Where is my car?

L'objectiu del projecte és dissenyar i desenvolupar un petit APP o aplicatiu per tal de trobar la ubicació del vehicle aparcat.

The COSMIN checklist for evaluating the methodological quality of studies on measurement properties: a clarification of its content

Background: The COSMIN checklist (COnsensus-based Standards for the selection of health status Measurement INstruments) was developed in an international Delphi study to evaluate the methodological quality of studies on measurement properties of health-related patient reported outcomes (HR-PROs). In this paper, we explain our choices for the design requirements and preferred statistical methods for which no evidence is available in the literature or on which the Delphi panel members had substantial discussion. Methods: The issues described in this paper are a reflection of the Delphi process in which 43 panel members participated. Results: The topics discussed are internal consistency (relevance for reflective and formative models, and distinction with unidimensionality), content validity (judging relevance and comprehensiveness), hypotheses testing as an aspect of construct validity (specificity of hypotheses), criterion validity (relevance for PROs), and responsiveness (concept and relation to validity, and (in) appropriate measures).Conclusions: We expect that this paper will contribute to a better understanding of the rationale behind the items, thereby enhancing the acceptance and use of the COSMIN checklist.

Inter-rater agreement and reliability of the COSMIN (COnsensus-based Standards for the selection of health status Measurement Instruments) Checklist

Background: The COSMIN checklist is a tool for evaluating the methodological quality of studies on measurement properties of health-related patient-reported outcomes. The aim of this study is to determine the inter-rater agreement and reliability of each item score of the COSMIN checklist (n = 114). Methods: 75 articles evaluating measurement properties were randomly selected from the bibliographic database compiled by the Patient-Reported Outcome Measurement Group, Oxford, UK. Raters were asked to assess the methodological quality of three articles, using the COSMIN checklist. In a one-way design, percentage agreement and intraclass kappa coefficients or quadratic-weighted kappa coefficients were calculated for each item. Results: 88 raters participated. Of the 75 selected articles, 26 articles were rated by four to six participants, and 49 by two or three participants. Overall, percentage agreement was appropriate (68% was above 80% agreement), and the kappa coefficients for the COSMIN items were low (61% was below 0.40, 6% was above 0.75). Reasons for low inter-rater agreement were need for subjective judgement, and accustom to different standards, terminology and definitions.Conclusions: Results indicated that raters often choose the same response option, but that it is difficult on item level to distinguish between articles. When using the COSMIN checklist in a systematic review, we recommend getting some training and experience, completing it by two independent raters, and reaching consensus on one final rating. Instructions for using the checklist are improved.

A variant in the gene FUT9 is associated with susceptibility to placental malaria infection

Malaria in pregnancy forms a substantial part of the worldwide burden of malaria, with an estimated annual death toll of up to 200,000 infants, as well as increased maternal morbidity and mortality. Studies of genetic susceptibility to malaria have so far focused on infant malaria, with only a few studies investigating the genetic basis of placental malaria, focusing only on a limited number of candidate genes. The aim of this study therefore was to identify novel host genetic factors involved in placental malaria infection. To this end we carried out a nested case-control study on 180 Mozambican pregnant women with placental malaria infection, and 180 controls within an intervention trial of malaria prevention. We genotyped 880 SNPs in a set of 64 functionally related genes involved in glycosylation and innate immunity. A SNP located in the gene FUT9, rs3811070, was significantly associated with placental malaria infection (OR = 2.31, permutation p-value = 0.028). Haplotypic analysis revealed a similarly strong association of a common haplotype of four SNPs including rs3811070. FUT9 codes for a fucosyl-transferase that is catalyzing the last step in the biosynthesis of the Lewis-x antigen, which forms part of the Lewis blood group-related antigens. These results therefore suggest an involvement of this antigen in the pathogenesis of placental malaria infection.

Allele variants in functional MicroRNA target sites of the neurotrophin-3 receptor gene (NTRK3) as susceptibility factors for anxiety disorders

Genetic and functional data indicate that variation in the expression of the neurotrophin-3 receptor gene (NTRK3) may have an impact on neuronal plasticity, suggesting a role for NTRK3 in the pathophysiology of anxiety disorders. MicroRNA (miRNA) posttranscriptional gene regulators act by base-pairing to specific sequence sites, usually at the 3'UTR of the target mRNA. Variants at these sites might result in gene expression changes contributing to disease susceptibility. We investigated genetic variation in two different isoforms of NTRK3 as candidate susceptibility factors for anxiety by resequencing their 3'UTRs in patients with panic disorder (PD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and in controls. We have found the C allele of rs28521337, located in a functional target site for miR-485-3p in the truncated isoform of NTRK3, to be significantly associated with the hoarding phenotype of OCD. We have also identified two new rare variants in the 3'UTR of NTRK3, ss102661458 and ss102661460, each present only in one chromosome of a patient with PD. The ss102661458 variant is located in a functional target site for miR-765, and the ss102661460 in functional target sites for two miRNAs, miR-509 and miR-128, the latter being a brain-enriched miRNA involved in neuronal differentiation and synaptic processing. Interestingly, these two variants significantly alter the miRNA-mediated regulation of NTRK3, resulting in recovery of gene expression. These data implicate miRNAs as key posttranscriptional regulators of NTRK3 and provide a framework for allele-specific miRNA regulation of NTRK3 in anxiety disorders.

Methods and representativeness of European surveys in children and adolescents: the KIDSCREEN study

Background: The objective of the present study was to compare three different sampling and questionnaire administration methods used in the international KIDSCREEN study in terms of participation, response rates, and external validity. Methods: Children and adolescents aged 8–18 years were surveyed in 13 European countries using either telephone sampling and mail administration, random sampling of school listings followed by classroom or mail administration, or multistage random sampling of communities and households with self-administration of the survey materials at home. Cooperation, completion, and response rates were compared across countries and survey methods. Data on non-respondents was collected in 8 countries. The population fraction (PF, respondents in each sex-age, or educational level category, divided by the population in the same category from Eurostat census data) and population fraction ratio (PFR, ratio of PF) and their corresponding 95% confidence intervals were used to analyze differences by country between the KIDSCREEN samples and a reference Eurostat population. Results: Response rates by country ranged from 18.9% to 91.2%. Response rates were highest in the school-based surveys (69.0%–91.2%). Sample proportions by age and gender were similar to the reference Eurostat population in most countries, although boys and adolescents were slightly underrepresented (PFR <1). Parents in lower educational categories were less likely to participate (PFR <1 in 5 countries). Parents in higher educational categories were overrepresented when the school and household sampling strategies were used (PFR = 1.78–2.97). Conclusion: School-based sampling achieved the highest overall response rates but also produced slightly more biased samples than the other methods. The results suggest that the samples were sufficiently representative to provide reference population values for the KIDSCREEN instrument.

Protocol of the COSMIN study: consensus-based standards for the selection of health measurement instruments

Background: Choosing an adequate measurement instrument depends on the proposed use of the instrument, the concept to be measured, the measurement properties (e.g. internal consistency, reproducibility, content and construct validity, responsiveness, and interpretability), the requirements, the burden for subjects, and costs of the available instruments. As far as measurement properties are concerned, there are no sufficiently specific standards for the evaluation of measurement properties of instruments to measure health status, and also no explicit criteria for what constitutes good measurement properties. In this paper we describe the protocol for the COSMIN study, the objective of which is to develop a checklist that contains COnsensus-based Standards for the selection of health Measurement INstruments, including explicit criteria for satisfying these standards. We will focus on evaluative health related patient-reported outcomes (HR-PROs), i.e. patient-reported health measurement instruments used in a longitudinal design as an outcome measure, excluding health care related PROs, such as satisfaction with care or adherence. The COSMIN standards will be made available in the form of an easily applicable checklist.Method: An international Delphi study will be performed to reach consensus on which and how measurement properties should be assessed, and on criteria for good measurement properties. Two sources of input will be used for the Delphi study: (1) a systematic review of properties, standards and criteria of measurement properties found in systematic reviews of measurement instruments, and (2) an additional literature search of methodological articles presenting a comprehensive checklist of standards and criteria. The Delphi study will consist of four (written) Delphi rounds, with approximately 30 expert panel members with different backgrounds in clinical medicine, biostatistics, psychology, and epidemiology. The final checklist will subsequently be field-tested by assessing the inter-rater reproducibility of the checklist.Discussion: Since the study will mainly be anonymous, problems that are commonly encountered in face-to-face group meetings, such as the dominance of certain persons in the communication process, will be avoided. By performing a Delphi study and involving many experts, the likelihood that the checklist will have sufficient credibility to be accepted and implemented will increase.

Self-reported social class in adolescents: validity and relationship with gradients in self-reported health

Background: Analyzing social differences in the health of adolescents is a challenge. The accuracy of adolescent's report on familial socio-economic position is unknown. The aims of the study were to examine the validity of measuring occupational social class and family level of education reported by adolescents aged 12 to 18, and the relationship between social position and self-reported health.Methods: A sample of 1453 Spanish adolescents 12 to 18 years old from urban and rural areas completed a self-administered questionnaire including the Child Health and Illness Profile-Adolescent Edition (CHIP-AE), and data on parental occupational social class (OSC) and level of education (LE). The responsible person for a sub-sample of teenagers (n = 91) were interviewed by phone. Kappa coefficients were estimated to analyze agreement between adolescents and proxy-respondents, and logistic regression models were adjusted to analyze factors associated with missing answers and disagreements. Effect size (ES) was calculated to analyze the relationship between OSC, LE and the CHIP-AE domain scores.Results: Missing answers were higher for father's (24.2%) and mother's (45.7%) occupational status than for parental education (8.4%, and 8.1% respectively), and belonging to a non-standard family was associated with more incomplete reporting of social position (OR = 4,98; 95%CI = 1,3–18,8) as was agreement between a parent and the adolescent. There were significant social class gradients, most notably for aspects of health related to resilience to threats to illness.ConclusionAdolescents can acceptably self-report on family occupation and level of education. Social class gradients are present in important aspects of health in adolescents.

The Multiscenario Multienvironment BioSecure Multimodal Database (BMDB)

A new multimodal biometric database designed and acquired within the framework of the European BioSecure Network of Excellence is presented. It is comprised of more than 600 individuals acquired simultaneously in three scenarios: 1) over the Internet, 2) in an office environment with desktop PC, and 3) in indoor/outdoor environments with mobile portable hardware. The three scenarios include a common part of audio/video data. Also, signature and fingerprint data have been acquired both with desktop PC and mobile portable hardware. Additionally, hand and iris data were acquired in the second scenario using desktop PC. Acquisition has been conducted by 11 European institutions. Additional features of the BioSecure Multimodal Database (BMDB) are: two acquisitionsessions, several sensors in certain modalities, balanced gender and age distributions, multimodal realistic scenarios with simple and quick tasks per modality, cross-European diversity, availability of demographic data, and compatibility with other multimodal databases. The novel acquisition conditions of the BMDB allow us to perform new challenging research and evaluation of eithermonomodal or multimodal biometric systems, as in the recent BioSecure Multimodal Evaluation campaign. A description of this campaign including baseline results of individual modalities from the new database is also given. The database is expected to beavailable for research purposes through the BioSecure Association during 2008.

La evolución de la teoría de los efectos de los medios de comunicación de masas: la teoría de la espiral del silencio a partir de la construcción de la realidad social por parte de los medios de comunicación de masas

Este trabajo estudia la evolución de la teoría de los efectos de los medios decomunicación de masas desde su origen, a principios del siglo XX en el contextonorteamericano de la Mass Communication Research, hasta la fecha. Para ello, repasalos diferentes paradigmas en el análisis de la comunicación y sus teorías, haciendo unespecial énfasis en el contexto histórico en que se dan, así como los paradigmassociológicos y psicológicos simultáneos. El trabajo se centra en la teoría de la espiraldel silencio de Noelle-Neumann, como consecuencia de la construcción social de larealidad a partir de los medios de comunicación, y analiza los efectos psicosociales de dicha teoría, principalmente el miedo al aislamiento, la percepción del clima de opinióny la voluntad de expresar opiniones en público.

Agrupación de resultados de una consulta de corpus según medidas de similitud léxica

A medida que el tamaño de un corpus aumenta, aumenta también el número de concordancias obtenidas al consultar una forma. Un número muy elevado de concordancias, de cientos o de miles, dificulta la sistematicidad de la tarea del lexicógrafo. La propuesta del artículo consiste en el uso de un sistema automático de agrupación de concordancias según su similitud léxica (es decir, qué elementos léxicos comparten), con el objetivo de presentar dichas concordancias agrupadas y asociadas a un único representante de todo el conjunto de las que son consideradas como léxicamente similares, de manera que la cardinalidad efectiva de los datos de corpus se vea reducida. El sistema se ha desarrollado teniendo en cuenta las ventajas de una arquitectura distribuida, por lo que cada una de las partes del sistema (stemming, identificación de stop words, cálculo de similitud entre concordancias, ordenación final de los datos, etc.) se ha desarrollado en módulos diferentes que pueden estar alojados en servidores, ya que las necesidades de cálculo del sistema harían que su uso desde un ordenador personal resultara muy lento.

El Consum i les empreses de refinançament

El principal objectiu del nostre treball és l’estudi de les empreses de refinançament espanyoles iamericanes mitjançant l’anàlisi de l’evolució de l’endeutament familiar al nostre país.Posteriorment intentarem establir paral·lelismes entre la situació a Espanya i als Estats Units, onmoltes d’aquestes societats han acabat fent fallida. L’objectiu de la comparació és veure si aquestacrisis arribarà al nostre país a mesura que creixin els impagats.Finalment, establirem un resum de les idees més importants per tal de que el lector pugui obteniruna idea ràpida amb una perspectiva el màxim de realista possible i capaç d’esclarir-nos les idees.

Anàlisi dels factors de creixement d'una ciutat: el cas concret de Cerdanyola i Granollers

Segurament molts de nosaltres ens hem preguntat algun cop quina és la millor ciutat per viure, o si les polítiques de ciutat que adopta el nostre ajuntament tindran un bon desenvolupament en el futur, és a dir, si milloraran el nivell de vida de la nostra ciutat o no. També és possible que aquells que hagueu canviat de lloc de residència algun cop en la vostra vida, us hagueu plantejat diferents qüestions a l’hora d’escollir la vostra destinació, com per exemple la seva proximitat respecte el lloc de treball/estudi, la seva situació geogràfica, el nivell de vida, etc. Però quin d’aquests factors és més determinant? En què ha d’invertir una ciutat si vol atreure més gent?Òbviament totes aquestes preguntes no tenen una resposta senzilla, entre d’altres coses perquè la forma plantejada no és la millor per a un estudi coherent (què ens fa millorar el nostre nivell de vida, més comerç o més habitants? Més centres hospitalaris o més centres d’oci? Més comunicacions o més serveis?). Però motivacions com aquestes eren les que nosaltres ens vàrem fer al principi del treball i, delimitant bé el nostre àmbit d’estudi, hem aconseguit realitzar una aproximació per determinar i estudiar els factors més importants del creixement de les ciutats.Al llarg del treball, a part de conèixer algunes dades curioses, com quines són les ciutats amb més riquesa de Catalunya (en RFDB per càpita) hem analitzat diversos factors, com la immigració, el nivell d’atur o l’edat de la població autòctona, que hom podria considerar claus per una ciutat, però també hem trobat d’altres menys previsibles com els desplaçament diaris atrets i generats, el factor capitalitat, etc.A part de tot això teníem la intenció de fer el treball el més proper possible, en el que ens poguéssim sentir identificats i fins i tot trobar-li una aplicació directa. És per això que vam voler concretar i estudiar tots aquests factors en dues ciutats que coneixíem prou bé, però aquestes havien de complir una sèrie de característiques: la població d’aquestes ha de ser semblant, la situació geogràfica ha de ser prou propera per evitar biaixos per raons climàtiques, però alhora l’àmbit d’influència de les dues ha de ser petit perquè si no ens podríem trobar que les accions que tinguin lloc en una, tinguin conseqüències en l’altra. Creiem doncs que les dues ciutats escollides, Granollers i Cerdanyola del Vallès, compleixen amb les característiques. Aquestes ciutats es troben en la província de Barcelona, en la que podríem anomenar segona corona metropolitana; dins d’aquesta regió es troba la gran majoria de la població catalana, habitants de moltes ciutats segurament molt semblants a les dues analitzades, així que segurament gran part dels lectors també s’hi podran sentir identificats.També serveix aquest treball per refutar algunes de les hipòtesis que ens vam fer al principi i ens semblaven molts coherents i d’altres que es troben del tot esteses per la societat i, a més, a mesura que el lector vagi progressant en la lectura del treball podrà comprovar que no és un sol factor el que determina el desenvolupament de les ciutats, sinó que s’estableix una extensa xarxa d’interrelacions entre elles que promou aquest creixement. Així doncs, tan sols ens queda animar-vos a endinsar-vos en la lectura del treball, que esperem us resulti interessant.

El coito de Tánatos. Erotismo y muerte en el cine contemporáneo

La imposibilidad del cine por hallar un imaginario luminoso alrededor de Eros ha sido provocada por la constante represión a la que se han visto sometidas sus imágenes. Frente a esta subyugación, el cine ha respondido con la perversión, síntoma evidente de su malestar y de la estrecha relación existente en el ser humano entre sexualidad y muerte.