Elements Of Good Practice Research Articles

Legacy planning, Regeneration and events: The Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games

This paper focuses upon the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games (CWG) legacy proposals regarding the regeneration of the East End. It provides a preliminary pre-event evaluation by examining local progress towards urban regeneration legacies, primarily physical and economic renewal. Following an examination of the events’ legacy landscape and problems within the legacy planning process, the paper outlines the socio-economic profile of the locale. Thereafter, the relevance of the CWG to the area is highlighted and an evaluation of the progress towards physical and economic urban regeneration goals is charted. Key risks in the legacy planning process are identified. It is suggested that while there are elements of good practice in local progress towards legacy planning and regeneration, there are community issues that could pose tensions.

Inclusive education and best practice for children with autism spectrum disorder: an integrated approach

Many parents of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have reported general discontent with the services offered by the education system and have advocated for increased ASD‐specific services to better meet their children’s educational needs. The elements of best practice offer an ideal model for educational support. There are, however, limitations to advocating ASD‐specific services. This paper describes how best practice for ASD as an educational model fits within what is described as authentic inclusion. Further, it is suggested that the ASD community align with the greater inclusive education reform movement. With the use of this unified model of education, all children will receive the educational support they require.

Convention of hope–communicating positive, realistic messages to families at the time of a child’s diagnosis with disabilities

Accessible summary • This study is about the way that parents are told that their child has disabilities. The researchers talked to families and professionals to find out if parents are given nice and hopeful messages about their child. • The study found that parents and professionals agreed that there should be positive, realistic messages and hope given to parents about their child. • Many parents said that they did not get nice or hopeful messages. The study found that professionals could give realistic and hopeful messages by telling parents that there is help available The study also found that professional could tell parents about the value and importance of every child. • Giving realistic, positive and hopeful messages to parents about their child is the start of providing good support to people with disabilities through their whole lives. Providing good support throughout people’s whole lives is one of the aims of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Summary As part of a larger study to develop best practice recommendations for informing families of their child’s disabilities, this study researched the elements of best practice required when communicating this news to families. It traced the convergence between these practice recommendations and the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; in particular with regard to the provision of positive, realistic and hopeful communication. The study employed a mixed methodology, involving 22 focus groups and a questionnaire survey of 1588 professionals and 584 families. The study found that a large majority of parents and professionals supported the recommendation of providing families with positive, realistic and hopeful messages at the time of diagnosis but less than half of the parents surveyed reported receiving communication of this type. The findings indicated that some professionals may struggle with fears of providing ‘false hope’, a fear of litigation and a lack of training, when considering providing hope. However the research also identified positive and hopeful messages that are not in conflict with providing honest and realistic communication. These include: acknowledging the dignity and worth of the child as an individual, indicating that there is help available for parents, and informing families about the spectrum of possible outcomes for their child rather than the worst case scenario. The provision of appropriate positive, realistic messages and hope is fully aligned with the principles of the UN Convention.

‘Fencing them in’: the A‐League, policing and the dilemma of public order

The establishment of an elite national Australian soccer league has been accompanied by an unprecedented growth in popularity for the world game in several Australian cities. Such growth presents numerous challenges for public order maintenance, particularly in light of the widespread concern over the relationship between soccer, disasters in major closed venues and violence. After outlining the emerging issues, and the extant Australian research into the phenomena of policing and sports crowd disorder, this study offers a knowledge‐based approach to foster informed, reflective and collaborative policing in elite and sub‐elite soccer venues. Rather than advocating a fundamental shift in the current public order policing paradigm, we suggest drawing on elements of best practice that are currently adopted in other Australian sporting and public order settings and appropriate overseas experience to facilitate a better understanding of the dynamics of Australian soccer fandom. The result should be the promotion of safer yet exciting events at which interactive crowd management based on harm minimization principles are key features.

Good practices addressing school integration of Roma/Gypsy children in Hungary

Our recent project1 has a comparative perspective: it compares selected good practices of integration of ethnic minority children among three European countries (Italy, Switzerland and Hungary). The project examines several key areas of integration: governmental policies, NGO practices and most importantly good practices that might be transferable, irrespective of differences regarding national environment and ethnic group. We focus here on Hungary and aim to identify key elements of good practices of integrating Roma/Gypsy2 children such as creative pedagogical methods, differentiated personal treatment of children with learning problems, a multicultural curriculum, teacher training, extracurricular activities, community building and family involvement. This paper describes an innovative and transferable practice that promotes inclusion and addresses low school‐performance and high dropout rates among low status Roma children. The ‘Learnery’ project is an after‐school programme run by the minority community with the professional assistance of the public school. Results of the innovative practice are convincing: improved school performance, significant decrease in dropout rates, improved community relationships, and decrease of interethnic conflicts within the school.

A UK literature review of progressive long-term neurological conditions

Progressive long-term neurological conditions are relatively rare, and policy attention has only recently been directed at community services for people with these conditions. This literature review draws together findings from 16 UK studies relating to the provision of care in the community for people with progressive long-term neurological conditions. The purpose is to identify elements of best practice which could be promoted at a national level to improve services. The findings point to the uneven coverage of services and their lack of flexibility. Multidisciplinary care delivery was considered essential and patients and carers highly valued the use of key workers. The studies also highlighted the potential for self-managed care. This evidence can be used to inform service developments for the delivery of community care for people with progressive long-term neurological conditions.

Information transformation: Some missing links

Using grounded theory along with participant observation and interviews the authors explore how individuals in organizations process information. They build a model of human information processing which links the cognitivist-constructionist perspective to an algorithmic-heuristic continuum. They test this model using non-parametric procedures and find interesting results showing links to efficient information processing outcomes such as contributions to decision-making, knowledge-creation and innovation. They also identify some elements of best practice by efficient human information processing individuals whom they call the “information catalysts”.

How Can We Use an Extra Pair of Hands?

Classroom assistants are widely employed to support pupils with special educational needs. However, little attention has been paid to the way in which they are deployed and managed within the classroom. Drawing on research undertaken by the National Foundation for Educational Research, Felicity Fletcher-Campbell, senior research officer, NFER, identifies elements of good practice.

Hospital protocols for targeted glycemic control: Development, implementation, and models for cost justification

Evolving elements of best practices for providing targeted glycemic control in the hospital setting, clinical performance measurement, basal-bolus plus correction-dose insulin regimens, components of standardized subcutaneous (s.c.) insulin order sets, and strategies for implementation and cost justification of glycemic control initiatives are discussed. Best practices for targeted glycemic control should address accurate documentation of hyperglycemia, initial patient assessment, management plan, target blood glucose range, blood glucose monitoring frequency, maintenance of glycemic control, criteria for glucose management consultations, and standardized insulin order sets and protocols. Establishing clinical performance measures, including desirable processes and outcomes, can help ensure the success of targeted hospital glycemic control initiatives. The basal-bolus plus correction-dose regimen for insulin administration will be used to mimic the normal physiologic pattern of endogenous insulin secretion. Standardized insulin order sets and protocols are being used to minimize the risk of error in insulin therapy. Components of standardized s.c. insulin order sets include specification of the hyperglycemia diagnosis, finger stick blood glucose monitoring frequency and timing, target blood glucose concentration range, cutoff values for excessively high or low blood glucose concentrations that warrant alerting the physician, basal and prandial or nutritional (i.e., bolus) insulin, correction doses, hypoglycemia treatment, and perioperative or procedural dosage adjustments. The endorsement of hospital administrators and key physician and nursing leaders is needed for glycemic control initiatives. Initiatives may be cost justified on the basis of the billings for clinical diabetes management services and/or the return- on-investment accrued to reductions in hospital length of stay, readmissions, and accurate documentation and coding of unrecognized or uncontrolled diabetes, and diabetes complications. Standardized insulin order sets and protocols may minimize risk of insulin errors. The endorsement of these protocols by administrators, physicians, nurses, and pharmacists is also needed for success.

Incentivising project performance in the construction of new facilities

PurposeThe purpose of the paper is to outline a method for reporting project performance that can be used to provide incentives to both clients and contractors to share risks and opportunities.Design/methodology/approachThe conceptual foundation of the paper is two‐fold: firstly, a review of the literature highlights the limitations of fixed price, fixed unit price and variable (fee for service) type contracts and hence the need for contracts that incentivise project clients and contractors to act in mutually beneficial ways; secondly, the earned‐value method (EVM) is discussed as a means of reporting project progress via a single value‐based metric that is applicable to both client and contractor. The integrating of these two elements provides the basis for the method for reporting project performance described in this paper.FindingsThe paper presents the co‐operative incentivised negotiation budget (COIN). The COIN budget uses the concept of the variable (fee for service) type contract. In addition, it utilises the EVM to report project progress in a simple, easy‐to‐understand manner that enables both parties to share in the beneficial outcomes of better than planned performance and to share in the negative results of under‐performance.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper is conceptual and, although reporting elements of best practice, further research is needed in the following areas: firstly, the benefits, costs and limitations of, and the barriers to, using EVM‐based approaches in projects in general, and facilities projects in particular; secondly, the effectiveness of incentivising contracts in terms of addressing issues that lead to poor performance, such as poor communication and lack of trust between the parties.Practical implicationsThe COIN budget is a means by which the client and contractor can easily monitor performance in terms of the value earned in providing the agreed project deliverables. Whilst enabling the contractor to earn a cost plus margin, it enables both parties to have a common goal through the sharing of the positive and negative consequences associated with project opportunities and risks.Originality/valueThe paper makes an original contribution by integrating elements of best practice in the areas of contract selection and monitoring of project performance.

Legislation as Vulnerability Factor

A study conducted in Central America in 2003 shows that in the aftermath of Hurricane Mitch noticeable progress was made in introducing new legislation for disaster management, understood as covering the whole cycle from prevention, preparedness and relief, to reconstruction. The new legislation includes civil defence or disaster management laws and regulations to improve their effectiveness in responding to the threat of natural disasters. A similar situation can be observed in other countries like Cuba and the Dominican Republic. The study looks into existing urban and municipal laws, regulations and planning guidelines to assess the extent to which they respond to vulnerability reduction criteria. This paper focuses on aspects of prevention and risk reduction. An attempt was made to look into the complementarities and gaps between the two sets of regulations for disaster management and for municipal/urban management. It is found that despite the many elements of good practice included in them, the links between these instruments are weak or absent on issues ranging from planning to the actual supervision of interventions on the built environment. Thus, the main elements of the edifice were there, but they did not constitute a solid, interconnected, structure, therefore, bound to fail under the loads imposed by rapid urbanisation, speculation, emergencies and weak governance structures. Institutions are often left to fend themselves in discharging their tasks. Without a coherent normative framework, and the capacity to apply it, their work is primarily driven by institutional initiative, leading to problems of underperformance, overlaps, gaps, and non-constructive competition. Thus, the institutional setup and normative framework become important factors in increasing vulnerability, as real as a building with the wrong foundations. The article reviews the mentioned aspects drawing from the experience in Central America, Cuba and Dominican Republic.

The Generalisability of Pharmacoeconomic Studies

Developing from a previous review, this article revisits the generalisability theme to summarise recent advances in methodology and provide an update of challenges faced by producers and users of pharmacoeconomic data. Our original evaluative criteria encompassed technical issues, applicability and transferability. The technical elements of best practice are comparatively uncontroversial: choosing relevant alternatives; transparent reporting of methods and findings; accessing and applying the best-quality evidence; using best methods to synthesise data; and using deterministic sensitivity analysis to explore potential systematic bias whilst employing probabilistic sensitivity analysis to explore the influence of random error at the whole model level. The applicability of economic findings within their original policy context (e.g. national analyses based on generalisable within-country data) can be determined, provided that best practice guidelines for economic modelling are adhered to. The transferability of economic findings (from one policy setting to another, e.g. country, region, clinical setting or patient population) requires careful exploration of changes in resource implications, unit prices and outcomes, a process facilitated again by transparent reporting of methods, adjustment for baseline risk and potentially by recent statistical developments intended to deal with hierarchically structured data. Although there is considerable consensus in the published literature about these key issues, limitations remain for economic analysis as implemented because of its opaqueness of method, failure to reflect the opportunity cost of decisions and lack of societal mandate. If the primary purpose of health economic evaluation is to help society to obtain the best value from limited resources, then, at a time when most technologically advanced societies need to engage with the realities of limited healthcare funding, technocratic solutions alone appear insufficient. Making health economic findings accessible to patients, clinicians and society, in the form of relevant narratives, will help this essential debate and expose assumptions underpinning economic analysis to broader critical inspection.

The Orkney based craft entrepreneur: remote yet global?

Purpose – This paper reports a study of the craft sector in a remote area of Scotland. The objective is to understand what has made the sector in Orkney relatively successful, and whether elements of best practice can be transferred to other parts of Scotland and the UK.Design/methodology/approach – The analysis and discussion is based upon face‐to‐face interviews with public and private payers in the sector and is supplemented by discussions with craftspeople conducted as part of the wider study of which the Orkney story is but one part.Findings – A vibrant and innovative sector, parts of which are global, is revealed as having existed in Orkney for some time. There are, inevitably, some stresses and strains between the main players and different directions in which policy could develop. However, a framework based on businesses at different levels of experience is outlined as the basis for targeted economic intervention in the future.Research limitations/implications – Further understanding of the craft ...

Considerations, challenges and methodologies for implementing best practices in patent office and like patent information departments

Patent information plays a key role for corporations and all the institutions involved in technological activities. But patent information is a very “labile” resource and requires a very professional approach based on sound management for being handled properly and used efficiently. This article focuses initially on the characteristics of patent information, bringing together some key statistics over the last 20 years. Then it deals with the management of patent information, the basic content of a policy to be defined and implemented, and finally with the key elements of best practice. The best practice analysis, applied to novelty searches performed in a patent office, covers the nature of data, the coverage of data and databases (e.g. geography and languages), and the functionalities of the tools (e.g. search engines, navigation tools). Finally, a model methodology of search strategy is presented.

Medical input, rehabilitation and discharge planning for patients with hip fracture: Why traditional models are not fit for purpose and how things are changing

Summary Femoral fracture is the commonest reason for bed occupancy from trauma in older patients. Its incidence is rising and it is associated with high morbidity, mortality and loss of function for individuals and major burdens for health and social care. It is usually the result of falls and bone fragility and is a marker of underlying frailty acute and chronic medical co-morbidity. As such, older patients with hip fracture tend to have a wide range of medical illness and require co-ordinated discharge planning and multidisciplinary care. These skills and emphases do not generally reside in traditional orthopaedic teams. Evidence from the UK-wide audits suggests that patient outcomes and bed utilization are better when co-ordinated medical liaison and interdisciplinary care is available. This is backed up by a growing number of controlled clinical trials, an imperative from the NSF for older people and emerging evidence from managed care. A model of proactive specialist medical input allied to a multidisciplinary team can offer: early pre-operative optimization; avoidance of unnecessary operative delay; incorporation of elements of good practice (e.g. in pressure area care, analgesia and fluid balance); early discharge planning and rehabilitation goal setting; attention to medically reversible causes of “failure to thrive” such as poor nutrition, iatrogenic problems, delirium, sepsis and medical co-morbidity. In some cases, therapeutic futility and good palliation should be accepted and managed well. This model also crucially focus the mind on identifying the cause of the index fall and considering assessment of bone health—crucial in overall fracture prevention. Such a service can also offer expertise in the interface with primary and intermediate care, social services and in dealing with patients’ families. The advantages of this model mean that it should gradually supplant traditional models of orthopaedic care.

SERVICE-LEARNING IN CHRISTIAN HIGHER EDUCATION: BRINGING OUR MISSION TO LIFE

The purpose of the study reported in this paper was to develop a working definition of service-learning, identify the best practices of service-learning in the context of Christian colleges and universities and, based upon that information, develop a model for replication. The study undertaken included: (a) examination of the findings of unpublished data from a survey on service-learning at 90 Christian colleges and universities and notes from a conference on service-learning at faith-based institutions; (b) a thorough review of the literature on service-learning and the mission and purpose of Christian higher education; and (c) interviews with practitioners from seven Christian colleges or universities that met prescribed criteria for best practices in service-learning, A content analysis resulted in a comprehensive definition of service-learning, key elements of best practices in service-learning, and a model which incorporates guidelines for Christian colleges and universities to use when developing service-learning programs. The comprehensive definition incorporates characteristics from previous definitions, but includes an added component of institutional support for service-learning. The best practices in service-learning in Christian higher education corroborate this finding and include key elements. The model for designing a service-learning program at a Christian college builds further upon the definition and best practices and includes eight guidelines. The model guidelines are meant to address the philosophical and practical implications in designing an effective service-learning course and program in Christian institutions of learning. The data from this study strongly suggest that Christian colleges and universities should implement service-learning as a means of furthering their faith-based missions through their curricula.

Partnership‐based approaches to learning in the context of restructuring

The European steel and metal sectors have experienced processes of radical restructuring. Employers within the sector increasingly require employees to have a broader and deeper range of skills, although restructuring has also highlighted the need for workers to gain transferable skills in order to increase their employability. This paper, which draws on research conducted in seven European nations, describes how partnership‐based approaches to learning involving public, private and voluntary sector organisations have emerged in order to meet these needs. It argues that whileit may not be possible to develop a European model for partnership‐based approaches to learning, an examination of a number of particularly innovative and successful partnerships nevertheless facilitates the identification of the constituent elements of good practice with respect to partnership‐based approaches to learning, which may themselves have wider applications.

Local Participation in the Planning and Management of Ecotourism: A Revised Model Approach

Ecotourism is increasingly being advanced as a strategy to help address economic and social problems in local communities, and as an appropriate and effective tool of environmental conservation. The full and effective participation of local communities in the planning and management of ecotourism is, however, rarely a feature of ecotourism projects. At best, ecotourism projects tend to aim for the 'involvement' of local people, and at worst, ecotourism projects can ignore the issue of local participation completely. Such projects frequently fail after a relatively short period of time. This paper sets out to identify a number of elements of good practice in incorporating the fundamental principles of local community participation into the processes by which ecotourism projects are planned and managed. Taking lessons from this good practice, and drawing on a model previously developed in the early 1990s by Susan Drake, a revised model approach for local participation in the planning and management of ecotourism is then introduced and discussed. While this revised model approach was originally developed in the context of marine ecotourism in the EU Atlantic Area, it is arguably more generally applicable to different types of ecotourism projects and across a wider spectrum of geographical locations.

Official Intervention in the Foreign Exchange Market: Elements of Best Practice

This paper offers guidance on the operational aspects of official intervention in the foreign exchange market, particularly in developing countries with flexible exchange rate regimes. A brief survey of the literature and country experience is followed by an analysis of the objectives, timing, amount, degree of transparency, and choice of markets and counterparties in conducting intervention. The analysis highlights the difficulty of detecting exchange rate misalignments and disorderly markets, and argues in favor of parsimony in official intervention. Determining the timing and amount of intervention is a highly subjective excercise, and some degree of discretion is almost necessary, though policy may serve as rules of thumb.

Official Intervention in the Foreign Exchange Market: Elements of Best Practice

This paper offers guidance on the operational aspects of official intervention in the foreign exchange market, particularly in developing countries with flexible exchange rate regimes. A brief survey of the literature and country experience is followed by an analysis of the objectives, timing, amount, degree of transparency, and choice of markets and counterparties in conducting intervention. The analysis highlights the difficulty of detecting exchange rate misalignments and disorderly markets, and argues in favor of parsimony in official intervention. Determining the timing and amount of intervention is a highly subjective exercise, and some degree of discretion is almost always necessary, though policy rules may serve as rules of thumb.