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Strategies used by healthcare professionals to increase the human papillomavirus vaccine uptake among adolescents in Ireland: A qualitative study
No full textBackground: Adolescent human papillomavirus vaccine uptake in Ireland dropped to 50–60 % between 2016 and 2021. Healthcare professionals play a vital role in increasing the uptake of human papillomavirus vaccine among adolescents. This is the first study that sought to identify the key opportunities for healthcare professionals to get adolescent vaccination uptake to optimal rate. Objective: To explore the strategies healthcare professionals in Ireland use to promote vaccine uptake among adolescents and to understand how they are addressing vaccine hesitancy. Design: A qualitative descriptive study. Setting(s): Three community health organisations in Ireland. Participants: A purposive sample of 17 healthcare professionals involved in the delivery of the human papillomavirus vaccination programme in Ireland was recruited. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted between November 2022 and July 2023. Reflexive thematic analysis method was used to analyse the interview data. Results: Four themes emerged from the data: Attitudes towards the human papillomavirus vaccine; Strategies used to promote the vaccine's uptake; Organisational and structural enablers and barriers; and Future improvement strategies. Healthcare professionals reported that there are still concerns about the safety and efficacy of human papillomavirus vaccine especially among marginalised populations. Healthcare professionals reported that increased uptake was more likely if they adopted flexible approaches to delivering the vaccine, easily accessible drop-in clinics, and proving more opportunities to educate adolescents and parents about the importance of the vaccine. Despite these efforts, healthcare professionals are faced with organisational barriers that hinder effective delivery. Policy reform to support and educate stakeholders could improve the vaccine uptake. In addition, more work is needed to address unproven negative testimonies on social media, to reduce concerns among the public regarding the safety and potential side effects of the vaccine. Conclusions: Human papillomavirus vaccine is one of the best preventative measures that public health care has to offer in preventing and reducing human papillomavirus related cancers and infections. Healthcare professionals demonstrated several interventions they adopt to improve the uptake of the human papillomavirus vaccine for adolescents. The findings suggest that adopting better multi-setting approaches to vaccination programmes and multi-system collaborative efforts would significantly increase the uptake of the vaccine. Tweetable abstract: Strategies used by healthcare professionals to increase the human papillomavirus vaccine uptake among adolescents in Ireland.</p
Task difficulty promotes tactical learning but supresses the positive learning effects of autonomy and cognitive effort
No full textLearning conditions that provide task-relevant autonomy, and those that encourage cognitive effort through manipulations of difficulty, have been reported to enhance skill development. However, research is yet to directly compare these two manipulations to establish their relative contribution to enhancing motor learning. This study used an on-screen target interception task to compare an autonomous group (self-selection of racquet size), a Challenge Point group (performance-contingent racquet size), a yoked group, and a fixed racquet size control group. Task accuracy and self-report measures of intrinsic motivation and cognitive effort were recorded at multiple time points across acquisition and at immediate, 24-h, seven-day, and 30-day retention and transfer tests. Results showed that task accuracy improved over acquisition, and remained robust across all retention tests, but no between group differences were seen. Intrinsic motivation levels decreased over acquisition, but with no between group differences observed. Participants (83, mean age 40(±12) years, 50 % male) within all groups reported consistently high cognitive effort scores, and made tactical learning choices, suggesting that high task difficulty may have suppressed the more subtle effects of autonomy and performance contingent practice. Conclusions are made regarding the variability of individual approaches to a novel task and the need to build experiments that can detect these idiosyncrasies</p
Like a Lion - Research Statement
No full textIn this research report, I outline the artistic development, recording and release of my debut album, 'Like a Lion.' The album features ten original songs, which I composed as a socio-musical Feminist exploration of women's experiences in contemporary Ireland. The album was produced by celebrated Irish musician, composer and producer, Seán Óg Graham and was released in December 2019. The report includes an explanation of the creative impetus for the project, evidence of the album's impact with links to reviews and other related work such as videos, and acknowledgements of my various collaborators.</p
Sustainable core-shell structures derived from lignin for Na ion batteries
No full textThe aromatic nature of the structure of lignin enables its use as a natural and sustainable hard carbon precursor. Upon carbonisation, lignin-derived hard carbon has shown potential as a sodium-ion battery anode. In this study, we have utilised coaxial electrospinning to produce nanofibers, which undergo stabilisation and carbonisation, to analyse the influence of carbon morphology on sodium-ion storage mechanisms. Various nanostructures have been tailored to produce intricate core/shell structures with varying degrees of porosity to allow controlled Na diffusion and storage. The morphology of these unique high surface area nanostructures has been assessed by scanning electron microscopy. The optimized Core-Shell structure shows a specific capacity of 184.7mAh g− 1 , with 99.7 % of coulombic efficiency. This innovative and green approach enables new strategies to obtain sustainable materials for sodium ion energy storage applications.</p
Utilisation of robots in nursing practice: an umbrella review
No full textBackground The provision of nursing care across the globe is confronted with a range of challenges, including the surge in the older persons population which amplifies the reliance on nursing services and exacerbates the shortage of nurses worldwide. A possible solution could be the broader implementation of robotics in nursing practice. Therefore, this umbrella review aimed to assess and synthesise systematically reviewed evidence on the utilisation of robots in nursing practice.Methods An extensive search of nine relevant databases was conducted for research syntheses. We included reviews that reported the experiences of nurses, perceived benefits and challenges of using robots in nursing practice in all care settings and published between the years 2012 and 2022. A supplementary search was conducted in October 2024 using the same criteria. Quality appraisal, data extraction and syntheses were carried out according to Joanna Brigg’s Institute’s guidelines for undertaking umbrella reviews. The protocol of this umbrella review was registered on PROSPERO prior to the commencement of the review (Registration ID CRD42022361835).Results Thirteen reviews (representing 558 studies) were included following the quality appraisal. The evidence was summarised in narrative form with supporting quotes from the reviews. The findings were grouped into categories, which were further categorised into three main synthesised findings: ‘Documented experiences of nurses in using robots’, ‘perceived benefits of using robots’ and ‘perceived challenges of using robots’. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first umbrella review that synthesised evidence on the experiences and perceptions of nurses regarding the use of robots. This umbrella review has limitations as it is not the primary source of evidence, relying on the quality of the included reviews and studies.Conclusions Evidence shows that there is a perception that robots can support nurses in their work. However, thereis not enough experiential evidence from nurses who work with robots in practice to support this. There are also perceived challenges that are of concern to nurses, particularly in relation to liability, ethical dilemmas and patient safety. The authors have no competing interests to declare in the conduct of this review.</p
TCN-based DDoS detection and mitigation in 5G healthcare-IoT: a frequency monitoring and dynamic threshold approach
No full textThe Internet of Things (IoT) revolutionizes precision healthcare by enhancing patient care and reducing costs. However, this technology poses challenges in securing Healthcare-IoT (H-IoT) devices, as low-latency packet transmission increases vulnerability to attacks (e.g., Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS)) in 5G networks. This research develops a monitoring frequency-based detection and dynamic threshold mitigation method using Temporal Convolutional Networks (TCNs) in 5G H-IoT environments. A monitoring frequency-based detection method calculates each H-IoT node’s message count over the past five seconds as a percentage of total traffic. A dynamic threshold strategy also provides adaptive security by averaging detected malicious behavior messages across all nodes to determine the base threshold. This approach enhances classification accuracy, effectively mitigates actual DDoS attack nodes, and blacklists malicious nodes without false positives in H-IoT environments. Moreover, this research creates DDoS attack models, monitoring parameters using two simulators (Cooja and ns-3) on H-IoT devices. Data is collected over the Message Queuing Telemetry Transport (MQTT) and User Datagram Protocol (UDP) in a realistic 5G-based H-IoT environment, creating two datasets with malicious and benign data. The proposed TCN-based DDoS prediction and mitigation method achieves 99.98% and 95% accuracy on the MQTT dataset. This model also attains a slightly higher prediction accuracy of 99.99% and mitigation of 80% on the UDP dataset. This research evaluates the proposed model against prior methods, including Bidirectional Long Short-Term Memory (BiLSTM) and Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs), demonstrating improved accuracy. Thus, the proposed TCN model is a versatile and resilient security solution for H-IoT environments.</p
Metal Dyshomeostasis as a driver of gut pathology in autism spectrum disorders
No full textDespite being classified as neurodevelopmental disorders, in recent years, there has been a growing interest in the association between autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) and gut pathology. This comprehensive and systematic review explores a potential mechanism underlying gut pathology in ASDs, including alterations in gut microbiota, intestinal permeability, immune dysregulation, and gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms. Specifically, it delves into the role of toxic and essential metals and their interplay, affecting the development and function of the GI tract. The review also discusses the potential implications of this gut pathology in the development and management of ASDs. Studies have shown that heavy metal exposure, whether through environmental sources or dietary intake, can disrupt the delicate balance of trace elements in the gut. This disruption can adversely affect zinc homeostasis, potentially exacerbating gut pathology in individuals with ASDs. The impaired zinc absorption resulting from heavy metal exposure may contribute to the immune dysregulation, oxidative stress, and inflammation observed in the gut of individuals with ASDs. By shedding light on the multifaceted nature of gut pathology, including the impact of metal dyshomeostasis as a non-genetic factor in ASD, this review underscores the significance of the gut-brain axis in the etiology and management of ASDs.</p
CFD modelling and simulations of atomization-based processes for production of drug particles: A review
No full textAtomization-based techniques are widely used in pharmaceutical industry for production of fine drug particles due to their versatility and adaptability. Key performance measure of such techniques is their ability to provide control over critical quality attributes (CQAs) of produced drug particles. CQAs of drug particles produced via atomization critically depend on fluid dynamics of sprays; resulting mixing, heat and mass transfer; distribution of supersaturation and subsequent nucleation and growth of particles. It is essential to develop and use computational fluid dynamics (CFD) models for adequate understanding of multi-scale transport processes ranging from molecular scale mixing and particle scale processes, and from atomizer nozzle to overall spray chamber scale establishing relationships between CQAs and design and operating parameters of spray nozzle and chamber. In this work, we critically review past and current research efforts on CFD modelling of pharmaceutical atomization-based processes with an objective to provide clear assessment of the state of the art and to provide recommendations. An overview of the key atomization-based methods for producing drug particles with desired CQAs is presented. Key underlying physical processes and relevant concepts are then outlined. This discussion is related to the demands on CFD models; and state of the art is then discussed with respect to the process needs. Recommendations are provided towards higher fidelity and more efficient models of atomized multiphase flow dynamics and turbulence, drying modelling for the produced particles, and validation approaches. We conclude by highlighting a perceived need for numerical atomization studies with a pharmaceutical context; then, we deliver an outlook on current promising active control and machine learning strategies to augment the shift towards quality-by-design approaches in pharmaceutical manufacturing</p
Climate Justice and the University: Shaping a hopeful future for all
No full textJennie C. Stephens, Professor of Climate Justice at Maynooth University, opens this provocative and immensely significant book by posing a simple but radical question: ‘Could universities become critical infrastructures for advancing transformative climate justice by imagining and creating better futures for all’ (p. 3). The very question is likely to raise unease among many academics who have been formed to imagine the university as a more neutral and disinterested space, generating and sharing knowledge for the overall good of society. But Stephens dares to ask how true this is, exposing the ‘capture of higher education by powerful elites and corporate interests’ and the ways in which universities ‘concentrate wealth and power by gatekeeping knowledge’ (p. 6). Already in the first few pages, the reader knows they are going to be taken on a rollercoaster ride through the realities of how universities really function as facilitators and drivers of much of the polycrisis that envelops our contemporary world, and how they could be transformed to foster the foundations of a better future for humankind.</p
Conversions and Lutheranism in Early Modern Central Europe
No full textIn 1880 the final volume of the Strasbourg bishop Andreas Räss’ monumental The Converts since the Reformation according to Their Lives and Own Writings (“Die Convertiten seit der Reformation nach ihrem Leben und aus ihren Schriften dargestellt”) was published in Freiburg.1 it was the thirteenth volume of this massive undertaking. The books described converts to Catholicism, starting with the Humanist Wilibald Pirkheimer and continuing all the way into the nineteenth century. While not overtly polemical in nature, the books were celebratory and argued that those profiled in ca. 7200 pages had returned to the true and only Catholic Church. Ordered chronologically as a sequence of individual convert biographies, the volumes built – by means of repetition – a compelling narrative of false belief overcome through conversion to a perennially forgiving and receptive Catholic Church. Räss’ undertaking was the most substantial of several works produced by scholars from the middle to the end of the nineteenth century, which discussed the converts to Catholicism in a celebratory mode.2 Undoubtedly, Räss’ work was not meant for popular consumption since purchasing the set of thirteen volumes would have been beyond the means of most contemporaries. Nonetheless, the continuation and completion of this ambitious publication project over fourteen years suggests that amongst suitably resourced readers, at the very least, Räss’ account of Catholic triumph by way of conversion was well received. Räss followed a narrative that was already popular amongst the missionaries of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, namely that through instruction and catechesis, many Protestants (as well as heathens) saw the error of their ways and embraced Catholicism.</p