Preterm birth in Vietnam : direct medical cost assessment and the investigation of parents' experiences and satisfaction with health care services

Preterm birth remains a critical public health challenge and the leading cause of neonatal death in Vietnam. The aim of this thesis was to assess the financial impact of premature deliveries as well as parental experiences and satisfaction with preterm health care services in Vietnam. A mixed methods approach was used to address the main objectives of the study. Our results suggest that preterm births create a considerable burden to families as well as the health system in Vietnam. Out-of-pocket expenditure was generally limited for parents who followed national care seeking guidelines. Parents who bypassed lower-level facilities without referral authorization faced out-of-pocket expenditure about six times higher than those of infants who had a proper transfer. Both premature birth and hospital transfers were caused a major psychological burden and stress for parents. The primary reasons for decision to transfer preterm infants to the national hospital were acute illness, positive perceptions of the quality of care of the national hospital and advice of other parents. Longer length of stay and worsening infant health status were the main factors resulting in lower parental satisfaction with the quality of care provided. Reducing the impact of preterm births likely requires a close cooperation between health professionals and infants’ familie

Quality-aware Tasking in Mobile Opportunistic Networks - Distributed Information Retrieval and Processing utilizing Opportunistic Heterogeneous Resources.

Advances in wireless technology have facilitated direct communication among mobile devices in recent years, enabling opportunistic networks. Opportunistic networking among mobile devices is often utilized to offload and save cellular network traffic and to maintain communication in case of impaired communication infrastructure, such as in emergency situations. With a plethora of built-in capabilities, such as built-in sensors and the ability to perform even intensive operations, mobile devices in such networks can be used to provide distributed applications for other devices upon opportunistic contact. However, ensuring quality requirements for such type of distributed applications is still challenging due to uncontrolled mobility and resource constraints of devices. Addressing this problem, in this thesis, we propose a tasking methodology, which allows for assigning tasks to capable mobile devices, considering quality requirements. To this end, we tackle two fundamental types of tasks required in a distributed application, i.e., information retrieval and distributed processing. Our first contribution is a decentralized tasking concept to obtain crowd collected data through built-in sensors of participating mobile devices. Based on the Named Data Networking paradigm, we propose a naming scheme to specify the quality requirements for crowd sensing tasks. With the proposed naming scheme, we design an adaptive self-organizing approach, in which the sensing tasks will be forwarded to the right devices, satisfying specified quality requirements for requested information. In our second contribution, we develop a tasking model for distributed processing in opportunistic networks. We design a task-oriented message template, which enhances the definition of a complex processing task, which requires multiple processing stages to accomplish a predefined goal. Our tasking concept enables distributed coordination and an autonomous decision of participating device to counter uncertainty caused by the mobility of devices in the network. Based on this proposed model, we develop computation handover strategies among mobile devices for achieving quality requirements of the distributed processing. Finally, as the third contribution and to enhance information retrieval, we integrate our proposed tasking concept for distributed processing into information retrieval. Thereby, the crowd-collected data can be processed by the devices during the forwarding process in the network. As a result, relevant information can be extracted from the crowd-collected data directly within the network without being offloaded to any remote computation entity. We show that the obtained information can be disseminated to the right information consumers, without over-utilizing the resource of participating devices in the network. Overall, we demonstrate that our contributions comprise a tasking methodology for leveraging resources of participating devices to ensure quality requirement of applications built upon an opportunistic network

How do CSR and perceived ethics enhance corporate reputation and product innovativeness?

Market competitiveness is considered a core business objective besides profit-making in the current business environment, which instigates organisations to remain ethically and socially responsible. This leads to implied pressure on the organisation, whereas consumers expect to deal with ethically and socially responsible organisations. Therefore, this study explores the role of perceived corporate social responsibility (CSR) and ethics, which derives the organisational brand reputation and product innovativeness. The data was collected from 418 respondents, and partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) was applied for predicting the hypothesised relationships. The results revealed the positive and significant hypothesised relationships. As per findings, CSR and ethics positively correlated with product innovativeness, brand equity, and customer trust. Based on the results, organisations are advised to have transparency and higher compliance towards ethics and CSR strategies. In contrast, organisations need to have good communication of their adherence, which can further assist them in improving the customer base and maintaining the competitive advantage. These outcomes offer valuable policies

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Changes in lesson plans as teachers participate in a professional development on statistical literacy

Research on mathematics teacher knowledge has gained momentum recently; however, research on teacher planning is scarce, especially using lesson plans as the primary data source. This study examines how teachers' lesson plans change as they participate in a professional development, supporting them in implementing the Vietnamese reformed Curriculum 2018. Using a design-based research methodology, we developed a research-informed framework that assesses teachers' lesson plans for developing students' statistical literacy as emphasized in the mathematics Curriculum. Informed by research literature and data collected from teachers, the framework including seven criteria was shared and used by 61 teachers to reflect on the quality of their lessons. The analysis of 38 lesson plans shows all criteria have improved from pre- to post-lesson plans. The teachers included more explicit and comprehensive learning intentions in their post-lessons. Tasks in the post-lesson plans afforded more opportunities for students to develop statistical literacy, helped them engage in the statistical investigation using real data, and included multiple representations. Finally, the post-lesson plans tended to follow the constructivist teaching principles. Implications on ways to develop teachers' planning competence and suggestions for future studies are included. © 2023 Authors

Parental satisfaction with quality of neonatal care in different level hospitals: evidence from Vietnam

Most health systems provide the most specialized, and presumably also the highest quality of care at a central level. This study assessed parental satisfaction and its determinants in the context of neonatal care in a provincial as well as a national hospital of Vietnam.; In this cross-sectional quantitative study, parents of 340 preterm infants admitted to neonatal care units of a national and a provincial hospital in 2018 were interviewed using structured questionnaires. Unadjusted and adjusted linear regression models were used to assess the relationship between parental satisfaction and hospital rank.; The mean parental satisfaction score was 3.74 at the provincial, and 3.56 at the national hospital. These satisfaction differences persisted when parent and child characteristics were adjusted for in multivariate analysis. Longer length of stay and worsening infant health status were associated with parents reporting lower levels of satisfaction with the quality of care being provided at the healthcare facility.; This study suggests that parents of preterm infants admitted in a provincial hospital were more satisfied with the quality of care received than those in a specialized national hospital. Length of stay and infant health status were the two most important determinants of level of parental satisfaction

Does green finance facilitate firms in achieving corporate social responsibility goals?

Socio-economic and environment-friendly initiatives are imperative to ensure sustainable development. And corporate social responsibility (CSR) emerged as a solution to create a balance in society through sustainable business performance. However, organizations need plentiful resources to comply with the philosophies of sustainability and CSR. Therefore, the current study explores the role of green financing that covers the social, environmental, and economic aspects of green financing for achieving, excelling and enhancing CSR in the banking sector. Through the employment of survey methodology and the application of Partial Least Square-Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM), the data confirms the contributing role of green finance and its respective dimensions (Environmental, Economics, and Social) in enhancing the multiple facets of CSR. Based on these findings, it is recommended that the banking sector should allocate additional financial resources to promote CSR attributes

Ecological innovation for environmental sustainability and human capital development: the role of environmental regulations and renewable energy in advanced economies

This study examines the trends in environmental sustainability and human well-being through green technologies, clean energy, and environmental taxes using panel data for the top eight advanced economies from 1990 to 2018. The study applies an advanced panel technique, cross-sectionally augmented distributed lags (CS-ARDL), to find long-run and short-run associations between these variables. Moreover, the role of foreign investment is added as a control variable. The CS-ARDL estimation confirms the productive impact of green technologies on environmental and human well-being, providing that it helps to reduce haze pollution while promoting human development. Moreover, clean energy and environmental taxes contribute toa sustainable environment and human development. Moreover, foreign investment is a direct source of haze pollution because of more industrialization and economic activities. The study finally recommends strengthening the promotion of green technology and clean energy to achieve both environmental and human well-being in the long run

Application of AHP algorithm on power distribution of load shedding in island microgrid

This paper proposes a method of load shedding in a microgrid system operated in an Island Mode, which is disconnected with the main power grid and balanced loss of the electrical power. This proposed method calculates the minimum value of the shed power with reference to renewable energy sources such as wind power generator, solar energy and the ability to control the frequency of the generator to restore the frequency to the allowable range and reduce the amount of load that needs to be shed. Computing the load importance factor (LIF) using AHP algorithm supports to determine the order of which load to be shed. The damaged outcome of load shedding, thus, will be noticeably reduced. The experimental results of this proposed method is demonstrated by simulating on IEEE 16-Bus microgrid system with six power sources