The perception of stakeholders regarding the outcomes achieved by schools with high or low levels of effectiveness and high numbers of immigrant students

The aim of this study was to characterize those schools in the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country (Spain) with high numbers of immigrant students in accordance with their effectiveness level (high or low). Three effectiveness criteria (scores, residuals, and times) were used to select the schools, resulting in three models: a ceiling or floor effect model, a contextualized cross-sectional model, and a contextualized longitudinal model. Of the 524 initial schools analyzed, 7 were found to have high or low effectiveness levels and higher-than-average immigration levels. Following the selection, the discourses of 40 education stakeholders were analyzed through semi-structured interviews and discussion groups. The results highlight the strong sense of vulnerability felt in some schools, as well as the general conviction that greater support, commitment, and stable, collaborative leadership by the management team and inspectorate would contribute to improving effectiveness.

Evaluating Residual Cognition in Advanced Cognitive Impairment: The Residual Cognition Assessment

<b><i>Background:</i></b> In nursing homes, most of the patients with dementia are affected by severe cognitive disorder. Care interventions follow an accurate and recurring multidimensional assessment, including cognitive status. There is still a need to develop new performance-based scales for moderate-to-advanced dementia. <b><i>Objectives:</i></b> The development of the Residual Cognition Assessment (RCA) responds to the need to create new scales for global cognitive screening in advanced dementia, with some peculiar features: performance based, brief (&#x3c;5 m), available without specific training, and suitable for nonverbal patients with minimal distress. <b><i>Methods:</i></b> Two raters have administered the RCA and the Severe Impairment Battery-short version (SIB-S) to 84 participants with MMSE = 0. After 2–3 weeks, the same sample has been retested. The RCA has been also administered to 40 participants with MMSE 1–10 for a comparison. <b><i>Results:</i></b> The RCA has exhibited excellent values for test-retest reliability (intraclass correlation [ICC] = 0.956) as well as for inter-rater reliability (ICC = 0.997). The concurrent validity analyzes have shown strong correlations between the RCA and the SIB-S with ρ = 0.807 (<i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.01), and the RCA and the Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR) with ρ = −0.663 (<i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.01). Moderate correlation has been found between the RCA and the Functional Assessment Staging Scale with ρ = −0.435 (<i>p</i> &#x3c; 0.01). The instrument has showed high internal reliability, too (total: <i>α</i> = 0.899). The RCA has low floor effect (2%) with respect to the SIB-S (58%) but shows ceiling effect in the MMSE 1–10 sample (50%). The ROC curve analyses demonstrate that the RCA is acceptably able to discriminate between subjects with CDR 4/5 with an AUC of 0.92. Exploratory factor analysis shows 3 factors, defined as three major degrees of cognitive performance in advanced dementia, indeed hierarchically structured in three possible levels of decline. <b><i>Conclusions:</i></b> The RCA has showed excellent validity and reliability as well as good sensitivity to identify advanced cognitive impairment in dementia, without floor effect. The RCA seems complementary to the MMSE, so advisable when the latter reaches 0. Administration and scoring are simple, and only few minutes are required to assess the patient. The RCA can discriminate at least 3 different major stages in advanced dementias: severe, profound, and late.

Psychometric Performance of Learning Burnout Scale for Undergraduates (LBSU) in Guangdong

To analyze the psychometric performance of Learning Burnout Scale for Undergraduates (LBSU) in Guangdong province． LBSU was used to conduct the survey involing 1628 undergraduates who were selcted with stratified random sampling from 7 colleges in Guangdong province. Cronbach's α coefficient and split-half reliability were used to analyze the internal consistency of the questionnaire．Convergent validity, discriminant validity and factor analysis were used to evaluate its structural validity. Celling and floor effect were used to analyze its sensitivity. Cronbach's α coefficient of the total questionniar was 0.89 and cronbach's α coefficient of 3 dimensions were 0.73-0.78, which met with the requirements of the group comparison. Spearman - Brown split-half coefficient of the total questionniar and 3 dimensions were 0.90, 0.85, 0.81, 0.79, respectively, which also met with the requirements of the group comparison. Both the calibration success rate of convergent validity and discriminant validity of each dimension were 100%. Four components obtained from 20 items which cumulative variance contribution rate was 51.924%. The total score and score of each dimension were all normal distribution, without any floor or celling effect in dimensions. The psychometric performance of LBSU for assessing undergraduates in Guangdong province is valid and reliable．

Recent, national trends in US adolescent use of menthol and non-menthol cigarettes

ObjectiveIn light of the current U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) proposal to ban menthol cigarettes, this study updates trends in menthol cigarette use among adolescents age 13–18 years up to the year 2020. The study considers a potential role for the ban to reduce black/non-black disparities in menthol cigarette use, as well as a counterargument that a ban is not necessary because menthol use is already diminishing.MethodsData are from annual, cross-sectional, nationally representative Monitoring the Future (MTF) surveys of 85 547 8th, 10th and 12th grade students surveyed between 2012 and 2020. Analyses include trends in past 30-day menthol and non-menthol cigarette smoking among the total adolescent population, as well as stratified by race/ethnicity.ResultsDeclines in adolescent menthol and non-menthol cigarette smoking continued through 2020 so that in 2018–2020 past 30-day prevalence for each was less than 1% for non-Hispanic black adolescents and less than 2.2% for non-black adolescents. For non-Hispanic black adolescents no smoking declines in mentholated or non-mentholated cigarette use from 2015–2017 to 2018–2020 were statistically significant, in part because prevalence levels approached a floor effect and had little room to fall further. Menthol levels were lower for non-Hispanic black versus all other adolescents in all study years.ConclusionsContinuing declines in adolescent menthol prevalence indicate that both menthol prevalence and also black/non-black disparities in its use are steadily decreasing. However, these decreases in adolescence will take decades to reach later ages through generational replacement. Efforts to accelerate menthol decreases will require new initiatives to increase cessation among adult menthol users.

Validation of a Spanish-Language Scale for Evaluating Perceived Quality of Care of Medical Abortions Before 9 Weeks Gestation

Background: Spanish Organic Law 2/2010 legalizes abortion within 14 weeks of gestation. Medical abortion with mifepristone and misoprostol is around 97% effective and is offered at primary care centers during the first 9 weeks of gestation. It consists administration of 200 mg of mifepristone by healthcare professional and of the self-administration 800 mg of misoprostol by the patient at home, along with prescribed analgesics. However, the quality of this process as perceived by patients has never been assessed. This study aims to validate a scale designed to assess the perceived quality of this process.Methods: Validation study of a Spanish adaptation of the SERVPERF scale. In total, 289 patients completed a self‑administered questionnaire consisting of 26 items previously evaluated by a group of experts. A re-test was performed on 53 of these patients 15 days later to assess interobserver consistency.Results: The non-response rate did not exceed 2.1%. The floor effect was 26% and the ceiling effect did not surpass 83%. The linearly weighted Kappa coefficient was good to excellent, in general. An exploratory factor analysis was performed with varimax rotation, obtaining a total of 7 dimensions that explain 65.9% of the variability. The internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha) for all items was 0.862.Conclusion: This psychometric instrument is valid and reliable for assessing the quality of care of medical abortion.Medical abortion is efficient, effective and eliminates the need for hospital care, anesthesia and surgical risk. However, user satisfaction has yet to be determined. This study offers a validated scale to assess perceived quality of care, their quality experience and person-centered care for abortion as a fundamental part of overall service quality as a fundamental part of overall service quality.

Translation, Reliability Assessment, and Validation of the Persian Version of MedRisk Instrument for Measuring Patient Satisfaction With Physical Therapy Care (20-Item MRPS)

Introduction: This study aimed to evaluate the reliability and validity of the Persian version of the 20-item version of the MedRisk. Materials and Methods: In our study, we used a cross-sectional and prospective validation study design. This research was a test development study involving 297 outpatients with musculoskeletal disorders from the physiotherapy centers in Kerman City, Iran, in 2017. All patients completed the MedRisk instrument for measuring patient satisfaction with physical therapy care. Participants also answered a demographic questionnaire, visual analog score, and global rating of change. Internal consistency and reproducibility were investigated, too. To determine test-retest reliability, 40 randomly selected patients completed the MedRisk instrument again 5-7 days after their treatment. Factor analysis, divergent validity, convergent validity, and the floor and ceiling effects were tested, too. The Ethics Committee of the University of Social Welfare and Rehabilitation Sciences, Tehran, Iran, reviewed and approved this research project. The SPSS software-24 was used for statistical analysis. Results: Dimension of MedRisk demonstrated a high internal consistency (the Cronbach alpha=0.82). Reproducibility was also satisfactory (intraclass correlation coefficient=0.76). The standard error of measurement, minimal detectable changes, and coefficients of variation indices were respectively 0.63, 1.76, and 0.13 for the total score. In factor analysis, the 4-factor solution has emerged. The external validity testing revealed that the MedRisk instrument score correlated negatively with the visual analog scale (r=-0.18, P=0.002) and global rating of change (r=-0.19, P=0.001). Eighteen individual items of MedRisk were positively correlated with global satisfaction. The results showed that items 5 and 7 had a floor effect, and all other items except items 4, 5, and 7 had a ceiling effect. Conclusion: The Persian version of the MedRisk instrument is a valid and reliable instrument for measuring patient satisfaction with physical therapy and can be used in a clinical setting.

Are Fatigue and Pain Overlooked in Subjects with Stable Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease?

Although there have been many published reports on fatigue and pain in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), it is considered that these symptoms are seldom, if ever, asked about during consultations in Japanese clinical practice. To bridge this gap between the literature and daily clinical experience, the authors attempted to gain a better understanding of fatigue and pain in Japanese subjects with COPD. The Brief Fatigue Inventory (BFI) to analyse and quantify the degree of fatigue, the revised Short–Form McGill Pain Questionnaire 2 (SF-MPQ-2) for measuring pain and the Kihon Checklist to judge whether a participant is frail and elderly were administered to 89 subjects with stable COPD. The median BFI and SF-MPQ-2 Total scores were 1.00 [IQR: 0.11–2.78] and 0.00 [IQR: 0.00–0.27], respectively. They were all skewed toward the milder end of the respective scales. A floor effect was noted in around a quarter on the BFI and over half on the SF-MPQ-2. The BFI scores were significantly different between groups regarding frailty determined by the Kihon Checklist but not between groups classified by the severity of airflow limitation. Compared to the literature, neither fatigue nor pain are considered to be frequent, important problems in a real-world Japanese clinical setting, especially among subjects with mild to moderate COPD. In addition, our results might suggest that fatigue is more closely related to frailty than COPD.

Psychometric Performance of Resilience Scale for Chinese Adolescent (RSCA) for Undergraduates in Guangdong, China

To analyze the psychometric performance of Resilience Scale for Chinese Adolescent (RSCA) for undergraduates in Guangdong. Stratified random sampling method was used to select 1628 undergraduates from 7 colleges in Guangdong. RSCA and Academic Burnout Scale for Chinese Undergraduates (ABSCU) were used to investigate them. Cronbach's αcoefficient and split-half reliability were used to analyze the internal consistency of RSCA. Convergent validity, discriminant validity, factor analysis and criterion validity were used to evaluate its validity. Celling and floor effect were used to analyze its sensitivity. Cronbach's α coefficient of the total questionniar, 2 domains and 5 factors were0.72-0.86, which met the requirements of the group comparison. Spearman-Brown split-half coefficient of the total questionniar, 2 domains and 5 factors were 0.71-0.89. The calibration success rate of convergent and discriminant validity of 5 factors were all 100%. The calibration success rate of convergent and discriminant validity of 2 domains were all above 86.7%. Five principal components obtained from 27 items, witha cumulative variance contribution rate of48.79% and two principal components obtained from 5 factors, withacumulative variance contribution rateof 65.23%,which basically metthe theoretical conception of RSCA. The total score of RSCA significantly predicted the total score of ABSCU (Radj2=0.158, P<0.001). The total score, scores of 2 domains and 5 factors of RSCA were all normal distribution, without any celling or floor effect. The psychometric performance of RSCA for undergraduates in Guangdong were valid and reliable.