26729 research outputs found
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Diaspora and ‘homeland’ development
No full textThe relationships of diaspora groups with their homelands shape development processes. Three dimensions are of notable significance—the idea of return, return mobilities, and financial remittances and investment. These three are examined here by combining commentary on a wider literature with our exploration of the specific context of the conflict-generated Kurdish diaspora. Through this analysis, the chapter considers theoretical, policy, and practice debates about how the notion of homeland influences the nature of diaspora engagement and the contribution of the diaspora to homeland development
Einflussfaktoren und Priorisierungskriterien im IT-Portfoliomanagement – Eine theoretische Betrachtung und empirische Analyse am Beispiel der Deutschen Bahn AG
No full textHow companies' huge IT budgets are distributed among projects and programs for implementation is often decided in IT portfolio management or accompanied by it. This dissertation examines the importance of influencing factors and prioritization criteria in IT portfolio management using the example of Deutsche Bahn AG, which offers interesting insights due to its size and diversity. The study explains the functioning and organizational embedding of IT portfolio management and the relationships within it. It includes a very comprehensive literature research and analysis, a critical discussion of the theoretical content and a clear extraction and summary. Specifically, it is worked out which influencing factors and prioritization criteria are treated in science and how they are used in theories and models.
The main research question as well as the theory-, empirical- and design-led questions and objectives are derived and answered in detail. The research gap addressed in the dissertation is closed by interviewing top-class experts from the company that is the focus of the case study, qualitatively analyzing the content of the results and preparing them in a clear manner. It is investigated which influencing factors and internal and external prioritization criteria are used in reality, how the ITPPM process works, which interfaces it has and which methods and tools are used. A distinction is made between the corporate level of Deutsche Bahn and the individual business areas of the company. The entire process of the methodological approach and operationalization is described in detail.
Through this work, in which the empirical results are combined with the findings from the latest scientific literature and critically discussed, an effective overall concept with organizational, procedural, methodological and cultural recommendations for action to optimize the ITPPM in corporate practice was developed. It is the first of its kind to attempt to identify influencing factors and prioritization criteria in such detail and to provide research - also with concrete recommendations for action - with valuable information for future adjustments or additions to models and theories directly from reality. A detailed examination and evaluation of the quality criteria met, final summary and conclusion round off the dissertation
The right to freedom of thought in South Africa
Get PDFThis chapter analyses the scope and possible further development of the right to freedom of thought in South Africa. Although still facing a myriad of social issues, three decades since the abolition of Apartheid has seen the country establishing itself as a liberal democracy with a highly respected judiciary. It boasts a progressive constitution with a robust Bill of Rights, which specifically includes the right to freedom of thought albeit as part of the right to freedom of religion, belief and opinion in Section 15. From an analysis of relevant case law it is clear that FOT is not yet seen as a fundamental right on its own. Section 15 seems to be understood as mainly referring to the right to freedom of religion, or as some prefer, freedom from religion. At first glance it may seem that coercive proselytising, archaic witchcraft and blasphemy legislation comprise the main issues for FOT in South Africa. The chapter argues that this is too narrow an interpretation, and that the right, although specifically contained under the umbrella of religious freedom in the Constitution, also forms part and parcel of other fundamental rights such as equality, speech, and privacy. To that end, the chapter uses the four attributes of the right to freedom of thought as formulated by the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief and considers to what extent, in aggregate, South Africa lives up to the ideal. It concludes that an enabling environment for freedom of thought not only exists, but has the potential to be further developed in South Africa
Exploring perspectives and experiences of pressure ulcer prevention among healthcare support workers
No full textBackground: Given the global shift of delegating more responsibilities including Pressure Ulcer (PrU) prevention to healthcare support workers (HCSWs), yet their experiences and perspectives are often underrepresented in research.
Aim: To explore HCSWs’ experiences and perspectives in PrU prevention when deliver patients care.
Method: A generic qualitative research was utilised. Four focus groups were conducted via Zoom with HCSWs working in different clinical settings between March and June 2021. The focus groups explored HCSWs’ experiences and perspectives into PrU prevention, including their roles, challenges and areas need improvements. Data were analysed using thematic analysis.
Findings: 14 participants included 3 trainee Nursing Associates (2 acute, 1 community) and 1 Nursing Associate from acute settings, remaining 10 Healthcare Assistants from acute (4), community (2), domiciliary care (3), and mental health (1). Participants demonstrated strong commitment to PrU prevention, driven by their compassion and a genuine desire to alleviate patient suffering. Participants discussed challenges to effective PrU prevention, including lack of knowledge, skills, staff shortages, excessive workloads, and inconsistent practices. They stressed the critical role of teamwork and communication with patients and families for successful PrU prevention. There was a strong call for structured training to enhance their knowledge and skills, advocating for mandatory, comprehensive and recurrent training for all involved in patient care.
Conclusion: The findings highlights the critical role of HCSWs in PrU prevention within current healthcare workforce model. It identified challenges and emphasises the need for proper training and support to fortify the contributions to effective PrU prevention among HCSWs
How gender comes to matter: tracing matter, space, place, time and affect in early childhood research
No full textThis chapter re-turns to encounters in early childhood contexts as they are presented by a range of feminist new materialist scholars over the past decade. This body of work underscores the imperative to research gender and sexualities in ways that attend to the more-than-human. Our tracing illustrates that this emergent field of scholarship presents new and generative possibilities for opening out ideas and practices concerning how gender comes to matter in early childhood. Gender is understood expansively so that the organisation of space, the agency of matter, the significance of atmospheric forces that create possibilities to re-imagine gender and sexualities become central to investigation. Dwelling upon the feltness of encounters in early childhood contexts involves paying close attention to forces agitated from emerging, vanishing and transforming affective ecologies. Our objective in this chapter then, is to re-attune to spatiality, flows, intensities, and affective stutters; to zoom in and out to illuminate multiple and contradictory gendered forces at play, and to make visible what that might mean for research and practice. While some hegemonic gender formations continue to be privileged, we explore how they are at once queered by other affective currents that present ways of becoming gendered otherwise
The Urban Life of Workers in Post-Soviet Russia: Engaging in Everyday Struggle by Alexandrina Vanke. Manchester: University of Manchester Press, 2024. 256 pp. £85.00. ISBN 978-1-5261-6763-7 [Book review]
No full textReview of: The Urban Life of Workers in Post-Soviet Russia: Engaging in Everyday Struggle by Alexandrina Vanke. Manchester: University of Manchester Press, 2024. 256 pp. £85.00. ISBN 978-1-5261-6763-
Orwellian odyssey: smart borders and the imperative for explainability
No full textSunlight, they say is the best disinfectant. Therefore, it does not come as a surprise that transparency vis-a-vis explainability of Machine Learning (ML) algorithms used in the context of border control constitutes a key societal desideratum. Integrating ML algorithms in surveillance technologies, particularly algorithms deployed in border and asylum control and management (smart borders), has transformed security measures. This has evoked profound ethical and legal concerns as a result of ML opacity. This paper seeks to contribute to the ongoing discourse on safeguarding fundamental rights in an increasingly algorithmic world, specifically in the context of migration. The paper argues that embedding explainability into AI systems used in migration control is essential to prevent the emergence of an Orwellian surveillance state, ensuring that security measures do not erode civil liberties. It proposes several technical solutions to enhance AI system explainability and address power asymmetries between affected individuals and system users, including developers. It argues that by mandating explainability of ML algorithms, we can better balance power dynamics and protect the rights of individuals impacted by AI systems
A latent diffusion approach to visual attribution in medical imaging
Get PDFVisual attribution in medical imaging seeks to make evident the diagnostically-relevant components of a medical image, in
contrast to the more common detection of diseased tissue deployed in standard machine vision pipelines (which are less
straightforwardly interpretable/explainable to clinicians).
We here present a novel generative visual attribution technique, one that leverages latent diffusion models in combination with domain-specific large language models, in order to generate normal counterparts of abnormal images. The discrepancy between the two hence gives rise to a mapping indicating the diagnostically-relevant image components. To achieve this, we deploy image priors in conjunction with appropriate conditioning mechanisms in order to control the image generative process, including natural language text prompts acquired from medical science and applied radiology. We perform experiments and quantitatively evaluate our results on the COVID-19 Radiography Database containing labelled chest X-rays with differing pathologies via the Frechet Inception Distance (FID), Structural Similarity (SSIM) and Multi Scale Structural Similarity Metric (MS-SSIM) metrics obtained between real and generated images.
The resulting system also exhibits a range of latent capabilities including zero-shot localized disease induction, which are evaluated with real examples from the cheXpert dataset
Childhood maltreatment and the risk of impaired glucose metabolism or type 2 diabetes in young adults: findings from the Lifelines Cohort Study
Get PDFWe examined the associations between childhood maltreatment and the risk of impaired glucose metabolism (IGM) or type 2 diabetes (T2D) in young adults aged 18–35. Participants ( N = 8506) from the Lifelines Cohort Study without IGM or diabetes at baseline (2007–2013) were included. Childhood maltreatment was assessed by the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) and incident IGM/T2D was assessed by haemoglobin A1c levels (≥5.7%) in 2014–2017. There were 223 (2.6%) cases of IGM/T2D during the follow-up period. After adjusting for sociodemographic and health/lifestyle covariates and follow-up time, only the CTQ Sexual Abuse subscale was significantly associated with IGM/T2D (RR = 1.05 [95% CI = 1.01, 1.10]). The association remained when additionally accounting for depressive and anxiety symptoms (RR = 1.05 [95% CI = 1.00, 1.09]). Childhood sexual abuse was associated with an increased risk of IGM/T2D in young adults, highlighting the long-term metabolic consequences of childhood maltreatment
Interprofessional and inter-organisational collaboration in the COVID-19 vaccination programme: lessons from North Central London
Get PDFAim
To discuss inter-organisational collaboration in the context of the successful COVID-19 vaccination programme in North Central London (NCL).
Design
An action research study in 2023–2024.
Methods
Six action research cycles used mixed qualitative methods.
Results
Four findings are presented which illustrate inter-organisational collaboration across professional and organisational boundaries: working in the action research group, learning to work as an action research group, working collaboratively in new ways, working outside professional, occupational and organisational silos. These themes are discussed in relation to the literature on interprofessional and inter-organisational collaboration.
Conclusion
The COVID-19 vaccination programme offered a way out of the pandemic. Between December 2020 and February 2022, 2.8 M people were vaccinated by the NCL Vaccination team in an example of inter-organisational collaboration between science, health and community. Staff on the vaccination programme worked inter-organisationally in new ways to achieve this. In NCL several thousand local residents joined the NHS to work with healthcare professionals including nurses, nursing associates and students to deliver the programme in new ways which are illustrative of inter-organisational collaboration.
No Patient or Public Contribution
No PPI within this study.
Implications for the Profession and/or Patient Care
The implications for the profession and for healthcare organisations of the findings are that, in contrast to traditional ways of working which have been entrenched in silos of professional knowledge and expertise, health professionals are able to work in new ways and find inter-organisational work satisfying. This has implications for patients as it has the potential to improve communication between very different organisations and as the vaccination programme shows, results in successful public health vaccination rates.
Impact
This study set out to create a public resource for learning (for future pandemics or other works of national effort) to commemorate the collaborative efforts of the diverse vaccination workforce and volunteers involved in the programme. Participation in the COVID-19 vaccination programme had a profound effect on NHS clinical and professional staff, on partners across business and volunteer organisation in North Central London and on volunteers from the public in North Central London. Inter-organisation collaboration has been sustained after the delivery of the vaccination programme in North Central London; innovative ways of working have been introduced in the local community to deliver ongoing vaccinations and wider prevention activities and the partnership between academia and clinical practice. The research findings have had an impact on the research participants and the wider public through the website created as a public resource to commemorate the COVID-19 vaccination programme in North Central London.
Reporting Method
The consolidated criteria for reporting qualitative studies (COREQ) was used as a guide throughout data collection and analysis.
Patient or Public Contribution
The public were involved as participants in this study. They did not participate in the study design