first-year engineering students in building environmental literacy and personal resilience skills. The faculty-librarian team established in class and out of class themes, games, assignments, and programming using an embedded librarian approach. Sustainability programming included environmental movie nights with curricular links and conversations about climate change using the World Café methodology. These activities allowed students time outside of class to engage with topics in an interdisciplinary manner as they were open to students in all departments and the public. Mindfulness interventions were introduced in the fall 2019 semester and included thought awareness, breathing techniques, a Biodot® activity, and an introduction to meditation. Overall, 98% of the 58 students completing a survey in the fall 2019 semester felt the mindfulness techniques were at least a little bit helpful, and 64% felt the techniques would help them fairly well to a tremendous amount. Introducing first-year engineering students to mindfulness techniques and strategies along with sustainability topics, may help students cope with stress and anxiety about environmental challenges and their early college transition, in addition to providing strategies for resilience. These are skills that engineers can benefit from for the rest of their lives

Three-dimensional tissue scaffolds from interbonded poly(e-caprolactone) fibrous matrices with controlled porosity

In this article, we report on the preparation and cell culture performance of a novel fibrous matrix that has an interbonded fiber architecture, excellent pore interconnectivity, and controlled pore size and porosity. The fibrous matrices were prepared by combining melt-bonding of short synthetic fibers with a template leaching technique. The microcomputed tomography and scanning electron microscopy imaging verified that the fibers in the matrix were highly bonded, forming unique isotropic pore architectures. The average pore size and porosity of the fibrous matrices were controlled by the fiber/template ratio. The matrices having the average pore size of 120, 207, 813, and 994 mm, with the respective porosity of 73%, 88%, 96%, and 97%, were investigated. The applicability of the matrix as a three-dimensional (3D) tissue scaffold for cell culture was demonstrated with two cell lines, rat skin fibroblast and Chinese hamster ovary, and the influences of the matrix porosity and surface area on the cell culture performance were examined. Both cell lines grew successfully in the matrices, but they showed different preferences in pore size and porosity. Compared with two-dimensional tissue culture plates, the cell number on 3D fibrous matrices was increased by 97.27% for the Chinese hamster ovary cells and 49.46% for the fibroblasts after 21 days of culture. The fibroblasts in the matrices not only grew along the fiber surface but also bridged among the fibers, which was much different from those on two-dimensional scaffolds. Such an interbonded fibrous matrix may be useful for developing new fiber-based 3D tissue scaffolds for various cell culture applications

Duodenal-bronchial fistula: an unusual cause of shortness of breath and a productive cough

AbstractDuodenal-bronchial fistulas are very uncommon, even among the already rare subgroup of abdominal-bronchial fistulas. We describe a case of a woman with Crohn's disease who presented with shortness of breath and a productive cough who was found to have a duodeanl bronchial fistula on computed tomography scan. We demonstrate with this case how these rare cases can lead to chronic lung aspirations and require multidisciplinary involvement

Robotic Book Scanner

Digitizing books has been an issue tackled by companies to allow people to read off Kindles and iPads rather than the traditional paperback. Companies like Google have spent more than $1000 on machines to convert books into electronic copies readable on devices. Yet, not much effort has been made into the invention of an automatic book scanner for consumers. This project seeks to determine a cost-effective approach to robotic book scanning to create PDFs from physical books. This project serves as a proof of concept for a reasonably priced automatic book scanner accessible to consumers. Potentially, the device may be used in libraries similarly to copy machines where the user pays to have their book converted to electronic form, however, security measures would need to be made over access to the PDFs. If developed cost-efficiently enough, consumers may benefit as far as to have the device in their homes to convert their entire book collections to personal PDFs