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Incidence and risk factors for travellers’ diarrhoea among short-term international adult travellers from high-income countries: a systematic review with meta-analysis of cohort studies
Full text linkIntroduction: Travellers’ diarrhoea (TD) continues to be the most common travel-related medical event in international travellers. Updated incidence and risk factor data will improve pre-travel medical advice for travellers from high-income countries (HICs), providing an opportunity for disease prevention and appropriate disease management.
Methods: A systematic search for cohort studies of TD incidence published between 1 January 1997 and 2 March 2023 was performed using Ovid Medline, SCOPUS and Google Scholar databases. Study quality was assessed with a modified Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS). We extracted incidence data for adults travelling less than 100 days from HIC and available risk factor data. The overall random-effects pooled incidence and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) were estimated. Heterogeneity was assessed using the I2 statistic, tau and the 95% prediction intervals. Subgroup analyses were conducted to identify the sources of heterogeneity. Risk factor studies were reviewed qualitatively and described.
Results: Ten studies were included in the meta-analysis, containing 8478 participants. Two of the studies measured as high quality and eight as good quality as assessed by the modified NOS. The TD incidence was 36.1% (95% CI 24–41%; I2 94%), with a prediction interval ranging from 20.3 to 55.8%. The pooled incidence of mild, moderate and severe TD was 23.6, 8.1 and 2.9%, respectively. Subgroup analysis showed that the incidence increased with increasing average data collection period. Risk factors for TD in travellers from HIC identified include younger age, longer travel periods, low and middle-income destinations, travelling for tourism, backpacking travel styles and pre-travel health status.
Conclusion
It is estimated that between 20 and 56% of international travellers can expect to develop TD in travel of under 100 days. While most cases are mild, ~3% of all travellers will experience a disease that prevents usual activities or requires medical attention
Critical Issues Facing Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in Organizations and Society
Full text linkThe discussion of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) in the context of the West is uniquely complex. AAPIs are often held up as “model minorities,” resulting in exclusion from many equity conversations. The lack of attention focusing on the experiences of AAPI communities in organizations and society suggests a need for us to remedy this. In this special issue, we curated a collection of eight papers that tackle a broad range of issues that advance conversations of AAPI communities and diasporas. We contend that it may be particularly beneficial to take a critical perspective (using Asian Critical Theory or AsianCrit) to bring to light and challenge systemic issues faced by AAPI communities in Western workplaces and societies. We also call for a post-model minority narrative, which has the potential to mitigate the adverse impacts that the notion of a model minority has on both intragroup and intergroup relations and well-being
Understanding Environmental Generational Amnesia through urban school garden learning experiences in Gimuy/Cairns, Australia
Full text linkThis paper explores the potential role of school garden learning experiences in remediating Environmental Generational Amnesia (EGA). EGA is a generational type of environmental forgetting brought about by prolonged disconnection from ‘natural’ landscapes, with symptoms manifesting as poor motor skills, deficient food origin knowledge, a lack of environmental moral affiliation and undeveloped connections to place. Drawing on interviews with teachers, parents, counsellors, groundskeepers, and administrators at a Far North Queensland primary school, this paper explores how school garden learning experiences foster interaction patterns that combat EGA’s symptoms. We find that urban school gardens offer new possibilities for reassembling students into more-than-human local ecologies in ways that can remediate the manifestation of EGA
Mapping migrants’ narratives: A qual-GIS approach to Cairns’ urban liveability
No full textThis study introduces a novel approach to urban liveability research by combining interviews with participatory mapping techniques. More specifically, the research integrates concepts from geographic information systems (GISs) with episodic narrative interviews to develop a qualitative GIS (qual-GIS) methodology to map and interpret the spatial experiences of recent migrants to Cairns. This qual-GIS approach involves participants annotating amenity maps with personal narratives, effectively geolocating subjective experiences, and providing visual representations of liveability insights. During mapping sessions, participants identified and highlighted significant locations by annotating maps with pens and sticky notes to express their spatial stories and place attachments. Analysis of annotated maps in ArcGIS enabled the juxtaposition of qualitative insights with quantitative data, offering a rich, spatially informed understanding of liveability in place. The maps transcended their function as mere analytical instruments or memory aides, and the activity evolved into a platform for migrants to articulate experiences of, and emotional ties to the city. This approach enhances understandings of urban liveability from first-hand experiences and establishes qual-GIS approaches as valuable tools in urban and regional policy and research
Trade-offs involved in the choice of pot vs field experiments
No full text[Extract] The ability to control and account for environmental conditions is essential when conducting ecological experiments. Two frequent approaches are pot and field experiments. Pot experiments under common garden conditions are excellent for detecting distinct plant responses to specific experimental treatments. Even maternal effects can be accounted for if plants are grown under the same conditions over generations. Pot experiments are exceptional at detecting even slight differences in response to highly controlled factors, but they are not always a meaningful representation of plant responses under more complex and variable natural habitats
A Scoping Review of Intervention Outcomes for School Students With Communication Difficulties
Full text linkPurpose: For speech-language pathologists (SLPs) working in schools, outcome measurement is an important element of practice, enabling us to evaluate the efficacy of our service provision and guiding future decision making, funding, and resource allocation. When selecting outcomes to measure, it is helpful to consider both the level at which change may be occurring and the extent or impact of that change. The primary aim of this review was to identify the outcomes measured in intervention studies for school-aged children with speech, language, and communication difficulties (SLCD) using the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health to classify the outcomes. A second aim was to identify tools used in research studies to measure the outcomes.
Method: A systematic search of five databases was undertaken to identify papers reporting outcomes for school students who had received intervention targeting SLCD. Articles written in English and published between January 2000 and August 2021 were included. The Taxonomy for Categorizing Outcome Measures for SLCD was created to enable a review of outcomes and measurement tools.
Results: There were 125 papers included in the final review. Most papers (n = 109, 87.2%) reported on studies that included outcome measures that captured changes at Body Function level, while approximately half captured Activity-level change. Only 24 (19.2%) explored changes at Participation level.
Conclusions: Change at the Body Function or Activity levels does not always reflect change at the Participation level. Measuring outcomes at the Participation level enables SLPs to determine the real-world impact of the adjustments they have recommended or the intervention they have provided. However, in order to measure outcomes at the Participation level, we need the tools for capturing those changes for school-aged students with SLCD
The future of utilising semiochemical pest control methods to manage the destructive crown-of-thorns starfish outbreaks on coral reefs
Full text linkThe Crown-of-Thorns Starfish (Acanthaster cf. solaris; CoTS) is arguably the most destructive non-human animal to coral reefs, significantly impeding coral survival in the face of the foremost effects of climate change and coral bleaching. Controlling the unprecedented number of CoTS outbreaks and damage on reef systems is vital for the survival of the reef ecosystem. The emergent strategy of using semiochemicals in terrestrial pest control management, due to their environmentally friendly nature, has generated interest in their application to control populations of this destructive species. However, there have been only a limited number of studies on promising semiochemical applications within aquatic systems. This Perspectives Review provides a much-needed outlook of CoTS chemosensory and semiochemical repertoire, how we might hypothetically utilise semiochemicals with regard to modifying CoTS behaviours and discusses future research directions and the scope for innovative semiochemical technologies with the aim of sustainably controlling CoTS populations, thereby mitigating their devastating outbreaks and destruction of coral reef systems
Optimal Planning Target Volume Margins to Account for Intra-Fractional Prostate Motion Relative to Treatment Duration: A Study Using Real-Time Transperineal Ultrasound Guidance
No full textIntroduction: Prostate motion during external beam radiotherapy (EBRT) is common and typically managed using fiducial markers and cone beam CT (CBCT) scans for inter-fractional motion correction. However, real-time intra-fractional motion management is less commonly implemented. This study evaluated the extent of intra-fractional prostate motion using transperineal ultrasound (TPUS) and examined the impact of treatment time on prostate motion.
Methods: Patients undergoing prostate EBRT with TPUS at a single institution from August 2016 to August 2021 were analysed. Pre-treatment daily CBCT corrected inter-fractional prostate shift. Continuous intra-fractional prostate motion was recorded at two frames per second in three dimensions, with three-dimensional (3D) displacement calculated as a vector. Motion data were modelled to determine the probability of the prostate remaining within pre-specified PTV margins relative to treatment delivery time.
Results: The study analysed 3364 fractions delivered to 122 patients. The mean treatment delivery time was 3.8 min. The prostate remained within a 5 mm margin with high frequencies in the superior–inferior (SI) and left–right (LR) directions, 97.8% and 98.4% of fractions respectively while 5.5% of fractions had deviations greater than 5 mm in the anterior–posterior (AP) direction. By contrast, the 3D vector exceeded a 5 mm margin in 14.5% of fractions. Drift motion modelling indicated a 99% probability of the vector staying within a 3 mm margin for 2 min, while for a 5 mm margin, the duration extended to 3.4 min.
Conclusions: Intra-fractional prostate motion monitoring is increasingly important as SABR with reduced PTV margins are utilised in prostate radiotherapy. Smaller PTV margins and longer treatment time require real-time monitoring to avoid geographical miss
Evolution of ore fluids in the magmatic-hydrothermal Pb-Zn metallogenic system: A case study from Narusongduo deposit in the Himalayan-Tibetan orogen
No full textMost skarn-type Pb-Zn deposits have at least two alteration stages: an early prograde and a later retrograde. However, whether these stages were formed by a single pulse or multiple pulses of magmatic fluids remains unclear. The Narusongduo deposit, a large magmatic-hydrothermal Pb-Zn deposit in the Gangdese polymetallic belt of the Himalayan-Tibetan orogen, provides an ideal vehicle to answer this issue. Skarn- and cryptoexplosive breccia–type are two major types of mineralization in this deposit. Three hydrothermal stages are distinguished for the skarn-type ore: pre-ore stage with garnet, diopside, rhodonite, and wollastonite; syn-ore stage with actinolite, epidote, chlorite, quartz, calcite plus sulfides; and post-ore stage with quartz, calcite, and pyrite. Contrastingly, two stages—namely, the syn-ore stage with epidote-chlorite-sericite-quartz-calcite-sphalerite-galena, and the post-ore stage with quartz-calcite-tetrahedrite-tennantite-anglesite are found for the cryptoexplosive breccia–type ore. Primary fluid inclusions trapped in garnet from skarn-type ores have relatively higher homogenization temperatures of 430–440 °C, higher salinities of 42–43 wt% NaCl equivalent, and higher concentrations of Na (8.26 wt%), K (1.64 wt%), Pb (18,118 ppm), and Zn (11,196 ppm) than those in sphalerite and calcite (300–310 °C, 4–5 wt% NaCl equivalent, 1.27 wt%, 0.03 wt%, 649 ppm, and 664 ppm). Primary fluid inclusions trapped in sphalerite and quartz from cryptoexplosive breccia–type ores share similar temperature, salinity, and element compositions (300–310 °C, 4–5 wt% NaCl equivalent, 1.13 wt% Na, 0.04 wt% K, 705 ppm Pb, and 981 ppm Zn) with that in the same stage of the skarn-type ores. These microthermal and trace element data from single fluid inclusions point to the syn-ore fluid for the skarn-type ores being different from the pre-ore fluid for the same ore types but similar to the syn-ore stage of the cryptoexplosive breccia–type ores. This suggests magmatic fluid origins for the fluids from all stages in the deposit. Geochemical reaction path modeling of the pre-ore fluid from skarn-type ores predicted large amounts of skarn and alteration mineral precipitation with no Pb and Zn sulfides. Together with varying fluid inclusion compositions, we suggest that the pre-ore versus syn-ore stages are different pulses of hydrothermal fluids exsolved from a magma chamber. The magmatic-hydrothermal process should be as follows. The early supercritical fluid exsolved from the magma reservoir upwelling to ∼1.0 km under lithostatic conditions, separated into a hypersaline fluid and a low-salinity vapor, and produced the earliest skarn alteration. Subsequently, the second pulses of the supercritical fluid intersected the saturated vapor-pressure curve and boiled at the same depth of ∼1.0 km under hydrostatic conditions, resulting in the residual liquid with moderate to low temperature and low salinity and the formation of the skarn-type and cryptoexplosive breccia–type mineralization in different lithologies and structures. This work disclosed a two-stage pulse of fluids in the magmatic-hydrothermal Pb-Zn metallogenic system, indicating that maybe this kind of fluid involution is responsible for the formation of this kind of deposit
Rotation-based outlier detection for geochemical anomaly identification in stream sediment multivariate data
Full text linkThis research explores the use of the rotation-based outlier detection (ROD) method for identifying geochemical anomalies in a multivariate stream sediment dataset from Iran, targeting porphyry and vein-type Cu mineralization. Geochemical datasets often present challenges for outlier detection methods like local outlier factor (LOF) and k-nearest neighbor (KNN), which rely on distance or density metrics and require parameter tuning (e.g., neighborhood size k). High-dimensional feature spaces further complicate their application. ROD, in contrast, offers a parameter-free, rotation-based approach that effectively analyzes geometric relationships between samples in subspaces, mitigating the curse of dimensionality. This makes ROD particularly suited to high-dimensional geochemical datasets, where complex relationships between elements (due to lithology or mineralization) are critical for identifying anomalies. This study compares ROD with LOF and KNN using two subsets of geochemical variables (Ag, As, Au, Bi, Co, Cr, Cu, Mo, Ni, Pb, Sb, Zn; and Ag, As, Au, Cu, Mo, Sb) and evaluates its performance based on the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis and the number of known mineral occurrences detected in anomaly class. ROD outperforms LOF and KNN, capturing 78% (14 out of 18) of known Cu-bearing mineral occurrences. Moreover, ROD shows better conformity between 10% of highest outlier scores and Cu-mineralization sites. Rotation cost function in ROD, evaluated using the median absolute deviation (MAD), enhances its ability to detect outliers by focusing on orientation rather than distance, and by reducing noise misclassification. In addition, the parameter-free design of ROD and improved handling of high-dimensional data makes it a promising tool for geochemical exploration, as it captures unique mineralization-related signals that might be missed by traditional methods