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Attitudes toward own aging and cognition among individuals living with and without dementia: findings from the IDEAL programme and the PROTECT study
Get PDFYesIt is unclear whether people with dementia (PwD) have more negative attitudes toward own aging (ATOA) than people without dementia and what factors influence ATOA among PwD. We investigated whether PwD have more negative ATOA than individuals without dementia and whether cognition and dementia subtype are associated with ATOA in PwD.
Data from the IDEAL and PROTECT studies were used to compare ATOA between 1502 PwD (mean (SD) age = 76.3 (8.5)) and 6377 individuals without dementia (mean (SD) age = 66.1 (7.1)). Linear regressions and ANOVA were used.
PwD reported slightly more negative ATOA than people without dementia; this relationship disappeared after controlling for depression and self-rated health. In PwD more positive ATOA showed negligible associations with better general cognition, memory performance, verbal fluency, and visuospatial ability. However, after adjusting for covariates only better visuospatial ability predicted more positive ATOA. Additional analyses showed that before and after controlling for covariates, individuals with poorer self-reported visual acuity have more negative ATOA. Amongst dementia subtypes, people with Parkinson's disease dementia and dementia with Lewy bodies reported most negative ATOA.
ATOA between PwD and people without dementia do not differ. ATOA in PwD appear to be affected not by cognitive impairment but by other characteristics that vary across dementia subtypes. Among PwD, those with Parkinson's disease dementia and dementia with Lewy bodies may have higher risk of experiencing negative ATOA due to the motor and visual impairments that they experience.Improving the experience of Dementia and Enhancing Active Life: living well with dementia. The IDEAL study’ was funded jointly by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) through grant ES/L001853/2. The IDEAL-2 study’ is funded by Alzheimer’s Society, grant number 348, AS-PR2-16-00
Comments on Point:Counterpoint: Artificial limbs do/do not make artificially fast running speeds possible
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Frontline Health Care Workers' (HCWs) perception of barriers to managing COVID-19 in Fiji
Get PDFYesHealth Care Workers (HCWs) are at higher risk of COVID-19 infection with their efforts while protecting the greater community and also exposed to hazards, such as psychological distress, fatigue, and stigma. This study aimed to explore the perception of frontline HCWs on barriers of managing COVID-19 in Fiji.
Methods: A qualitative study method was approached to conduct this study among the HCWs who worked on the frontline during the COVID-19 pandemic based at ten purposively selected health facilities in the Suva subdivision in the Central Division of Fiji. The Colonial War Memorial Hospital (CWMH), the Fiji Centre for Communicable Diseases (Fiji CDC), Twomey hospital laboratory, and CWMH laboratory did the main control and most of the operations of other divisions were monitored from these settings. A semi-structured open-ended questionnaire was used to collect data using in-depth interviews. The participants' responses were audio-recorded and were later transcribed and analyzed using thematic analysis.
Results: A total of twenty-nine HCWs took part in the in-depth interview and the responses were grouped into four themes, which include: workload, poor communication, lack of resources, and hindrance to education. It was also found through this study that some of the HCWs felt tired, frustrated, got rude to patients, and found it difficult to handle situations, which affected them mentally and physically stressed.
Conclusion: Managing the COVID-19 cases has been attributed to the presence of many barriers, such as workload, tiredness, frustration, and sometimes difficult-to-handle situations, and the HCWs were indeed affected mentally and physically. Regular training for HCWs and more awareness programs would help the general public to follow the preventive measures, which reduces the cases and would help the HCWs manage COVID-19 well.Research Development Fund Publication Prize Award winner, Aug 2022
Microstructural response and wear behaviour of Ti-6Al-4V impregnated with Ni/Al2O3 + TiO2 nanostructured coating using an electric arc
Get PDFYesTitanium alloys are known for their excellent corrosion resistance; however, low surface hardness results in poor wear resistance, which limits its potential application. This study employs a novel two-step process to embed a hard Ni coating containing a mixture of nanosized particles (Al2O3 and TiO2) into the surface of the Ti-6Al-4V alloy using an electric arc produced during the inert tungsten gas welding process. The surface of the sample was evaluated using Vickers Microhardness, Scanning electron microscopy, Energy dispersive spectroscopy and pin-on-plate wear testing. Microstructural analysis showed that impregnating the titanium surface with Ni/(Al2O3 and TiO2) nanomaterials resulted in the formation of a hard martensitic structure to a depth of approximately 2 mm below the surface. The changes observed are driven by modification of the surface chemistry and the presence of nickel, causing grain size reduction, solid solution strengthening and dispersion strengthening of the treated layer by the nanoparticles. The hardness of the treated layer increased by more than 180% when 40 nm Al2O3 and 30 nm TiO2 particles were embedded into the surface. Similarly, the wear resistance of the treated surface improved by 100%
Recruitment and retention of the health and social care digital workforce: A rapid review
Get PDFYesThe recruitment and retention of a digital health and social care workforce in the United Kingdom (UK)
is challenging for several reasons that include the shortages of these employees in the National Health
Service (NHS) and social care and the high demand for digital skills from other sectors (HEE, 2021a;
NHS Providers, 2017). Brown (2022:7) notes that ‘high staff turnover rates, chronic recruitment and
retention issues, and low morale are increasingly identified as major challenges for those working in
social care’. Liu et al., (2019:5) in their report ‘NHS Informatics workforce in England: Phase 1 Project
Report’ estimated that the size of the NHS informatics workforce in 2019 was between 40,640 Full
Time Equivalents (FTEs) to 53,936 FTEs based on electronic staff records. However, significant
shortages in digital and information technology staff in health and social care were identified that pose
a challenge. This rapid review examines the strategies used to recruit and retain the health and social
care digital workforce and potential solutions to issues raised
The Chemerin-CMKLR1 Axis is Functionally important for Central Regulation of Energy Homeostasis
No full textYesChemerin is an adipokine involved in inflammation, adipogenesis, angiogenesis and energy metabolism, and has been hypothesized as a link between obesity and type II diabetes. In humans affected by obesity, chemerin gene expression in peripheral tissues and circulating levels are elevated. In mice, plasma levels of chemerin are upregulated by high-fat feeding and gain and loss of function studies show an association of chemerin with body weight, food intake and glucose homeostasis. Therefore, chemerin is an important blood-borne mediator that, amongst its other functions, controls appetite and body weight. Almost all studies of chemerin to date have focused on its release from adipose tissue and its effects on peripheral tissues with the central effects largely overlooked. To demonstrate a central role of chemerin, we manipulated chemerin signaling in the hypothalamus, a brain region associated with appetite regulation, using pharmacological and genetic manipulation approaches. Firstly, the selective chemerin receptor CMKLR1 antagonist α-NETA was administered i.c.v. to rats to test for an acute physiological effect. Secondly, we designed a short-hairpin-RNA (shRNA) lentivirus construct targeting expression of CMKLR1. This shRNA construct, or a control construct was injected bilaterally into the arcuate nucleus of male Sprague Dawley rats on high-fat diet (45%). After surgery, rats were maintained on high-fat diet for 2 weeks and then switched to chow diet for a further 2 weeks. We found a significant weight loss acutely and inhibition of weight gain chronically. This difference became apparent after diet switch in arcuate nucleus-CMKLR1 knockdown rats. This was not accompanied by a difference in blood glucose levels. Interestingly, appetite-regulating neuropeptides remained unaltered, however, we found a significant reduction of the inflammatory marker TNF-α suggesting reduced expression of CMKLR1 protects from high-fat diet induced neuroinflammation. In white and brown adipose tissue, mRNA expression of chemerin, its receptors and markers of adipogenesis, lipogenesis and brown adipocyte activation remained unchanged confirming that the effects are driven by the brain. Our behavioral analyses suggest that knockdown of CMKLR1 had an impact on object recognition. Our data demonstrate that CMKLR1 is functionally important for the central effects of chemerin on body weight regulation and neuroinflammation.This work was funded in part by the Academy of Medical Sciences, the Wellcome Trust, the Government of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the British Heart Foundation and Diabetes United Kingdom [SBF004/1063] (GH), the Society for Endocrinology Equipment Grant (GH, RD), the University of Bradford (GH, KP, SK) and Nottingham Trent University (RD)
Grothendieck bound in a single quantum system
Get PDFYesGrothendieck's bound is used in the context of a single quantum system, in contrast to previous work which used it for multipartite entangled systems and the violation of Bell-like inequalities. Roughly speaking the Grothendieck theorem considers a 'classical' quadratic form that uses complex numbers in the unit disc, and takes values less than 1. It then proves that if the complex numbers are replaced with vectors in the unit ball of the Hilbert space, then the 'quantum' quadratic form might take values greater than 1, up to the complex Grothendieck constant . The Grothendieck theorem is reformulated here in terms of arbitrary matrices (which are multiplied with appropriate normalisation prefactors), so that it is directly applicable to quantum quantities. The emphasis in the paper is in the 'Grothendieck region' , which is a classically forbidden region in the sense that cannot take values in it. Necessary (but not sufficient) conditions for taking values in the Grothendieck region are given. Two examples that involve physical quantities in systems with six and 12-dimensional Hilbert space, are shown to lead to in the Grothendieck region . They involve projectors of the overlaps of novel generalised coherent states that resolve the identity and have a discrete isotropy
Spring-mass behavioural adaptations to acute changes in prosthetic blade stiffness during submaximal running in unilateral transtibial prosthesis users
Get PDFYesBackground: Individuals with lower-limb amputation can use running specific prostheses (RSP) that store and
then return elastic energy during stance. However, it is unclear whether varying the stiffness category of the
same RSP affects spring-mass behaviour during self-selected, submaximal speed running in individuals with
unilateral transtibial amputation.
Research question: The current study investigates how varying RSP stiffness affects limb stiffness, running performance,
and associated joint kinetics in individuals with a unilateral transtibial amputation.
Methods: Kinematic and ground reaction force data were collected from eight males with unilateral transtibial
amputation who ran at self-selected submaximal speeds along a 15 m runway in three RSP stiffness conditions;
recommended habitual stiffness (HAB) and, following 10-minutes of familiarisation, stiffness categories above
(+1) and below (-1) the HAB. Stance-phase centre of mass velocity, contact time, limb stiffness' and joint/RSP
work were computed for each limb across RSP stiffness conditions.
Results: With increased RSP stiffness, prosthetic limb stiffness increased, whilst intact limb stiffness decreased
slightly (
6G wireless communication systems: applications, opportunities and challenges
Get PDFYesAs the technical specifications of the 5th Generation (5G) wireless communication standard are being wrapped up, there are growing efforts amongst researchers, industrialists, and standardisation bodies on the enabling technologies of a 6G standard or the so-called Beyond 5G (B5G) one. Although the 5G standard has presented several benefits, there are still some limitations within it. Such limitations have motivated the setting up of study groups to determine suitable technologies that should operate in the year 2030 and beyond, i.e., after 5G. Consequently, this Special Issue of Future Internet concerning what possibilities lie ahead for a 6G wireless network includes four
high-quality research papers (three of which are review papers with over 412 referred sources and one regular research). This editorial piece summarises the major contributions of the articles and the Special Issue, outlining future directions for new research