4,443 research outputs found
The Legal Status of Gibraltar: Whose Rock is it Anyway?
This Note argues that the right to self-determination, as expressed in Resolution 1514, empowers the people of Gibraltar with the right to determine their own destiny. Part I discusses the factual and legal background of the dispute over sovereignty of both the City of Gibraltar, as well as the isthmus connecting the city to Spain. Part II explains the British, Spanish, and Gibraltarian claims to the territory, analyzing the relevant U.N. resolutions, agreements and legislation that have defined the respective rights of the three parties. Part III argues that Gibraltar has the right to self-determination and that Great Britain should no longer represent Gibraltar in negotiations with Spain. This Note concludes that, in accord with Resolution 1514, Gibraltar has the right to self-determination, and the Spanish claim to territorial integrity does not supersede this right
The Legal Status of Gibraltar: Whose Rock is it Anyway?
This Note argues that the right to self-determination, as expressed in Resolution 1514, empowers the people of Gibraltar with the right to determine their own destiny. Part I discusses the factual and legal background of the dispute over sovereignty of both the City of Gibraltar, as well as the isthmus connecting the city to Spain. Part II explains the British, Spanish, and Gibraltarian claims to the territory, analyzing the relevant U.N. resolutions, agreements and legislation that have defined the respective rights of the three parties. Part III argues that Gibraltar has the right to self-determination and that Great Britain should no longer represent Gibraltar in negotiations with Spain. This Note concludes that, in accord with Resolution 1514, Gibraltar has the right to self-determination, and the Spanish claim to territorial integrity does not supersede this right
Scintillation in the Circinus Galaxy water megamasers
We present observations of the 22 GHz water vapor megamasers in the Circinus
galaxy made with the Tidbinbilla 70m telescope. These observations confirm the
rapid variability seen earlier by Greenhill et al (1997). We show that this
rapid variability can be explained by interstellar scintillation, based on what
is now known of the interstellar scintillation seen in a significant number of
flat spectrum AGN. The observed variability cannot be fully described by a
simple model of either weak or diffractive scintillation.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures. AJ accepte
Evaluation of a group acceptance commitment therapy intervention for people with knee or hip osteoarthritis: a pilot randomized controlled trial
Objectives: The aim was to evaluate an Acceptance Commitment Therapy (ACT) intervention for people with knee or hip osteoarthritis; a related aim was to compare treatment effects from Rasch-transformed and standard scales. Methods: Participants were recruited from a research database and outpatient rheumatology and orthopaedic clinics at two hospitals. Eligible participants were randomly allocated to either intervention or usual care. Intervention comprised six-sessions of group ACT. Outcomes were assessed two and four months after randomisation. Rasch-transformed and standard self-report measures were compared. Qualitative interviews also explored the acceptability of the intervention. Results: Of 8 people assessed for eligibility, 31 (36%) were randomised. The main reason for non-randomisation was that participants received surgery. Of the 16 participants randomised to intervention, 64% completed ≥50% of the scheduled group sessions. Follow-up data was complete for 84% participants at two months and 68% at four months. Outcome analysis demonstrated important differences between the Rasch-transformed and standard scales. There were significant differences between the groups in pain. Qualitative interviews with 7 participants suggested the intervention was acceptable. Conclusions: ACT for osteoarthritis is likely to be an acceptable treatment option for people with osteoarthritis. Progress to a definitive trial is warranted. Rasch-transformed outcome scales are preferable in clinical trials where possible
Patients' views on interactions with practitioners for type 2 diabetes:a longitudinal qualitative study in primary care over 10 years
BACKGROUND: It has been suggested that interactions between patients and practitioners in primary care have the potential to delay progression of complications in type 2 diabetes. However, as primary care faces greater pressures, patient experiences of patient-practitioner interactions might be changing.AIM: To explore the views of patients with type 2 diabetes on factors that are of significance to them in patient-practitioner interactions in primary care after diagnosis, and over the last 10 years of living with the disease.DESIGN AND SETTING: A longitudinal qualitative analysis over 10 years in UK primary care.METHOD: The study was part of a qualitative and quantitative examination of patient experience within the existing ADDITION-Cambridge and ADDITION-Plus trials from 2002 to 2016. The researchers conducted a qualitative descriptive analysis of free-text comments to an open-ended question within the CARE measure questionnaire at 1 and 10 years after diagnosis with diabetes. Data were analysed cross-sectionally at each time point, and at an individual level moving both backwards and forwards between time points to describe emergent topics.RESULTS: At the 1-year follow-up, 311 out of 1106 (28%) participants had commented; 101 out of 380 (27%) participants commented at 10-year follow-up; and 46 participants commented at both times. Comments on preferences for face-to-face contact, more time with practitioners, and relational continuity of care were more common over time.CONCLUSION: This study highlights issues related to the wider context of interactions between patients and practitioners in the healthcare system over the last 10 years since diagnosis. Paradoxically, these same aspects of care that are valued over time from diagnosis are also increasingly unprotected in UK primary care.</p
Help-seeking pathways in early psychosis
INTRODUCTION: Understanding the help-seeking pathways of patients with a putative risk of developing psychosis helps improving development of specialised care services. This study aimed at obtaining information about: type of health professionals contacted by patients at putative risk for psychosis on their help-seeking pathways; number of contacts; type of symptoms leading to contacts with health professionals; interval between initial contact and referral to a specialised outpatient service. METHOD: The help-seeking pathways were assessed as part of a prospective study in 104 patients with suspected at-risk states for psychosis. RESULTS: The mean number of contacts prior to referral was 2.38. Patients with psychotic symptoms more often contacted mental health professionals, whereas patients with insidious and more unspecific features more frequently contacted general practitioners (GPs). CONCLUSIONS: GPs have been found to under-identify the insidious features of emerging psychosis (Simon et al. (2005) Br J Psychiatry 187:274–281). The fact that they were most often contacted by patients with exactly these features calls for focussed and specialised help for primary care physicians. Thus, delays along the help-seeking pathways may be shortened. This may be of particular relevance for patients with the deficit syndrome of schizophrenia
Mean-field driven first-order phase transitions in systems with long-range interactions
We consider a class of spin systems on with vector valued spins
(\bS_x) that interact via the pair-potentials J_{x,y} \bS_x\cdot\bS_y. The
interactions are generally spread-out in the sense that the 's exhibit
either exponential or power-law fall-off. Under the technical condition of
reflection positivity and for sufficiently spread out interactions, we prove
that the model exhibits a first-order phase transition whenever the associated
mean-field theory signals such a transition. As a consequence, e.g., in
dimensions , we can finally provide examples of the 3-state Potts model
with spread-out, exponentially decaying interactions, which undergoes a
first-order phase transition as the temperature varies. Similar transitions are
established in dimensions for power-law decaying interactions and in
high dimensions for next-nearest neighbor couplings. In addition, we also
investigate the limit of infinitely spread-out interactions. Specifically, we
show that once the mean-field theory is in a unique ``state,'' then in any
sequence of translation-invariant Gibbs states various observables converge to
their mean-field values and the states themselves converge to a product
measure.Comment: 57 pages; uses a (modified) jstatphys class fil
Personal experience of osteoarthritis and pain questionnaires: mapping items to themes
Purpose. The aim of this study was to examine the correspondence between qualitative and quantitative methods of coding experience of pain reported by participants with osteoarthritis (OA) of the knee. Method. A mapping grid was produced to record the correspondence between subthemes that emerged from thematic analysis of interviews with 24 participants with knee OA, and from questionnaire items which were used in a study of 192 knee OA participants. Items were rated according to their degree of correspondence between subthemes and questionnaire items and an overall correspondence score was produced for each subtheme and questionnaire measure. Results. The subthemes that corresponded well with the questionnaire items were those that related to socio-emotional functioning, the overall experience of pain and the impact of pain on physical functioning. The questionnaire items did not relate to participants' knowledge about their condition and their experience of the medical system. Conclusions. The study indicated that many aspects of pain experience reported by patients in qualitative interviews are also assessed by commonly used questionnaire outcome measures for people with pain. However, although participants reported that knowledge about their condition and their experience of the medical system were important aspects of the overall pain experience, these are rarely used as outcome measures. Questionnaires that address these additional aspects ofthe pain experience could be useful to further evaluate the experience of pain and may help to address importance concerns raised by patients with OA of the knee
On the absence of ferromagnetism in typical 2D ferromagnets
We consider the Ising systems in dimensions with nearest-neighbor
ferromagnetic interactions and long-range repulsive (antiferromagnetic)
interactions which decay with a power, , of the distance. The physical
context of such models is discussed; primarily this is and where,
at long distances, genuine magnetic interactions between genuine magnetic
dipoles are of this form. We prove that when the power of decay lies above
and does not exceed , then for all temperatures, the spontaneous
magnetization is zero. In contrast, we also show that for powers exceeding
(with ) magnetic order can occur.Comment: 15 pages, CMP style fil
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