Cortisol reactivity to psychosocial stress is greater in sexual risk takers

Several studies have reported an association between deviant behaviour and cortisol reactivity to stress. However relatively few studies have investigated the relationship between psychobiological stress reactivity and sexual risk taking behaviours. In the present study, cortisol reactivity to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) was measured in 26 healthy young adults prior to the administration of a sexual health and behaviour questionnaire. The cortisol response to the TSST was greater in those individuals who reported that at least one of their previous two sexual partners was someone whom they had just met. Results are discussed in context of a model which suggests that early life stress dysregulates the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis and increases the likelihood of later life risk taking behaviour. The findings have implications in terms of improving our understanding of psychobiological factors which predispose individuals to engage in adverse sexual health behaviours

Isolation and characterization of the rhealogical properties of the gum produced by Alcalgines viscolactis as grown in whey substrate

The objectives of this study were to isolate the gum produced by Alcaligenes viscolactis grown in whey and to characterize the rheological properties of the gum as they pertain to food systems. A 5% inoculum of A. viscolactis was grown in whey for 120 hours at 21° C. The gum was harvested by acid precipi-tation followed by washing with water and acetone and air-drying. The effects of gum concentration, salt concentration, pH, heating treatment, and temperature of measurement on the viscosity of aqueous solutions of the gum were studied. Gum concentration was found to have the largest significant effect on viscosity followed by temperature of measurement, heating treatment, and salt. The effect of pH was not significant. Using the analysis of variance data, a regression polynomial was derived. Correlation between predicted and observed viscosities was 0.91

Resource centre at the South African museum

No Abstract

The origin, development and decline of back-to-back houses in Leeds, 1787-1937

This paper traces the development of back-to-back house building in Leeds. It first outlines the origin of the house type, before examining the urban layout, building form and social aspects of back-to-back courts in the first half of the 19th century, and the role of speculative developers, building societies and sanitary reformers. The focus then turns to the bills, acts and by-laws of the later 19th- and early 20th-century, and the determination of the people of Leeds to retain their preferred house type. Together, these brought improvements to the design and facilities, culminating in a house type that was far superior to that which was condemned by the back-to-back critics, and arguably had overcome all of the criticisms by the time construction of back-to-backs was prohibited in 1909

Living with schizophrenia: A phenomenological study of people with schizophrenia living in the community.

Research question: How do you people with schizophrenia and their carers live with a diagnosis of schizophrenia? Research aim: To gain a greater understanding of the meaning and experience of schizophrenia. The objective of this phenomenological study was to explore the lived experience of schizophrenia. Sample: Self-selected sample of 35 participants (22 people with schizophrenia and 13 carers) recruited from the local community. . Data collection: 33 unstructured audiotaped interviews conducted in participants¿ own homes. In addition some participants completed diaries. Interviews were conducted in two stages: in stage one 10 participants were interviewed, transcripts were analysed and probes were fine tuned and in stage two these probes were used in the remaining interviews. Data analysis: Verbatim transcripts were analysed using the coding paradigm proposed by Strauss (1987), in conjunction with Burnard¿s (1991) 14 stage model of analysis. Inductive coding was used and respondent validation was completed. Findings: Stress was described as a major cause of schizophrenia. Some participants with schizophrenia described moving on in their lives, a factor associated with having a positive self-concept. Other participants with schizophrenia reported feeling stopped in their lives, which was associated with acceptance of the diagnosis, and having a negative self-concept. The most severe problems they reported were social and psychological. Male and female participants with schizophrenia were treated differently. Some participants with schizophrenia sought support while others chose isolation. Mental health nursing care was reported as coercive and disempowering. Carers described conflict within families, carer burden, and stress. Those who had been caregiving for longer appeared to have adapted and now experienced less stress and burden than others. Younger carers and carers who have been caregiving for a shorter time and were less willing to accept the caregiving role, reported more burden and stress. Conclusions: These findings suggest that a positive self-concept may be necessary to move on after the diagnosis of schizophrenia. The inability to move on may be a result of a negative self-concept or disempowering care. There was no partnership and no shared understanding of schizophrenia, or of care, between these participants with schizophrenia and nurses, or between these participants with schizophrenia and their carers, or between carers and nurses. Many of the participants¿ self-identified needs were not met. A new attitude displaying reluctance about a caregiving role may be emerging

Interprofessional collaboration to improve professional practice and healthcare outcomes

BackgroundPoor interprofessional collaboration (IPC) can adversely affect the delivery of health services and patient care. Interventions that address IPC problems have the potential to improve professional practice and healthcare outcomes.ObjectivesTo assess the impact of practice-based interventions designed to improve interprofessional collaboration (IPC) amongst health and social care professionals, compared to usual care or to an alternative intervention, on at least one of the following primary outcomes: patient health outcomes, clinical process or efficiency outcomes or secondary outcomes (collaborative behaviour).Search methodsWe searched CENTRAL (2015, issue 11), MEDLINE, CINAHL, ClinicalTrials.gov and WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform to November 2015. We handsearched relevant interprofessional journals to November 2015, and reviewed the reference lists of the included studies.Selection criteriaWe included randomised trials of practice-based IPC interventions involving health and social care professionals compared to usual care or to an alternative intervention.Data collection and analysisTwo review authors independently assessed the eligibility of each potentially relevant study. We extracted data from the included studies and assessed the risk of bias of each study. We were unable to perform a meta-analysis of study outcomes, given the small number of included studies and their heterogeneity in clinical settings, interventions and outcomes. Consequently, we summarised the study data and presented the results in a narrative format to report study methods, outcomes, impact and certainty of the evidence.Main resultsWe included nine studies in total (6540 participants); six cluster-randomised trials and three individual randomised trials (1 study randomised clinicians, 1 randomised patients, and 1 randomised clinicians and patients). All studies were conducted in high-income countries (Australia, Belgium, Sweden, UK and USA) across primary, secondary, tertiary and community care settings and had a follow-up of up to 12 months. Eight studies compared an IPC intervention with usual care and evaluated the effects of different practice-based IPC interventions: externally facilitated interprofessional activities (e.g. team action planning; 4 studies), interprofessional rounds (2 studies), interprofessional meetings (1 study), and interprofessional checklists (1 study). One study compared one type of interprofessional meeting with another type of interprofessional meeting. We assessed four studies to be at high risk of attrition bias and an equal number of studies to be at high risk of detection bias.For studies comparing an IPC intervention with usual care, functional status in stroke patients may be slightly improved by externally facilitated interprofessional activities (1 study, 464 participants, low-certainty evidence). We are uncertain whether patient-assessed quality of care (1 study, 1185 participants), continuity of care (1 study, 464 participants) or collaborative working (4 studies, 1936 participants) are improved by externally facilitated interprofessional activities, as we graded the evidence as very low-certainty for these outcomes. Healthcare professionals’ adherence to recommended practices may be slightly improved with externally facilitated interprofessional activities or interprofessional meetings (3 studies, 2576 participants, low certainty evidence). The use of healthcare resources may be slightly improved by externally facilitated interprofessional activities, interprofessional checklists and rounds (4 studies, 1679 participants, low-certainty evidence). None of the included studies reported on patient mortality, morbidity or complication rates.Compared to multidisciplinary audio conferencing, multidisciplinary video conferencing may reduce the average length of treatment and may reduce the number of multidisciplinary conferences needed per patient and the patient length of stay. There was little or no difference between these interventions in the number of communications between health professionals (1 study, 100 participants; low- certainty evidence).Authors’ conclusionsGiven that the certainty of evidence from the included studies was judged to be low to very low, there is not sufficient evidence to draw clear conclusions on the effects of IPC interventions. Neverthess, due to the difficulties health professionals encounter when collaborating in clinical practice, it is encouraging that research on the number of interventions to improve IPC has increased since this review was last updated. While this field is developing, further rigorous, mixed-method studies are required. Future studies should focus on longer acclimatisation periods before evaluating newly implemented IPC interventions, and use longer follow-up to generate a more informed understanding of the effects of IPC on clinical practice

Photodynamics of the nitrogen-vacancy colour centre in diamond

The nitrogen-vacancy (N-V⁻) colour centre in diamond has potential applications in quantum information processing and single photon generation. It is currently the only known defect in a solid detected at a single site level that has a non-zero spin in the electronic ground state. For the proposed applications it is desirable to have a good understanding of the electronic structure and photodynamics of the centre, however this is currently not the case. Various models have been proposed to explain the fluorescence characteristics observed in single site experiments. The challenge has been to also account for the properties of the centre well-known from observations of the fluorescence from large ensembles of N-V⁻ in diamond. Firstly, that a non-Boltzmann population distribution between the. ground state spin levels is induced by optical excitation. Secondly, that the fluorescence intensity exhibits a strong dependence on the spin orientation. The models proposed to date either cannot account for these properties, or do so only by invoking optical processes that are arbitrary or, in some cases, not physical. In this thesis an alternative model is presented. The derivation of the model, from group theoretical considerations, does not form part of this thesis. This thesis is concerned primarily with a series of independent measurements to determine the transition rates which govern the photodynamics of the centre. When these transition rates are known, there will be no free parameters in the model and the N-V⁻ emission can be simulated for an arbitrary optical field by solving the classical rate equations. To conclude the first part of this thesis, a two-pulse optical excitation is considered and the results of experiment are compared to the predictions of the model. The latter part of t his thesis is concerned with optically detecting single N-V⁻ centres. A confocal microscope system, to enable single site detection, was developed as part of this work. The photon statistics from a single N-V⁻ centre is compared to the statistics predicted by the model. The implications for the modelling of individual N-V⁻ photon statistics are discussed

Spin-flip and spin-conserving optical transitions of the nitrogen-vacancy centre in diamond

We map out the first excited state sublevel structure of single nitrogen-vacancy (NV) colour centres in diamond. The excited state is an orbital doublet where one branch supports an efficient cycling transition, while the other can simultaneously support fully allowed optical Raman spin-flip transitions. This is crucial for the success of many recently proposed quantum information applications of the NV defects. We further find that an external electric field can be used to completely control the optical properties of a single centre. Finally, a group theoretical model is developed that explains the observations and provides good physical understanding of the excited state structure

Empowering young people who experienced domestic violence and abuse: The development of a group therapy intervention

This article describes the development of a group-based therapeutic intervention for young people (YP) who have lived with domestic violence and abuse. The intervention was informed by interviews with 107 YP, focused on their experiences of coping, resilience and agency. The intervention draws on resources from systemic, creative and narrative approaches to group work, and aims to facilitate YP's expression of distress in a way that recognizes that it is embodied, contextual and relational. The intervention also explores YP's existing strategies for coping and maintaining a sense of agency, and works to harness, enhance and further develop those skills. We report on the pilot of this intervention, and its development and application across four European countries (the United Kingdom, Greece, Italy and Spain). We outline the goals, strengths and limitations of this group intervention, as well as the main challenges, hindrances and ethical dilemmas experienced by the research and intervention team. Implications for therapeutic practice and training are addressed