Recruitment and selection in Europe: one step beyond

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Development of Resting Cell Assay Protocol to Characterize Sulfolane Degrading Bacteria

Sulfolane is a chemical contaminant present in hundreds of commercial and residential drinking wells in the North Pole area. Due to the possible health impacts of consumption, degradation/removal of the sulfolane from contaminated wells is necessary. Microbial isolates taken from sulfolane contaminated sites have shown the potential to degrade sulfolane. It is the purpose of my research to design a protocol by which sulfolane tolerant bacteria could be screened or their potential to utilize sulfolane as a sole carbon source (SOCS), and characterize them as sulfolane degraders

Institutionalizing health impact assessment in London as a public health tool for increasing synergy between policies in other areas

Objectives: To describe the background to the inclusion of health impact assessment (HIA) in the development process for the London mayoral strategies, the HIA processes developed, how these evolved, and the role of HIA in identifying synergies between and conflicting priorities of different strategies.Study design: Case series.Methods: Early HIAs had just a few weeks for the whole HIA process. A rapid appraisal approach was developed. Stages included: scoping, reviewing published evidence, a stakeholder workshop, drafting a report, review of the report by the London Health Commission, and submission of the final report to the Mayor. The process evolved as more assessments were conducted. More recently, an integrated impact assessment (IIA) method has been developed that fuses the key aspects of this HIA method with sustainability assessment, strategic environmental assessment and equalities assessment.Results: Whilst some of the early strategy drafts encompassed some elements of health, health was not a priority. Conducting HIAs was important both to ensure that the strategies reflected health concerns and to raise awareness about health and its determinants within the Greater London Authority (GLA). HIA recommendations were useful for identifying synergies and conflicts between strategies. HIA can be successfully integrated into other impact assessment processes.Conclusions: The HIAs ensured that health became more integral to the strategies and increased understanding of determinants of health and how the GLA impacts on health and health inequalities. Inclusion of HIA within IIA ensures that health and health inequalities impacts are considered robustly within statutory impact assessments. (C) 2010 The Royal Society for Public Health. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved