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Disaster Management in Bangladesh: Developing an Effective Emergency Supply Chain Network
Get PDFThis study has addressed and identified the problems in managing the existing emergency supply chain of Bangladesh in all phases of operation in terms of the primary drivers of the supply chain. It has also attempted to conceptualize and suggest an effective emergency supply chain. In this context, a thorough field investigation in several districts was conducted among the employees of the organizations sharing common information with similar protocols and implications (interoperable). Information was collected from the employees of all the participating organizations involved in disaster management through a semi-structured questionnaire based survey. The respondents addressed and illustrated several interconnected reasons which are inhibiting proper forecasting, procurement, storage, identification of affected people, and distribution. The respondents pointed out that the mismatching of objectives in the different organizations resulted in non-interoperability among the participating organizations. These issues are related to the malfunctioning of management with multidimensional organizational conflicts. Reflecting those issues, an emergency supply chain for disaster management is proposed in this study
Advertisements on Facebook: Identifying the Persuasive Elements in the Development of Positive Attitudes in Consumers
Get PDFThe main objective of this study is to develop the scale items of consumers’ attitudes toward Facebook advertisements and to theorize consumers’ attitudinal behaviour. To undertake this study, a research assistant was appointed, who is also an active member of Facebook, to introduce a message about the product Samsung Tab S, and to pass it to other members of their network. From this experiment, different members of their network participated in generating, passing, and receiving messages to develop a preliminary structured perception which was converted to generate scale items to measure attitude. Then an independent empirical study was conducted among members of a social network to verify and validate these scale items and their underlying constructs. From the findings in this study, it is identified that attitudes toward social network advertisement, i.e., any effort to communicate messages about products among network members, who are also consumers of different products, is formed and persuaded by hedonic motivation (HM), source derogation (SD), self-concept (SC), message informality (MI), and experiential messages (EM)
Comparison of Staphylococcus Phage K with Close Phage Relatives Commonly Employed in Phage Therapeutics
Get PDFThe increase in antibiotic resistance in pathogenic bacteria is a public health danger requiring alternative treatment options, and this has led to renewed interest in phage therapy. In this respect, we describe the distinct host ranges of Staphylococcus phage K, and two other K-like phages against 23 isolates, including 21 methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) representative sequence types representing the Irish National MRSA Reference Laboratory collection. The two K-like phages were isolated from the Fersisi therapeutic phage mix from the Tbilisi Eliava Institute, and were designated B1 (vB_SauM_B1) and JA1 (vB_SauM_JA1). The sequence relatedness of B1 and JA1 to phage K was observed to be 95% and 94% respectively. In terms of host range on the 23 Staphylococcus isolates, B1 and JA1 infected 73.9% and 78.2% respectively, whereas K infected only 43.5%. Eleven open reading frames (ORFs) present in both phages B1 and JA1 but absent in phage K were identified by comparative genomic analysis. These ORFs were also found to be present in the genomes of phages (Team 1, vB_SauM-fRuSau02, Sb_1 and ISP) that are components of several commercial phage mixtures with reported wide host ranges. This is the first comparative study of therapeutic staphylococcal phages within the recently described genus Kayvirus
Socio-economic determinants of physical activity across the life course: A DEterminants of DIet and Physical ACtivity (DEDIPAC) umbrella literature review
Get PDFBackground To date, the scientific literature on socioeconomic correlates and determinants of physical activity behaviours has been dispersed throughout a number of systematic reviews, often focusing on one factor (e.g. education or parental income) in one specific age group (e.g. pre-school children or adults). The aim of this umbrella review is to provide a comprehensive and systematic overview of the scientific literature from previously conducted research by summarising and synthesising the importance and strength of the evidence related to socioeconomic correlates and determinants of PA behaviours across the life course. Methods Medline, Embase, ISI Web of Science, Scopus and SPORTDiscus were searched for systematic literature reviews and meta-analyses of observational studies investigating the association between socioeconomic determinants of PA and PA itself (from January 2004 to September 2017). Data extraction evaluated the importance of determinants, strength of evidence, and methodological quality of the selected papers. The full protocol is available from PROSPERO (PROSPERO2014:CRD42015010616). Results Nineteen reviews were included. Moderate methodological quality emerged. For adults, convincing evidence supports a relationship between PA and socioeconomic status (SES), especially in relation to leisure time (positive relationship) and occupational PA (negative relationship). Conversely, no association between PA and SES or parental SES was found for pre-school, school-aged children and adolescents. Conclusions Available evidence on the socioeconomic determinants of PA behaviour across the life course is probable (shows fairly consistent associations) at best. While some evidence is available for adults, less was available for youth. This is mainly due to a limited quantity of primary studies, weak research designs and lack of accuracy in the PA and SES assessment methods employed. Further PA domain specific studies using longitudinal design and clear measures of SES and PA assessment are required
The Effectiveness of School-Based Interventions on the Fundamental Movement Skill Proficiency Among a Cohort of Irish Primary School Children
Get PDFBackground: Fundamental movement skills (FMS) are basic observable patterns of movement such as running and jumping. FMS facilitate participation in physical activity and sport. The ability to perform FMS correctly (i.e. FMS proficiency) is associated with numerous health benefits and is important for the holistic development of children. FMS proficiency among primary school children worldwide is low. Thus, interventions aimed at improving FMS levels among children are warranted. Therefore, this thesis aimed to assess the FMS proficiency among a cohort of Irish primary school children and examine the effectiveness of a physical activity (PA) (Year 1) and a multicomponent FMS (Year 2) intervention on children’s FMS levels.
Methods: FMS proficiency was assessed using the Test of Gross Motor Development-2 (TGMD-2), across academic year 2014/2015 (Year 1) and academic year 2015/2016 (Year 2). Participants were children from three primary schools (two intervention, one control) in south Ireland. In Year 1 (N=187), intervention (n=96) and control (n=91) groups were children from senior infant and fourth classes. In Year 2 (N=357), intervention (n=195) and control (n=162) groups were senior infant, 1st, 4th and 5th class children. At baseline Year 1, an analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to assess age and sex related differences in FMS proficiency among all participating children (N=203). Following both the PA- and FMS-intervention, repeated measures ANOVAs were conducted to investigate the effectiveness of each intervention. Only participants with complete data sets at baseline and post-intervention testing were included in the analyses.
Results: FMS levels among Irish primary school children are similar to children worldwide, with age and sex differences evident. Older children scored significantly higher than younger children in both locomotor (p
Conclusion: FMS levels among primary school children in Ireland, and worldwide, are less than satisfactory. While a PA-based intervention improved locomotor proficiency, it was not more effective at improving children’s FMS levels than the Irish PE curriculum only. However, a multicomponent FMS-based intervention significantly improved locomotor, object-control and overall FMS proficiency among primary school children (large effect sizes for all). It is suggested that multicomponent FMS-based interventions should be implemented across primary schools in Ireland to improve FMS proficiency level, as greater proficiency is related to greater PA participation and numerous health benefits
Project Spraoi: A School-Based Intervention to Increase Physical Activity, Improve Nutrition and Positively Impact the Health of Irish Primary School Children
No full textSystemic Behaviour Change: Irish Farm Deaths and Injuries
Get PDFWhile the Irish agricultural sector accounts for just 6% of the working population of Ireland, it consistently has the highest proportion of fatal incidents of any sector - generally ranging from between 35% and 45% of all workplace fatalities in any given year. This was again evident in 2014 where 55% (30 of the 56) of the fatal workplace incidents were in the agricultural sector. Agriculture has an ageing workforce with the average age of an Irish farmer now standing at fifty-seven and farmers are eight times more likely to be fatally injured in a farm accident than the general working population. Interviews were conducted with farmers and farm safety advisory bodies. The findings from this research show that a systems social marketing approach should be adopted to eliminate farm deaths and injuries and that interventions should be co-created with the farming community. A grass-roots mentoring system needs to be established to advise farmers on best practice. This needs to be modelled on 3 main pillars (individual farm visits, courses in safe farming, and group farm walks) delivered by and for farmers. Live testimonials from farmers who have been involved in farming accidents also need to be incorporated into all farm safety talks and demonstrations. These need to show farmers the physical, emotional and financial consequences of a farming accident. These farm accident victims should attend individual farm visits, courses in safe farming and group farm walks. Practical workshops need to be set up so farmers learn specific skills appropriate to their farming situation. Lecture-based teaching where farmers sit and listen about safe farming practices should be avoided as farmers like to learn by doing. The issue of farm safety needs to be addressed at a macro marketing level and needs to involve a broadening of the traditional 4Ps to include People, Policy and Partnership
Project Spraoi: The Effectiveness of a Nutrition and Physical Activity Intervention on the Dietry Intake, Dietary Patterns, Nutritional Knowledge and Markers of Health of Irish Primary School Children
Get PDFAim: To implement and evaluate the effectiveness of a nutrition and physical activity (PA) intervention (Project Spraoi) on dietary intake (DI), dietary patterns (DP), nutritional knowledge (NK), cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF), blood pressure (BP) and markers of health of Irish children in one primary school in Cork. The relationship between DP and NK, CRF, BP and anthropometric data will also be examined.
Design: Cross-sectional and longitudinal study. Food diary, NK questionnaire and 550m walk/run test were used to assess DI, DP, NK and CRF, respectively. BP, body mass index (BMI) and waist to height ratio (WHtR) were also calculated.
Setting: Two primary schools, Cork, Ireland.
Subjects: Six (n = 49, age 5.9 ± 0.6 years) and ten (n = 52, age 9.8 ± 0.5 years) year olds.
Results: Study One: Intakes of fruit, vegetables, fibre, calcium, iron, unhealthy snacks and saturated fat were sub-optimal. Only 24.4% of six year olds and 35.4% of ten year olds were classified as ‘fast’. Nearly half (45.9%) of all participants had high-normal BP. For ten year olds, there was a positive correlation between WHtR and run score (r = 0.350, p = 0.014) and BMI and run score (r = 0.482, p = 0.001). Study Two: There was a significant improvement (p \u3c 0.05) in systolic and diastolic BP, WHtR and NK for ten year olds and a significant improvement for fibre intake in six year old males (p = 0.024) after the Project Spraoi intervention. Percentage energy from protein in ten year old females from the intervention group (p = 0.021) also significantly improved. Study Three: At baseline, three out of four dietary patterns identified for six and ten year olds were unfavourable and there was no significant difference in dietary patterns at baseline and post-intervention. There were also statistically insignificant differences in nutritional knowledge, BMI, WHtR, CRF and BP with respect to dietary patterns at baseline and post-intervention.
Conclusion: Project Spraoi was effective in improving nutritional knowledge, WHtR, BP and some aspects of dietary intake (fibre, protein) in older Irish primary school children in one intervention school in Cork, Ireland. This study also highlights, for the first time, the relationship between DP and nutritional knowledge, CRF, BP and anthropometric data for Irish children
‘The Show Must Go On’: Amateur Musical Theatre as a Community of Practice
Get PDFAmateur musical theatre has its roots in long-standing theatre traditions that include both professional and amateur production. Apart from the performance, which is the over-arching goal, participation in amateur musical theatre yields many other personal and social benefits in areas of learning, community and identity, aligning with Wenger’s concept of a ‘Community of Practice’.
Using an analytical framework based on previous studies in this area, this research investigates how amateur musical theatre functions as a ‘Community of Practice’. The research was conducted using an ethnographic case study of two contrasting local amateur productions. Experiential data and details regarding participant interactions were gathered via observation, field notes and interviews. Analysis of data follows Wenger’s categories, including aspects of mutual engagement, joint enterprise and shared repertoire, showing how meaningful friendships are formed whilst also achieving rehearsal and performance goals. The data analysis will also include a consideration of nature of the learning that occurs in accordance with established research of formal, informal and non-formal practices. The research contributes to an understanding of the value of musical theatre and what it offer