30 research outputs found
Consumer Protection in Ecommerce: A case Study of Egypt
This paper examines electronic contract regulation in the context of business-to-consumer transactions. The technological advancement and cross-border nature of e-commerce have posed significant challenges to the Egyptian legal framework highlighting the limitations of general commercial contract rules with regards to electronic contracts. This thesis argues that access to the courts is hindered by restrictive terms in the electronic contracts over which the Egyptian law has no jurisdictional power. Accordingly, private institutions set the rules in the e-contracts and enforce them through private methods leaving no room for state intervention to ensure the protection of consumers. Hence, the application of national consumer law is impaired by the private practices that shape the transaction to their best business ends. Consumer protection is essential to promote access to the online market since it serves as a safety valve in face of the electronic risks. So, to increase the level of protection for consumers conducting e-transactions, the Egyptian legislator should adopt reforms to control the private mechanism to ensure consumer rightsâ application instead of informal negotiations to satisfy consumerâs problems
Optimization of Resources to Improve Patient Experience in the New Emergency Department of Mater Hospital Dublin
Healthcare systems globally are facing capacity issues due to the increased demand of health services, the high cost of resources and the level of quality anticipated of service providers. Emergency Departments (ED) are the most pressurized unit in healthcare systems due to uncertainty in demand and limited resources allocated. Mater Hospital (one of leading hospitals) in Dublin has built a new (state-of-the-art) unit for ED yet faced an issue in resourcing the unit to optimize performance. This paper presents an integrated solution to optimize the capacity of the new ED before opening to public and examine improvement interventions in the ED area. This solution provides ED management with a tool that can contribute significantly in enhancing patient experience by reducing the waiting time from 21 hours to 6 hours while achieving utilization below the 80% burn-out threshold. The model is recommended by Health Service Executives to be used national wide
Assabeyya : idiome de détresse : exploration anthropologique de la détresse psychologique de femmes dans le Caire contemporain
Cette recherche sâest fixĂ© de nombreux objectifs dont le principal est celui dâexplorer âassabeyya afin de dĂ©couvrir si c'est un idiome de dĂ©tresse exprimĂ© et manifestĂ© par de nombreuses femmes Ă©gyptiennes. Elle a ensuite cherchĂ© Ă savoir si âassabeyya est l'expression d'une souffrance Ă©motionnelle, exprimĂ©e Ă travers âles nerfsâ, et secondaire Ă l'exposition Ă de nombreux Ă©vĂ©nements traumatiques violents (violence directe ou violence indirecte comme violence structurelle et symbolique / culturelle) comme dans nervios. Le troisiĂšme objectif a Ă©tĂ© de voir s'il existe une biomĂ©dicalisation de cette souffrance sociale reprĂ©sentĂ©e par âassabeyya, et enfin, le dernier objectif a Ă©tĂ© de dĂ©couvrir si âassabeyya et trouble de la personnalitĂ© limite (TPL) sont en fait liĂ©s et s'ils rĂ©sultent tous deux des consĂ©quences traumatiques de l'exposition des femmes Ă©gyptiennes Ă ces nombreuses sources de violence. Des entretiens approfondis inspirĂ©s du modĂšle explicatif de la maladie ont Ă©tĂ© mis en place pour recueillir des informations, notamment sur le type de souffrance et l'exposition Ă la violence de femmes d'une banlieue du Caire (patientes psychiatriques et non psychiatriques). La prĂ©sence de symptĂŽmes caractĂ©ristiques du TPL et de lâĂ©tat de stress post-traumatique complexe (ESPT) a aussi Ă©tĂ© recherchĂ©e. Les entretiens se sont Ă©galement dĂ©roulĂ©s auprĂšs de professionnels de la santĂ© mentale et de la santĂ© plus globalement, ainsi quâauprĂšs de personnes ressources issues de la mĂȘme communautĂ©. Lâanalyse des donnĂ©es a permis tout dâabord de confirmer les hypothĂšses avancĂ©es puis de dĂ©peindre une vision synthĂ©tique de âassabeyya, vision gravitant autour de la notion clĂ© dâassujettissement. La relation de lâassujettissement Ă âassabeyya a Ă©tĂ© analysĂ©e selon lâapproche tridimensionnelle de disease, illness et sickness (Kleinman et al. 1980, 2006) ainsi que les mĂ©canismes de coping que cet assujettissement induit et les types dâagencĂ©itĂ© quâil inspire, dont la victimcy (Honwana 2000). Assujettissement et âassabeyya ont Ă©tĂ© ensuite abordĂ©s, selon lâapproche ethnopsychiatrique Ă travers les concepts de âassabeyya khaldunienne (Ibn Khaldun 1986), dâaliĂ©nation et dâanomie (Durkheim 1960) ; et ethnopsychanalytique (Freud 1914-1916 ; 1961 ; Butler 1997). Enfin une approche existentielle a tentĂ© dâexplorer la relation de âassabeyya Ă lâassujettissement donnant ainsi Ă âassabeyya une portĂ©e qui dĂ©passe le domaine de lâanthropologie et de la psychiatrie pour atteindre ceux de la politique et de la philosophie.This research has set many objectives, the main one was to explore 'assabeyya in order to discover if it is an idiom of distress expressed and manifested by many Egyptian women. The research investigated then whether âassabeyya is the expression of an emotional suffering, expressed through ânerves', secondary to exposure to many violent traumatic events (direct or indirect violence as structural and symbolic /cultural violence) as in nervios, nevra, nervos or even nerves. The third objective was to see if there is a biomedicalization of this social suffering represented by âassabeyya, and finally the last objective was to discover if âassabeyya and borderline personality disorder (BPD) are in fact related resulting both from the traumatic consequences of Egyptian women's exposure to these numerous sources of violence. In-depth interviews based on the explanatory model of the disease were set in order to gather information on the type of suffering and exposure to violence of women in a Cairo suburb, who were psychiatric and non-psychiatric patients. The presence of characteristic symptoms of BPD and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) was also investigated. In addition, interviews were conducted with mental health professionals and more broadly with health professionals, as well as with resource persons from the same community. The analysis of the data allowed, first, to confirm the hypotheses put forward, and then to depict a synthetic vision of âassabeyya, a vision revolving around the key notion of subjugation. The relationship between subjugation and âassabeyya has been analyzed according to the three-dimensional approach of disease, illness and sickness (Kleinman et al., 1980, 2006), along with the coping mechanisms induced by this subjugation and the types of agency it inspires, including victimcy (Honwana 2000). Subjection and âassabeyya were then analyzed according to the ethnopsychiatric approach through the concepts of Khaldunian âassabeyya (Ibn Khaldun 1986), alienation and anomie (Durkheim 1960); and through the ethnopsychanalytic one (Freud 1914-1916, 1961; Butler 1997). Finally, an existential approach has attempted to explore the relation of âassabeyya to subjugation, providing âassabeyya with a scope beyond the field of anthropology and psychiatry, to reach those of politics and philosophy
HumanâComputer Interaction and Participation in Software Crowdsourcing
Improvements in communication and networking technologies have transformed peopleâs lives and organizationsâ activities. Web 2.0 innovation has provided a variety of hybridized applications and tools that have changed enterprisesâ functional and communication processes. People use numerous platforms to broaden their social contacts, select items, execute duties, and learn new things. Context: Crowdsourcing is an internet-enabled problem-solving strategy that utilizes humanâcomputer interaction to leverage the expertise of people to achieve business goals. In crowdsourcing approaches, three main entities work in collaboration to solve various problems. These entities are requestors (job providers), platforms, and online users. Tasks are announced by requestors on crowdsourcing platforms, and online users, after passing initial screening, are allowed to work on these tasks. Crowds participate to achieve various rewards. Motivation: Crowdsourcing is gaining importance as an alternate outsourcing approach in the software engineering industry. Crowdsourcing application development involves complicated tasks that vary considerably from the micro-tasks available on platforms such as Amazon Mechanical Turk. To obtain the tangible opportunities of crowdsourcing in the realm of software development, corporations should first grasp how this technique works, what problems occur, and what factors might influence community involvement and co-creation. Online communities have become more popular recently with the rise in crowdsourcing platforms. These communities concentrate on specific problems and help people with solving and managing these problems. Objectives: We set three main goals to research crowd interaction: (1) find the appropriate characteristics of social crowd utilized for effective software crowdsourcing, (2) highlight the motivation of a crowd for virtual tasks, and (3) evaluate primary participation reasons by assessing various crowds using Fuzzy AHP and TOPSIS method. Conclusion: We developed a decision support system to examine the appropriate reasons of crowd participation in crowdsourcing. Rewards and employments were evaluated as the primary motives of crowds for accomplishing tasks on crowdsourcing platforms, knowledge sharing was evaluated as the third reason, ranking was the fourth, competency was the fifth, socialization was sixth, and source of inspiration was the seventh.Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University Researchers Supporting - Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Project number (PNURSP2023TR140)
AN INTEGRATED APPROACH OF MULTI-OBJECTIVE OPTIMIZATION MODEL FOR EVALUATING NEW SUPPORTING PROGRAM IN IRISH HOSPITALS
Hospitals are witnessing an inexorable growth in emergency admissions, which results in overcrowding and a poorer patient experience. The Acute Medicine Program (AMP) is one of the programs developed by the Irish health authority aimed at improving patient experience. To review the AMP intervention, this study applies a model that integrates three analytical approaches: simulation, multivariate factor analysis and multi-objective optimization. The simulation identified 14 different factors affecting five responses that were used to develop a Design of Experiments (DoE). Multivariate factor analysis used the DoE to determine the factors creating âbottlenecksâ, such as downstream resources. The multi-objective optimization model, based on the Simulated Annealing approach, is applied to support management decisions on optimizing key parameters affecting the treatment journey of patients. A Pareto set of solutions found that an increase in downstream capacity and unit staff can lead to a 25% decrease at least in the patientâs experience time
Interleukin-6 in systemic sclerosis and potential correlation with pulmonary involvement
Background: A progressive pulmonary involvement is frequent in systemic sclerosis and it is the leading cause of morbidity and mortality. IL-6 has been implicated in the pathogenesis of systemic sclerosis via stimulation of fibroblasts to produce excess collagen and glycosaminoglycan. Specific correlation between IL-6 and lung involvement have not been found yet.
Aim: To study the possible correlation between lung involvement (assessed by spirometry and HRCT abnormalities) and the serum level of IL-6.
Subjects and methods: 20 patients with scleroderma compared with 20 matched volunteers as control group. All participants underwent spirometry, HRCT scan and serum IL-6 measurements. HRCT signs were scored according to Warrick et al. score for systemic sclerosis.
Results: Patients showed a statistically significant reduction in FVC%, FEF 25â75% and significantly higher ESR and IL-6 compared to control. There was a highly significant positive correlation between the total HRCT score and serum IL-6.
Conclusion: Serum IL-6 could be a marker of the degree of pulmonary involvement in patients with systemic sclerosis