1,082 research outputs found
Telling donor-conceived children about their conception: Evaluation of the use of the Donor Conception Network children's books
If parents have used donated gametes, it is a personal choice whether they disclose to their children. For those that do, there is, however, little advice on how to tell their children. The Donor Conception Network (DCN) has made a series of books to help parents disclose. This study evaluated parents’ experience of using these books. An online survey with both quantitative and qualitative questions was used. The DCN membership and social media were used to publicize the survey, and 108 responses were analysed. At the time of conception, the parents’ family types were mainly mother and father (56.5%) and solo mothers (36.1%). The method of conception was mainly donor spermatozoa (55.6%) followed by donor egg (38.0%), double donation (8.3%) and one case of surrogacy. Most parents had read the book to their children before 2 years of age (76.9%). Before reading the books, some of the parents had some confidence in telling (43.5%) or were very confident in telling (30.6%). After reading the books, 60.2% reported having much more confidence in telling. Most parents felt their children had no understanding (76.8%) or only some understanding (22.3%) of donor conception before reading the books. After reading the books most parents felt their children's understanding had increased (71.3%). Most parents felt that reading the books had given them more confidence in using donor conception language (90.7%). The use of books to tell children about their conception may be a useful resource for parents wishing to be open with their children
Chaotic Scattering and Capture of Strings by Black Hole
We consider scattering and capture of circular cosmic strings by a
Schwarzschild black hole. Although being a priori a very simple axially
symmetric two-body problem, it shows all the features of chaotic scattering. In
particular, it contains a fractal set of unstable periodic solutions; a
so-called strange repellor. We study the different types of trajectories and
obtain the fractal dimension of the basin-boundary separating the space of
initial conditions according to the different asymptotic outcomes. We also
consider the fractal dimension as a function of energy, and discuss the
transition from order to chaos.Comment: RevTeX 3.1, 9 pages, 5 figure
The randomly driven Ising ferromagnet, Part I: General formalism and mean field theory
We consider the behavior of an Ising ferromagnet obeying the Glauber dynamics
under the influence of a fast switching, random external field. After
introducing a general formalism for describing such systems, we consider here
the mean-field theory. A novel type of first order phase transition related to
spontaneous symmetry breaking and dynamic freezing is found. The
non-equilibrium stationary state has a complex structure, which changes as a
function of parameters from a singular-continuous distribution with Euclidean
or fractal support to an absolutely continuous one.Comment: 12 pages REVTeX/LaTeX format, 12 eps/ps figures. Submitted to Journal
of Physics
Inter-Intra Molecular Dynamics as an Iterated Function System
The dynamics of units (molecules) with slowly relaxing internal states is
studied as an iterated function system (IFS) for the situation common in e.g.
biological systems where these units are subjected to frequent collisional
interactions. It is found that an increase in the collision frequency leads to
successive discrete states that can be analyzed as partial steps to form a
Cantor set. By considering the interactions among the units, a self-consistent
IFS is derived, which leads to the formation and stabilization of multiple such
discrete states. The relevance of the results to dynamical multiple states in
biomolecules in crowded conditions is discussed.Comment: 7 pages, 7 figures. submitted to Europhysics Letter
Fractal Image Coding as Projections Onto Convex Sets
Abstract. We show how fractal image coding can be viewed and gen-eralized in terms of the method of projections onto convex sets (POCS). In this approach, the fractal code denes a set of spatial domain sim-ilarity constraints. We also show how such a reformulation in terms of POCS allows additional contraints to be imposed during fractal image decoding. Two applications are presented: image construction with an incomplete fractal code and image denoising.
Coherent States Measurement Entropy
Coherent states (CS) quantum entropy can be split into two components. The
dynamical entropy is linked with the dynamical properties of a quantum system.
The measurement entropy, which tends to zero in the semiclassical limit,
describes the unpredictability induced by the process of a quantum approximate
measurement. We study the CS--measurement entropy for spin coherent states
defined on the sphere discussing different methods dealing with the time limit
. In particular we propose an effective technique of computing
the entropy by iterated function systems. The dependence of CS--measurement
entropy on the character of the partition of the phase space is analysed.Comment: revtex, 22 pages, 14 figures available upon request (e-mail:
[email protected]). Submitted to J.Phys.
Astrophysical thermonuclear functions
As theoretical knowledge and experimental verification of nuclear cross
sections increases it becomes possible to refine analytic representations for
nuclear reaction rates. In this paper mathematical/statistical techniques for
deriving closed-form representations of thermonuclear functions are summarized
and numerical results for them are given.The purpose of the paper is also to
compare numerical results for approximate and closed-form representations of
thermonuclear functions.Comment: 17 pages in LaTeX, 8 figures available on request from
[email protected]
Multifractal analysis of the metal-insulator transition in anisotropic systems
We study the Anderson model of localization with anisotropic hopping in three
dimensions for weakly coupled chains and weakly coupled planes. The eigenstates
of the Hamiltonian, as computed by Lanczos diagonalization for systems of sizes
up to , show multifractal behavior at the metal-insulator transition even
for strong anisotropy. The critical disorder strength determined from the
system size dependence of the singularity spectra is in a reasonable agreement
with a recent study using transfer matrix methods. But the respective spectrum
at deviates from the ``characteristic spectrum'' determined for the
isotropic system. This indicates a quantitative difference of the multifractal
properties of states of the anisotropic as compared to the isotropic system.
Further, we calculate the Kubo conductivity for given anisotropies by exact
diagonalization. Already for small system sizes of only sites we observe
a rapidly decreasing conductivity in the directions with reduced hopping if the
coupling becomes weaker.Comment: 25 RevTeX pages with 10 PS-figures include
Feedback GAP: pragmatic, cluster-randomized trial of goal setting and action plans to increase the effectiveness of audit and feedback interventions in primary care
Background
Audit and feedback to physicians is a commonly used quality improvement strategy, but its optimal design is unknown. This trial tested the effects of a theory-informed worksheet to facilitate goal setting and action planning, appended to feedback reports on chronic disease management, compared to feedback reports provided without these worksheets.
Methods
A two-arm pragmatic cluster randomized trial was conducted, with allocation at the level of primary care clinics. Participants were family physicians who contributed data from their electronic medical records. The ‘usual feedback’ arm received feedback every six months for two years regarding the proportion of their patients meeting quality targets for diabetes and/or ischemic heart disease. The intervention arm received these same reports plus a worksheet designed to facilitate goal setting and action plan development in response to the feedback reports. Blood pressure (BP) and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL) values were compared after two years as the primary outcomes. Process outcomes measured the proportion of guideline-recommended actions (e.g., testing and prescribing) conducted within the appropriate timeframe. Intention-to-treat analysis was performed.
Results
Outcomes were similar across groups at baseline. Final analysis included 20 physicians from seven clinics and 1,832 patients in the intervention arm (15% loss to follow up) and 29 physicians from seven clinics and 2,223 patients in the usual feedback arm (10% loss to follow up). Ten of 20 physicians completed the worksheet at least once during the study. Mean BP was 128/72 in the feedback plus worksheet arm and 128/73 in the feedback alone arm, while LDL was 2.1 and 2.0, respectively. Thus, no significant differences were observed across groups in the primary outcomes, but mean haemoglobin A1c was lower in the feedback plus worksheet arm (7.2% versus 7.4%, p<0.001). Improvements in both arms were noted over time for one-half of the process outcomes.
Discussion
Appending a theory-informed goal setting and action planning worksheet to an externally produced audit and feedback intervention did not lead to improvements in patient outcomes. The results may be explained in part by passive dissemination of the worksheet leading to inadequate engagement with the intervention
Prevalence of facet joint pain in chronic spinal pain of cervical, thoracic, and lumbar regions
BACKGROUND: Facet joints are a clinically important source of chronic cervical, thoracic, and lumbar spine pain. The purpose of this study was to systematically evaluate the prevalence of facet joint pain by spinal region in patients with chronic spine pain referred to an interventional pain management practice. METHODS: Five hundred consecutive patients with chronic, non-specific spine pain were evaluated. The prevalence of facet joint pain was determined using controlled comparative local anesthetic blocks (1% lidocaine or 1% lidocaine followed by 0.25% bupivacaine), in accordance with the criteria established by the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP). The study was performed in the United States in a non-university based ambulatory interventional pain management setting. RESULTS: The prevalence of facet joint pain in patients with chronic cervical spine pain was 55% 5(95% CI, 49% – 61%), with thoracic spine pain was 42% (95% CI, 30% – 53%), and in with lumbar spine pain was 31% (95% CI, 27% – 36%). The false-positive rate with single blocks with lidocaine was 63% (95% CI, 54% – 72%) in the cervical spine, 55% (95% CI, 39% – 78%) in the thoracic spine, and 27% (95% CI, 22% – 32%) in the lumbar spine. CONCLUSION: This study demonstrated that in an interventional pain management setting, facet joints are clinically important spinal pain generators in a significant proportion of patients with chronic spinal pain. Because these patients typically have failed conservative management, including physical therapy, chiropractic treatment and analgesics, they may benefit from specific interventions designed to manage facet joint pain
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