A multi-site pilot test study to measure safety climate in the university work setting

Next to leisure, sport, and household activities, the most common activity resulting in medically consulted injuries and poisonings in the United States is work, with an estimated 4 million workplace related episodes reported in 2008 (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2009). To address the risks inherent to various occupations, risk management programs are typically put in place that include worker training, engineering controls, and personal protective equipment. Recent studies have shown that such interventions alone are insufficient to adequately manage workplace risks, and that the climate in which the workers and safety program exist (known as the "safety climate") is an equally important consideration. The organizational safety climate is so important that many studies have focused on developing means of measuring it in various work settings. While safety climate studies have been reported for several industrial settings, published studies on assessing safety climate in the university work setting are largely absent. Universities are particularly unique workplaces because of the potential exposure to a diversity of agents representing both acute and chronic risks. Universities are also unique because readily detectable health and safety outcomes are relatively rare. The ability to measure safety climate in a work setting with rarely observed systemic outcome measures could serve as a powerful means of measure for the evaluation of safety risk management programs. ^ The goal of this research study was the development of a survey tool to measure safety climate specifically in the university work setting. The use of a standardized tool also allows for comparisons among universities throughout the United States. A specific study objective was accomplished to quantitatively assess safety climate at five universities across the United States. At five universities, 971 participants completed an online questionnaire to measure the safety climate. The average safety climate score across the five universities was 3.92 on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 indicating very high perceptions of safety at these universities. The two lowest overall dimensions of university safety climate were "acknowledgement of safety performance" and "department and supervisor's safety commitment". The results underscore how the perception of safety climate is significantly influenced at the local level. A second study objective regarding evaluating the reliability and validity of the safety climate questionnaire was accomplished. A third objective fulfilled was to provide executive summaries resulting from the questionnaire to the participating universities' health & safety professionals and collect feedback on usefulness, relevance and perceived accuracy. Overall, the professionals found the survey and results to be very useful, relevant and accurate. Finally, the safety climate questionnaire will be offered to other universities for benchmarking purposes at the annual meeting of a nationally recognized university health and safety organization. The ultimate goal of the project was accomplished and was the creation of a standardized tool that can be used for measuring safety climate in the university work setting and can facilitate meaningful comparisons amongst institutions.^

Change in permeation rates of acids and bases through limited use protective fabrics after repeated wash cycles

The primary objective of this study was to determine if there is a change in permeation rates when limited use protective fabrics undergo repeated exposure and wash cycles. The null hypothesis of this study was that no substantial change in permeation takes place after the test material is subjected to repeated contact with a strong acid or base and has undergone repeated wash cycles. ^ The materials tested were DuPont Tychem® CPF 3 and CPF 4 fabrics. The challenge chemicals in this study were ninety-eight percent sulfuric acid and fifty percent sodium hydroxide. Permeation testing was conducted utilizing ASTM designation F739-99a Standard Test Method for Resistance of Protective Clothing Materials to Permeation by Liquids or Gases Under Conditions of Continuous Contact. ^ In this study, no change in permeation rates of either challenge chemical was detected for CPF 3 or CPF 4 limited use protective fabrics after repeated exposure and wash cycles. Certain unexposed areas of the fabric suffered structural degradation unrelated to exposure and which may be due to multiple washings.^

Legal regulation of the food industry as a public health measure

Background. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is an agency of the federal government that is responsible for monitoring and maintaining public health through the regulation of many industries, including food safety. Through the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990, the FDA was granted authority over the implementation and regulation of nutrition labeling on packaged foods. Many nutrients are printed on nutrition labels as well as their percent Daily Values. Research has been undertaken to examine the evidentiary basis the FDA relied upon in making its determinations regarding which nutrients to include on nutrition labels as well as their Daily Values. ^ Methods. Relevant legal policies, scientific studies, and other published literature (either in print or electronic form) were used to collect data. ^ Results. Results demonstrated that the FDA did not employ one single method in its determination of which nutrients to select for inclusion on food labels. The agency relied upon current public heath studies of that time as well as recommendations from the U.S. Surgeon General.^

Comparison of Tumor Shrinkage and Cumulative Dose Distribution for Lung Cancers

Background: The physical characteristic of protons is that they deliver most of their radiation dose to the target volume and deliver no dose to the normal tissue distal to the tumor. Previously, numerous studies have shown unique advantages of proton therapy over intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) in conforming dose to the tumor and sparing dose to the surrounding normal tissues and the critical structures in many clinical sites. However, proton therapy is known to be more sensitive to treatment uncertainties such as inter- and intra-fractional variations in patient anatomy. To date, no study has clearly demonstrated the effectiveness of proton therapy compared with the conventional IMRT under the consideration of both respiratory motion and tumor shrinkage in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients. Purpose: This thesis investigated two questions for establishing a clinically relevant comparison of the two different modalities (IMRT and proton therapy). The first question was whether or not there are any differences in tumor shrinkage between patients randomized to IMRT versus passively scattered proton therapy (PSPT). Tumor shrinkage is considered a standard measure of radiation therapy response that has been widely used to gauge a short-term progression of radiation therapy. The second question was whether or not there are any differences between the planned dose and 5D dose under the influence of inter- and intra-fractional variations in the patient anatomy for both modalities. Methods: A total of 45 patients (25 IMRT patients and 20 PSPT patients) were used to quantify the tumor shrinkage in terms of the change of the primary gross tumor volume (GTVp). All patients were randomized to receive either IMRT or PSPT for NSCLC. Treatment planning goals were identical for both groups. All patients received 5 to 8 weekly repeated 4-dimensional computed tomography (4DCT) scans during the course of radiation treatments. The original GTVp contours were propagated to T50 of weekly 4DCT images using deformable image registration and their absolute volumes were measured. Statistical analysis was performed to compare the distribution of tumor shrinkage between the two population groups. In order to investigate the difference between the planned dose and the 5D dose with consideration of both breathing motion and anatomical change, we re-calculated new dose distributions at every phase of the breathing cycle for all available weekly 4DCT data sets which resulted 50 to 80 individual dose calculations for each of the 7 patients presented in this thesis. The newly calculated dose distributions were then deformed and accumulated to T50 of the planning 4DCT for comparison with the planned dose distribution. Results: At the end of the treatment, both IMRT and PSPT groups showed mean tumor volume reductions of 23.6% ( 19.2%) and 20.9% ( 17.0 %) respectively. Moreover, the mean difference in tumor shrinkage between two groups is 3% along with the corresponding 95% confidence interval, [-8%, 14%]. The rate of tumor shrinkage was highly correlated with the initial tumor volume size. For the planning dose and 5D dose comparison study, all 7 patients showed a mean difference of 1 % in terms of target coverage for both IMRT and PSPT treatment plans. Conclusions: The results of the tumor shrinkage investigation showed no statistically significant difference in tumor shrinkage between the IMRT and PSPT patients, and the tumor shrinkage between the two modalities is similar based on the 95% confidence interval. From the pilot study of comparing the planned dose with the 5D dose, we found the difference to be only 1%. Overall impression of the two modalities in terms of treatment response as measured by the tumor shrinkage and 5D dose under the influence of anatomical change that were designed under the same protocol (i.e. randomized trial) showed similar result.

(Table 1) Isotopic composition of Sm and Nd in mantle restites of the Central Atlantic and in associated plutonic and volcanic rocks

Ultrabasic rock samples collected from two areas of the crustal zone of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (MAR): (1) 13-17°N (near the intersection of the ridge axis with the 15°20'N prime fracture zone), and (2) 33°40'N prime (the western intersection of the MAR crest with the Heis fracture zone) were objects of this study. Samples of peridotite and of plutonic and volcanic rocks associated with it were used to measure their Sm/Nd, 143Nd/144Nd, and 147Sm/144Nd ratios, which allowed to test time and genetic relationships between evolution of mantle material under the ridge crest and products of its magmatic activity. Results of this work proved ubiquitous discrepancy between melting degree values of extremely depleted mantle peridotites in the MAR area between 14°N and 16°N, obtained using petrologic and geochemical methods. This discrepancy suggests large-scale interaction between mantle material and magmatic melts and fluids enriched in incompatible elements or fluids. The results obtained suggest that repeated melting of the mantle under the axial MAR zone is an universal characteristic of magmatism in low-velocity spreading centers. The results of this study also proved the crestal MAR zone in the Central Atlantic region show distinct indications of isotope-geochemical segmentation of the mantle. It is suggested that the geochemically anomalous MAR mantle peridotite in the zone of the MAR intersection with the 15°20'N prime fracture zone can be interpreted as fragments of mantle substrate, foreign for the Atlantic mantle north of the equator.

(Table 1) Dissolved organic carbon, water temperature and conductivity in three subarctic ponds near Kilpisjärvi, North Finland

Daphnia was collected from five subarctic ponds which differed greatly in their DOC contents and, consequently, their underwater light (UV) climates. Irrespective of which Daphnia species was present, and contrary to expectations, the ponds with the lowest DOC concentrations (highest UV radiation levels) contained Daphnia with the highest eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) concentrations. In addition, EPA concentrations in these Daphnia generally decreased in concert with seasonally increasing DOC concentrations. Daphnia from three of the ponds was also tested for its tolerance to solar ultraviolet radiation (UVR) with respect to survival. Daphnia pulex from the clear water pond showed, by far, the best UV-tolerance, followed by D. longispina from the moderately humic and D. longispina from the very humic pond. In addition, we measured sublethal parameters related to UV-damage such as the degree to which the gut of Daphnia appeared green (as a measure of their ability to digest algae), and whether their guts appeared damaged. We developed a simple, noninvasive scoring system to quantify the proportion of the gut in which digestive processes were presumably active. This method allowed repeated measurement of the same animals over the course of the experiment. We demonstrated, for the first time, that sublethal damage of the gut precedes mortality caused by exposure to UVR. In a parallel set of experiments we fed UV-exposed and non-exposed algae to UV-exposed and non-exposed daphnids. UVR pretreatment of algae enhanced the negative effects of exposure to natural solar UV-irradiation in Daphnia. These UV-related effects were generally not specific to the species of Daphnia.

Assessment of Youth-Friendly Postabortion Care Services: A Global Tool for Assessing and Improving Postabortion Care for Youth

This tool is designed to help assessment teams, project managers, supervisors, and providers collect detailed information on the quality of Postabortion Care (PAC) services provided to adolescents at a given facility in order to make services more youth-friendly. It can also be used before PAC services have been established to see how best to design PAC services to meet youth’s needs. The assessment process facilitates the development of action plans for quality improvement that can help facilities address policy, operations, training, and other program areas needing adjustments and change. The tool also provides essential baseline information, allowing for repeated applications to measure changes and the impact of program interventions. Although the tool is primarily for use by a team, it may also be used by an individual.

The effect of repeated exposure to parasite genotypes of the eyefluke Diplostomum pseudospathaceum on infection rate and immunization in three-spined sticklebacks

Adaptive immunity in vertebrates can confer increased resistance against invading pathogens upon re-infection. But how specific parasite genotypes affect the transition from innate to adaptive immunity is poorly understood. Here, we investigated the effects of homologous and heterologous exposures of genetically distinct parasite lineages of the eye fluke Diplostomum pseudospathaceum on gene expression patterns of adaptive immunity in sticklebacks (Gasterosteus aculeatus). We showed that observable differences were largely attributable to final exposures and that there is no transcription pattern characteristic for a general response to repeated infections with D. pseudospathaceum. Final exposure did not unify expression patterns of heterologous pre-exposed fish. Interestingly, heterologous final exposures showed similarities between different treatment groups subjected to homologous pre-exposure. The observed pattern was supported by parasite infection rates and suggests that host immunization was optimized towards an adaptive immune response that favored effectiveness against parasite diversity over specificity.

Using the input-output approach to measure participation in GVCs : the case of Costa Rica

In order to illustrate how the input-output approach can be used to explore various aspects of a country's participation in GVCs, this paper applies indicators derived from the concept of trade in value-added (TiVA) to the case of Costa Rica. We intend to provide developing countries that seek to foster GVC-driven structural transformation with an example that demonstrates an effective way to measure progress. The analysis presented in this paper makes use of an International Input-Output Table (IIOT) that was constructed by including Costa Rica's first Input-Output Table (IOT) into an existing IIOT. The TiVA indicator has been used to compare and contrast import flows, export flows and bilateral trade balances in terms of gross trade and trade in value-added. The country's comparative advantage is discussed based on a TiVA-related indicator of revealed comparative advantage. The paper also decomposes the domestic content of value added in each sector and measures the degree of fragmentation in the value chains in which Costa Rica participates, highlighting the partner countries that add the most value.