Which European Public Sphere? Normative Standards and Empirical Insights from Multilingual Switzerland

Since the beginning of the 1990s, the EU has been increasingly criticised for its democratic deficit, which is intrinsically linked to the absence of a public sphere at the European level. Whereas scholars consider the emergence of such a public sphere as a necessary requirement for the democratisation of the EU, they disagree on the conceptualisation and normative requirements for a meaningful public sphere at the European level. This article takes an empirical perspective and draws on the nation-state context of multilingual Switzerland to get insights into what a European public sphere might realistically look like. Based on a content analysis of the leading quality paper from each German- and French-speaking Switzerland by means of political claims analysis, it shows that three of the most often cited criteria for a European public sphere - horizontal openness and interconnectedness, shared meaning structures, and inclusiveness - are hardly met in the Swiss context. On this basis, it concludes that the normative barrier for finding a European public sphere might be unrealistically high and should be reconsidered.

Factors influencing interprofessional practices of physiotherapists working in private settings with people with low back pain: a qualitative study

Purpose: Collaboration and interprofessional practices are highly valued in health systems everywhere, partly based on the rationale that they improve outcomes of care for people with complex health problems, such as low back pain. Research in the area of low back pain also supports the involvement of different health professionals in the interventions for people who present this condition. The aim of this studywas to identify factors influencing the interprofessional practices of physiotherapists working in private settings with people with low back pain. Relevance: Physiotherapists, like other health professionals, are encouraged to engage in interprofessional practices in their dailywork. However, to date, very little is known of their interprofessional practices, especially in private settings. Understanding physiotherapists' interprofessional practices and their influencing factors will notably advance knowledge relating to the organisation of physiotherapy services for people with low back pain. Participants: Participants in this study were 13 physiotherapists including 10 women and 3 men, having between 3 and 22 years of professional experience, and working in one of 10 regions of the Province of Quebec (Canada). In order to obtain maximal variation in the perspectives, participants were selected using a recruitment matrix including three criteria: duration of professional experience, work location, and physical proximity with other professionals. Methods: Thiswas a descriptive qualitative study using faceto- face semi-structured interviews as the main method of data collection. An interview guide was developed based on an evidence-derived frame of reference. Each interview lasted between 55 and 95 minutes and was transcribed verbatim. Analysis: Qualitative analyses took the form of content analysis, encompassing data coding and general thematic regrouping. NVivo version 8 was used to assist data organisation and analysis. Results: Multiple factors influencing the interprofessional practices of physiotherapists were identified. The main factors include the consulting person's health condition, the extent of knowledge on health professionals' roles and fields of practice, the proximity and availability of professional resources, as well as daily work schedules. Conclusions: Our findings highlight the influence of multiple factors on physiotherapists' interprofessional practices, including professional practice and organisational issues. However, further research on the interprofessional practices of physiotherapists is still required. Research priorities targeting the views of other health professionals, as well as those of services users, would enhance our comprehension of interprofessional practices of physiotherapists. Implications: This study provides new insights that improve our understanding of the interprofessional practices of physiotherapists working in private settings with people with low back pain, more specifically on the factors influencing these practices. Based on our findings, implementing changes such as improving current and future health professionals' knowledge of the fields and roles of other health professionals through training may contribute to positively influencing interprofessional practices. Keywords: Interprofessional practices; Private practice; Low back pain Funding acknowledgements: This research was supported in part by a B.E. Schnurr Memorial Fund Research Grant administered by the Physiotherapy Foundation of Canada, as well as from a clinical research partnership in physiotherapy between the Quebec Rehabilitation Research Network (REPAR) and the Ordre professionnel de la physiothérapie du Québec (OPPQ). KP received doctoral-level scholarships from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and the Institut de recherche Robert-Sauvé en santé et en sécurité du travail (IRSST). CE Dionne is a FRSQ senior Research Scholar. Ethics approval: This project was approved by the ethics research committee of the Institut de réadaptation en déficience physique de Québec.

Prevalence of anaemia in inflammatory bowel disease in Switzerland: a cross-sectional study in patients from private practices and university hospitals.

BACKGROUND: Anaemia represents a common complication of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Most studies on anaemia in IBD patients have been performed in tertiary referral centres (RC) and data from gastroenterologic practices (GP) are lacking. We investigated the frequency and severity of anaemia in IBD patients from tertiary referral centres and gastroenterologic practices compared to the general population. METHODS: Data were acquired from patients included in the Swiss IBD Cohort Study. IBD activity was evaluated by CDAI and modified Truelove and Witts severity index (MTWSI). Anaemia was defined as haemoglobin ≤120g/L in women and ≤130g/L in men. RESULTS: 125 patients from RC (66 with Crohn's disease (CD) and 59 with ulcerative colitis (UC)) and 116 patients from GP (71 CD and 45 UC) were included and compared to 6074 blood donors. Anaemia was found in 21.2% (51/241) of the IBD patients and more frequently in patients from RC as compared to GP and healthy controls (28.8% vs. 12.9% vs. 3.4%; P<0.01). IBD patients from RC suffered more frequently from active disease compared to IBD patients in GP (36% vs. 23%, P=0.032). Supplementation therapy (iron, vitamin B12, folic acid) was performed in 40% of anaemic IBD patients in GP as compared to 43% in RC. CONCLUSIONS: Anaemia is a common complication in patients with IBD and significantly more prevalent in patients from referral centres as compared to patients from gastroenterologic practices. Physicians treating IBD patients should pay attention to the presence of anaemia and ensure sufficient supplementation therapy.

Bayesian nash equilibrium in ''linear'' cournot models with private information about costs

Calculating explicit closed form solutions of Cournot models where firms have private information about their costs is, in general, very cumbersome. Most authors consider therefore linear demands and constant marginal costs. However, within this framework, the nonnegativity constraint on prices (and quantities) has been ignored or not properly dealt with and the correct calculation of all Bayesian Nash equilibria is more complicated than expected. Moreover, multiple symmetric and interior Bayesianf equilibria may exist for an open set of parameters. The reason for this is that linear demand is not really linear, since there is a kink at zero price: the general ''linear'' inverse demand function is P (Q) = max{a - bQ, 0} rather than P (Q) = a - bQ.

Entrepreneur's Overconfidence, Private Benefits and the Market Performance of the Firm

Many firms around the world are managed and partially owned by entrepreneurs. These entrepreneurs hold under diversified portfolios and, therefore, bear idiosyncratic risk in addition to systematic risk. To compensate the additional risk borne, they extract private benefits. In this paper, we analyse how an entrepreneur's overconfidence affects the market performance of the firm, through the channel of private benefits. We show that two dimensions of overconfidence, namely overestimation of future cash-flows and underestimation of idiosyncratic risk (called miscalibration), have opposite effects on the private benefits extracted by the entrepreneur. As a consequence, firms managed and partially owned by overconfident entrepreneurs can deliver overperformance or underperformance, depending on the prevalence of overestimation or miscalibration of the beliefs of the entrepreneur.

Iowa Community Private Well Study, 2004

Water fact sheet for Iowa Department of Natural Resources and the Geological Bureau.