Search results for "CARE"
showing 10 items of 9420 documents
Acoustic monitoring of the artificial airway — experimental results
1997
Non-invasive acoustic airway-monitoring was evaluated in an experimental study. Recording amplitude and travel time of acoustic pulse response, an acoustic pattern of airway's geometry was then calculated. Measurements on models and excised human cadaver lungs were performed to discover whether displacement or obstruction of the artificial airway could be detected by its acoustic equivalent. Regression analysis revealed a close correlation between displacement of tracheostomy tubes and the shifting of the acoustic area-distance function (corr. coeff.: 0.97-1) and an adequate correlation between acoustic and planimetrical determination of cross-sectional area within the tubes (corr. coeff.: …
SOLID LIPID NANOPARTICLES FOR APPLICATIONS IN GENE THERAPY: A REVIEW OF THE STATE OF THE ART
2010
Importance of the field. Gene therapy represents a new paradigm in the prevention and treatment of many inherited and acquired diseases, including genetic disorders, such as cystic fibrosis, haemophilia and many somatic diseases, such as tumours, neurodegenerative diseases and viral infections, such as AIDS. Areas covered in this review. Among a large array of non-viral transfection agents used for in-vitro applications, cationic SLNs are the topic of this review, being recently proposed as an alternative carrier for DNA delivery, due to many technological advantages such as large-scale production from substances generally recognized as safe, good storage stability and possibility of steam …
Shareholder Wealth Creation in Response to Announcements of Acquisitions of Unlisted Firms: Evidence from Spain
2011
We investigate shareholder value creation of Spanish listed firms in response to announcements of acquisitions of unlisted companies and compare this experience to the purchase of listed firms over the period 1991–2006. Similar to foreign markets, acquirers of listed targets earn insignificant average abnormal returns, whereas acquirers of unlisted targets gain significant positive average abnormal returns. When we relate these results to company and transaction characteristics our findings diverge from those reported in the literature for other foreign markets, as our evidence suggests that the listing status effect is mainly associated with the fact that unlisted firms tend to be smaller …
Data from: Assessing metabolic constraints on the maximum body size of actinopterygians: locomotion energetics of Leedsichthys problematicus (Actinop…
2019
Maximum sizes attained by living actinopterygians are much smaller than those reached by chondrichthyans. Several factors, including the high metabolic requirements of bony fishes, have been proposed as possible body-size constraints but no empirical approaches exist. Remarkably, fossil evidence has rarely been considered despite some extinct actinopterygians reaching sizes comparable to those of the largest living sharks. Here, we have assessed the locomotion energetics of Leedsichthys problematicus, an extinct gigantic suspension-feeder and the largest actinopterygian ever known, shedding light on the metabolic limits of body size in actinopterygians and the possible underlying factors th…
Design for social media engagement: Insights from elderly care assistance
2015
Abstract This paper explores an alternative view of design as an emergent process of engagement and learning, as opposed to the traditional view of systems design as a problem-solving tool. We focus on digitally enabled elderly support networks as an innovative approach to the design of elderly care assistance through social media. Our research project is conducted in the context of an Italian health-care institution and provides the empirical backdrop illustrating the ensemble artefact, the four design principles and the pragmatic outcomes of personalized elderly care interventions. These contributions add both practical and theoretical guidance and learning regarding social-media engageme…
A context-aware approach for long-term behavioural change detection and abnormality prediction in ambient assisted living
2015
This research aims to describe pattern recognition models for detecting behavioural and health-related changes in a patient who is monitored continuously in an assisted living environment. The early anticipation of anomalies can improve the rate of disease prevention. Here we present different learning techniques for predicting abnormalities and behavioural trends in various user contexts. In this paper we described a Hidden Markov Model based approach for detecting abnormalities in daily activities, a process of identifying irregularity in routine behaviours from statistical histories and an exponential smoothing technique to predict future changes in various vital signs. The outcomes of t…
Togetherness — A Manifestation of Day Care Life
1999
This article discusses togetherness in the day care centre. In what way and in which situations is togetherness expressed among children? “What is the impact of adults on the rise and development of togetherness?” Answers to these questions were sought by making use of observations carried out in a cooperative Nordic study of the quality of children's lives in Danish, Finnish and Swedish day care centres. The data were collected by observing five‐year‐old children during their daily activities in seven day care centres. Attention was paid to relations between the children and adults as well as to the objects — in the sense of contents and objectives of ongoing activities. What do individual…
Converting Retirement Benefit into a Life Care Annuity with Graded Benefits: How Costly Would it Actually Be?
2016
This paper deals with life care annuities, i.e. bundled products comprising a life annuity and long-term care insurance. It aims to assess the cost of converting retirement benefit into a life care annuity with graded benefits using a pre-existing public pay-as-you-go pension scheme. With this objective in mind, we present an actuarial method based on array calculus for valuing this type of life care annuity. The health dynamics of the annuitant rely on a reversible illness-death multistate framework. The paper contains a numerical example in which mortality and disability assumptions are based on data from the USA and Australia, although this should be viewed simply as an illustration. In …
The Separating Role of Collateral Requirements in Credit Markets with Asymmetric Information
2001
In this paper we test Bester's (1985, 1987) prediction about the separating role of contracts that involve both interest rates and collateral requirements in credit markets. To test this prediction we use data from natural credit markets and controlled experiments. Using a sample of credits to small and medium size firms in Valencia, Spain, we relate two different types of contracts with the ex post risk type of the borrower and other relevant variables. We then design two incentive compatible contracts and analyze decisions under two different experimental treatments, one with moral hazard. Our empirical results confirm that borrowers of ex post lower risk choose contracts with higher coll…
Applying RUG-III for reimbursement of nursing facility care
2006
The Resource Utilization Groups (RUG-III) case-mix classification is becoming an internationally accepted methodology for determining payment for nursing facility and care. In this paper we discuss the key concepts of case-mix reimbursement and several different payment approaches based on RUG-III. In discussing the empirical evidence of case-mix reimbursement, we draw especially on the US experience. Clearly, the success of case-mix reimbursement depends not only on the payment design, but also on the ability to foresee market conditions and the regulatory environment in which the payment system is being implemented. Moreover, we demonstrate the need to develop a case-mix based reimburseme…