scholarly journals Review of the scientific evidence on the individual sensitivity to electromagnetic fields (EHS)

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dariusz Leszczynski
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Poor Quality ◽  
Drop Out ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
Individual Sensitivity ◽  
Communication Devices ◽  
Broad Variety ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Specific Symptoms

Abstract Part of the population considers themselves as sensitive to the man-made electromagnetic radiation (EMF) emitted by powerlines, electric wiring, electric home appliance and the wireless communication devices and networks. Sensitivity is characterized by a broad variety of non-specific symptoms that the sensitive people claim to experience when exposed to EMF. While the experienced symptoms are currently considered as a real life impairment, the factor causing these symptoms remains unclear. So far, scientists were unable to find causality link between symptoms experienced by sensitive persons and the exposures to EMF. However, as presented in this review, the executed to-date scientific studies, examining sensitivity to EMF, are of poor quality to find the link between EMF exposures and sensitivity symptoms of some people. It is logical to consider that the sensitivity to EMF exists but the scientific methodology used to find it is of insufficient quality. It is time to drop out psychology driven provocation studies that ask about feelings-based non-specific symptoms experienced by volunteers under EMF exposure. Such research approach produces only subjective and therefore highly unreliable data that is insufficient to prove, or to disprove, causality link between EHS and EMF. There is a need for a new direction in studying sensitivity to EMF. The basis for it is the notion of a commonly known phenomenon of individual sensitivity, where individuals’ responses to EMF depend on the genetic and epigenetic properties of the individual. It is proposed here that new studies, combining provocation approach, where volunteers are exposed to EMF, and high-throughput technologies of transcriptomics and proteomics are used to generate objective data, detecting molecular level biochemical responses of human body to EMF.

On the Individual

1999 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 205-218 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Magnusson
Keyword(s):  
School Psychologist ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
Developmental Research ◽  
Future Directions ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Over Time

A description of two cases from my time as a school psychologist in the middle of the 1950s forms the background to the following question: Has anything important happened since then in psychological research to help us to a better understanding of how and why individuals think, feel, act, and react as they do in real life and how they develop over time? The studies serve as a background for some general propositions about the nature of the phenomena that concerns us in developmental research, for a summary description of the developments in psychological research over the last 40 years as I see them, and for some suggestions about future directions.

scholarly journals POS1391 MEASURING SUBCLINICAL INFLAMMATION IN HAND AND FOREFOOT IN PATIENTS WITH ARTHRALGIA USING 1.5T OR 3.0T MRI: DOES FIELD STRENGTH MATTER?

2021 ◽  
Vol 80 (Suppl 1) ◽  
pp. 978.1-978
Author(s):  
D. Krijbolder ◽  
M. Verstappen ◽  
F. Wouters ◽  
L. R. Lard ◽  
P. D. De Buck ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Field Strength ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Correlation Coefficients ◽  
Daily Practice ◽  
Scientific Data ◽  
Imaging Features ◽  
Subclinical Inflammation ◽  
The Individual ◽  
3.0T Mri ◽  
Inflammation Score

Background:Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of small joints sensitively detects inflammation. MRI-detected subclinical inflammation, and tenosynovitis in particular, has been shown predictive for RA development in patients with arthralgia. These scientific data are mostly acquired on 1.0T-1.5T MRI scanners. However, 3.0T MRI is nowadays increasingly used in practice. Evidence on the comparability of these field strengths is scarce and it has never been studied in arthralgia where subclinical inflammation is subtle. Moreover, comparisons never included tenosynovitis, which is, of all imaging features, the strongest predictor for progression to RA.Objectives:To determine if there is a difference between 1.5T and 3.0T MRI in detecting subclinical inflammation in arthralgia patients.Methods:2968 locations (joints, bones or tendon sheaths) in hands and forefeet of 28 arthralgia patients were imaged on both 1.5T and 3.0T MRI. Two independent readers scored for erosions, osteitis, synovitis (according to RAMRIS) and tenosynovitis (as described by Haavaardsholm et al.). Scores were also summed as total inflammation (osteitis, synovitis and tenosynovitis) and total RAMRIS (erosions, osteitis, synovitis and tenosynovitis) scores. Interreader reliability (comparing both readers) and field strength agreement (comparing 1.5T and 3.0T) was assessed with interclass correlation coefficients (ICCs). Next, field strength agreement was assessed after dichotomization into presence or absence of inflammation. Analyses were performed on patient- and location-level.Results:ICCs between readers were excellent (>0.90). Comparing 1.5 and 3.0T revealed excellent ICCs of 0.90 (95% confidence interval 0.78-0.95) for the total inflammation score and 0.90 (0.78-0.95) for the total RAMRIS score. ICCs for individual inflammation features were: tenosynovitis: 0.87 (0.74-0.94), synovitis 0.65 (0.24-0.84) and osteitis 0.96 (0.91-0.98). The field strength agreement on dichotomized scores was 83% for the total inflammation score and 89% for the total RAMRIS score. Of the individual features, agreement for tenosynovitis was the highest (89%). Analyses on location- level showed similar results.Conclusion:Agreement of subclinical inflammation scores on 1.5T and 3.0T were good to excellent, in particular for tenosynovitis. This suggests that scientific evidence on predictive power of MRI in arthralgia patients, obtained on 1.5T, can be generalized to 3.0T when this field strength would be used for diagnostic purposes in daily practice.Disclosure of Interests:None declared

scholarly journals Evidence-Based Medicine in judicial decisions concerning right to healthcare

2016 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eduardo Rocha Dias ◽  
Geraldo Bezerra da Silva Junior
Keyword(s):  
Health Insurance ◽  
Evidence Based Medicine ◽  
Private Health Insurance ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Federal Court ◽  
Public Healthcare ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Unified Health System ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Based Medicine

ABSTRACT Objective To analyze, from the examination of decisions issued by Brazilian courts, how Evidence-Based Medicine was applied and if it led to well-founded decisions, searching the best scientific knowledge. Methods The decisions made by the Federal Courts were searched, with no time limits, at the website of the Federal Court Council, using the expression “Evidence-Based Medicine”. With regard to decisions issued by the court of the State of São Paulo, the search was done at the webpage and applying the same terms and criterion as to time. Next, a qualitative analysis of the decisions was conducted for each action, to verify if the patient/plaintiff’s situation, as well as the efficacy or inefficacy of treatments or drugs addressed in existing protocols were considered before the court granted the provision claimed by the plaintiff. Results In less than one-third of the decisions there was an appropriate discussion about efficacy of the procedure sought in court, in comparison to other procedures available in clinical guidelines adopted by the Brazilian Unified Health System (Sistema Único de Saúde) or by private health insurance plans, considering the individual situation. The majority of the decisions involved private health insurance plans (n=13, 68%). Conclusion The number of decisions that did consider scientific evidence and the peculiarities of each patient was a concern. Further discussion on Evidence-Based Medicine in judgments involving public healthcare are required.

scholarly journals Crowd behaviour during high-stress evacuations in an immersive virtual environment

2016 ◽  
Vol 13 (122) ◽  
pp. 20160414 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mehdi Moussaïd ◽  
Mubbasir Kapadia ◽  
Tyler Thrash ◽  
Robert W. Sumner ◽  
Markus Gross ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Environments ◽  
Virtual Environment ◽  
Human Subjects ◽  
High Stress ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Social Conventions ◽  
Emergency Situations ◽  
Crowd Behaviour ◽  
The Individual

Understanding the collective dynamics of crowd movements during stressful emergency situations is central to reducing the risk of deadly crowd disasters. Yet, their systematic experimental study remains a challenging open problem due to ethical and methodological constraints. In this paper, we demonstrate the viability of shared three-dimensional virtual environments as an experimental platform for conducting crowd experiments with real people. In particular, we show that crowds of real human subjects moving and interacting in an immersive three-dimensional virtual environment exhibit typical patterns of real crowds as observed in real-life crowded situations. These include the manifestation of social conventions and the emergence of self-organized patterns during egress scenarios. High-stress evacuation experiments conducted in this virtual environment reveal movements characterized by mass herding and dangerous overcrowding as they occur in crowd disasters. We describe the behavioural mechanisms at play under such extreme conditions and identify critical zones where overcrowding may occur. Furthermore, we show that herding spontaneously emerges from a density effect without the need to assume an increase of the individual tendency to imitate peers. Our experiments reveal the promise of immersive virtual environments as an ethical, cost-efficient, yet accurate platform for exploring crowd behaviour in high-risk situations with real human subjects.

scholarly journals Cuidados paliativos pediátricos: análise de estudos de enfermagem

2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
pp. 1409
Author(s):  
Thaís Cristina Flexa Souza ◽  
Antonio Jorge Silva Correa Júnior ◽  
Mary Elizabeth de Santana ◽  
Jacira Nunes Carvalho
Keyword(s):  
Palliative Care ◽  
Pain Control ◽  
Chronic Conditions ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Descriptive Statistics ◽  
Care Plans ◽  
On Line ◽  
La Red ◽  
Specific Symptoms ◽  
Oncological Nursing

RESUMOObjetivo: analisar as evidências científicas acerca dos cuidados paliativos pediátricos.Método: estudo bibliométrico de publicações brasileiras realizado com 23 artigos disponíveis on-line, no período de 2012 a 2016 nas bases de dados LILACS, MEDLINE e BDENF, analisados pela estatística descritiva simples em figuras e posteriormente segundo a análise de conteúdo. Resultados: os artigos encontrados estão em revistas B1 e B2 majoritariamente, com publicações no ano de 2014. Os sujeitos mais estudados foram enfermeiros e equipe de enfermagem e os descritores mais indexados: cuidados paliativos, criança, enfermagem oncológica, enfermagem, saúde da criança e neoplasias. A totalidade referiu-se a oncologia e as evidências para o suporte humanístico: assistência ao cuidador, controle da dor oncológica, engendrar cuidados com vista em atividades lúdicas e manter comunicação eficaz com a equipe, criança e família. Conclusão: a análise mostrou uma literatura focada na oncologia e assistência ao cuidador, revelando ainda baixa publicação de outras condições crônicas na pediatria. Os temas que podem contribuir para o avanço da enfermagem em estudos posteriores são: ampliações de planos de cuidados para sintomas específicos; pesquisas sobre a administração e gestão; tipificações e o conteúdo da comunicação na internação; e complexidade da rede de atendimento hospitalar e domiciliar. Descritores: Bibliometria; Cuidados Paliativos; Pediatria; Enfermagem Pediátrica; Criança; Doença Crônica.ABSTRACTObjective: to analyze the scientific evidence about pediatric palliative care. Method: this is a bibliometric study of Brazilian publications with 23 articles available online, between 2012 and 2016 in the LILACS, MEDLINE and BDENF databases analyzed by simple descriptive statistics in figures and later according to content analysis. Results: the articles found are in journals B1 and B2, with publications in 2014. The most studied subjects were nurses and nursing staff and the most indexed descriptors were palliative care, child, oncological nursing, nursing, child health, and neoplasms. All of them referred to the oncology and evidence for humanistic support: caregiver care, oncological pain control, engendering care for recreational activities and maintaining effective communication with staff, children, and family. Conclusion: the analysis showed a literature focused on oncology and caregiver care, revealing still low publication of other chronic conditions in pediatrics. The themes that may contribute to the advancement of nursing in later studies are an expansion of care plans for specific symptoms; research on administration and management; typification and content of the communication during hospitalization; and complexity of the hospital and home care network. Descriptors: Bibliometrics; Palliative Care; Pediatrics; Pediatric Nursing; Child; Chronic Disease.RESUMENObjetivo: analizar las evidencias científicas acerca de los cuidados paliativos pediátricos.Método: estudio bibliométrico de publicaciones brasileras realizado con 23 artículos disponibles online, en el período de 2012 a 2016 en las bases de datos LILACS, MEDLINE y BDENF analizados por la estadística descriptiva simple en figuras y posteriormente según análisis de contenido. Resultados: los artículos encontrados están en revistas B1 y B2 mayoritariamente, con publicaciones en 2014. Los sujetos más estudiados fueron enfermeros y equipo de enfermería y los descriptores más indexados fueron cuidados paliativos, niño, enfermería oncológica, enfermería, salud del niño y neoplasias. La totalidad apuntó la oncología y las evidencias para el soporte humanístico: asistencia al cuidador, control del dolor oncológica, engendrar cuidados para actividades lúdicas y mantener comunicación eficaz con el equipo, niño y familia. Conclusión: el análisis mostró una literatura enfocada en la oncología y asistencia al cuidador, revelando aún baja publicación de otras condiciones crónicas en la pediatría. Los temas que pueden contribuir para el avance de la enfermería en estudios posteriores son: ampliaciones de planos de cuidados para síntomas específicos; investigaciones sobre la administración y gestión; tipificaciones y el contenido de la comunicación en la internación; y complejidad de la red de atendimiento hospitalario y domiciliario. Descriptores: Bibliometría; Cuidados Paliativos; Pediatría; Enfermería Pediátrica; Niño; Enfermedad Crónica.

scholarly journals Physical Context Detection using Wearable Wireless Sensor Networks

2008 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 191 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muhannad Quwaider ◽  
Subir Biswas
Keyword(s):  
Markov Model ◽  
Hidden Markov Model ◽  
Hidden Markov ◽  
Human Subjects ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Sensor Data ◽  
Physical Context ◽  
Significant Extension ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Stochastic Identification

This paper presents the architecture of a wearable sensor network and a Hidden Markov Model (HMM) processingframework for stochastic identification of body postures andphysical contexts. The key idea is to collect multi-modal sensor data from strategically placed wireless sensors over a human subject’s body segments, and to process that using HMM in order to identify the subject’s instantaneous physical context. The key contribution of the proposed multi-modal approach is a significant extension of traditional uni-modal accelerometry in which only the individual body segment movements, without their relative proximities and orientation modalities, is used for physical context identification. Through real-life experiments with body mounted sensors it is demonstrated that while the unimodal accelerometry can be used for differentiating activityintensive postures such as walking and running, they are not effective for identification and differentiation between lowactivity postures such as sitting, standing, lying down, etc. In the proposed system, three sensor modalities namely acceleration, relative proximity and orientation are used for context identification through Hidden Markov Model (HMM) based stochastic processing. Controlled experiments using human subjects are carried out for evaluating the accuracy of the HMMidentified postures compared to a naïve threshold based mechanism over different human subjects.

scholarly journals Partnership among Librarians: Reflection on Observations, Interviews and Research Reports from Three Universities in Nigeria and Zimbabwe

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 338
Author(s):  
Rexwhite T. Enakrire ◽  
Collence T. Chisita ◽  
Tella Adeyinka
Keyword(s):  
Professional Growth ◽  
Information Science ◽  
Research Collaboration ◽  
Common Interest ◽  
Research Quality ◽  
Empirical Literature ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
The Individual

Partnership is not a new phenomenon in the university environment. It embraces strategies used by people with common interest to harvest knowledge in terms of sharing or collaboration. However, the case differs with collaborations in Library and Information Science (LIS) research in Africa, especially LIS scholars in African universities in Nigeria and Zimbabwe. Paucity of empirical literature is available on research collaboration among LIS scholars in Nigerian and Zimbabwean universities. The purpose of the study was to examine partnership among librarians, with reflection on observation and interview research reports in three universities in Nigeria and Zimbabwe. The study adopted a qualitative approach using interview to gather data from librarians drawn from three Nigerian and Zimbabwean universities. The qualitative research approach grounded on content analysis of documents/literature, observation and interview method was use for the study. The observation focus on the authors’ exposition in the sampled universities environment, while the interview were key informants from each of the three countries universities sampled. The study consider the collaborative theory through grounded method. The findings of the study revealed lack of trust in the individual or groups collaborator; team members have the feeling that the project they are collaborating on is of little benefit, due to poor relationship. Team members see themselves as contender or challenger; which has affected leadership issue and involvement of long meetings and inability to address the truth. In terms of the influence of collaboration on professional growth of librarians, result demonstrated enhancement of teaching aspect of librarianship, learning and research quality; promote cooperation, coordination, which in turn increased level of intensity, tenacity and interaction among members. Linkage among LIS professional ranges from networking, cooperation, alliances, coordination and partnership, coalition and eventually collaboration. Challenges reported include catastrophic consequent on negative effect of work, culture and stylistic parameters including concept, attitude and professional hindrances. dominance impact of policies and procedures of collaboration, exploitation of the weak members, lack of clarity and rationale behind the collaboration, unwillingness to change by members in collaboration, lack of socialisation, largeness of the group, wrong membership and jettisoning of members ideas which eventually make some members take the decision of quitting the team. The study recommends inter-disciplinary, intra-institutional and inter-institutional collaboration among various stakeholders in LIS education and training.

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