Submission to the 2012 Review of the Retirement Villages Act 1999 (Qld)

The submission addresses matters relevant to Issues for Comment numbered 1, 3, 5, 22 and 32 of the Issues Paper released by the Transport, Housing and local Government Committee of the Queensland Parliament. It concludes by making five recommendations for consideration by the Committee.

Investigation of decision making issues in the use of current clinical information systems

Clinical information systems have become important tools in contemporary clinical patient care. However, there is a question of whether the current clinical information systems are able to effectively support clinicians in decision making processes. We conducted a survey to identify some of the decision making issues related to the use of existing clinical information systems. The survey was conducted among the end users of the cardiac surgery unit, quality and safety unit, intensive care unit and clinical costing unit at The Prince Charles Hospital (TPCH). Based on the survey results and reviewed literature, it was identified that support from the current information systems for decision-making is limited. Also, survey results showed that the majority of respondents considered lack in data integration to be one of the major issues followed by other issues such as limited access to various databases, lack of time and lack in efficient reporting and analysis tools. Furthermore, respondents pointed out that data quality is an issue and the three major data quality issues being faced are lack of data completeness, lack in consistency and lack in data accuracy. Conclusion: Current clinical information systems support for the decision-making processes in Cardiac Surgery in this institution is limited and this could be addressed by integrating isolated clinical information systems.

Book Review : Bellanta, Melissa (2012) Larrikins : A History. Brisbane: University of Queensland Press.

This book has been painstakingly researched by a scholar whose intellectual competencies span several disciplines: history, sociology, criminology, culture, drama and film studies. It is theoretically sophisticated and yet not dense as it reads like a novel with an abundance of interesting complex characters.

Submission to the Legal Affairs and Community Safety Committee - Youth Justice (Boot Camp Orders) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2012

This submission addresses the Youth Justice (Boot Camp Orders) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2012 which has as its objectives (1) the introduction of a Boot Camp Order as an option instead of detention for young offenders and (2) the removal of the option of court referred youth justice conferencing for young offenders. As members of the QUT Faculty of Law Centre for Crime and Justice we welcome the invitation to participate in the discussion of these issues which are critically important to the Queensland community at large but especially to our young people.

Exploiting SNOMED CT concepts and relationships for clinical information retrieval : Australian e-Health Research Centre and Queensland University of Technology at the TREC 2012 Medical Track

The Australian e-Health Research Centre and Queensland University of Technology recently participated in the TREC 2012 Medical Records Track. This paper reports on our methods, results and experience using an approach that exploits the concept and inter-concept relationships defined in the SNOMED CT medical ontology. Our concept-based approach is intended to overcome specific challenges in searching medical records, namely vocabulary mismatch and granularity mismatch. Queries and documents are transformed from their term-based originals into medical concepts as defined by the SNOMED CT ontology, this is done to tackle vocabulary mismatch. In addition, we make use of the SNOMED CT parent-child `is-a' relationships between concepts to weight documents that contained concept subsumed by the query concepts; this is done to tackle the problem of granularity mismatch. Finally, we experiment with other SNOMED CT relationships besides the is-a relationship to weight concepts related to query concepts. Results show our concept-based approach performed significantly above the median in all four performance metrics. Further improvements are achieved by the incorporation of weighting subsumed concepts, overall leading to improvement above the median of 28% infAP, 10% infNDCG, 12% R-prec and 7% Prec@10. The incorporation of other relations besides is-a demonstrated mixed results, more research is required to determined which SNOMED CT relationships are best employed when weighting related concepts.

QUT Para at TREC 2012 Web Track : Word Associations for Retrieving Web Documents

Many existing information retrieval models do not explicitly take into account in- formation about word associations. Our approach makes use of rst and second order relationships found in natural language, known as syntagmatic and paradigmatic associ- ations, respectively. This is achieved by using a formal model of word meaning within the query expansion process. On ad hoc retrieval, our approach achieves statistically sig- ni cant improvements in MAP (0.158) and P@20 (0.396) over our baseline model. The ERR@20 and nDCG@20 of our system was 0.249 and 0.192 respectively. Our results and discussion suggest that information about both syntagamtic and paradigmatic associa- tions can assist with improving retrieval eectiveness on ad hoc retrieval.

Total Solar Eclipse in North Queensland 14 Nov 2012

This article is a brief introduction to the total solar eclipse Wed 14 November 2012 in north Queensland that will be seen in a narrow strip of land just 140 km wide in the vicinity of Cairns.

Looking Yonder : Longitudinal Research and Evaluation of the Yonder Participative Arts-based Learning Model Report 2010-2012

Since 2007, KITE Arts Education Program @ QPAC has been engaged in a series of arts and drama-based experiences for students in selected primary schools on the edges of Brisbane and in regional Queensland. The in-school workshop experiences of the program have culminated in a performance by the children for their school community, parents and carers at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre or a regional cultural venue. In conducting an analysis of the Yonder project, the researcher aimed to provide evidence of outcomes brought about through participation by schools, school staff, students and their communities in the Yonder project. To develop longitudinal data project initiators, participants were interviewed at six-monthly intervals to establish patterns of engagement and participation. The report analyses arts-based workshops conducted by the teacher artist in edge-city Brisbane and a regional centre; interviews with teachers and school administrators from the participating schools; interviews with teacher artist and professional artists; interviews with community partners; teacher professional development workshops; community-based workshops; performance outcomes that were the culminating events of the workshop program; student work samples and student reflections on the program. This document covers data and project outputs from February 2010 to July 2012. There have been five iterations of the Yonder project since its commencement in mid-2009 — three in regional Queensland (February–April 2010; February–May 2011; February–May 2012) and two in edge-city1 Brisbane (July–September 2010; August–October 2011). This report is a result of a research partnership between Queensland Performing Arts Centre and Queensland University of Technology (QUT) Creative Industries Faculty(Drama).

Compass points : the locations, landscapes and coordinates of identities in contemporary performance making : proceedings of the Australasian Association for Theatre, Drama & Performance Studies (ADSA) Conference 2012

Compass Points: The Locations, Landscapes and Coordinates of Identities' the Australasian Association for Theatre, Drama and Performance Studies (ADSA) Conference 2012 was held at Queensland University of Technology, July 3-6 2012. The Conference was sponsored by the Australasian Association for Theatre, Drama and Performance Studies (ADSA), Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Ian Potter Foundation, Arts Queensland, La Boite Theatre Company and Queensland Theatre Company. The papers selected for this collection represent a small sample of the scope, depth and diversity of scholarship presented at the conference - they cover a range of genres, cultures and contexts in contemporary performance making from autobiography, to playwrighting, to public space performance and beyond. The papers collected have been peer-reviewed to Australia’s Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST) standards - each has been subject to two blind reviews, followed by acceptance, rejection or revision, and editing of accepted papers - by colleagues from Australasia and overseas. The review process for the conference publication was separate from the review process for acceptance of abstracts for the actual conference presentations. The conference convenors, Bree Hadley and Caroline Heim, edited the collection, and would like to thank all those who gave their time to advise on the peer review process and act as reviewers - Tom Burvill, Christine Comans, Sean Edgecomb, Angela Campbell, Natalie Lazaroo, Jo Loth, Meg Mumford, Ulrike Garde, Laura Ginters, Andre Bastian, Sam Trubridge, Delyse Ryan, Georgia Seffrin, Gillian Arrighi, Rand Hazou, Rob Pensalfini, Sue Fenty-Studham, Mark Radvan, Rob Conkie, Kris Plummer, Lisa Warrington, Kate Flaherty, Bryoni Tresize, Janys Hayes, Lisa Warrington, Teresa Izzard, Kim Durban, Veronica Kelly, Adrian Keirnander, James Davenport, Julie Robson and others. We, and the authors, appreciate the rigour and care with which peers have approached the scholarship presented here. This collection was published in final form on July 3rd 2012, the first day of the ADSA Conference 2012.

Design Integration Workshops 2012

Businesses will learn how design integration can increase growth and productivity, and gain a sustainable competitive advantage. This hands on two-day workshop will demystify design thinking and introduce you to both theory and practice for the latest, world-class design integration methods. Design integration will transform your business and boost resilience in the face of current global, social and economic challenges.

Ultrafiltration rate is a poor indicator of haemodialysis nursing quality. Commentary on Lindberg and Ludvigsen (2012)

In their paper Lindberg and Ludvigsen (2012) have correctly identified the lack of evidence-based nurse-sensitive indicators measuring the quality of haemodialysis nursing care. The authors suggest that the intradialytic ultrafiltration rate (UFR) (total fluid removed divided by the total time in a single dialysis treatment, measured in litres per hour) may be one such indicator. Importantly it is best practice to minimise high UFRs as they are associated with higher risk of cardiovascular events and vascular access complications (Curatola et al., 2011). However, this does not justify UFR to qualify as a nurse-sensitive indicator of quality in the haemodialysis context. The aim of this response is to voice our concerns over the proposal to use haemodialysis treatment UFR as a haemodialysis nurse-sensitive quality indicator...

CCI-CCI Creative City Index 2012

The CCI-Creative City Index was commissioned in 2010 by the Beijing Academy of Science & Technology's Beijing Research Center for the Science of Science. John Hartley was asked to develop a new creative global city index. The brief was to improve on the existing indexes with a specific focus on creative industries and the sources of creative development. This report, by John Hartley, Jason Potts, Trent MacDonald, with Chris Erkunt and Carl Kufleitner, sets out the new model we have developed, which we call the CCI Creative City Index (CCI-CCI). It presents the results of a pilot application of the index to six cities: London, Cardiff, Berlin, Bremen, Melbourne and Brisbane. The index incorporates many elements from other global and creative city indexes, but also adds several new dimensions relating to creative industries scope, micro-productivity, and the economy of attention. The report and Excel spreadsheets of index calculations can be found on this site.

Innovative Products Focus Group Report 2012. Brisbane: QUT

This report presents the results of Phase 3 of the Innovative Road Products Project: National Focus Groups. The groups developed solutions to address the most important obstacles constraining the adoption of innovative products in Australian road construction projects. The Innovative Products Survey, the major Project deliverable in 2011, and the largest innovation survey ever undertaken in the Australian road consutrction industry, results in the identification of key obstacles constraining the adoption of innovative products on road projects.

Third international workshop on empirical research in business process management (ER-BPM 2012)

Empirical research in business process management(BPM) is coming of age. In 2009, when the inaugural ER-BPM workshop was held, the field of BPM research was characterized by a strong emphasis on solution development, but also by an increasing demand for insights or evaluations of BPM technology based on dedicated empirical research strategies. The ER-BPM workshop series was created to provide an international forum for researchers to discuss and present such research.