Science Teacher Learning of MBL-Supported Student-Centered Science Education in the Context of Secondary Education in Tanzania

Science teachers from secondary schools in Tanzania were offered an in-service arrangement to prepare them for the integration of technology in a student-centered approach to science teaching. The in-service arrangement consisted of workshops in which educative curriculum materials were used to prepare teachers for student-centered education and for the use and application of Microcomputer Based Laboratories (MBL)—a specific technology application for facilitating experiments in science education. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected to study whether the in-service arrangement impacted teacher learning. Teacher learning was determined by three indicators: (1) the ability to conduct MBL-supported student centered science lessons, (2) teachers’ reflection on those lessons and (3) students’ perceptions of the classroom environment. The results of the research indicate that the teachers’ were able to integrate MBL in their science lessons at an acceptable level and that they were able to create a classroom environment which was appreciated by their students as more investigative and open-ended

Chronic Diseases among Older Cancer Survivors

Objective. To compare the occurrence of pre-existing and subsequent comorbidity among older cancer patients (≥60 years) with older non-cancer patients. Material and Methods. Each cancer patient (n=3835, mean age 72) was matched with four non-cancer patients in terms of age, sex, and practice. The occurrence of chronic diseases was assessed cross-sectionally (lifetime prevalence at time of diagnosis) and longitudinally (incidence after diagnosis) for all cancer patients and for breast, prostate, and colorectal cancer patients separately. Cancer and non-cancer patients were compared using logistic and Cox regression analysis. Results. The occurrence of the most common pre-existing and incident chronic diseases was largely similar in cancer and non-cancer patients, except for pre-existing COPD (OR 1.21, 95% CI 1.06–1.37) and subsequent venous thrombosis in the first two years after cancer diagnosis (HR 4.20, 95% CI 2.74–6.44), which were significantly more frequent (P<0.01) among older cancer compared to non-cancer patients. Conclusion. The frequency of multimorbidity in older cancer patients is high. However, apart from COPD and venous thrombosis, the incidence of chronic diseases in older cancer patients is similar compared to non-cancer patients of the same age, sex, and practice

Reporting Multiple Individual Injuries in Studies of Team Ball Sports:A Systematic Review of Current Practice

Background To identify and prioritise targets for injury prevention efforts, injury incidence studies are widely reported. The accuracy and consistency in calculation and reporting of injury incidence is crucial. Many individuals experience more than one injury but multiple injuries are not consistently reported in sport injury incidence studies.Objective The aim of this systematic review was to evaluate current practice of how multiple injuries within individuals have been defined and reported in prospective, long-term, injury studies in team ball sports.Data Sources A systematic search of three online databases for articles published before 2016.Study Selection Publications were included if (1) they collected prospective data on musculoskeletal injuries in individual participants; (2) the study duration was &gt;1 consecutive calendar year/season; and (3) individuals were the unit of analysis.Data Extraction Key study features were summarised, including definitions of injury, how multiple individual injuries were reported and results relating to multiple injuries.Results Of the 71 publications included, half did not specifically indicate multiple individual injuries; those that did were largely limited to reporting recurrent injuries. Eight studies reported the number/proportion of athletes with more than one injury, and 11 studies presented the mean/number of injuries per athlete.Conclusions Despite it being relatively common to collect data on individuals across more than one season, the reporting of multiple injuries within individuals is much more limited. Ultimately, better addressing of multiple injuries will improve the accuracy of injury incidence studies and enable more precise targeting and monitoring of the effectiveness of preventive interventions.</p

A decision analysis approach for optimal groundwater monitoring system design under uncertainty

International audienceGroundwater contamination is the degradation of the natural quality of groundwater as a result of human activity. Landfills are one of the most common human activities threatening the groundwater quality. The objective of the monitoring systems is to detect the contaminant plumes before reaching the regulatory compliance boundary in order to prevent the severe risk to both society and groundwater quality, and also to enable cost-effective counter measures in case of a failure. The detection monitoring problem typically has a multi-objective nature. A multi-objective decision model (called MONIDAM) which links a classic decision analysis approach with a stochastic simulation model is applied to determine the optimal groundwater monitoring system given uncertainties due to the hydrogeological conditions and contaminant source characteristics. A Monte Carlo approach is used to incorporate uncertainties. Hydraulic conductivity and the leak location are the random inputs of the simulation model. The design objectives considered in the model are: (1) maximizing the detection probability, (2) minimizing the contaminated area and, (3) minimize the total cost of the monitoring system. The results show that the monitoring systems located close to the source are optimal except for the cases with very high unit installation and sampling cost and/or very cheap unit remediation cost

Management of major obstetric hemorrhage prior to peripartum hysterectomy and outcomes across nine European countries

Introduction Peripartum hysterectomy is applied as a surgical intervention of last resort for major obstetric hemorrhage. It is performed in an emergency setting except for women with a strong suspicion of placenta accreta spectrum (PAS), where it may be anticipated before cesarean section. The aim of this study was to compare management strategies in the case of obstetric hemorrhage leading to hysterectomy, between nine European countries participating in the International Network of Obstetric Survey Systems (INOSS), and to describe pooled maternal and neonatal outcomes following peripartum hysterectomy. Material and methods We merged data from nine nationwide or multi-regional obstetric surveillance studies performed in Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Slovakia, Sweden and the UK collected between 2004 and 2016. Hysterectomies performed from 22 gestational weeks up to 48 h postpartum due to obstetric hemorrhage were included. Stratifying women with and without PAS, procedures performed in the management of obstetric hemorrhage prior to hysterectomy between countries were counted and compared. Prevalence of maternal mortality, complications after hysterectomy and neonatal adverse events (stillbirth or neonatal mortality) were calculated. Results A total of 1302 women with peripartum hysterectomy were included. In women without PAS who had major obstetric hemorrhage leading to hysterectomy, uterotonics administration was lowest in Slovakia (48/73, 66%) and highest in Denmark (25/27, 93%), intrauterine balloon use was lowest in Slovakia (1/72, 1%) and highest in Denmark (11/27, 41%), and interventional radiology varied between 0/27 in Denmark and Slovakia to 11/59 (79%) in Belgium. In women with PAS, uterotonics administration was lowest in Finland (5/16, 31%) and highest in the UK (84/103, 82%), intrauterine balloon use varied between 0/14 in Belgium and Slovakia to 29/103 (28%) in the UK. Interventional radiology was lowest in Denmark (0/16) and highest in Finland (9/15, 60%). Maternal mortality occurred in 14/1226 (1%), the most common complications were hematologic (95/1202, 8%) and respiratory (81/1101, 7%). Adverse neonatal events were observed in 79/1259 (6%) births. Conclusions Management of obstetric hemorrhage in women who eventually underwent peripartum hysterectomy varied greatly between these nine European countries. This potentially life-saving procedure is associated with substantial adverse maternal and neonatal outcome.Peer reviewe

Emissie van N2O en CO2 uit organische landbouwbodems

According to the international agreement of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change the Netherlands has to report emissions of greenhouse gases periodically to the UNFCCC secretariat in Bonn in a national inventory. Such an inventory should be based on internationally comparable methodologies, be public and transparent, include all sources and removals by sinks of all greenhouse gases. This report is on calculations for a specific source (management of organic soils) of nitrous oxide (N2O) and carbon dioxide (CO2) that is not reported according to international standards and partly missing in the National Inventory Report for the Netherlands. The total area of organic soils is calculated at 223 000 ha in 2003 based on inventories. The area will continue to decrease further. The calculated annual emission of CO2 amounts to 4.246 Mton CO2 and for N2O to 0.508 Mton CO2 equivalent

Hoe IS-glossy Dabiq harten van westerse moslims wint

IS propaganda is assumed to contribute to radicalization of Western Muslims. How IS propaganda reaches the hearts and minds of Western Muslims and consequently fuels radicalization is nonetheless an understudied topic. Through content analysis of all fifteen issues of IS-glossy Dabiq this article demonstrates how IS propaganda works in Dabiq. First, IS attunes in Dabiq to factors that foster radicalization according to the literature. IS does so by its discussion in Dabiq of injustice done to Muslims worldwide, the image of the Western enemy, and its positive presentation of the individual and group identity of IS fighters. Second, in Dabiq IS paves the way for embracing violent means, such as terrorist attacks on Western civilians through a discourse of ‘denial’

Single-machine scheduling with stepwise tardiness costs and release times

We study a scheduling problem that belongs to the yard operations component of the railroad planning problems, namely the hump sequencing problem. The scheduling problem is characterized as a single-machine problem with stepwise tardiness cost objectives. This is a new scheduling criterion which is also relevant in the context of traditional machine scheduling problems. We produce complexity results that characterize some cases of the problem as pseudo-polynomially solvable. For the difficult-to-solve cases of the problem, we develop mathematical programming formulations, and propose heuristic algorithms. We test the formulations and heuristic algorithms on randomly generated single-machine scheduling problems and real-life datasets for the hump sequencing problem. Our experiments show promising results for both sets of problems