Examining the overlap of young people’s early contact with the police as a person of interest and victim or witness

There is known to be considerable overlap among the victims and perpetrators of crime. However, the extent of this overlap early in life among children and young adolescents is not clear. We examined the sociodemographic profiles of young people who had early contact with police regarding a criminal incident as a person of interest, victim and/or witness, as well as the patterns of multiple police contact types from birth to 13 years of age. Data were drawn from a longitudinal, population-based sample of 91,631 young people from New South Wales, Australia. Among the 10.6% (n = 9677) of young people who had contact with police, 14.4% (n = 1393) had contact as a person of interest and as a victim and/or witness on two or more separate occasions. The most common first contact type was as a victim/witness, but those children with a first contact as a person of interest were most likely to have at least one further contact. Young people with both types of police contact were younger at first police contact, were more likely to reside in a socioeconomically disadvantaged area, and to be recorded as having an Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander background. Our findings demonstrate that, by 13 years of age, 1 in 10 young people had been in early contact with police and that a minority have contact with the police as both a person of interest and a victim/witness. These young people may represent a particularly disadvantaged group in the community who are likely to be at risk of future adversity, including repeated contact with the criminal justice system.

Drug toxicoderma: possible causes, clinical manifestations and approaches to management at the outpatient’s stage

Adverse cutaneous drug reactions are skin manifestations resulting from systemic drug administration. Toxicoderma under medication treatment is the most common adverse cutaneous reaction with difficulty to diagnose, especially at early stages. The development and active introduction of new drugs into practice, uncontrolled self-medication of patients, polypharmacy, and repeated contact with one and the same preparation, contribute to the growth of toxicoderma. Doctors should treat patients with toxicoderma carefully, as it can be developed at any time and have different clinical manifestations. The pathogenesis of toxicoderma is not fully understood, which limits the possibility of the diagnosis, treatment and prevention. The benefit/risk ratio evaluation of prescribing medications is the basis of pharmacological safety and doctors, especially of primary health care (general practitioners), should always put it into practice.

Secondary Attack Rate (SAR) in household contacts of expired primary cases of COVID-19: A study from Western India

Secondary attack rate (SAR) in household contacts of expired primary COVID-19 cases is not well studied yet. Based on our previous pilot study conducted in Gandhinagar district of Gujarat state, we developed a new research protocol to understand SAR statistics in household contacts of COVID-19 cases that died/expired. The details of expired COVID positive primary cases were obtained from Government records and the details of secondary cases were retrieved using telephonic interviews of the household members. Forty-nine expired cases were registered between March to August, 2020. Out of 49 deaths, 28 families could be reached on phone. Rest were not reachable or refused to give information. These were interviewed after taking verbal consent. The study reported 25% SAR in household contact of expired primary cases with 7.4% of mortality in secondary cases. Though this is representative data only from a single district, it was observed that 75% of the household contacts were still not infected in spite of repeated contact with the sever cases. More such studies in various regions are needed to understand disease transmission.

Impact of serial systemic infection on Candida albicans virulence factors

Aim: To evaluate changes in virulence and pathogenicity approaches from Candida albicans after successive passages in a murine model of systemic candidiasis. Materials & methods: Phenotypic assays were performed using colonies recovered from animals infected serially, totalizing five passages. Results: A progressive infection was observed along the passages, with increased fungal burden and the presence of greater inflammatory areas in the histopathological findings. Recovered strains exhibited increased filamentation and biofilm abilities, along with modulation of phospholipase and proteinase activities. Conclusion: Repeated contact between yeast and host increased the expression of virulence factors. Furthermore, a correspondence between phenotypic profile and proteomic data obtained previously was observed.

Intercultural Interaction in English: Taiwanese University Students’ Investment and Resistance in Culturally Mixed Groups

Despite increased diversity on campuses worldwide, research has documented a lack of intercultural interaction among university students. Culturally mixed groups have been found to be a promising means of promoting the rich, repeated contact necessary for intercultural interaction, but hardly any studies of local students’ perceptions of such groups have been conducted in the newly internationalized universities in Asia. Through the lens of an expanded model of investment, this study analyzes reflective journals and interviews with Taiwanese college students to examine their perceptions and experiences of culturally mixed groups. Findings indicate that the majority resisted non-native to non-native speaker intercultural interaction in these groups. This resistance was driven by their pro-standard English ideologies, traceable to the earliest stages of their English education, which promoted native-speaker models and unrealistic imagined communities of native-like speakers.

COVID-19 in intensive care. Some necessary steps for health care workers

Due to the nature of their profession, health care personnel (HCP) have always been easy targets for transmission of communicable diseases like COVID-19. Shielding HCPs is of consequential significance in ensuring continued health care for the whole population in addition to reducing further spread. Close contact, repeated contact and prolonged contact are unavoidable in the intensive care (IC) environment. It is not uncommon for IC-HCPs to get carried away during an emergent situation, such as that posed by a suddenly deteriorating patient, and forgo the protective barriers that protect them from contracting a communicable infection. Some notable precautionary measures are mentioned below. This is by no means an exhaustive list.

Investigation of communication in budgetary accountability routines

Purpose This paper aims to analyse the role of communication in shaping the mechanisms of accountability routines. Design/methodology/approach Conceptual elements of the theory of communicative action and the literature on routines were used to conduct a field study in two hospital districts in Finland, from 2009 to 2015. Data were based on interviews, document analysis, observed meetings and repeated contact with key informants. Findings The findings explain how accountability routines take different forms – weak or strong – in different organisations and at different hierarchical levels. Differences depend on the generative structures and mechanisms of the communicative process – relational and normative – used to give and ask information to and from organisation members involved in accountability relationships. An explorative finding is that discourse-based communication plays an important role in bridging the gap between weak and strong accountability routines. The main theoretical contribution is to conceptualise and show the role of communicative rationalities in shaping the mechanisms of accountability routines. Practical implications The implication for practitioners and policymakers is to show to what extent the organisation policies and communicative rationalities used in accountability have potential to improve or not to improve the practices of accountability routines. Mutual understanding, motivation and capacity of organisation members to do as expected and agreed upon without pressure improve accountability routines. Originality/value The value of this study is to explain how accountability routines take different forms in practice (weak or strong) in different organisations and at different hierarchical levels, depending on the generative structures of the communicative process used in practicing accountability routines.