Effect of activities, social environment, and psychotropic medication use on behavioral symptoms of persons with dementia in nursing homes

A secondary data analysis was conducted using existing clinical and observational data of a 3-year longitudinal study to describe associations of time-varying background factors (cognitive function, physical function, psychotropic medication use), and proximal factors (activities, social environment) with positive and negative behaviors of persons with dementia at 24 months. Participants included residents with Alzheimer\u27s disease living in two nursing homes in Chicago. A Total 25,560 observation sessions, collected for all participants at baseline, 12-months and 24-months were used in analyses. Results showing that: 1) higher cognitive and physical functions, and being located in own bedroom and shower/tub/bathroom had the most positive influence on positive behaviors; 2) use of antipsychotic medications and solitary activities had the most negative influence on positive behaviors; 3) higher cognitive function significantly decreased the odds of negative behaviors; 4) total psychotropic and care-related activities significantly increased the odds of negative behaviors

FACTORS AFFECTING THE MOTIVATION OF THE COLLEGE OF NURSING FACULTY MEMBERS ON RESEARCH PRODUCTION, PRESENTATION AND PUBLICATION

With the desire for efficiency and effectiveness in the academe profession producing research outputs, universities must highlight faculty members' motivation towards research-related efforts. The study aims to identify the elements influencing the college of nursing faculty members' motivation for research production, presentation, and publication. The descriptive quantitative research design was used for the investigation using a snowball sampling technique for data collection. The study identified probationary, regular, and part-time faculty members in the College of Nursing. Simple frequency and percentage, and weighted mean were used to treat the collected data. This study showed that the teacher's access to a source of income, university-sponsored research tutorials, seminars, and workshops, and the attraction of organizational grant and reward systems are essential in motivating the teacher. The findings further revealed that peer influence and organizational support systems are vital motivating factors to boost teachers' self-confidence in research presentations and publications. The study concluded that the extensiveness of faculty motivation's elements resides in improving their incentive to generate, present, and publish research articles. The study further concludes that faculty desire to produce, present, and publish research outputs are influenced and affected by elements including but not limited to financial considerations, administrative assistance, peer influence, and organizational support

Recruitment methods in Alzheimer's disease research: general practice versus population based screening by mail

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In Alzheimer's disease (AD) research patients are usually recruited from clinical practice, memory clinics or nursing homes. Lack of standardised inclusion and diagnostic criteria is a major concern in current AD studies. The aim of the study was to explore whether patient characteristics differ between study samples recruited from general practice and from a population based screening by mail within the same geographic areas in rural Northern Norway.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>An interventional study in nine municipalities with 70000 inhabitants was designed. Patients were recruited from general practice or by population based screening of cognitive function by mail. We sent a questionnaire to 11807 individuals ≥ 65 years of age of whom 3767 responded. Among these, 438 individuals whose answers raised a suspicion of cognitive impairment were invited to an extended cognitive and clinical examination. Descriptive statistics, chi-square, independent sample t-test and analyses of covariance adjusted for possible confounders were used.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The final study samples included 100 patients recruited by screening and 87 from general practice. Screening through mail recruited younger and more self-reliant male patients with a higher MMSE sum score, whereas older women with more severe cognitive impairment were recruited from general practice. Adjustment for age did not alter the statistically significant differences of cognitive function, self-reliance and gender distribution between patients recruited by screening and from general practice.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Different recruitment procedures of individuals with cognitive impairment provided study samples with different demographic characteristics. Initial cognitive screening by mail, preceding extended cognitive testing and clinical examination may be a suitable recruitment strategy in studies of early stage AD.</p> <p>Clinical Registration</p> <p>ClinicalTrial.gov Identifier: NCT00443014</p

United States patent Alqudah et al.

There is provided a system , method , and a computer pro gram product that, when implemented, provides a user a notification about one or more road conditions. The system may include one or more sensors that may be configured to detect the presence and absence of one or more road markings, and a processing unit in operable communication with the one or more sensors configured to receive and process a plurality of sensor readings provided by the one or more sensors. A display in operable communication with the processing unit may be configured to display audi