Long-term Priority Research Articles

A longitudinal analysis of the lifetime cost of dementia.

Estimate the lifetime cost of dementia to Medicare and Medicaid. 1997-2005 Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey. A multistage analysis was conducted to first predict the probability of developing dementia by age and then predict the annual Medicare/Medicaid expenditures conditional on dementia status. A cohort-based simulation was conducted to estimate the lifetime cost of dementia. The average lifetime cost of dementia per patient for Medicare is approximately $12,000 (2005 dollars) and for Medicaid about $11,000. Dementia onset at older age leads to shorter duration and lower lifetime cost. Increased educational level leads to longer longevity, more dementia cases per cohort, but shorter duration, and lower lifetime cost per patient, which could offset the cost increase induced by more dementia cases. Increased body mass index leads to more dementia cases per cohort and higher lifetime cost per patient. Net cost of dementia is lower than the estimates from cross-sectional studies. Promoting healthy lifestyle to reverse the obesity epidemic is a short-term priority to confront the epidemic of dementia in the near future. Promoting higher education among the younger generation is a long-term priority to mitigate the effect of population aging on the dementia epidemic in the distant future.

Long-term priority effects among insects and fungi colonizing decaying wood

1. Priority effects have been hypothesized to have long-lasting impact on community structure in natural ecosystems. Long-term studies of priority effects in natural ecosystems are however sparse, especially in terrestrial ecosystems.2. Wood decay is a slow process involving a high diversity of insect and fungus species. Species interactions that drive change in communities of insects and fungi during wood decay are poorly understood because of a lack of sufficient long-term studies.3. In this paper, we followed the colonization and succession of wood-living insects and fungi on cut trees during 15 years, from tree death and onwards, in a boreal forest landscape. We test the long-term priority effects hypothesis that the identity and abundance of species that colonize first affect the colonization success of later-arriving species. We also hypothesize that species interact in both facilitative and inhibitory ways, which ultimately affect habitat quality for a red-listed late-succession beetle species.4. Possible causal associations between species were explored by path analysis. The results indicate that one bark beetle species, Hylurgops palliatus, and one wood-borer species, Monochamus sutor, which colonized the wood during the first year after cutting, influenced the occurrence of a rare, wood-living beetle, Peltis grossa, that started to emerge from the stumps about 10 years later. The positive effects of Hylurgops palliatus and negative effects of M. sutor were largely mediated through the wood-decaying fungus species Fomitopsis pinicola.5. The study shows that variable priority effects may have long-lasting impact on community assembly in decaying wood. The study also exemplifies new possibilities for managing populations of threatened species by exploring links between early, well-understood species guilds and late, more poorly understood species guilds.

Working with Young Children Who are Victims of Armed Conflict

Young children are particularly vulnerable to war and armed conflict. Although the long-term priority is always to try to unravel and reduce violence and conflict, in the short term some interventions may reduce suffering. In this article the authors report on recent evidence on psychosocial interventions designed to mitigate the impact of armed conflict on young children's development. A systematic review method was used to explore evaluations of interventions addressing the cognitive and psychosocial development of young children directly affected by armed conflict. In general the literature suggests therapeutic interventions drawing on the concept of post-traumatic stress disorder run the risk of imposing cultural norms from the global North. In contrast, more general psychosocial interventions and normalisation routines are likely to be more effective. But recent reviews also suggest that evaluation of interventions with children affected by armed conflict is weak. More robust evidence is badly needed.

THE EURO: PAST SUCCESSES AND NEW CHALLENGES

The successes of the first decade of European Economic and Monetary Union are impressive, but it is fair to stress these were achieved in a relatively benign economic environment characterised by steady global growth, supportive financial conditions and fiscal windfalls associated with booms in asset markets. Although all this has come to an abrupt end with the financial crisis, there is a silver lining of fiscal stimulus being more effective in EMU than without the single currency, with offsetting exchange rate responses absent, trade multipliers stronger and the fiscal framework credible. But the financial crisis also clearly demonstrated the need for stronger coordination of national policy actions to internalise cross-border spillovers. Meanwhile, the European Commission has a major role to play in striking the right balance between short-term emergency measures and longer-term priorities. Against this backdrop, this article sheds light on the longer-run challenges and the policy agenda for meeting them.

Priority and Negotiation Based Dynamic Spectrum Allocation Scheme for Multiple Radio Access Network Operators

Most of previous works have presented the dynamic spectrum allocation (DSA) gain achieved by utilizing the time or regional variations in traffic demand between multi-network operators (NOs). In this paper, we introduce the functionalities required for the entities related with the spectrum sharing and allocation and propose a spectrum allocation algorithm while considering the long-term priority between NOs, the priority between multiple class services, and the urgent bandwidth request. To take into account the priorities among the NOs and the priorities of multiple class services, a spectrum sharing metric (SSM) is proposed, while a negotiation procedure is proposed to treat the urgent bandwidth request.

A STUDY OF THE DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY OF CHINA METEOROLOGICAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

This paper is a general survey of the main results presented in Studies on the Development Strategy of China Meteorology-special Volume for the key scientific and technological issues. The background of, current status and the society requirement for the development of the meteorology are analyzed, in the perspectives including synoptic dynamical theory and forecasting technology, climatic system and global change, weather modification, atmospheric chemistry, atmospheric physics, and integrated sounding technology as well as field experiment. It points out that the development of the meteorology is necessarily to combine with the key scientific and technological results, to develop a set of long-term objective and priority domains for China meteorological sciences and technology development, which should have main focus on meteorological scientific issues related with weather, climate, and climate change in China. The suggestions are given which dedicated to the establishment of the meteorological theory framework, to the improvement of the weather forecasting and climate prediction, to the implementation of global climate observation system and to the interdisciplinary integrated efforts.

Shifting the focus of tuberculosis research in India

India has a long and distinguished tradition of research in the field of tuberculosis (TB). Pioneering studies from India demonstrated the efficacy and safety of domiciliary treatment, the necessity of direct observation of treatment, the feasibility of case detection through sputum smear microscopy in primary health care institutions, and the effectiveness of intermittent short-course chemotherapy. These findings laid the foundation of directly observed treatment, short course (DOTS), which has been adopted by nearly 150 countries worldwide. Today, India has the second-largest and the fastest-growing DOTS programme in the world. A strong component of programme evaluation and operational research is needed to sustain and expand DOTS in the context of a suboptimal primary health care system, a large and unregulated private health care system, and the dual threats of HIV and multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB). Therefore, the focus of TB research in India has shifted to the following operational research areas: evaluating models to involve the private health sector; assessing the role of incentives in increasing treatment compliance; examining gender differentials in the access to TB services; assessing risk factors for delay in diagnosis; evaluating diagnosis, treatment and prevention of TB among HIV-infected persons; monitoring MDR-TB; estimating cost-effectiveness of the DOTS programme; monitoring the quality of smear microscopy services; and measuring the current burden of TB. Research for developing newer diagnostic tools, drugs and vaccines remains a long-term priority. Greater networking is needed among national researchers, programme managers and policy-makers to translate the findings of research into policies and programmes to make TB control in India more effective and efficient.

National occupational health research priorities, agenda and strategy of Japan: invited report in NORA symposium 2001, USA.

An invited report on national occupational health research priorities, agenda and strategy of Japan was delivered in the NORA (National Occupational Research Agenda) Symposium 2001, USA. The third NORA Symposium was held by the US National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) in Washington DC on June 27, 2001. The national conference in Japan entitled "Conference on Occupational Health Research Strategies in the 21st Century" was organized by the Japanese Ministry of Labour (Currently, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare) in the years 1998-2001, and the national occupational health research agenda and strategy for the next decade in Japan was identified. A total of 50 Conference members, i.e., representatives from various fields of occupational health in Japan, ranked 58 comprehensive research topics, yielding short-term (5-year) and long-term (6-10 year) priority research topics. Overall (10-year) priority research topics were calculated by combining the short-term and long-term priority scores. Together with the ranking by 145 extramural occupational health specialists, it was identified that work stress (i.e., one of the 58 research topics) was the first overall priority research topic for the next 10 years in Japan. Three other topics, i.e., elderly workers, women workers and maternity protection, and mental health and quality of work and life, were the second group of priority topics; and hazard and risk assessment and biological effect index were the third priority group. Based on the scores for the short-term and long-term priority research topics, all 58 research topics were classified into three key research areas with 18 key research issues (National Occupational Health Research Agenda, NOHRA). Finally, eight implementation measures of national strategy for the Japanese Government to promote occupational health research were introduced.

The implementation of a control system for a product introduction process

This paper describes the approach taken in implementing a system to control the new product introduction process in an ‘engineering to order’ scenario. The primary objective was to ensure that the new system was immediately viable and able to control all aspects of new product introduction, including long-term learning. The approach taken consisted of integrating a series of techniques established by the authors with concepts previously developed in the literature. The consequence of the implementation was a significant improvement in new product introduction performance as measured against company strategic targets in terms of both short- and longer-term priorities.

The effects of privatization on marketing capability and activity in Poland

Privatization has been a major element of reform in Central and Eastern Europe, however its effects on firm marketing capability and performance are unclear. This study tests a number of hypotheses concerning the effects of privatization on marketing capability, activities and performance in Poland. The main conclusions are that privatization leads to enhanced marketing capability, to more pro-active marketing activities, such as the adoption of longer term priorities, to an emphasis on delivering superior quality to customers and to more active new product development. On both financial and market-based criteria, the privatized firms are seen to outperform their state-owned counterparts.