Search results for "Alu"
showing 10 items of 15362 documents
Smartphone Apps for the Treatment of Mental Disorders: Systematic Review
2020
Background Smartphone apps are an increasingly popular means for delivering psychological interventions to patients suffering from a mental disorder. In line with this popularity, there is a need to analyze and summarize the state of the art, both from a psychological and technical perspective. Objective This study aimed to systematically review the literature on the use of smartphones for psychological interventions. Our systematic review has the following objectives: (1) analyze the coverage of mental disorders in research articles per year; (2) study the types of assessment in research articles per mental disorder per year; (3) map the use of advanced technical features, such as sensors…
How do we assess in Clinical Legal Education? A 'reflection' about reflective learning
2016
I suggest this hypothesis and these premises from the perspective of my experience in Clinical Legal Education and the use of experiential learning methods in other 'traditional' courses. Firstly, institutional assessment must be distinguished from the assessment of learning. Traditionally, assessment is reduced to institutional assessment: that is, to give a mark depending on the achievement of knowledge instead of focusing in the student's learning. However, I propose (to remember) that: 1) (Formative) assessment is part of learning; 2) Reflective learning (and reflective skills) is/are a part of assessment. This implies a process of continuous evaluation instead of summative evaluation, …
Teaching clinical reasoning and decision-making skills to nursing students: Design, development, and usability evaluation of a serious game
2016
Background\ud \ud Serious games (SGs) are a type of simulation technology that may provide nursing students with the opportunity to practice their clinical reasoning and decision-making skills in a safe and authentic environment. Despite the growing number of SGs developed for healthcare professionals, few SGs are video based or address the domain of home health care.\ud \ud Aims\ud \ud This paper aims to describe the design, development, and usability evaluation of a video based SG for teaching clinical reasoning and decision-making skills to nursing students who care for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in home healthcare settings.\ud \ud Methods\ud \ud A prototy…
Usability and acceptability assessment of an empathic virtual agent to prevent major depression
2016
In Human-Computer Interaction, the adaptation of the content and the way of how this content is communicated to the users in interactive sessions is a critical issue to promote the acceptability and usability of any computational system. We present a user-adapted interactive platform to identify and provide an early intervention for symptoms of depression and suicide. In particular, we describe the work performed to assess users' system acceptability and usability. An empathic Virtual Agent is the main interface with the user, and it has been designed to generate the appropriate dialogues and emotions during the interactions according to the detected user's specific needs. This personalizat…
Cost-Effective eHealth System Based on a Multi-Sensor System-on-Chip Platform and Data Fusion in Cloud for Sport Activity Monitoring
2018
eHealth systems provide medical support to users and contribute to the development of mobile and quality health care. They also provide results on the prevention and follow-up of diseases by monitoring health-status indicators and methodical data gathering in patients. Telematic management of health services by means of the Internet of Things provides immediate support and it is cheaper than conventional physical presence methods. Currently, wireless communications and sensor networks allow a person or group to be monitored remotely. The aim of this paper is to develop and assess a system for monitoring physiological parameters to be applied in different scenarios, such as health or sports.…
Dynamic goal programming synthetic indicator: an application for water companies sustainability assessment
2018
ABSTRACTThis study proposes to evaluate the sustainability of water companies through time by using a new approach, one that involves a dynamic synthetic indicator derived from goal programming techniques. This dynamic indicator approach incorporates catch-up and innovation indices, which enables one to identify the main factors that drive changes in sustainability through time. We used a case study approach to clarify this dynamic approach by evaluating indicator values from a sample of 129 Portuguese water companies over the 2012 to 2015 time period. For most of the water companies we evaluated, sustainability values changed over time, which illustrates the importance of evaluating dynami…
Reviewing the role of ecosystems services in the sustainability of the urban environment: A multi-country analysis
2020
The urban environment is characterised by many pressures caused by population growth, transport (and its related emissions), and the damage to green areas. Yet, there is a variety of ecosystem services available in urban areas, which may be deployed to ameliorate the current problems and foster their sustainability. This paper reviews the role of ecosystem services as tools for sustainability, based on an urban setting. It also describes a series of multi-country case studies, where an assessment of their functions using a set of benefits valuation approaches such as health benefits, economic benefits, social benefits and benefits to climate resilience, are provided, along with an appraisal…
Evaluating the material resource efficiency of secondary aluminium production: A Monte Carlo-based decision-support tool
2019
The contamination of aluminium streams during the different life cycle stages by alloy mixing and/or accumulation of foreign elements, in combination with the limited melt purification options during remelting, represents an important limiting factor in recycling. Consequently, in secondary aluminium production, primary aluminium is used to dilute the concentration of the residual elements, and alloying elements are added to adjust the composition to the target alloy specifications. However, adding elements, for which their refinement in a subsequent recycling step is problematic, results in permanent down-cycling or ‘quality losses’. Hence, it is crucial to more efficiently control the com…
Modeling the natural gas supply chain for sustainable growth policy
2020
Abstract Natural gas has been used globally as a transitional fuel for supporting a green-energy-supply strategy, which has been questioned for the intermittence and lack of reliability of renewables. This paper proposes a System Dynamics model for assessing alternative security of supply policy along the natural gas value chain. The model incorporates demand, transport, production and reserves of natural gas variables according to a systemic perspective. It also includes a module for evaluating the effect of natural gas price on the demand and supply levels, respectively. Alternative supply policies are evaluated under different scenarios. The chosen case-study focuses on the Colombian nat…
Economic feasibility of stationary electrochemical storages for electric bill management applications: The Italian scenario
2016
Battery energy storage systems (BESSs) are expected to become a fundamental element of the electricity infrastructure, thanks to their ability to decouple generation and demand over time. BESSs can also be used to store electricity during low-price hours, when the demand is low, and to meet the demand during peak hours, thus leading to savings for the consumer. This work focuses on the economic viability of BESS from the point of view of the electricity customer. The analysis refers to a lithium-ion (Li-ion), an advanced lead-acid, a zinc-based, a sodium-sulphur (NaS) and a flow battery. The total investment and replacement costs are estimated in order to calculate the cumulated cash flow, …