A survey of the use of grading scales for contact lens complications in optometric practice

Purpose:  The aim of this study was to investigate the extent and pattern of use of grading scales for contact lens complications (‘grading scales’) in optometric practice. Methods:  An anonymous postal survey was sent to all 756 members of the Queensland Division of Optometrists Association Australia. Information was elicited relating to level of experience, practice type and location, and mode of usage of grading scales. Results:  Survey forms were returned by 237 optometrists, representing a 31 per cent response rate. The majority of respondents (61 per cent) reported using grading scales frequently in practice, while 65 per cent of these preferred to use the Efron Grading Scales for Contact Lens Complications. Seventy-six per cent of optometrists use a method of incremental grading rather than simply grading with whole numbers. Grading scales are more likely to be used by optometrists who have recently graduated (p < 0.001), have a postgraduate certificate in ocular therapeutics (p = 0.018), see more contact lens patients (p = 0.027) and use other forms of grading scales (p < 0.001). The most frequently graded ocular conditions were corneal staining, papillary conjunctivitis and conjunctival redness. The main reasons for not using grading scales included a preference for sketches, photographs or descriptions (87 per cent) and unavailability of scales (29 per cent). Conclusion:  Grading scales for contact lens complications are used extensively in optometric practice for a variety of purposes. This tool can now be considered as an expected norm in contact lens practice. We advocate the incorporation of such grading scales into professional guidelines and standards for good optometric clinical practice.

Building organizational capability through a quality assurance program within a business school and encouraging organizational culture change

This study explores organizational capability and culture change through a project developing an assurance of learning program in a business school. In order to compete internationally for high quality faculty, students, strategic partnerships and research collaborations it is essential for Universities to develop and maintain an international focus and a quality produce that predicts excellence in the student experience and graduate outcomes that meet industry needs. Developing, marketing and delivering that quality product requires an organizational strategy to which all members of the organization contribute and adhere. Now, the ability to acquire, share and utilize knowledge has become a critical organizational capability in academia as well as other industries. Traditionally the functional approach to business school structures and disparate nature of the social networks and work contact limit the sharing of knowledge between academics working in different disciplines. In this project a community of practice program was established to include academics in the development of an embedded assurance of learning program affecting more than 5000 undergraduate students and 250 academics from nine different disciplines across four schools. The primary outcome from the fully developed and implemented assurance of learning program was the five year accreditation of the business schools programs by two international accrediting bodies, EQUIS and AACSB. However this study explores a different outcome, namely the change in organizational culture and individual capabilities as academics worked together in teaching and learning teams. This study uses a survey and interviews with academics involved, through a retrospective panel design which contained an experimental group and a control group. Results offer insights into communities of practice as a means of addressing organizational capability and changes in organizational culture. Knowledge management and shared learning can achieve strategic and operational benefits equally within academia as within other industrial enterprises but it comes at a cost. Traditional structures, academics that act like individual contractors and deep divides across research, teaching and service interest served a different master and required fewer resources. Collaborative structures; fewer master categories of discrete knowledge areas; specific strategic goals; greater links between academics and industry; and the means to share learned insights will require a different approach to resourcing both the individual and the team.

Predicting residue-wise contact orders in proteins by support vector regression

Background The residue-wise contact order (RWCO) describes the sequence separations between the residues of interest and its contacting residues in a protein sequence. It is a new kind of one-dimensional protein structure that represents the extent of long-range contacts and is considered as a generalization of contact order. Together with secondary structure, accessible surface area, the B factor, and contact number, RWCO provides comprehensive and indispensable important information to reconstructing the protein three-dimensional structure from a set of one-dimensional structural properties. Accurately predicting RWCO values could have many important applications in protein three-dimensional structure prediction and protein folding rate prediction, and give deep insights into protein sequence-structure relationships. Results We developed a novel approach to predict residue-wise contact order values in proteins based on support vector regression (SVR), starting from primary amino acid sequences. We explored seven different sequence encoding schemes to examine their effects on the prediction performance, including local sequence in the form of PSI-BLAST profiles, local sequence plus amino acid composition, local sequence plus molecular weight, local sequence plus secondary structure predicted by PSIPRED, local sequence plus molecular weight and amino acid composition, local sequence plus molecular weight and predicted secondary structure, and local sequence plus molecular weight, amino acid composition and predicted secondary structure. When using local sequences with multiple sequence alignments in the form of PSI-BLAST profiles, we could predict the RWCO distribution with a Pearson correlation coefficient (CC) between the predicted and observed RWCO values of 0.55, and root mean square error (RMSE) of 0.82, based on a well-defined dataset with 680 protein sequences. Moreover, by incorporating global features such as molecular weight and amino acid composition we could further improve the prediction performance with the CC to 0.57 and an RMSE of 0.79. In addition, combining the predicted secondary structure by PSIPRED was found to significantly improve the prediction performance and could yield the best prediction accuracy with a CC of 0.60 and RMSE of 0.78, which provided at least comparable performance compared with the other existing methods. Conclusion The SVR method shows a prediction performance competitive with or at least comparable to the previously developed linear regression-based methods for predicting RWCO values. In contrast to support vector classification (SVC), SVR is very good at estimating the raw value profiles of the samples. The successful application of the SVR approach in this study reinforces the fact that support vector regression is a powerful tool in extracting the protein sequence-structure relationship and in estimating the protein structural profiles from amino acid sequences.

How can a mentor’s personal attributes and pedagogical knowledge develop a preservice teacher’s behaviour management?

This study presents the importance of a mentor’s (experienced teacher’s) personal attributes and pedagogical knowledge for developing a mentee’s (preservice teacher’s) teaching practices. Specifically, preservice teachers can have difficulties with behaviour management and must learn management strategies that help them to teach more effectively. This paper investigates how mentoring may facilitate the development of a mentee’s behaviour management strategies, in particular what personal attributes and pedagogical knowledge are used in this process.

Diversity in product familiarity across younger and older adults

This paper reports on the findings of a completed experiment examining levels of familiarity in younger and older adults. Research has shown that older adults use products less intuitively than younger adults, and that familiarity is an essential element of intuitive interaction. This finding influenced the decision to focus on familiarity and to investigate why older adults use products less intuitively than younger adults. By identifying and understanding the differences in familiarity, it is hypothesised that designers will be able to design more usable products for older adults. An empirical study was conducted, investigating the differences in familiarity between younger and older adults with contemporary products. Younger adults demonstrate significantly higher levels of familiarity compared to older adults, and the three groups of older adults demonstrated no significant differences between them. The implications of this finding is discussed.

Comparison of intraocular pressure measurement between rebound, non-contact and Goldmann applanation tonometry in treated glaucoma patients

Background: To compare the intraocular pressure readings obtained with the iCare rebound tonometer and the 7CR non-contact tonometer with those measured by Goldmann applanation tonometry in treated glaucoma patients. Design: A prospective, cross sectional study was conducted in a private tertiary glaucoma clinic. Participants: 109 (54M:55F) patients including only eyes under medical treatment for glaucoma. Methods: Measurement by Goldmann applanation tonometry, iCare rebound tonometry and 7CR non-contact tonometry. Main Outcome Measures: Intraocular pressure. Results: There were strong correlations between the intraocular pressure measurements obtained with Goldmann and both the rebound and non-contact tonometers (Spearman r values ≥ 0.79, p < 0.001). However, there were small, statistically significant differences between the average readings for each tonometer. For the rebound tonometer, the mean intraocular pressure was slightly higher compared to the Goldmann applanation tonometer in the right eyes (p = 0.02), and similar in the left eyes (p = 0.93) however these differences did not reach statistical significance. The Goldmann correlated measurements from the noncontact tonometer were lower than the average Goldmann reading for both right (p < 0.001) and left (p > 0.01) eyes. The corneal compensated measurements from the non-contact tonometer were significantly higher compared to the other tonometers (p ≤ 0.001). Conclusions: The iCare rebound tonometer and the 7CR non-contact tonometer measure IOP in fundamentally different ways to the Goldmann applanation tonometer. The resulting IOP values vary between the instruments and will need to be considered when comparing clinical versus home acquired measurements.

Predictive factors of contact lens case contamination

PURPOSE: To examine the relationship between contact lens (CL) case contamination and various potential predictive factors. METHODS: 74 subjects were fitted with lotrafilcon B (CIBA Vision) CLs on a daily wear basis for 1 month. Subjects were randomly assigned one of two polyhexamethylene biguanide (PHMB) preserved disinfecting solutions with the corresponding regular lens case. Clinical evaluations were conducted at lens delivery and after 1 month, when cases were collected for microbial culture. A CL care non-compliance score was determined through administration of a questionnaire and the volume of solution used was calculated for each subject. Data was examined using backward stepwise binary logistic regression. RESULTS: 68% of cases were contaminated. 35% were moderately or heavily contaminated and 36% contained gram-negative bacteria. Case contamination was significantly associated with subjective dryness symptoms (OR 4.22, CI 1.37–13.01) (P<0.05). There was no association between contamination and subject age, ethnicity, gender, average wearing time, amount of solution used, non-compliance score, CL power and subjective redness (P>0.05). The effect of lens care system on case contamination approached significance (P=0.07). Failure to rinse the case with disinfecting solution following CL insertion (OR 2.51, CI 0.52–12.09) and not air drying the case (OR 2.31, CI 0.39–13.35) were positively correlated with contamination; however, did not reach statistical significance. CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that case contamination may influence subjective comfort. It is difficult to predict the development of case contamination from a variety of clinical factors. The efficacy of CL solutions, bacterial resistance to disinfection and biofilm formation are likely to play a role. Further evaluation of these factors will improve our understanding of the development of case contamination and its clinical impact.

Grocery product pricing and Australian supermarket consumers : gender differences in perceived importance levels

Grocery shopping is an essential and routine activity. Although long regarded the responsibility of the female spouse, modern social and demographic shifts are causing men to become more engaged in this task. This is the first study to analyse gender differences with respect to the criterion of grocery product price within an Australian supermarket retail environment. A stratified sample of 140 male and 140 female grocery shoppers was surveyed. Results showed that men considered price attributes of products as being significantly lower in importance than did women. Additionally, men displayed lower levels of price nvolvement, reported referencing shelf price to a lesser extent, and gave lesser consideration to promotional tactics focusing on low price. Although men on average buy fewer items than do women, they spend more money for each item they purchase. This higher expenditure per item appears to be driven, at least in part, by a lack of price referencing. This research has implications for gender studies and consumer behaviour disciplines in relation to grocery shopping.

Feasibility of using health data sources to inform product safety surveillance in Queensland : a report for the Queensland Injury Prevention Council

This report provides an evaluation of the current available evidence-base for identification and surveillance of product-related injuries in children in Queensland. While the focal population was children in Queensland, the identification of information needs and data sources for product safety surveillance has applicability nationally for all age groups. The report firstly summarises the data needs of product safety regulators regarding product-related injury in children, describing the current sources of information informing product safety policy and practice, and documenting the priority product surveillance areas affecting children which have been a focus over recent years in Queensland. Health data sources in Queensland which have the potential to inform product safety surveillance initiatives were evaluated in terms of their ability to address the information needs of product safety regulators. Patterns in product-related injuries in children were analysed using routinely available health data to identify areas for future intervention, and the patterns in product-related injuries in children identified in health data were compared to those identified by product safety regulators. Recommendations were made for information system improvements and improved access to and utilisation of health data for more proactive approaches to product safety surveillance in the future.

Product labelling can confer sustained increases in expected and actual satiety

Expected satiety has been shown to play a key role in decisions around meal size. Recently it has become clear that these expectations can also influence the satiety that is experienced after a food has been consumed. As such, increasing the expected and actual satiety a food product confers without increasing its caloric content is of importance. In this study we sought to determine whether this could be achieved via product labelling. Female participants (N=75) were given a 223-kcal yoghurt smoothie for lunch. In separate conditions the smoothie was labelled as a diet brand, a highly-satiating brand, or an ‘own brand’ control. Expected satiety was assessed using rating scales and a computer-based ‘method of adjustment’, both prior to consuming the smoothie and 24 hours later. Hunger and fullness were assessed at baseline, immediately after consuming the smoothie, and for a further three hours. Despite the fact that all participants consumed the same food, the smoothie branded as highly-satiating was consistently expected to deliver more satiety than the other ‘brands’; this difference was sustained 24 hours after consumption. Furthermore, post-consumption and over three hours, participants consuming this smoothie reported significantly less hunger and significantly greater fullness. These findings demonstrate that the satiety that a product confers depends in part on information that is present around the time of consumption. We suspect that this process is mediated by changes to expected satiety. These effects may potentially be utilised in the development of successful weight-management products.

Ageing and use of complex product interfaces

This paper presents an experiment designed to investigate if redundancy in an interface has any impact on the use of complex interfaces by older people and people with low prior-experience with technology. The important findings of this study were that older people (65+ years) completed the tasks on the Words only based interface faster than on Redundant (text and symbols) interface. The rest of the participants completed tasks significantly faster on the Redundant interface. From a cognitive processing perspective, sustained attention (one of the functions of Central Executive) has emerged as one of the important factors in completing tasks on complex interfaces faster and with fewer of errors.