Workforce Planning Initiative (PDF 354 KB)

Medical Review

Final Evaluation Report of the Teen Parents Support Initiative

The evaluation was commissioned by the Department of Health and Children and undertaken by the Centre for Social and Educational Research, Dublin Institute of Technology. The content of the report relates from the Initiativeâ?Ts launch in July 1999 to June 2002.The Initiative sought to provide a range of additional support services for teen parents during pregnancy, until their children reached 2 years of age. Download document here

Rasharkin Health Initiative

This project will build on previous work carried out over the last 3 years. There are 4 main aspects: - intergenerational work focusing on the development of a vegetable garden with pharmacy input on health advice - develop and promote the lunch club which has been very successful to date and has targeted people previously not accessing support or community services in the village - annual health fair - local carer’s advice centre to provide practice information and signposting services. This last aspect is the result of ongoing identification of the need to support carers over the last 2 years of the BCPP project. This project will be driven forward by a lay health worker working closely with the pharmacist Outcome: The project built on previous work. Some of the work included: health fayre, intergenerational garden, and luncheon club. Results from questionnaires showed that the project increased people's awareness of the causes of ill-health and how they might deal with them. People now see the pharmacist as a local and not just as someone dispensing medicine.

National Fraud Initiative

The Public Health Agency is required by law to protect the public funds it administers. This A4 sheet provides information on the National Fraud Initiative.

A Report from a Local Initiative Concerning Alcohol / Drug Use Among Teenagers 1998-1999

This study was carried out by participants in a North Tipperary Community Services drug/alcohol awareness course. Its objectives were to: assess the level of drug and alcohol awareness among second-level students under the age of 18 years; to find out the extent of under-age drinking;to find out the extent of the use of illegal substances as well as stimulants such as glue and solvents in this age group; and to use this information to develop educational programmes for parents and students. Date was obtained through a survey of 1500 secondary school students in the North Tippeary area. The survey found that, although ilict drug use was very low, abuse of alcohol was quite common.This resource was contributed by The National Documentation Centre on Drug Use.

Promoting Corporate Responsibility in Private Banking: Necessary and Sufficient Conditions for Joining the Wolfsberg Initiative Against Money Laundering

In recent years, the fight against money laundering has emerged as a key issue of financial regulation. The Wolfsberg Group is an important multistakeholder agreement establishing corporate responsibility (CR) principles against money laundering in a domain where international coordination remains otherwise difficult. The fact that 10 out of the 25 top private banking institutions joined this initiative opens up an interesting puzzle concerning the conditions for the participation of key industry players in the Wolfsberg Group. The article presents a fuzzy-set analysis of seven hypotheses based on firm-level organizational factors, the macro-institutional context, and the regulatory framework. Results from the analysis of these 25 financial institutions show that public ownership of the bank and the existence of a code of conduct are necessary conditions for participation in the Wolfsberg Group, whereas factors related to the type of financial institution, combined with the existence of a black list, are sufficient for explaining participation.

Microfluidic processor allows rapid HER2 immunohistochemistry of breast carcinomas and significantly reduces ambiguous (2+) read-outs.

Biomarker analysis is playing an essential role in cancer diagnosis, prognosis, and prediction. Quantitative assessment of immunohistochemical biomarker expression on tumor tissues is of clinical relevance when deciding targeted treatments for cancer patients. Here, we report a microfluidic tissue processor that permits accurate quantification of the expression of biomarkers on tissue sections, enabled by the ultra-rapid and uniform fluidic exchange of the device. An important clinical biomarker for invasive breast cancer is human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 [(HER2), also known as neu], a transmembrane tyrosine kinase that connotes adverse prognostic information for the patients concerned and serves as a target for personalized treatment using the humanized antibody trastuzumab. Unfortunately, when using state-of-the-art methods, the intensity of an immunohistochemical signal is not proportional to the extent of biomarker expression, causing ambiguous outcomes. Using our device, we performed tests on 76 invasive breast carcinoma cases expressing various levels of HER2. We eliminated more than 90% of the ambiguous results (n = 27), correctly assigning cases to the amplification status as assessed by in situ hybridization controls, whereas the concordance for HER2-negative (n = 31) and -positive (n = 18) cases was 100%. Our results demonstrate the clinical potential of microfluidics for accurate biomarker expression analysis. We anticipate our technique will be a diagnostic tool that will provide better and more reliable data, onto which future treatment regimes can be based.

Portadown Blossom Surestart Community Food Initiative

A group devised by our families for our families. Southern Trust Initiative Type Nutrition Education and Training Programmes Location Armagh Target Groups Families Funding Southern Trust Partner Agencies Early Years

Reframing Dementia Report

The European Foundations’ Initiative on Dementia (EFID) held a workshop entitled 'Reframing Dementia' on 21 June at the Crown Plaza, Dundalk. This half-day workshop, hosted by CARDI, focussed on how to develop and promote new perspectives on communication about dementia. Paul McGill, Strategic Research Officer, CARDI, has written this report on the event. Read it here

Multimedia materials for education, training, and advocacy in international health: experiences with the Schistosomiasis Control Initiative CD-ROM

We describe an innovative use of multimedia materials to support training and advocacy within a schistosomiasis control programme. The Schistosomiasis Control Initiative (SCI) at Imperial College London works with selected sub-Saharan African countries to develop schistosomiasis control programmes. Two elements of the SCI programme were supported by multimedia materials developed at the Wellcome Trust in collaboration with the SCI: (1) training of programme managers, district health officers, and those delivering practical elements of the programme; and (2) advocacy targeted at decision-makers and donors. Evaluation of the materials revealed high reported ratings for both user satisfaction and impact from use of the product. From this experience we draw out several general messages about development of multimedia materials and how these will play a growing future role in promoting training within international health.

National Fraud Initiative

The Public Health Agency (PHA) is required by law to protect the public funds it administers. This A4 sheet provides information on the National Fraud Initiative.

Tuberculosis in the New World: a study of ribs from the Schild Mississippian population, West-Central Illinois

Vertebral lesions have been the main evidence for infection by the Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex (MTC) in paleopathology. Skeletal involvement is expected in a small percentage of infected individuals. Recently, several authors report a correlation between rib lesions and tuberculosis (TB) complex infection. This study tests the hypothesis that rib lesions can serve as a useful marker for MTC infection within the Mississippian Schild skeletal collection from West-Central Illinois. Ribs from 221 adults and juveniles were examined, and affected individuals were tested for TB complex infection. DNA from rib samples of affected individuals was amplified with primers targeting the IS6110 insertion element, which is common to all members of the TB complex. Although it cannot allow discrimination between different species of TB, IS6110 is present in many copies within their genomes, and its presence is thus an indication of MTC infection. The results support the use of rib lesions as a marker for TB infection. Additionally, we demonstrate that MTC DNA can be recovered from ribs that lack lesions in individuals who have lesions of other bones. We recommend that an examination of ribs be incorporated into investigations for TB.

Southern Cone Initiative for the elimination of domestic populations of Triatoma infestans and the interruption of transfusion Chagas disease: historical aspects, present situation, and perspectives

Created in 1991 by the governments of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay, the Southern Cone Initiative (SCI) has been extremely important for Chagas disease control in this region. Its basic objective was to reach the interruption of this disease, chiefly by means of the elimination of the principal vector Triatoma infestans and by the selection of safe donors in the regional blood banks. After a summarized historic of SCI, the text shows the advance of technical and operative activities, emphasizing some factors for the initiative success, as well as some difficulties and constraints. The future of SCI will depend of the continuity of the actions and of political priority. Scientific community has been highly responsible for this initiative and its maintenance. At the side of this, national and international efforts must be involved and reinforced to assure the accomplishment of the final targets of SCI. Very specially, the Pan American Health Organization has cooperated with the Initiative in all its moments and activities,being the most important catalytic and technical factor for SCI success.