Enquiring about traumatic experiences in bipolar disorder: A case note and self- report comparison

Objectives: This study examined: (i) the prevalence of lifetime trauma, childhood trauma and trauma related to civil unrest in a Bipolar Disorder sample, and (ii) the agreement between rates of disclosure of trauma in case notes and self-report questionnaires.

Methods: The case notes of sixty participants, recruited from a geographically well-defined mental health service in Northern Ireland, were examined for reports of experiences of lifetime, childhood and traumatic events related to civil conflict. The participants also completed self-report measures of trauma.

Results: Considerable differences were found between the prevalence of trauma as measured by self-report questionnaires and case notes reports. The prevalence of lifetime trauma as measured by the Trauma History Questionnaire was 61.7% (compared to case notes prevalence of 33.3%). The prevalence of moderate and severe levels of childhood trauma as measured by the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire was 65% (case notes 21.7%). Rates of trauma related to civil unrest were 35% (case notes 3.3%). Poor levels of agreement were found between all self-report trauma measures and case notes reports. Agreement on two categories of trauma (childhood emotional neglect and childhood physical neglect) reached statistical significance but kappa scores suggest this agreement was poor (kappa = .14. p<.05; kappa = .127, p<.05). © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Conclusions: It is probable that the increased rate of trauma disclosed in the self-report questionnaire arises because clinicians during initial assessment and subsequent treatment do not consistently enquire about trauma. The need for staff training is discussed. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Fibre embedding in aluminium alloy 3003 using ultrasonic consolidation process-thermo-mechanical analyses

This work presents a computational framework based on finite element methods to simulate the fibre-embedding process using ultrasonic consolidation process. The computational approach comprises of a material model which takes into account thermal and acoustic softening effects and a friction model which indicates the realistic friction behaviour at the interfaces. The derived material model and developed friction model have been incorporated in finite element model. Using the implemented material and friction model, thermo-mechanical analyses of embedding of fibre in aluminium alloy 3003 has been performed. Effect of different process parameters, such as velocity of sonotrode, displacement amplitude of ultrasonic vibration and applied loads, is studied and compared with the experimental results. The presented work has specially focused on the quality of the developed weld which could be evaluated by the friction work and the coverage of the fibre which is estimated by the plastic flow around the fibre. The computed friction work obtained from the thermomechanial analyses performed in this study show a similar trend as that of the experimentally found fracture energies. © Springer-Verlag London Limited 2010.

Multi-Attribute SCADA-Specific Intrusion Detection System for Power Networks

The increased interconnectivity and complexity of supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems in power system networks has exposed the systems to a multitude of potential vulnerabilities. In this paper, we present a novel approach for a next-generation SCADA-specific intrusion detection system (IDS). The proposed system analyzes multiple attributes in order to provide a comprehensive solution that is able to mitigate varied cyber-attack threats. The multiattribute IDS comprises a heterogeneous white list and behavior-based concept in order to make SCADA cybersystems more secure. This paper also proposes a multilayer cyber-security framework based on IDS for protecting SCADA cybersecurity in smart grids without compromising the availability of normal data. In addition, this paper presents a SCADA-specific cybersecurity testbed to investigate simulated attacks, which has been used in this paper to validate the proposed approach.

How Outcomes Are Defined in Clinical Trials of Mechanically Ventilated Adults and Children

Systematic reviews have considerable potential to provide evidence-based data to aid clinical decision-making. However, there is growing recognition that trials involving mechanical ventilation lack consistency in the definition and measurement of ventilation outcomes, creating difficulties in combining data for meta-analyses. To address the inconsistency in outcome definitions, international standards for trial registration and clinical trial protocols published recommendations, effectively setting the “gold standard” for reporting trial outcomes. In this Critical Care Perspective, we review the problems resulting from inconsistent outcome definitions and inconsistent reporting of outcomes (outcome sets). We present data highlighting the variability of the most commonly reported ventilation outcome definitions. Ventilation outcomes reported in trials over the last 6 years typically fall into four domains: measures of ventilator dependence; adverse outcomes; mortality; and resource use. We highlight the need, first, for agreement on outcome definitions and, second, for a minimum core outcome set for trials involving mechanical ventilation. A minimum core outcome set would not restrict trialists from measuring additional outcomes, but would overcome problems of variability in outcome selection, measurement, and reporting, thereby enhancing comparisons across trials.

Comparing a trauma focused and non trauma focused intervention with war affected Congolese youth: a preliminary randomised trial

While there is broad consensus about the need for interventions to help psychologically distressed, war affected youth, there is also limited research and even less agreement on which interventions work best. Therefore, this paper presents a randomised trial of trauma focused, and non trauma focused, interventions with war affected Congolese youth. Fifty war affected Congolese youth, who had been exposed to multiple adverse life events, were randomly assigned to either a Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioural Therapy group or a non trauma based psychosocial intervention (Child Friendly Spaces). Non clinically trained, Congolese facilitators ran both groups. A convenience sample, waiting list group was also formed. Using blind assessors, participants were individually interviewed at pre intervention, post intervention and a 6-month follow-up using self-report posttraumatic stress and internalising symptoms, conduct problems and pro social behaviour. Both treatment groups made statistically significant improvements, compared to the control group. Large, within subject, effect sizes were reported at both post intervention and follow-up. At the 6-month follow-up, only the Child Friendly Spaces group showed a significant decrease in pro social behaviour. The paper concludes that both trauma focused and non trauma focused interventions led to reductions in psychological distress in war affected youth.

Adaptive NormalHedge for robust visual tracking

In this paper, we propose a novel visual tracking framework, based on a decision-theoretic online learning algorithm namely NormalHedge. To make NormalHedge more robust against noise, we propose an adaptive NormalHedge algorithm, which exploits the historic information of each expert to perform more accurate prediction than the standard NormalHedge. Technically, we use a set of weighted experts to predict the state of the target to be tracked over time. The weight of each expert is online learned by pushing the cumulative regret of the learner towards that of the expert. Our simulation experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed adaptive NormalHedge, compared to the standard NormalHedge method. Furthermore, the experimental results of several challenging video sequences show that the proposed tracking method outperforms several state-of-the-art methods.

Child Poverty in Northern Ireland: Results from the Poverty and Social Exclusion Study

- There is general agreement that the measurement of child poverty is based on both low income and deprivation.

- Adjusting incomes for different household types, measuring before or after housing costs, and the selection of deprivation items all have an impact on poverty rates.

- The consensual poverty method, which takes account of what the population considers to be basic necessities, is described. The study found a high level of agreement on the basic necessities for children.

- The study found that only a few children lacked very basic necessities such as three meals a day and adequate clothing, but a third of all children (150,000) were deprived of an annual holiday and 75,000 children are growing up in cold and damp homes.

- Overall, the study found that 24% or 106,000 children are living in low income households and are deprived of four or more items.

- The study found those who had a ‘high experience’ of the conflict were significantly more deprived than those with no conflict experience and that a fifth of all children are living with an adult/s who have ‘high experience’.

Leniency (Amnesty) Plus: A Building Block or a Trojan Horse?

Leniency (amnesty) plus is one of the tools used in the fight against anticompetitive agreements. It allows a cartelist who did not manage to secure complete immunity under general leniency, to secure an additional reduction of sanctions in exchange for cooperation with the authorities with respect to operation of another prohibited agreement on an unrelated market. The instrument was developed in the United States and, in recent years, it was introduced in a number of jurisdictions. This article contextualises the operation of and rationale behind leniency plus, forewarning about its potential procollusive effects and the possibility of its strategic (mis)use by cartelists. It discusses theoretical, moral, and systemic (deterrence-related) problems surrounding this tool. It also provides a comparison of leniency plus in eleven jurisdictions, identifying common design flaws. This piece argues that leniency plus tends to be a problematic and poorly transplanted US legal innovation. Policy-makers considering its introduction should analyse it in light of institutional limits and local realities. Some of the regimes which already introduced it would be better off abandoning it.

Evidence reasoning for event inference in smart transport video surveillance

In this paper we present a new event recognition framework, based on the Dempster-Shafer theory of evidence, which combines the evidence from multiple atomic events detected by low-level computer vision analytics. The proposed framework employs evidential network modelling of composite events. This approach can effectively handle the uncertainty of the detected events, whilst inferring high-level events that have semantic meaning with high degrees of belief. Our scheme has been comprehensively evaluated against various scenarios that simulate passenger behaviour on public transport platforms such as buses and trains. The average accuracy rate of our method is 81% in comparison to 76% by a standard rule-based method.

Video Event Recognition by Dempster-Shafer Theory

This paper presents an event recognition framework, based on Dempster-Shafer theory, that combines evidence of events from low-level computer vision analytics. The proposed method employing evidential network modelling of composite events, is able to represent uncertainty of event output from low level video analysis and infer high level events with semantic meaning along with degrees of belief. The method has been evaluated on videos taken of subjects entering and leaving a seated area. This has relevance to a number of transport scenarios, such as onboard buses and trains, and also in train stations and airports. Recognition results of 78% and 100% for four composite events are encouraging.