Do Commercial Airline Policies for Passengers With Obesity Carry Enough Weight?

Commercial airlines websites (n Z 121) providing COVID-19 IPC information were examined. Recommended readability targets not reached. Only 1 / 4 of airline IPC-related websites examined had good readability. Mean Flesch Reading Ease score Z 54.1 (Target >60); Mean Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level Z 9 (Target <8). Need for further work to improve readability of IPC information on airline websites.

Global commercial passenger airlines and travel health information regarding infection control and the prevention of infectious disease: What's in a website?

The Environmentally Conscious Skies: Did the European Unionns Game of Brinksmanship Lead to a Viable Global Plan for Emissions Trading in Aviation?

Flying the Unfriendly Skies: A Case Report

Bangladesh is a one of the most populated developing country with a very limited resource of land. This rapid increase of population is creating high pressure over land-man ratio. Due to age-old land management system, Land ownership record management system is become insufficient and till now it's incomplete in Bangladesh. Also the land administration system is known as the most corrupted sector of Bangladesh. To solve these problems, an integrated land information system is required which will ensure the transparency and availability of land related information. The infrastructure can be effective by improving the land administration, land ownership record management, registration, relocation, advance mapping, tax payment, and so on. Based on the secondary information by literature review and interview, this paper is aimed to propose few feasible strategies of LIS for an efficient and effective land information system. This paper will also focus on the present challenges of current system that are needed to be resolved.

BackgroundAvailability of correct and adequate information about medicines is an important aspect in ensuring rational use of medicines and hence facilitating safety and expected efficacy of medicines during therapy. Package inserts have proven to be a good source of information to the prescribers and patients whereby they have been useful in highlighting important information pertaining proper use and handling of the medicines. The present study was aimed at establishing the extent to which package inserts of medicines circulating on the markets of the East African Community (EAC) Partner States conform to medicines information requirements as established in the harmonized guidelines as well as national guidelines.MethodsA total of 99 package inserts from six (6) types of medicines namely Albendazole, Artemether/Lumefantrine (ALu), Ciprofloxacin, Paracetamol, Amoxicillin and Metronidazole were purposefully collected from three EAC Partner States: Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. The medicines were selected based on their indications as first line treatments, high rates of utilization within the medicines supply system and their positions in treatment of diseases of public importance across EAC Partner States. The inserts were evaluated on the availability of information regarding fifteen (15) parameters as extracted from the EAC harmonized guidelines for registration of medicines. Moreover, comparisons were made between the percentage conformity of the branded versus generic products, markets from which the samples were collected, origin of the manufacturer and type of medicine.ResultsMajority (93.9–100%) of the medicines’ package inserts highly conformed to the inclusion of the information regarding the description and composition of the medications, indications, dosage and methods of administration, warnings and precautions, contraindications and storage conditions. However, the information on handling and disposal, container package description, excipients used, clinical pharmacology of the medicines, and directions regarding overdose ranked the least in conformance with conformity ranging from 13.1–52.5%.The parameter with the lowest observed percentage conformity among the branded products scored 50% as compared to 10.8% among the generic products. Moreover, there was no significant difference (P<0.05) in the percentage conformity of the package inserts collected from each of the three Partner States as compared to the average from studied medicines. A generally good conformity was observed among medicines manufactured by European based manufacturers as compared to those based in Asia and EAC Partner States. In addition, PIs of Albendazole, Ciprofloxacin, Amoxicillin and Artemether/Lumefantrine did show overall high conformity across most of the product information requirements.ConclusionOur study revealed the existence of a significant number of medicinal products circulating on the markets of EAC Partner States without necessary compliance with all product information requirements. We therefore recommend that NMRAs ensure thorough pre-market assessment of product information as well as strengthening their post marketing surveillance to ensure that medicines circulating on the market comply to medicines information requirements at all times. Emphasis should also be given to manufacturers on the importance of inclusion of appropriate and adequate product information for the safety of patients, including advocating for inclusion of patient-friendly and easy to understand medicines information.

To identify the policy of international airlines for the carriage of passengers with epilepsy. Postal questionnaire asking about policy for epileptic passengers, training of cabin crew, onboard drugs suitable for the treatment of seizures, and details of any problems reported by crews as a result of in-flight passenger seizures. The questionnaire was addressed to the medical advisors of 42 international airlines. Thirty (71%) of 42 airlines responded. Eleven (37%) of the 30 airlines that responded had a stated policy or restriction on the carriage of passengers with epilepsy. Five of these airlines advised increasing the dose of anticonvulsant drugs before travel. One airline insisted that epileptic passengers travel with a companion. Twenty-five (83%) of 30 airlines dealt specifically with epilepsy in the training program of their cabin crews. Seventeen (57%) of 30 airlines carried diazepam onboard, mostly in injectable form. Most airlines reported no, or very few, incidents of in-flight passenger seizures annually. The advice offered to intending epileptic passengers differs greatly between airlines. Some airlines instruct intending passengers to increase their regular medication, probably without justification, since in-flight seizures are very infrequent. Training of cabin crew and the medical equipment carried onboard also vary and in some cases are inadequate.

Airport security measures serve to protect the traveling public, crew and aircraft. According to the TSA over 600 million passengers travel on commercial airlines and more than 700 million pieces of luggage are screened each year [2]. With such a large number of people traveling, airports and aircraft have become natural targets for terrorists. We propose a new concept of airport security screening measures that connects all airport security screening equipment for passengers and their belongings together from the onset of their check-in. Utilizing historical and profiling passenger information and the global security threat level to adapt and optimize the screening level and process for each screening device, it will streamline all check-in activities while drastically improving the overall quality of screening.

BackgroundWorldwide, 2.75 billion passengers fly on commercial airlines annually. When in-flight medical emergencies occur, access to care is limited. We describe in-flight medical emergencies and the outcomes of these events.MethodsWe reviewed records of in-flight medical emergency calls from five domestic and international airlines to a physician-directed medical communications center from January 1, 2008, through October 31, 2010. We characterized the most common medical problems and the type of on-board assistance rendered. We determined the incidence of and factors associated with unscheduled aircraft diversion, transport to a hospital, and hospital admission, and we determined the incidence of death.ResultsThere were 11,920 in-flight medical emergencies resulting in calls to the center (1 medical emergency per 604 flights). The most common problems were syncope or presyncope (37.4% of cases), respiratory symptoms (12.1%), and nausea or vomiting (9.5%). Physician passengers provided medical assistance in 48.1% of in-flight medical emergencies, and aircraft diversion occurred in 7.3%. Of 10,914 patients for whom postflight follow-up data were available, 25.8% were transported to a hospital by emergency-medical-service personnel, 8.6% were admitted, and 0.3% died. The most common triggers for admission were possible stroke (odds ratio, 3.36; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.88 to 6.03), respiratory symptoms (odds ratio, 2.13; 95% CI, 1.48 to 3.06), and cardiac symptoms (odds ratio, 1.95; 95% CI, 1.37 to 2.77).ConclusionsMost in-flight medical emergencies were related to syncope, respiratory symptoms, or gastrointestinal symptoms, and a physician was frequently the responding medical volunteer. Few in-flight medical emergencies resulted in diversion of aircraft or death; one fourth of passengers who had an in-flight medical emergency underwent additional evaluation in a hospital. (Funded by the National Institutes of Health.)

Mobile computing is becoming more and more pervasive, liberating users from the confines of wired networks. At the same time, transparent access to heterogeneous, distributed information sources has become a reality in wired computing. Obviously, this kind of access is highly desirable for mobile users, too. However, current architectures for transparent information access do not take the specific needs of mobile users into account, while existing architectures for mobile computing do not support transparent access well. For the future growth of the usage of mobile computing, it is of utmost importance that, instead of individually-developed, isolated extensions to the existing architectures, the research community agrees on a strong, standardized middleware platform extending both existing mobile architectures and existing information access architectures to ensure mobile access in heterogeneous environments. In this paper, we propose such a platform.

The comparison of pilots' and controllers' goals and SA information requirements revealed many parallels at the higher levels. At the more detailed, lower levels, however, subtle underlying differences were identified that lend insight into their decisions. The preliminary experimental results indicate that situation awareness was improved when information was shared between the cockpit and the ground. Pilots' traffic situation awareness improved when traffic information was displayed; controllers' weather situation awareness improved when weather information was displayed. Operational errors were reduced in the process. Pilots and controllers also exhibited behavioral changes. When information was shared, there were fewer requests for information, and controllers provided more frequent weather advisories to pilots. Pilots and controllers were more likely to suggest preferred route amendment alternatives to their counterparts, and re-route negotiation increased in the process. Based on these preliminary results, it appears that shared information between flight crews and air traffic controllers may be beneficial in terms of improved situation awareness and the behaviors it seems to foster.

Topicality of modeling information transparency is determined by the influence it has on the effectiveness of management decisions made by an economic entity in the context of uncertainty and information asymmetry. It has been found that information transparency is a poorly structured category which acts as a qualitative characteristic of information and at certain levels forms an additional spectrum of properties of the information that has been adequately perceived or processed. As a result of structuring knowledge about the factor environment, a fuzzy cognitive model of information transparency was constructed in the form of a weighted digraph. Structural analysis and scenario forecasting of optimal alternatives of the fuzzy cognitive model made it possible to evaluate the classes of factors, identify their limited relations, establish the centrality of the roles of information transparency and information and communication security in the system built and evaluate their importance when modeling the situation self-development. Information visibility, reliability and availability have been found to have the strongest impact on the system. Taking into account different initial weights of the key factors — information transparency and information and communication security — the study substantiates the strategic ways for economic entities to achieve their goals in the context of uncertainty and information asymmetry, which allows us to use this approach as a tool for strategic management in the information environment.

The paper presents the analysis of modern political communications in terms of availability of adequate information and scientific and educational resources within the political discourse. The theoretical and methodological framework of the article is based on political communication studies being the most essential focus area of modern political science. The authors present the analysis of history and the current state of political communication issues being an element and a tool to study political processes, identify the specific characteristics of public political discourse in the context of existing contradictions in social development.&#x0D; To resolve some of the difficulties, the authors present a new unique interface (link) between political science and political discourse – electronic resources of systematized political science publications and political documents in the form of online libraries with books, articles, reports, documents available – ‘Library of a Political Scientist’ and ‘Library of a Conflictologist’, which are a unique form of inventory of available scientific and educational resources. ‘The Library of a Political Scientist’ is more universal in nature and is intended for rather broad audience. ‘The Library of a Conflictologist’, although being a more specialized information and analytical resource, at the same time contains multimedia (photos, videos, maps, infographics) and interactive (test game on six conflicts) components, which is in line with the modern educational and research paradigm. These resources are a new way of filing political science publications; they are intended to maintain by means of information and references modern scientific discourse in Russia on topical issues of Russian national and international policy, as well as international political conflictology in the geopolitical arena of Russian interests.

Many transgender and gender-diverse (TGD) individuals rely on online resources to obtain gender-affirming surgery (GAS) information. In 2021, US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) mandated that hospitals disclose prices for common services and procedures. The aim of this study was to assess the online information and price availability for GAS in US-based hospitals. The largest 100 hospitals by inpatient bedvolume were included. Hospital websites were searched in October 2023 for terms pertaining to GAS, and price estimator tools were queried for 66 common CPT codes used in GAS. Data on hospital ownership, hospital income, Medicaid revenue, plastic surgery residency programpresence, ZIP code median income, social vulnerability index score, and state-level nondiscrimination laws were also collected. Out of 100 hospitals, 59 publicly offered GAS. Hospitals located in the US South and Church-owned hospitals were the least likely to have any GAS information availability (41.5% and 36.4%, respectively). Hospitals in states with laws protecting GASinsurance access and those with plastic surgery residency programs were more likely to publicly offer GAS. Only 48 hospitals offered any GAS pricing information. Of these hospitals, the median number of prices displayed was two, and only five hospitals disclosed prices for more than ten procedures. Pricing information was particularly limited for genital and facial procedures. Significant gaps exist in the public availability of GAS information and price transparency, with notable regional and institutional disparities. Standardizing price estimator tools would enhance informed decision-making and reduce barriers to care. http://www.springer.com/00266 LEVEL OF EVIDENCE IV: This journal requires that authors assign a level of evidence to each article. For a full description of these Evidence-Based Medicine ratings, please refer to the Table of Contents or the online Instructions to Authors www.springer.com/00266 .

The article deals with the issue of ensuring and monitoring the quality of social services and the role of such an instrument of social marketing and advertising as informing the population with the help of Internet technologies. The article reveals the necessity of existence and obligatory requirements to the content of the websites of the state social organizations. The article states the functions of the sites in terms of informing recipients of social services about the activities of organizations, the opportunities and services they provide, the establishment of feedback. The article reveals the essence and purpose of an independent assessment of the quality of social service institutions, a list of its criteria. The characteristic of indicators within one criterion of an independent quality assessment - openness and availability of information on the organization - is given. The authors analyzed the legal framework for the formation and conduct of an independent quality assessment in the system of social service institutions. The article describes the results of the content analysis of the content of the websites of institutions of social service of the Irkutsk region in terms of their information transparency, completeness and accessibility for recipients of social services. The authors consider the role of the websites and the way the information is arranged on them while forming the policy to improve the quality of social services to different categories of citizens. The level of compliance with the requirements for all indicators of information openness and accessibility of social services institutions of different types is analyzed. The degree of representation of information on the websites in terms of individual indicators is stated, as well as parameters of full disclosure of information with maximum and minimum values are identified. The difference of requirements to transparency and availability of information, their relevance to various types of institutions are revealed. The differentiation of information openness and accessibility depending on the type of social service institution, the legal status of the institution, the service audience are identified. The role of Internet technologies, requirements to information openness and accessibility for the implementation of social advertising and the development of social commitment by institutions of social services are outlined.