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CORM-3 induces DNA damage through Ru(II) binding to DNA
Get PDFYesWhen the 'CO-releasing molecule-3', CORM-3 (Ru(CO)3Cl(glycinate)), is dissolved in water it forms a range of ruthenium complexes. These are taken up by cells and bind to intracellular ligands, notably thiols such as cysteine and glutathione, where the Ru(II) reaches high intracellular concentrations. Here, we show that the Ru(II) ion also binds to DNA, at exposed guanosine N7 positions. It therefore has a similar cellular target to the anticancer drug cisplatin, but not identical, because Ru(II) shows no evidence of forming intramolecular crossbridges in the DNA. The reaction is slow, and with excess Ru, intermolecular DNA crossbridges are formed. The addition of CORM-3 to human colorectal cancer cells leads to strand breaks in the DNA, as assessed by the alkaline comet assay. DNA damage is inhibited by growth media containing amino acids, which bind to extracellular Ru and prevent its entry into cells. We conclude that the cytotoxicity of Ru(II) is different from that of platinum, making it a promising development target for cancer therapeutics
The role of patient and public involvement in rapid qualitative studies: Can we carry out meaningful PPIE with time pressures?
Get PDFYesRapid qualitative studies conducted with patient and public involvement can help promote policy-relevant and efficient research. There is a need to understand the experiences of researchers, patients, and members of the public to guide the development of good practice and to determine the extent to which rapid qualitative research can be implemented in PPIE projects.
We conducted a qualitative study to explore the experiences of research teams that carried out studies using rapid techniques with patient and public involvement. We carried out 26 interviews with researchers, coordinators, patients, carers, service users and members of the public.
This study identified needs which related to practical and time constraints. Rapid qualitative research tends to be limited to certain PPIE groups, and particular phases of the research process. Study findings are rarely discussed with PPIE members. The educational needs of rapid qualitative research were also identified. Researchers and PPIE members considered three main issues: a lack of training on patient involvement for researchers, rapid qualitative research training for PPIE members, and the diversity of PPIE members.
We found that rapid researchers were able to involve patients and members of the public in research despite time pressures. The challenges identified in this study can be used to plan future training programmes for researchers and PPIE panel members and develop strategies to recruit PPIE panel members from a wide range of backgrounds.
The research aim was to explore the experiences of those carrying out rapid qualitative studies with PPIE. As such, the participants of this study included patients, carers, service users and members of the public, who were interviewed individually. A lived experienced researcher and PPIE member for a hospital conducted the design, data collection and analysis of the study. The study brief was to interview researchers only. The lived-experience researcher initiated the inclusion of PPIE members as participants, therefore strengthening the study design. We shared the draft report with the PPIE participants for participant validation and to maintain a continuous feedback relationship. This led to addressing key issues in designing and involving PPIE members in more meaningful and equal ways. Whilst there is agreement on activities which centre on PPIE, there is no consensus on how to achieve these in high quality rapid qualitative studies
Perceptions of students regarding the delivery of sexual and reproductive health education in schools in Fiji
Get PDFYesAdolescent sexual and reproductive health (SRH) remains a challenge globally. High school youths without comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) are more likely to engage in high risk sexual behaviors than their peers in schools with CSE. Fiji continues to have very poor adolescents SRH indicators. This study aimed to gauge the perceptions of students towards the delivery of SRH education in schools in Fiji. A qualitative study design was used to collect data from students in year 11-13 in public secondary schools in Suva, Fiji in 2018. Schools with equal ethnic mix were selected. A semi-structured open-ended questionnaire was used to guide Focus Group Discussions (FGDs). A male research facilitator conducted FGD with males while a female research facilitator facilitated that amongst the females. Data collected was analyzed thematically. Seven FGDs were conducted. A total of 46 students (29 males) participated with the age range from 17-19 years old. Eight themes emerged: current SRH education; students' knowledge on adverse consequences of SRH; sources of SRH information; need for sex education; provision of SRH education in schools; characteristics of teachers of SRH education; age-appropriate incremental sex education; and ideal version of SRH. The study shows that Fijian students desired a lot more from sex education than what is currently offered for sexual decision-making. There is a need for mandatory and comprehensive sex education for young people
Opportunities, challenges and tensions: Open science through a lens of qualitative social psychology
No full textYesIn recent years, there has been a focus in social psychology on efforts to improve the robustness, rigour, transparency and openness of psychological research. This has led to a plethora of new tools, practices and initiatives that each aim to combat questionable research practices and improve the credibility of social psychological scholarship. However, the majority of these efforts derive from quantitative, deductive, hypothesis-testing methodologies, and there has been a notable lack of in-depth exploration about what the tools, practices and values may mean for research that uses qualitative methodologies. Here, we introduce a Special Section of BJSP: Open Science, Qualitative Methods and Social Psychology: Possibilities and Tensions. The authors critically discuss a range of issues, including authorship, data sharing and broader research practices. Taken together, these papers urge the discipline to carefully consider the ontological, epistemological and methodological underpinnings of efforts to improve psychological science, and advocate for a critical appreciation of how mainstream open science discourse may (or may not) be compatible with the goals of qualitative research
Mapping the resilience performance of community pharmacy to maintain patient safety during the Covid-19 pandemic
No full textYesBackground
The first UK wave of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 placed unprecedented stress on community pharmacy. Various policies and initiatives were announced during this period to support community pharmacy to continue to perform in a manner that prioritised patient safety. However, little is understood about how these policies and initiatives were implemented by staff working in community pharmacy, and the system adaptions and responses that were initiated to maintain patient safety.
Objective
The study aimed to investigate how staff working in UK community pharmacy during the first waves of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 responded and adapted to system stressors to maintain patient safety.
Methods
We adopted a qualitative interview approach, underpinned by Resilient Healthcare theory, with interview data collected between July 2020 and January 2021. Data were synthesised and analysed using Framework Analysis.
Results
23 community pharmacy staff from England and Scotland were interviewed. We identified five themes supported by between two and six sub-themes: 1. Covid-19, an impending threat to the system. 2. Patient safety stressors during the first waves of Covid-19. 3. Altering the system, responding to system stressors. 4. Monitoring and adjusting. 5. Learning for the future.
Conclusion
Privileging the accounts of community pharmacy staff working on the frontline during the pandemic illuminated how responses and adaptions were developed and deployed, how continual monitoring occurred, and the factors that supported or hindered system resilience. The key learning derived from this study can serve to shorten the gap between ‘work as imagined’ and ‘work as done’, and in doing so, support the future resilience performance of community pharmacy during future outbreaks of Covid-19 or similar events.This research was funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Yorkshire and Humber Patient Safety Translational Research Centre (NIHR Yorkshire and Humber PSTRC)
Can development initiatives reduce the recruitment of adolescents to organised crime groups? Perspectives of the recipients of the Prospera Conditional Cash Transfer Programme in Mexico
Get PDFThis thesis explores the role of Development policy as an alternative to the traditional public security focused strategies for tackling organised crime violence in Latin America and the Caribbean. To do so, it builds bridges between the academic literature of criminology and development. It examines the public experiences of insecurity in Mexico and the social impacts of a development initiative, the Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programme in two municipalities in Mexico. The thesis poses questions about the impacts of Development initiatives upon organised crime violence from the perspectives of those living within areas affected by violence. The CCT programmes seek to address poverty in the short and long-term and research has begun to explore the potential of these programmes to diminish violence and crime, almost exclusively from a quantitative research approach, whereas this study adopts a qualitative design. This research is based on data gathered through interviews, observations, and focus groups to examine the perspectives and experiences of current and former CCT recipients, CCT administrators, public security officials, members of the public, NGO leads, and ex-gang affiliated individuals. This micro-level qualitative methodology adopted in this research contrasts the almost exclusively macro-level, econometric evaluations which have dominated CCT and organised crime research. The findings demonstrated that respondents perceived CCTs as significant in reducing the propensity of young men participating in organised crime violence in their localities. The perspectives of participants in this study provided enough evidence to overturn a common narrative of ‘prevention doesn’t work’ and suggest that in each of the areas targeted by the study there is potential for a reduction of organised crime rooted in development initiatives according to respondents
Discovery of 2,3-dihydro-1H-pyrrolo[3,4-b]quinolin-1-one derivatives as possible antileishmanial agents
No full textNoA series of uniquely functionalized 2,3,-dihydro-1H-pyyrolo[3,4-b]quinolin-1-one derivatives were synthesized in one to two steps by utilizing a post-Ugi modification strategy and were evaluated for antileishmanial efficacy against visceral leishmaniasis (VL). Among the library compounds, compound 5m exhibited potential in vitro antileishmanial activity (CC50 = 65.11 μM, SI = 7.79, anti-amastigote IC50 = 8.36 μM). In vivo antileishmanial evaluation of 5m demonstrated 56.2% inhibition in liver and 61.1% inhibition in spleen parasite burden in infected Balb/c mice (12.5 mg kg-1, i.p.). In vitro pharmacokinetic study ascertained the stability of 5m in both simulated gastric fluid and simulated intestinal fluid. All the active compounds passed the PAINS filter and showed no toxicity in in silico predictions.SERB, New Delhi (Grant No. CRG/ 2018/001897 [GAP0320], Grant No. CRG/2020/002932 [GAP0371]), DBT, New Delhi (Grant No. BT/PR32490/ MED/29/1457/2019
Wave induced silty seabed response around a trenched pipeline
No full textYesMost previous studies on seabed liquefaction around offshore pipelines focused on investigating the wave-induced pore pressure variation in sandy seabed, while limited studies have been conducted for silty seabed. In this study, laboratory experiments are conducted to investigate wave-induced pore pressure within silty bed around the buried or partially/fully backfilled pipeline. Results show that residual pore pressure is the dominant factor that causes the liquefaction in silty soil. For buried pipeline, liquefaction first occurs at the pipeline bottom, then propagates upwards and downwards vertically. Comparing with the buried pipeline, the liquefaction potential is reduced when the pipeline is placed in a trench. To protect pipeline from liquefaction, backfill is recommended. Experiments show that the residual pore pressure significantly decreases as backfill depth increases. Fully backfilled pipeline is the best choice for silty seabed. Furthermore, backfill material with coarser particle size than native soil provides better protection for pipeline. In this study, there is no residual pore pressure around the pipeline periphery for three backfill soils (d50 = 0.15 mm; 0.3 mm; and 0.5 mm) tested. Results indicate that for the range of this experimental study, d50 = 0.15 mm is the best backfill material that provides the most protection for the underneath pipeline.National Postdoctoral Program for Innovative Talents granted by China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (Grant No. BX20190105) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Grant No. B200202062)
Wireless electromagnetic radiation assessment based on the specific absorption rate (SAR): A review case study
No full textYesEmploying electromagnetic fields EMFs) in new wireless communication and sensing technologies has substantially increased the level of human exposure to EMF waves. This paper presents a useful insight into the interaction of electromagnetic fields with biological media that is defined by the heat generation due to induced currents and dielectric loss. The specific absorption
rate (SAR) defines the heating amount in a biological medium that is irradiated by an electromagnetic field value. The paper reviews the radio frequency hazards due to the SAR based on various safety standards and organisations, including a detailed investigation of previously published work in terms of modelling and measurements. It also summarises the most common techniques utilised
between 1978 and 2021, in terms of the operational frequency spectrum, bandwidth, and SAR values.The European Union's Horizon 2020 innovation programme under grant agreement H2020- MSCA-ITN-2016 SECRET-722424; U.K. Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) under grant EP/E022936/1 supported this research; FCT/MEC ; ERDF under the PT2020 Partnership Agreement under the UID/EEA/50008/2020 project; European Commission's Joint Undertaking under the grant number Ecsel-7831132-Postitio-II-2017-IA. Moreove; British Council “2019 UK-China-BRI Countries Partnership Initiative” programme; Universidad Carlos III de Madrid and the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Grant 801538
A scoping review: Strategic workforce planning in health and social care
No full textYesAim
This aim of this scoping review was to undertake a detailed review of the pertinent literature examining strategic workforce planning in the health and social care sectors. The scoping review was tasked to address the following three questions:
1. How is strategic health and social care workforce planning currently undertaken?
2. What models, methods, and tools are available for supporting strategic health and
social care workforce planning?
3. What are the most effective methods for strategic health and social care workforce
planning?
Methods
The scoping review utilised the five-stage scoping review framework proposed by Arksey and O’Malley (2005). This includes identifying the research question; identifying relevant studies; study selection; charting the data and collating, summarizing, and reporting the results. The search included a range of databases and key search terms included “workforce” OR “human resource*” OR “personnel” OR “staff*”. Relevant documents were selected through initially screening titles and s, followed by full text screening of potentially relevant documents.
Results
The search returned 6105 unique references. Based on title and screening, 654 were identified as potentially relevant. Screening of full texts resulted in 115 items of literature being included in the synthesis. Both national and international literature covers strategic workforce planning, with all continents represented, but with a preponderance from high income nations. The emphasis in the literature is mainly on the healthcare workforce, with few items on social care. Medical and dental workforces are the predominate groups covered in the literature, although nursing and midwifery are also discussed. Other health and social care workers are less represented. A variety of categories of workforce planning methods are noted in the literature that range from determining the workforce using supply and demand, practitioner to population ratios, needs based approach, the utilisation of methods such as horizon scanning, modelling, and scenario planning, together with mathematical and statistical modelling. Several of the articles and websites include specific workforce planning models that are nationally and internationally recognised, e.g., the workload indicators of staffing needs (WISN), Star model and the Six Step Methodology. These models provide a series of steps to help with workforce planning and tend to take a more strategic view of the process. Some of the literature considers patient safety and quality in relation to safe staffing numbers and patient acuity. The health and social care policies reviewed include broad actions to address workforce planning, staff shortages or future service developments and advocate a mixture of developing new roles, different ways of working, flexibility, greater integrated working and enhanced used of digital technology. However, the policies generally do not include workforce models or guidance about how to achieve these measures. Overall, there is an absence in the literature of studies that evaluate what are the most effective methods for strategic health and social care planning.
Recommendations
The literature suggests the need for the implementation of a strategic approach to workforce planning, utilising a needs-based approach, including horizon scanning and scenarios. This could involve adoption of a recognised workforce planning model that incorporates the strategic elements required for workforce planning and a ‘one workforce’ approach across health and social care