The importance of good data, analysis and interpretation for showing the economics of reducing healthcare-associated infection

To the Editor—In a recent review article in Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology, Umscheid et al1 summarized published data on incidence rates of catheter-associated bloodstream infection (CABSI), catheter-associated urinary tract infection (CAUTI), surgical site infection (SSI), and ventilator- associated pneumonia (VAP); estimated how many cases are preventable; and calculated the savings in hospital costs and lives that would result from preventing all preventable cases. Providing these estimates to policy makers, political leaders, and health officials helps to galvanize their support for infection prevention programs. Our concern is that important limitations of the published studies on which Umscheid and colleagues built their findings are incompletely addressed in this review. More attention needs to be drawn to the techniques applied to generate these estimates...

The BRICS and R2P : contestation, re-interpretation and norm entrepreneurship

The intra-state humanitarian crises in Libya and Syria have led to renewed debate over the content and implementation of pillar three of the responsibility to protect (R2P). This paper examines the BRICS’ (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) current perspectives on R2P and their recent efforts to shape the concept’s evolution. While Brazil’s “Responsibility while Protecting” (RwP) proposal has been widely discussed, the central focus here is on the lesser-known, semi-official Chinese idea of “Responsible Protection” (RP). Like RwP, RP proposes decision-making criteria and accountability mechanisms for UN-authorised military intervention under R2P’s third pillar. This paper argues that although RP draws heavily on previous R2P proposals such as the original 2001 ICISS report and Brazil’s RwP, by amalgamating and re-packaging these earlier ideas in a more restrictive form the Chinese initiative represents a new and distinctive interpretation of R2P. However, as it currently stands, some aspects of RP appear to be framed too strictly to provide workable guidelines for determining the permissibility of R2P military intervention, and would, therefore, benefit from clarification and refinement. Of broader significance, China’s RP and Brazil’s RwP initiatives point to the growing willingness of rising, non-Western powers to articulate and promote their own normative preferences on sovereignty, intervention and global governance. This development has potential implications both for R2P’s evolution and for the structure of the international system.

A Statutory interpretation EXperience : putting the SEX into statutory interpretation

With the growing proliferation of statute laws, the skill of statutory interpretation is an increasingly important aspect of legal practice. Despite the importance, statutory interpretation can be a challenging area of law to teach to undergraduate law students, who may find the topic dry and disengaging when taught through traditional methods. Such disengagement may adversely affect knowledge retention, particularly if the material is taught in the first or second year of study and not explicitly reinforced in subsequent years. Concern over the present standard of statutory interpretation skills being exhibited by practitioners, has prompted the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Queensland to contact law schools, enquiring how and to what extent statutory interpretation is being taught...

Ausma Bushfire Research : Photographic record of built work

Colour Photographs of built work of architecture: Ausma House, Ocean Beach, Shire of Denmark Western Australia. Conducted as 100% commercial research with QUT-Client agreement. Clients M & S Ausma.

The Artful Interpretation of Science through Picture Books

Science picture books offer pleasurable and educational reading experiences. These texts open up opportunities for cross-curriculum teaching and learning and a means for developing students’ visual literacy skills, aesthetic appreciation, and higher level thinking skills. Picture books demonstrate how one mode or semiotic system (visual and verbal) mediates the other, often complementing, extending, and filling-in the gaps between words and images. Students’ meaning making is further extended when they can understand the subtleties and effects (and affects) of the visual elements of art and design, and the different styles of writing and language use.

An efficient tagging data interpretation and representation scheme for item recommendation

A tag-based item recommendation method generates an ordered list of items, likely interesting to a particular user, using the users past tagging behaviour. However, the users tagging behaviour varies in different tagging systems. A potential problem in generating quality recommendation is how to build user profiles, that interprets user behaviour to be effectively used, in recommendation models. Generally, the recommendation methods are made to work with specific types of user profiles, and may not work well with different datasets. In this paper, we investigate several tagging data interpretation and representation schemes that can lead to building an effective user profile. We discuss the various benefits a scheme brings to a recommendation method by highlighting the representative features of user tagging behaviours on a specific dataset. Empirical analysis shows that each interpretation scheme forms a distinct data representation which eventually affects the recommendation result. Results on various datasets show that an interpretation scheme should be selected based on the dominant usage in the tagging data (i.e. either higher amount of tags or higher amount of items present). The usage represents the characteristic of user tagging behaviour in the system. The results also demonstrate how the scheme is able to address the cold-start user problem.

A survey of radiographers' confidence and self-perceived accuracy in frontline image interpretation and their continuing educational preferences

Introduction The provision of a written comment on traumatic abnormalities of the musculoskeletal system detected by radiographers can assist referrers and may improve patient management, but the practice has not been widely adopted outside the United Kingdom. The purpose of this study was to investigate Australian radiographers’ perceptions of their readiness for practice in a radiographer commenting system and their educational preferences in relation to two different delivery formats of image interpretation education, intensive and non-intensive. Methods A cross-sectional web-based questionnaire was implemented between August and September 2012. Participants included radiographers with experience working in emergency settings at four Australian metropolitan hospitals. Conventional descriptive statistics, frequency histograms, and thematic analysis were undertaken. A Wilcoxon signed-rank test examined whether a difference in preference ratings between intensive and non-intensive education delivery was evident. Results The questionnaire was completed by 73 radiographers (68% response rate). Radiographers reported higher confidence and self-perceived accuracy to detect traumatic abnormalities than to describe traumatic abnormalities of the musculoskeletal system. Radiographers frequently reported high desirability ratings for both the intensive and the non-intensive education delivery, no difference in desirability ratings for these two formats was evident (z = 1.66,P = 0.11). Conclusions Some Australian radiographers perceive they are not ready to practise in a frontline radiographer commenting system. Overall, radiographers indicated mixed preferences for image interpretation education delivered via intensive and non-intensive formats. Further research, preferably randomised trials, investigating the effectiveness of intensive and non-intensive education formats of image interpretation education for radiographers is warranted.

Engaging sex: Promoting the statutory interpretation experience in legal education

Given the ever increasing importance of legislation to the resolution of legal disputes, there is a concomitant need for law students to be well trained in the anatomy, identification, interpretation and application of laws made by or under parliament. This article discusses a blended learning project called Indigo’s Folly, implemented at the Queensland University of Technology Law School in 2014. Indigo’s Folly was created to increase law student competency with respect to statutory interpretation. Just as importantly, it was designed to make the teaching of statutory interpretation more interesting – to “bring the sexy” to the student statutory interpretation experience. Quantitative and qualitative empirical data will be presented as evidence to show that statutory interpretation can be taught in a way that law students find engaging.

Interpretation of morphological data to inform design Bridge to Bridge: Ridge to Ridge urban design workshop

The importance of design practice informed by urban morphology has led to intensification in interest, signalled by the formation of the ISUF Research and Practice Task Force and voiced through several recent academic publications cognisant of this current debate, this paper reports on a recent urban design workshop at which morphology was set as one of the key themes. Initially planned to be programmed as a augmented concurrent event to the 2013 20th ISUF conference held in Brisbane, the two day Bridge to Bridge: Ridge to Ridge urban design workshop nevertheless took place the following month, and involved over one hundred design professionals and academics. The workshop sought to develop several key urban design principles and recommendations addressing a major government development proposal sited in the most important heritage precinct of the city. The paper will focus specifically on one of the nine groups, in which the design proposal was purposefully guided by morphological input. The discussion will examine the design outcomes and illicit review and feedback from participants, shedding critical light on the issues that arise from such a design approach.

Meltdown : a tool to help in the interpretation of thermal melt curves acquired by differential scanning fluorimetry

The output of a differential scanning fluorimetry (DSF) assay is a series of melt curves, which need to be interpreted to get value from the assay. An application that translates raw thermal melt curve data into more easily assimilated knowledge is described. This program, called “Meltdown,” conducts four main activities—control checks, curve normalization, outlier rejection, and melt temperature (Tm) estimation—and performs optimally in the presence of triplicate (or higher) sample data. The final output is a report that summarizes the results of a DSF experiment. The goal of Meltdown is not to replace human analysis of the raw fluorescence data but to provide a meaningful and comprehensive interpretation of the data to make this useful experimental technique accessible to inexperienced users, as well as providing a starting point for detailed analyses by more experienced users.

Putting the 'Personal' back into injury: An interpretation of Pt 3-5 of the ACL

There is an ongoing debate in relation to Part 3-5 of the ACL, particularly over its use in relation to other civil liability remedies. This article looks more closely at ss 138 and 139. It argues that, because of a possible design flaw in the statutory construction of s 138, it can be interpreted much more broadly than it has been to date. Also, the paper discusses the effect on an interpretation of s 139 ACL of both the High Court’s decision in Marks v GIO Australia Holdings Ltd, and a small but significant amendment to s 139 when the ACL was enacted. It argues that s 139 can now be interpreted broadly to include claims not just for loss of financial support or services but for all loss or damage or injury caused.

What is Statutory Interpretation? A Primer QUT law students

In this Primer, our aims are to explain what statutory interpretation is and why it is important. We also aim to note some of the more difficult concepts and ideas you will need to understand when reading a statute, when deciding if it is relevant to a legal problem, and, if so, how it applies to that problem. We do not aim to provide an overview of the rules of Statutory Interpretation, but only to focus on areas that have created well-known difficulties for students and practitioners alike, such as the concept of the intentions of Parliament and the correct use of intrinsic materials.

A continuum to characterise and support teacher interpretation of an innovative curriculum

A continuum for describing the degree to which teachers interpret the various features of a curriculum is presented. The continuum has been developed based upon the observation of classroom practices and discussions with a group of teachers who are using an innovative junior secondary mathematics curriculum. It is anticipated that the ongoing use of the continuum will lead to its improvement as well as the refinement of the curriculum, more focussed support for the teachers,improved student learning, and the building of explanatory theory regarding mathematics teaching and learning.

An analytical study revisiting debate on interpretation of Article 38 of the Statute of International Court of Justice

Article 38(1) of the Statute of International Court of Justice (hereinafter ICJ) is today generally seen as a direction to the significant sources of international law, which the world court must consider in resolving disputes; however, the list is not exhaustive nor encompasses all the formal and material sources of the international legal system. Article 38 of the Statute of ICJ was written ninety years ago in a different world, a question is under debate in many states, whether or not sources mentioned in Article 38 of the statute are compatible with needs of 21st century ? In recent decade, many new actors come on the stage which have transformed international law and now it is not only governs relations among states but also covers many International Organizations. Article 38(2) does refer to the other possible sources but does not define them. Moreover, law is a set of rules that citizens must follow to regulate peace and order in society. These laws are binding on both the individual and the state on a domestic and international level. Do states regard this particular rule as a rule of international law? The modern legal system of states is in the form of a specified and well organized set of rules, regulating affairs of different organs of a state. States also need a body of rules for their intercourse with each other. These sets of rules among states are called “International Law.” This article examines international law, its foundation and sources. It considers whether international conventions and treaties can be the only way states can considerably create international law, or there is a need for clarity about the sources of international law. Article is divided into two parts, the first one deals with sources of international law discussed in Article 38 of the statute of International Court of Justice whereas the second one discusses the material and formal sources of law, which still need reorganization as sources of law.