Tag: pubmed

Work. 2022 Sep 29. doi: 10.3233/WOR-220235. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in mandatory remote working for workers in many sectors, including education.

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate the physical characteristics of workspaces, computer use, and prevalence, associated factors, and reported impact of computer-related musculoskeletal symptoms (MSS) among university staff during the COVID-19 pandemic.

METHODS: A cross-sectional study of staff in a university in Ireland was conducted in March 2021. An anonymous online survey of computer use, work practices and 3-month prevalence and the reported impact of computer-related MSS (modified Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire) was conducted. Data analysis involved descriptive statistics and factors associated with MSS were ascertained using chi-squared analysis.

RESULTS: The analysis included 1045 responses. The majority (63%) worked solely from home, used a laptop more frequently than a desktop computer, and worked a greater number of hours. Almost half (48%) did not have a dedicated home workspace. More respondents reported their university workspace (72%) was more comfortable than their home workspace (51.2% ; p < 0.0001). Prevalence of computer-related MSS was 83% : neck (62%), shoulder (57%), lower back (47%). Laptop-related MSS was reported more frequently (82%) than desktop-related MSS (65% ; p < 0.05). Computer-related MSS was associated with workspace, equipment at home, laptop use, female gender, and righthandedness (p < 0.05). A reduction in non-work-related activities (35%), work activities (18%) and seeking medical attention (24%) was reported.

CONCLUSION: The prevalence of computer-related MSS was high and associated with remote working. Further studies that aim to mitigate the risks of computer-related MSS in those working remotely or in hybrid models are required.

PMID:36189523 | DOI:10.3233/WOR-220235

Work. 2022 Sep 29. doi: 10.3233/WOR-220137. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Digital applications have been vital to ensuring business continuity during the COVID-19 pandemic. Indeed, digital transformation is considered key to shaping Europe’s future, including the opportunity for hybrid work. Consequently, a central issue is the experience and perception of workers and the effect on their mental well-being.

OBJECTIVE: Building on the assumption that the more ‘digitalized’ and ‘experienced with working from home (WFH),’ the more positive peoples’ perceptions are, this paper explores how workers in Italy and Denmark perceived WFH during the first COVID-19 lockdown from a psychosocial perspective and what lessons could be drawn for policy and industry.

METHODS: Ranking top and bottom respectively on the European Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI) and different pre-pandemic experiences of WFH, data about WFH perceptions and mental well-being were collected among Danes and Italians via a survey from March to May 2020. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, t-Tests, and ANOVA.

RESULTS: The combination of high rank and pre-experience of WFH did not result in a positive perception of WFH. Mental well-being of Danes were mostly affected and they experienced WFH to be more challenging than the Italians, where the key disadvantages were related to “Home office constraints” and the isolation that followed.

CONCLUSION: When digitalizing Europe and workplaces are likely to offer people the opportunity to have hybrid work, the results highlight how national conditions affect the prospects of the new ways of working including people’s mental well-being and where actions are most needed for policy and industry.

PMID:36189522 | DOI:10.3233/WOR-220137

Work. 2022 Sep 29. doi: 10.3233/WOR-211249. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Work injury can put older workers at higher risk of disability and early retirement. Rapid population ageing has raised questions about the ability of older workers to continue working, especially for those who have experienced work injury. Career development practices have been highlighted as a form of rehabilitation support to enable longer working lives of injured older workers.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to explore whether career development practices contribute to higher expected retirement age for injured older workers (aged 45 and above).

METHOD: A total of 274 older Australian workers employed at large organisations completed a survey about their health, retirement intentions, work injury, and engagement with career development practices. Hierarchical multiple regression and two-way analysis of variances were used to analyse the data.

RESULTS: Work injury contributed to significantly lower expected retirement age for older workers. Work training and development predicted a significant amount of variance in expected retirement age of injured older workers, and enabled them to work to later retirement ages. There was no statistically significant difference in injured older workers’ expected retirement age for those who participated in career discussion with their managers and those who did not participate.

CONCLUSION: Lack of career development support can affect injured older workers’ ability to participate in employment. The findings highlight the importance for rehabilitation and human resource professionals to have a proactive and educative role in providing career development support to injured older workers.

PMID:36189521 | DOI:10.3233/WOR-211249

Clin Rehabil. 2022 Oct 3:2692155221129832. doi: 10.1177/02692155221129832. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVES: To identify falls prevalence, falls risk factors and evaluate the effectiveness of falls prevention interventions for community-dwelling people with Mild Cognitive Impairment.

DATA SOURCES: Peer-reviewed articles (inception to 4 August 2022) from PubMed, CINAHL, PsycInfo, EMBASE, Scopus, SportDiscus and the Cochrane library.

REVIEW METHODS: All types of methodological approaches were considered. Inclusion criteria were community-dwelling; diagnosis of Mild Cognitive Impairment; aged 50+ years. Interventions needed to include falls prevention programs aiming to reduce falls and/or risk of falls. Outcomes of interest included number and/or rate of falls, falls prevalence and falls risk factors. For controlled trials, any control group was included. Quality assessment was completed using Cochrane’s Risk of Bias Tool for randomized controlled trials and the Standard Quality Assessment Criteria for Evaluating Primary Research Papers from a Variety of Fields for all other studies. Where statistical data pooling was not possible, narrative synthesis was used to present data in tables and figures.

RESULTS: Forty-seven studies were included. Prevalence of falls was 43% when data were gathered prospectively for 12 months. Confirmed falls risk factors included slow gait, dual-tasking, postural control and non-amnesic Mild Cognitive Impairment. Few studies evaluated interventions to reduce falls. Six meta-analyses were conducted, no significant reduction in falls was found.

CONCLUSIONS: Until further high-quality, adequately powered studies are available to guide practice, best practice guidelines recommend balance training as a core component of falls prevention programs for older people generally, as well as people with Mild Cognitive Impairment.

PMID:36189497 | DOI:10.1177/02692155221129832

Nurs Health Sci. 2022 Oct 2. doi: 10.1111/nhs.12988. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

The activities of nursing researchers have been constrained by the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the types of support and related factors that nursing researchers hope to receive from academic societies during the pandemic, and to obtain suggestions for the role of academic societies in supporting nursing researchers and expanding research. An online survey was conducted with 1,532 Japan Academy of Nursing Science members. The survey included 19 items of potential support from the society during the COVID-19 pandemic as well as open-ended questions. Data were analyzed statistically and qualitatively. For 9 of the 19 items, over 50% of respondents reported that they “needed” or “very much needed” support. Multivariate analysis results showed that younger respondents and those with family members requiring care were significantly more likely to report needs for some items. In the open-ended comments, there were several suggestions for activities, including “Lobbying for revision of regulations on research implementation.” Nursing researchers expressed needs for support that reflect their demographic characteristics and situations, including collaboration across organizations and securing research-promotion and skill-development opportunities online.

PMID:36184750 | DOI:10.1111/nhs.12988

ESC Heart Fail. 2022 Oct 2. doi: 10.1002/ehf2.14167. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

AIMS: Chronic heart failure (HF) is a common disease and one of the leading causes of death worldwide. Heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) and with reduced ejection fraction (HFrEF) are different diseases with distinct as well as comparable pathophysiologies and diverse responses to therapeutic agents. We aimed to identify possible pathobiochemical signalling pathways and biomarkers in HFpEF and HFrEF by using a broad proteomic approach.

METHODS AND RESULTS: A total of 180 biomarkers in the plasma of a representative subgroup (71 years old) of HFpEF (70% female) with a left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) ≥ 50% and HFrEF (18% female) with an LVEF ≤ 40% patients (n = 127) from the Prevalence and Clinical Course of Diastolic Dysfunction and Diastolic Heart Failure (DIAST-CHF) trial were examined and compared with a healthy control group (n = 40; 48% female). We were able to identify 35 proteins that were expressed significantly different in both HF groups compared with the control group. We determine 29 unique proteins expressed in HFpEF and 33 unique proteins in HFrEF. Significantly up-regulated trefoil factor 3 (TFF3) and down-regulated contactin-1 could be identified as previously unknown biomarkers for HF. However, TFF3 is also a predictive factor for the occurrence of a cardiovascular event in HFpEF patients. In HFpEF, serine protease 27 was found at reduced levels for the first time, which could offer a new therapeutic target. Additionally, network analyses showed a special role of platelet-derived growth factor subunit A, Dickkopf-related protein 1, and tumour necrosis factor receptor superfamily member 6 in HFpEF patients, whereas perlecan and junctional adhesion molecule A stood out in the HFrEF group. Overall, signalling pathways of metabolic processes, cellular stress, and iron metabolism seemed to be important for HFrEF, whereas for HFpEF, oxygen stress, haemostasis, cell renewal, cell migration, and cell proliferation are in the foreground.

CONCLUSIONS: The identified proteins and signalling pathways offer new therapeutic and diagnostic approaches for patients with chronic HF.

PMID:36184749 | DOI:10.1002/ehf2.14167

J Dent Educ. 2022 Oct 2. doi: 10.1002/jdd.13113. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: Situational judgment tests (SJT) have been previously used in the admission process of medical and dental undergraduate programs, but their utilization as an assessment tool is fairly new. The objective of this study was to explore essential non-cognitive attributes of dental graduates. We also aimed to assess the attributes of final year dental students utilizing SJT and later collected participants’ reactions on the test.

METHODS: A mixed-method exploratory sequential study was conducted. One-on-one and group discussions were done with subject matter experts (SMEs) to explore the essential attributes of fresh dental graduates. Based on the thematic analysis, 10 SJT items per domain were constructed by one group of SMEs and expert validated by a different group of SMEs and vice versa. The final dental-SJT was piloted online on final year dental students and their perceptions were collected using a five-point Likert scale questionnaire. Descriptive statistics and Cronbach’s alpha were calculated for the test.

RESULTS: The consultation with SMEs generated three main themes, namely, Conventional skills, Tribal skills, and Occupational skills. The 70-item dental-SJT piloted on 150 final year dental students revealed data were normally distributed. The internal reliability of test was good (0.738). Students scored highest in “management skills” (>70%) and lowest in “professional ethics” (56%) and “diverse experiences” (58%). The overall student perception about the test was good.

CONCLUSION: SJT is an effective tool to assess non-cognitive attributes of dental students. It has an overall positive perception about perceived predictive validity, perceived fairness, face and content validity.

PMID:36184745 | DOI:10.1002/jdd.13113

Ecol Appl. 2022 Aug 4:e2717. doi: 10.1002/eap.2717. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

We report on survival and growth of ponderosa pines (Pinus ponderosa Douglas ex P. Lawson & C. Lawson) 2 decades after forest restoration treatments in the G. A. Pearson Natural Area, northern Arizona. Despite protection from harvest that conserved old trees, a dense forest susceptible to uncharacteristically severe disturbance had developed during more than a century of exclusion of the previous frequent surface-fire regime that ceased upon Euro-American settlement in approximately 1876. Trees were thinned in 1993 to emulate prefire-exclusion forest conditions, accumulated forest floor was removed, and surface fire was re-introduced at 4-years intervals (full restoration). There was also a partial restoration treatment consisting of thinning alone. Compared with untreated controls, mortality of old trees (mean age 243 years, maximum 462 years) differed by <1 tree ha^-1 and old-tree survival was statistically indistinguishable between treatments (90.5% control, 92.3% full, 82.6% partial). Post-treatment growth as measured by basal area increment of both old (pre-1876) and young (post-1876) pines was significantly higher in both treatments than counterpart control trees for more than 2 decades following thinning. Drought meeting the definition of megadrought affected the region almost all the time since the onset of the experiment, including 3 years that were severely dry. Growth of all trees declined in the driest 3 years, but old and young treated trees had significantly less decline. Association of tree growth with temperature (negative correlation) and precipitation (positive correlation) was much weaker in treated trees, indicating that they may experience less growth decline from warmer, drier conditions predicted in future decades. Overall, tree responses after the first 2 decades following treatment suggest that forest restoration treatments have led to substantial, sustained improvement in the growth of old and young ponderosa pines without affecting old-tree survival, thereby improving resilience to a warming climate.

PMID:36184740 | DOI:10.1002/eap.2717

Curr Med Sci. 2022 Oct 3. doi: 10.1007/s11596-022-2635-z. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the epidemiological features in children after the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

METHODS: This study collected throat swabs and serum samples from hospitalized pediatric patients of Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University, Wuhan, Hubei province, China before and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Respiratory infected pathogens [adenovirus (ADV), influenza virus A/B (Flu A/B), parainfluenza virus 1/2/3 (PIV1/2/3), respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), Mycoplasma pneumoniae (MP), and Chlamydia pneumoniae (CP)] were detected. The pathogens, age, and gender were used to analyze the epidemiological features in children after the COVID-19 pandemic.

RESULTS: The pathogen detection rate was significantly higher in females than in males (P<0.05), and the infection of PIV1 and MP was mainly manifested. After the COVID-19 pandemic, PIV1, PIV3, RSV, and MP had statistically different detection rates among the age groups (P<0.05), and was mainly detected in patients aged 0-6 years, 0-3 years, 0-3 years, and 1-6 years, respectively. When comparing before the COVID-19 pandemic, the total detection rate of common respiratory pathogens was lower (P<0.05). Except for the increase in the detection rate of PIV1 and CP, the infection rate of other pathogens had almost decreased.

CONCLUSION: The prevention and control measures for the COVID-19 pandemic effectively changed the epidemiological features of common respiratory tract infectious diseases in pediatric children.

PMID:36184728 | DOI:10.1007/s11596-022-2635-z

Lifetime Data Anal. 2022 Oct 2. doi: 10.1007/s10985-022-09577-1. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

We develop an efficient algorithm to compute the likelihood of the phase-type ageing model. The proposed algorithm uses the uniformisation method to stabilise the numerical calculation. It also utilises a vectorised formula to only calculate the necessary elements of the probability distribution. Our algorithm, with an error’s upper bound, could be adjusted easily to tackle the likelihood calculation of the Coxian models. Furthermore, we compare the speed and the accuracy of the proposed algorithm with those of the traditional method using the matrix exponential. Our algorithm is faster and more accurate than the traditional method in calculating the likelihood. Based on our experiments, we recommend using 20 sets of randomly-generated initial values for the optimisation to get a reliable estimate for which the evaluated likelihood is close to the maximum likelihood.

PMID:36184723 | DOI:10.1007/s10985-022-09577-1