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We surveyed healthcare workers within the Duke Antimicrobial Stewardship Outreach Network (DASON) to describe beliefs regarding coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination and their decision-making process behind vaccination recommendations. In contrast to the type of messaging that appealed most on a personal level to the healthcare workers, they preferred a more generic message emphasizing safety and efficacy when making vaccination recommendations.
Automated virtual reality therapies are being developed to increase access to psychological interventions. We assessed the experience with one such therapy of patients diagnosed with psychosis, including satisfaction, side effects, and positive experiences of access to the technology. We tested whether side effects affected therapy.
Methods
In a clinical trial 122 patients diagnosed with psychosis completed baseline measures of psychiatric symptoms, received gameChange VR therapy, and then completed a satisfaction questionnaire, the Oxford-VR Side Effects Checklist, and outcome measures.
Results
79 (65.8%) patients were very satisfied with VR therapy, 37 (30.8%) were mostly satisfied, 3 (2.5%) were indifferent/mildly dissatisfied, and 1 (0.8%) person was quite dissatisfied. The most common side effects were: difficulties concentrating because of thinking about what might be happening in the room (n = 17, 14.2%); lasting headache (n = 10, 8.3%); and the headset causing feelings of panic (n = 9, 7.4%). Side effects formed three factors: difficulties concentrating when wearing a headset, feelings of panic using VR, and worries following VR. The occurrence of side effects was not associated with number of VR sessions, therapy outcomes, or psychiatric symptoms. Difficulties concentrating in VR were associated with slightly lower satisfaction. VR therapy provision and engagement made patients feel: proud (n = 99, 81.8%); valued (n = 97, 80.2%); and optimistic (n = 96, 79.3%).
Conclusions
Patients with psychosis were generally very positive towards the VR therapy, valued having the opportunity to try the technology, and experienced few adverse effects. Side effects did not significantly impact VR therapy. Patient experience of VR is likely to facilitate widespread adoption.
Many patients with mental health disorders become increasingly isolated at home due to anxiety about going outside. A cognitive perspective on this difficulty is that threat cognitions lead to the safety-seeking behavioural response of agoraphobic avoidance.
Aims:
We sought to develop a brief questionnaire, suitable for research and clinical practice, to assess a wide range of cognitions likely to lead to agoraphobic avoidance. We also included two additional subscales assessing two types of safety-seeking defensive responses: anxious avoidance and within-situation safety behaviours.
Method:
198 patients with psychosis and agoraphobic avoidance and 1947 non-clinical individuals completed the item pool and measures of agoraphobic avoidance, generalised anxiety, social anxiety, depression and paranoia. Factor analyses were used to derive the Oxford Cognitions and Defences Questionnaire (O-CDQ).
Results:
The O-CDQ consists of three subscales: threat cognitions (14 items), anxious avoidance (11 items), and within-situation safety behaviours (8 items). Separate confirmatory factor analyses demonstrated a good model fit for all subscales. The cognitions subscale was significantly associated with agoraphobic avoidance (r = .672, p < .001), social anxiety (r = .617, p < .001), generalized anxiety (r = .746, p < .001), depression (r = .619, p < .001) and paranoia (r = .655, p < .001). Additionally, both the O-CDQ avoidance (r = .867, p < .001) and within-situation safety behaviours (r = .757, p < .001) subscales were highly correlated with agoraphobic avoidance. The O-CDQ demonstrated excellent internal consistency (cognitions Cronbach’s alpha = .93, avoidance Cronbach’s alpha = .94, within-situation Cronbach’s alpha = .93) and test–re-test reliability (cognitions ICC = 0.88, avoidance ICC = 0.92, within-situation ICC = 0.89).
Conclusions:
The O-CDQ, consisting of three separate scales, has excellent psychometric properties and may prove a helpful tool for understanding agoraphobic avoidance across mental health disorders.
As a nurse caring for paediatric patients, it is important to develop the ability to recognise and respond to a sick infant or child. This is so important that a variety of projects have been undertaken, both internationally and throughout Australia and New Zealand, to ensure that nurses working with paediatric patients are able to recognise, respond promptly to and appropriately manage sick and deteriorating infants and children. Paediatric early warning tools help clinicians to recognise a deteriorating infant or child, and trigger an escalation in care to prevent further deterioration and achieve favourable outcomes. This chapter provides a basic understanding and knowledge so you will be able to recognise and respond to a sick and deteriorating child.
Agoraphobic avoidance of everyday situations is a common feature in many mental health disorders. Avoidance can be due to a variety of fears, including concerns about negative social evaluation, panicking, and harm from others. The result is inactivity and isolation. Behavioural avoidance tasks (BATs) provide an objective assessment of avoidance and in situ anxiety but are challenging to administer and lack standardisation. Our aim was to draw on the principles of BATs to develop a self-report measure of agoraphobia symptoms.
Method
The scale was developed with 194 patients with agoraphobia in the context of psychosis, 427 individuals in the general population with high levels of agoraphobia, and 1094 individuals with low levels of agoraphobia. Factor analysis, item response theory, and receiver operating characteristic analyses were used. Validity was assessed against a BAT, actigraphy data, and an existing agoraphobia measure. Test–retest reliability was assessed with 264 participants.
Results
An eight-item questionnaire with avoidance and distress response scales was developed. The avoidance and distress scales each had an excellent model fit and reliably assessed agoraphobic symptoms across the severity spectrum. All items were highly discriminative (avoidance: a = 1.24–5.43; distress: a = 1.60–5.48), indicating that small increases in agoraphobic symptoms led to a high probability of item endorsement. The scale demonstrated good internal reliability, test–retest reliability, and validity.
Conclusions
The Oxford Agoraphobic Avoidance Scale has excellent psychometric properties. Clinical cut-offs and score ranges are provided. This precise assessment tool may help focus attention on the clinically important problem of agoraphobic avoidance.
This study aimed to investigate general factors associated with prognosis regardless of the type of treatment received, for adults with depression in primary care.
Methods
We searched Medline, Embase, PsycINFO and Cochrane Central (inception to 12/01/2020) for RCTs that included the most commonly used comprehensive measure of depressive and anxiety disorder symptoms and diagnoses, in primary care depression RCTs (the Revised Clinical Interview Schedule: CIS-R). Two-stage random-effects meta-analyses were conducted.
Results
Twelve (n = 6024) of thirteen eligible studies (n = 6175) provided individual patient data. There was a 31% (95%CI: 25 to 37) difference in depressive symptoms at 3–4 months per standard deviation increase in baseline depressive symptoms. Four additional factors: the duration of anxiety; duration of depression; comorbid panic disorder; and a history of antidepressant treatment were also independently associated with poorer prognosis. There was evidence that the difference in prognosis when these factors were combined could be of clinical importance. Adding these variables improved the amount of variance explained in 3–4 month depressive symptoms from 16% using depressive symptom severity alone to 27%. Risk of bias (assessed with QUIPS) was low in all studies and quality (assessed with GRADE) was high. Sensitivity analyses did not alter our conclusions.
Conclusions
When adults seek treatment for depression clinicians should routinely assess for the duration of anxiety, duration of depression, comorbid panic disorder, and a history of antidepressant treatment alongside depressive symptom severity. This could provide clinicians and patients with useful and desired information to elucidate prognosis and aid the clinical management of depression.
Structural models of psychopathology consistently identify internalizing (INT) and externalizing (EXT) specific factors as well as a superordinate factor that captures their shared variance, the p factor. Questions remain, however, about the meaning of these data-driven dimensions and the interpretability and distinguishability of the larger nomological networks in which they are embedded.
Methods
The sample consisted of 10 645 youth aged 9–10 years participating in the multisite Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study. p, INT, and EXT were modeled using the parent-rated Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL). Patterns of associations were examined with variables drawn from diverse domains including demographics, psychopathology, temperament, family history of substance use and psychopathology, school and family environment, and cognitive ability, using instruments based on youth-, parent-, and teacher-report, and behavioral task performance.
Results
p exhibited a broad pattern of statistically significant associations with risk variables across all domains assessed, including temperament, neurocognition, and social adversity. The specific factors exhibited more domain-specific patterns of associations, with INT exhibiting greater fear/distress and EXT exhibiting greater impulsivity.
Conclusions
In this largest study of hierarchical models of psychopathology to date, we found that p, INT, and EXT exhibit well-differentiated nomological networks that are interpretable in terms of neurocognition, impulsivity, fear/distress, and social adversity. These networks were, in contrast, obscured when relying on the a priori Internalizing and Externalizing dimensions of the CBCL scales. Our findings add to the evidence for the validity of p, INT, and EXT as theoretically and empirically meaningful broad psychopathology liabilities.
Large material accumulations from single events found in the archaeological record are frequently defined as evidence of ritual. They are interpreted as generalized deposit categories that imply rather than infer human motivations. While useful in the initial collection of data, these categories can, over time, become interpretations in and of themselves. The emic motivations behind the formation process of ‘ritual deposits’ ought to be considered using a relational ontology as an approach to understanding how past populations interacted with non-human actors, such as structures and natural features on the landscape. The present study evaluates the assembly and possible function of a dense deposit of artifacts recovered from a Classic period sweat bath at Xultun, Guatemala. Analyses of the various artifact types and human remains in the deposit in relation to what is known of the social history of the sweat bath itself illustrate ontological relationships among offered materials as well as between the offering and the personified place in which it was recovered. We observe that with a better understanding of place, it is possible to evaluate the ritual logic in Classic Maya material negotiations.
The ACA shifted U.S. health policy from centering on principles of actuarial fairness toward social solidarity. Yet four legal fixtures of the health care system have prevented the achievement of social solidarity: federalism, fiscal pluralism, privatization, and individualism. Future reforms must confront these fixtures to realize social solidarity in health care, American-style.
If federal health reforms continue to rely on employer-sponsored health care coverage, ERISA preemption reform should be part of the next steps. State-level reform has acquired greater urgency, while the justifications for preempting that source of reform has eroded. This article recommends a statutory waiver for ERISA preemption as a feasible way to adapt to these circumstances. It offers proposed statutory text for reformers inclined to pursue ERISA reform as health reform.
Disparities exist in the health, livelihood, and opportunities for the 46-60 million people living in America’s rural communities. Rural communities across the United States need a new energy and focus concentrated around health and health care that allows for the designing capturing, and spreading of existing and new innovations. This paper aims to provide a framework for policy solutions to build a healthier rural America describing both the current state of rural health policy and the policies and practices in states that could be used as a national model for positive change.
My thanks to Maria Doerfler for organizing a session at the January 2020 meeting of the American Society of Church History on my book The Fathers Refounded: Protestant Liberalism, Roman Catholic Modernism, and the Teaching of Ancient Christianity in Early Twentieth-Century America, to the editors of Church History for suggesting that the (revised) papers from the session could find a home in print, and, especially, to the panelists for their insightful comments.
Dissemination and implementation (D&I) science is dedicated to studying how to effectively translate and apply research in real-world contexts. There has been increasing interest in health equity within the D&I field to ensure the equitable implementation of evidence-based programs/practices across a range of diverse populations and settings. At the same time, health equity researchers recognize the potential of D&I science to promote the more widespread dissemination, implementation, and sustainment of evidence-based interventions to address health inequities. The National Center for Accelerating Clinical and Translational Science Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) Program has been a champion for community engagement and translational scholarship in its mission to improve individual and population health. The overall CTSA infrastructure and resources within and among CTSA hubs are well-equipped to facilitate a health equity focus to D&I across the phases of translational research. This paper proposes a framework that demonstrates the interaction and opportunities between health equity and D&I science and highlights how CTSAs can support and facilitate wider efforts in translational research with a focus on equitable D&I.
Obesity is an excess of adipose tissue (AT) and is linked with increased inflammation that enhances risk of type-2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. The BIOCLAIMS study assessed the effect of obesity on AT fatty acid composition and gene expression, and the responses of these to chronic omega-3 FA supplementation.
Materials and methods:
AT biopsies were collected pre- and post-12 week supplementation with 1.1 g EPA + 0.8 g DHA/day or corn oil. The composition of FA in the total lipid extract of AT from 37 normal-weight and 44 obese subjects was assessed by gas chromatography, whole AT transcriptome from 10 normal-weight and 10 obese subjects was assessed by RNA-Sequencing, and selected gene expression in AT of 27 normal-weight and 38 obese subjects was assessed by qRT-PCR.
Results:
789 AT genes were differentially expressed (623 upregulated, 175 downregulated) in obesity compared to normal-weight (FC > 2, P < 0.05). Differentially expressed genes included EGFL6, MMP-7 and -9, 5-LOX, WNT3 and WNT10B, DACT2, CNR1, SLC27A2 and PLA2G7, and were associated with immune and inflammatory response, cell proliferation, activation and movement, Wnt signalling, remodelling and expansion, and lipid incorporation and degradation.
Chronic supplementation with EPA + DHA increased the concentration of AT EPA, DPA and DHA in normal-weight subjects (P < 0.01), and EPA in obese subjects (P = 0.006). EPA + DHA modulated the expression of 26 genes (14 upregulated, 12 downregulated) in normal-weight subjects and 7 genes (3 upregulated, 5 downregulated) in obese subjects (FC > 2, P < 0.05). Of note, EPA + DHA downregulated IGLV1-44, IGLV1-51, PROK2, and TREM1 in normal weight subjects (P < 0.05), and IGLV1-44, IGLV1-47, DACT2 and IDO1 obese subjects (P < 0.05). Genes of note upregulated by EPA + DHA included KCNH2, GCGR, SLC36A2 and FOXC2 in normal-weight subjects, and MAB21L1, LRRTM4, and COX-2, in obese subjects. Differentially expressed genes were associated with a decrease in complement activation and immunoglobulin secretion, negative regulation of cell proliferation, and positive regulation of remodelling, amino acid and glucose transport, and COX pathway metabolite synthesis.
Discussion:
These data indicate an altered AT transcription profile and gene expression in obesity suggesting enhanced immune and inflammatory response, tissue expansion and remodelling, and changes to lipid metabolism, as well as dysregulation in response to supplementary EPA + DHA at a gene expression level. EPA + DHA are able to modulate AT gene expression predominantly associated with reducing immune response, but obesity may involve resistance to the effects on tissue remodelling and nutrient transport.
This analysis focuses on the institutional talk of sea-kayak guides and their clients in order to understand how guides negotiate the interactional balance of giving orders to maintain a safe and timely excursion while facilitating a fun and recreational experience. Using a mixed-method analysis including Conversation Analysis, ethnography, and statistics, this study examines 576 instances of directives found in video recordings of twenty-five Alaskan kayaking ecotourism excursions and explores the practices guides use in their talk to maintain control of an excursion while not coming across as domineering. By systemically examining directives’ design, directives are found to reveal both their temporal urgency in addition to the precipitating events that necessitate them, such as client behaviors or environmental stimuli. This study's analysis contributes to our understanding of how interactants mitigate face-threatening actions and focuses attention on the interactional work that directives and their accounts achieve in an institutional setting currently underinvestigated (Directives, mixed-methods, Conversation Analysis, ethnography, ecotourism)*
In rainfed lowland rice-based systems, increasing labour scarcity due to off-farm employment is encouraging farmers to switch from transplanting to dry direct seeding (DDS). To assure stable productivity at a level comparable with or superior to transplanting, DDS management must ensure rice seedlings have access to nutrients in order to be competitive with weeds, which must also be suppressed. This paper examined farmer perceptions of DDS using a farmer survey, and used on-farm experiments to examine responses of rainfed lowland rice to integrated nutrient–weed management, based around mechanised DDS. In the survey, weeds were the biggest problem faced by farmers in using DDS (61%). In 90% of cases, farmers reported that weeds had increased under DDS, with most farmers (78%) controlling weeds by hand. All farmers said they would use DDS in the following season (100%), due to labour savings (47%), timeliness of operations, improved productivity, low investment or a combination of these (44%). In on-farm experiments, banding nutrients with the seed at sowing enhanced early dry matter of rice, while early weed dry matter was reduced. Early weed control using ducklings or hand weeding reduced weed competition and increased rice growth, with ducklings providing additional yield benefits over hand weeding. Early increases in seedling vigour of rice, and in weed suppression, carried through to greater dry matter and yield of rice at maturity. Integrated nutrient–weed management in mechanised DDS increased DDS yields, reduced DDS yield variability and contributed to sustainability of DDS rice systems.