Discretionary risks disclosure: a management perspective

Discretionary risks disclosure practices by managers provide useful information to investors and other users of accounting information in assessing the risk profile of a company. A managers’ ability to disclose relevant risk information that reflects more accurately the companies’ current and future financial performance will facilitate these users in making effective investment decisions. This paper aims to examine empirically the effect of management perception on the disclosure of risk-related information in companies’ annual reports, thus, exploring the current practices of risk reporting by managers of listed companies in Malaysia. The findings should provide useful information to regulators and other policymakers in identifying the factors that influence managers’ perception of risk-related information and, consequently, affect the extent and nature of risk information disclosed in companies’ annual reports. Overall, the findings reveal that enhanced understanding and perception on the overall risk concepts are important drivers that can facilitate managers in disclosing more comprehensive and relevant risk-related information. This, in turn, improves the trust and confidence of investors and other users of financial statements as their evaluations are influenced by the choices of information being disclosed in annual reports by managers

Medical errors related to look-alike and sound-alike drugs

Despite recent developments in the inventory management, introduction of electronic drug trolleys and cabinets, color coding of the filled syringes and many more interventions, medication errors could not be eliminated. The most common of these are syringe swap and human errors regarding wrong drug administration due to look-alike drug containers or sound-alike names of the drugs belonging to diverse groups. Many of the fatalities, that occur in third world countries due to these causes, go unnoticed and unregistered. This special article complements two special editorials on the same topic by Professor Joseph D. Tobias et al and Professor Robert Stoelting, a case report, a patient’s perspective and a ‘Cliniquiz’ being published in the current issue of the journal. It discusses salient features of this issue as well as preventive measures and recommendations. Key words: Medications; Medications errors; Adverse drug events; Look-alike drugs; Sound-alike drugs Tall man lettering; Medication Errors Reporting Program; Anesthesia Patient Safety Foundation Citation: Ismail S and Taqi A. Medical errors related to look-alike and sound-alike drug

Demographic and clinical characteristics of patients presenting with conversion disorder in a tertiary care hospital in north India

 Background: Conversion (functional neurological symptom) disorder refers to patients who have neurological symptoms in the absence of neurological disease, encompassing one or more symptoms of altered voluntary motor or sensory function. Aim of the study was to study the demographic and clinical characteristics of patients with conversion disorder.Methods: The study population comprised all the patients (both inpatients and outpatients) of conversion disorder attending department of psychiatry, government medical college Srinagar over a period of 6 months who fulfilled the inclusion criteria of the study were evaluated on a semi-structured proforma for demographic variables and clinical characteristics.Results: A total of 76 patients of conversion disorder were included in our study. Conversion disorder is more common in age group of 20-29 years (52.6%), females (93.4%) and among students (71.1%) belonging to rural background. Motor symptoms were the predominant presentation with pseudo seizure (69.7%) being the commonest. A majority of the patients had an obvious psychosocial stressor, of which family-related (36.8%) and relationship- related (15.8%) problems accounted for the major types.Conclusions: Conversion disorders are commonly seen in young adult females, students and in those from rural background. They are mostly preceded by psychosocial stressors

The effects of tasks on language-related episodes (LREs) during focus-on-form instruction

This paper discusses the effectiveness of using two task-types, dictogloss and opinion-gap tasks, in focus-on-form lessons to elicit language-related episodes (LREs) and produce modified output. The participants were 40 Form 6 students in a Malaysian secondary school in two intact classes. One group was taught using opinion-gap tasks and the other using dictogloss tasks. Results show that almost double the number of LREs was elicited in the dictogloss group compared to the opinion-gap group. However, more than 50% of the LREs in both groups were unresolved or wrongly resolved. These results imply the need to train learners to notice linguistic errors and engage in negotiations of form and meaning and could also indicate the need for teacher feedback on language use, perhaps during pre-task and post-task activities. The types of linguistic errors learners focused on might be an indication of learner developmental readiness which could influence task and text selection

Exact solutions for unsteady MHD free convection flow with time dependent shear stress

In this paper, the effects of MHD on unsteady free convection flow with time dependent shear stress are analyzed. The effects of thermal radiation and porosity on the flow are also studied. Closed-form solutions in general form are obtained by using the Laplace transform technique. The obtained results for velocity and temperature are found to satisfy all the imposed initial and boundary conditions and can be reduced to known solutions from the literature as limiting cases. The velocity profile is presented as a sum of convective and mechanical parts. The effects of shear stress and effective Prandtl number on velocity as well as temperature profiles are presented graphically and discussed in details

Stokes' second problem for rotating MHD flow of a maxwell fluid in a porous medium

An analysis is presented to establish the exact solution of Stokes' second problem for magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) rotating flows of Maxwell fluid in a porous medium. Based on modified Darcy's law the expressions for dimensionless velocity are obtained by using Laplace transform method. The derived steady and transient solutions satisfying the involved differential equations and imposed boundary and initial conditions. The influence of various parameters on the velocity has been analyzed in graphs and discussed

Heavy metals (Cd, Cu, Ph and Zn) concentrations in telescopium telescopium from Dumai Coastal Waters, Indonesia

Concentrations of cadmium, copper, lead and zinc in the marine gastropod, Telescopium telescopium, were determined to provide background information on heavy metal levels in the Straits of Malacca in the Indonesian side. Samples ofT. telescopium were collected from intertidal Dumai coastal waters at four stations inJuly 2004. The results of the present study showed that metal concentrations in the soft tissue ofT. telescopium varied at different sampling stations: 0.33 - 0.69 )1g/g; 9.38 - 52.29 )1g/g; 1.73 - 10. 78 )1g/g; 14.69 - 69.87 )1g/g dry weight far cadmium, copper, lead and zinc, respectively. Samples from Sungai Dumai station accumulated mare heavy metals when compared to other stations. Smaller T. telescopium accumulate mare metals than larger ones. Negative carrelations between metal concentrations and size (length and weight) were obseroed (except Cd and Cu in samples from Sungai Mesjid) with some variation in the carrelation coefficients which indicated metal regulation lJy the T. telescopiurn. Sungai Dumai showed the highest Metal Pollution Index (MPl) of 12.57 and Tomlinson Pollution Load Index (PLI) of 34.35 with Lubuk Gaung showing the lowest with 3.26 and 8.89, respectively. In general, the MPI and PU values indicate that metal pollution in Dumai coastal waters is not a serious threat yet and no drastic rectification measures are needed. However, as one of the most developing regions in Sumatera, further studies are necessary to assess temparal variation in metal accumulation and concentration for this species and other possible indicator organisms as well as in sediment from the surrounding areas in order to gain a better understanding of pollution status in Dumai coastal waters

Case Study: Recombinant Bromelain Selection

This chapter presents an investigation that we performed prior to the decision to proceed cloning and producing recombinant bromelain. The criteria that we examined were the following: (1) easy access to a DNA source; (2) broad application; (3) an enzyme size amenable to the cloning strategy; (4) available data in free online databases; (5) broad industrial application

Technical Efficiency of Paddy Farming in the East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia: A Comparison Based on DEA and SFA

The KADA and IADA KETARA are among important granary areas in Peninsular Malaysia producing paddy for domestic consumption. Both granaries are located in the East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia and involved with the new paddy scheme introduced by the Malaysian Government in 2008 during the world food crisis. This research was conducted to determine the best granary area in terms of technical efficiency (TE) based on two methods; Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA). The study involved interviewing with 148 paddy farmers using open and close ended questionnaires and the respondents were randomly chosen. The results showed that based on DEA indicator, IADA KETARA recorded the highest TE which is 0.90 while KADA obtained only 0.61. Based on SFA indicator, IADA KETARA indicated 0.84 TE while KADA, 0.67. The results consistently showed the TE scores estimated under DEA (TE-vrs) and SFA methodologies for IADA KETARA is greater than KADA and they are statistically significant at 5% level in both areas. Thus, it can be concluded that IADA KETARA are the best managed paddy farms in terms of technical efficiency compared to KADA. Keywords: Technical efficiency, paddy granary areas, Data Envelopment Analysis, Stochastic Frontier Analysi