The Gastrostomy Feeding Button™

The button™ feeding device replaces conventional long-term gastrostomy feeding tubes. Health care professionals can educate parents on maintenance of the button and provide them with emotional support

Design description of the Tangaye Village photovoltaic power system

The engineering design of a stand alone photovoltaic (PV) powered grain mill and water pump for the village of Tangaye, Upper Volta is described. The socioeconomic effects of reducing the time required by women in rural areas for drawing water and grinding grain were studied. The suitability of photovoltaic technology for use in rural areas by people of limited technical training was demonstrated. The PV system consists of a 1.8-kW (peak) solar cell array, 540 ampere hours of battery storage, instrumentation, automatic controls, and a data collection and storage system. The PV system is situated near an improved village well and supplies d.c. power to a grain mill and a water pump. The array is located in a fenced area and the mill, battery, instruments, controls, and data system are in a mill building. A water storage tank is located near the well. The system employs automatic controls which provide battery charge regulation and system over and under voltage protection. This report includes descriptions of the engineering design of the system and of the load that it serves; a discussion of PV array and battery sizing methodology; descriptions of the mechanical and electrical designs including the array, battery, controls, and instrumentation; and a discussion of the safety features. The system became operational on March 1, 1979

Operational performance of the photovoltaic-powered grain mill and water pump at Tangaye, Burkina Faso (formerly Upper Volta)

A photovoltaic (PV) system powering a grain mill and water pump was installed in the remote African village of Tangaye, Burkina Faso (formerly Upper Volta) under the sponsorship of the U.S. Agency for International Development (AID) and by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Lewis Research Center (LeRC) in early 1979. The presence reports covers the second two years of operation from April 1981 through June 1983. During this time, the grain mill and water pump were operational 96 and 88 percent of the time respectively, and the PV system generated sufficient electricity to enable the grinding of about 111 metric tons of finely ground flow and the pumping of over 5000 cm sq of water from the 10 m deep well. The report includes a description of the current configuration of the system, a review of system performance, a discussion of the socioeconomic impact of the system on the villagers and a summary of results and conclusions covering the entire four-year period

Smooth empirical Bayes estimation of observation error variances in linear systems

A smooth empirical Bayes estimator was developed for estimating the unknown random scale component of each of a set of observation error variances. It is shown that the estimator possesses a smaller average squared error loss than other estimators for a discrete time linear system

Biden’s “Blue” Hydrogen Plan is not the Answer

The excitement about hydrogen as a fuel and energy source is similar to buying an electric vehicle (EV) thinking it will reduce your personal CO2 emissions. On the surface, it seems great! No greenhouse gas emissions while driving is certainly better than the greenhouse gasses released from a normal combustion engine car, but when you consider other effects, it’s no longer as great. What if the grid that you plug your EV into is powered primarily by coal? What about the environmental and human rights impacts of mining the materials to make the batteries? What about the lack of a battery recycling program in the United States

Evaluation of Interrater Reliability for Coding of Types of Gazes in Nurse-Patient Dyads

1st Place in Emerging Issues in Healthcare policy, Administration, and Workforce Category at The OSU Denman Undergraduate Research ForumThe purpose of this secondary analysis project was to describe and evaluate processes of interrater reliability assessment based on 13 videotapes of ICU nurse-patient dyads that were collected as part of a prior study (Happ et al., 2004). The videos were coded for four types of gazes (relating, assessing, technical doing, listening) during nursing care in the Medical (MICU) or Cardiothoracic Intensive Care Unit (CTICU). Interrater reliability is important to establish in research data collection, codebook development, and standardized nursing assessments in clinical practice. Steps described by Lombard et al. (2010) constituted the overall framework for interrater reliability assessment for the coding of gazes for the videotaped nurse-patient dyads. Raw percentage agreement for the four types of gazes was calculated by dividing the number of times the data collectors agreed by the total number of gazes per videotape within and across the videotapes. Overall, the coders agreed in the coding of the four visual gazes across the 13 videotapes 70% of the time, but with a substantial range of agreement from 58% to 90% for ratings of individual videotapes. The overall percentage was lower than the target goal of at least 75% agreement per videotape, with only one gaze, “relating,” achieving a percentage agreement (90%) exceeding 75%. Sources of disagreement in coding arose from formative clarifications of the codebook definitions, but evolved over time to improved agreement for coding as the codebook was refined. As definitions were clarified during the coding process, fewer disagreements in coding of the gazes were found over the 13 videotapes. The raw percentage agreement could be improved by rating more training videos to better refine the codebook prior to the official coding of the videos. Further research could use the Kappa coefficient method of establishing interrater reliability, which adjusts for agreement that occurs by chance.No embargoAcademic Major: Nursin

Evaluation of Interrater Reliability for Coding of Types of Gazes in Nurse-Patient Dyads

Health Professions - Clinical: 1st Place (The Ohio State University Denman Undergraduate Research Forum)The purpose of this secondary analysis project was to describe and evaluate processes of interrater reliability assessment based on 13 videotapes of ICU nurse-patient dyads that were collected as part of a prior study (Happ et al., 2004). The videos were coded for four types of gazes (relating, assessing, technical doing, listening) during nursing care in the Medical (MICU) or Cardiothoracic Intensive Care Unit (CTICU). Interrater reliability is important to establish in research data collection, codebook development, and standardized nursing assessments in clinical practice. Steps described by Lombard et al. (2010) constituted the overall framework for interrater reliability assessment for the coding of gazes for the videotaped nurse-patient dyads. Raw percentage agreement for the four types of gazes was calculated by dividing the number of times the data collectors agreed by the total number of gazes per videotape within and across the videotapes. Overall, the coders agreed in the coding of the four visual gazes across the 13 videotapes 70% of the time, but with a substantial range of agreement from 58% to 90% for ratings of individual videotapes. The overall percentage was lower than the target goal of at least 75% agreement per videotape, with only one gaze, “relating,” achieving a percentage agreement (90%) exceeding 75%. Sources of disagreement in coding arose from formative clarifications of the codebook definitions, but evolved over time to improved agreement for coding as the codebook was refined. As definitions were clarified during the coding process, fewer disagreements in coding of the gazes were found over the 13 videotapes. The raw percentage agreement could be improved by rating more training videos to better refine the codebook prior to the official coding of the videos. Further research could use the Kappa coefficient method of establishing interrater reliability, which adjusts for agreement that occurs by chance.No embargoAcademic Major: Nursin