Resource Directory Research Articles

GlobalTower.com: Global Resource Directory

GlobalTower.com: Global Resource Directory

Enhancing Pediatric Mental Health Care: Strategies for Preparing a Primary Care Practice

In 2004, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Board of Directors formed the Task Force on Mental Health and charged it with developing strategies to improve the quality of child and adolescent mental health* services in primary care. The task force acknowledged early in its deliberations that enhancing the mental health care that pediatricians and other primary care clinicians† provide to children and adolescents will require systemic interventions at the national, state, and community levels to improve the financing of mental health care and access to mental health specialty resources. Systemic strategies toward achieving these improvements are the subject of other publications of the task force: “ Strategies for System Change in Children's Mental Health: A Chapter Action Kit ” (chapter action kit),1 “Improving Mental Health Services in Primary Care: Reducing Administrative and Financial Barriers to Access and Collaboration,”2 and “Enhancing Pediatric Mental Health Care: Strategies for Preparing a Community.”3 The task force also recognized that enhanced mental health practice will require competencies not currently achieved by many primary care clinicians; in the policy statement “The Future of Pediatrics: Mental Health Competencies for Pediatric Primary Care,”4 the task force collaborated with the AAP Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health to outline these competencies and propose strategies for achieving them. This report offers strategies for preparing the primary care practice itself for provision of enhanced mental health care services. The task force proposes incrementally applying chronic care principles to the care of children with mental health and substance abuse problems as primary care clinicians apply them to the care of children with chronic medical conditions such as asthma. Most primary care clinicians will find that significant gaps exist between their current practice and the proposed ideal. The task force offers guidance in … Address correspondence to Jane Meschan Foy, MD, Department of Pediatrics, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Medical Center Blvd, Winston-Salem, NC 27157. E-mail: jmfoy{at}wfubmc.edu

An approach for heterogeneous and loosely coupled geospatial data distributed computing

Most GIS (Geographic Information System) applications tend to have heterogeneous and autonomous geospatial information resources, and the availability of these local resources is unpredictable and dynamic under a distributed computing environment. In order to make use of these local resources together to solve larger geospatial information processing problems that are related to an overall situation, in this paper, with the support of peer-to-peer computing technologies, we propose a geospatial data distributed computing mechanism that involves loosely coupled geospatial resource directories and a term named as Equivalent Distributed Program of global geospatial queries to solve geospatial distributed computing problems under heterogeneous GIS environments. First, a geospatial query process schema for distributed computing as well as a method for equivalent transformation from a global geospatial query to distributed local queries at SQL (Structured Query Language) level to solve the coordinating problem among heterogeneous resources are presented. Second, peer-to-peer technologies are used to maintain a loosely coupled network environment that consists of autonomous geospatial information resources, thus to achieve decentralized and consistent synchronization among global geospatial resource directories, and to carry out distributed transaction management of local queries. Finally, based on the developed prototype system, example applications of simple and complex geospatial data distributed queries are presented to illustrate the procedure of global geospatial information processing.

Can telephone counseling post‐treatment improve psychosocial outcomes among early stage breast cancer survivors?

To determine whether a telephone counseling program can improve psychosocial outcomes among breast cancer patients post-treatment. A randomized trial was conducted involving 21 hospitals and medical centers, with assessments (self-administered questionnaires) at baseline, 12 and 18 months post-enrollment. Eligibility criteria included early stage diagnosis, enrollment during last treatment visit, and the ability to receive the intervention in English. Endpoints included distress (Impact of Event Scale), depression (Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale), and two study-specific measures: sexual dysfunction and personal growth. The control group (n=152) received a resource directory for breast cancer; the intervention group (n=152) also received a one-year, 16 session telephone counseling program augmented with additional print materials. Significant intervention effects were found for sexual dysfunction at 12 (p=0.03) and 18 months (p=0.04) and personal growth (12 months: p=0.005; 18 months: p=0.03). No differences by group were found in mean scores for distress and depression, with both groups showing significant improvement at 12 and 18 months (all p values for within-group change from baseline were <or=0.003). However, when dichotomized at cutpoints suggestive of the need for a clinical referral, the control group showed virtually no change at 18 months, whereas the intervention group showed about a 50% reduction in both distress (p=0.07) and depression (p=0.06). Telephone counseling may provide a viable method for extending psychosocial services to cancer survivors nationwide.

Research into a resource directory service based on Grid RLS

At present, massive amounts of data are distributed across different institutions, departments and scientific research institutes, and even at one site can be stored in heterogeneous storage systems. Therefore, it is hard to get the desired information from the massive data resource, which leads to the requirement of data sharing. In an effort to solve this problem, this paper studies Grid technology and RLS, for sharing remote sensing data. Furthermore, a resource directory service has been designed and implemented by using RLS in the Grid environment.

Educational Opportunities in Integrative Medicine: The A-to-Z Healing Arts Guide and Professional Resource Directory

Educational Opportunities in Integrative Medicine: The A-to-Z Healing Arts Guide and Professional Resource Directory

CREATIVE AND TAILORED STRATEGIES NEEDED TO FOSTER RESEARCHER-COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS

The strategies put forth by Christopher et al.1 are consistent with the experience of HIV researchers who are part of the Adolescent Medicine Trials Network for HIV/AIDS Interventions. These researchers (including us) have been working for more than 5 years in 13 urban areas across the United States and in Puerto Rico to help create and sustain local coalitions focused on HIV structural change strategies.2 We've found that having defined research parameters does not preclude building trusting and sustaining relationships with community members, as long as flexibility and transparency are employed. Researchers must be clear about the requirements versus areas of flexibility. In addition, researchers must allow opportunity for partners to lead in meaningful ways. Based on our experience so far, here are some additional strategies to consider: First, find ways to support community partners’ institutional needs. Before ever asking partners for their time, we provided them with several resources, including a community-wide resource directory of youth health services, as well as maps depicting local HIV and sexually transmitted disease prevalence, and results from interviews with local youth regarding their risk behaviors, which support grant writing. It is critical to become an honest broker that can help partners gain the resources that they need to prosper. For example, connect a partner who is looking for “people power” to another organization that has volunteers ready to staff community events. In addition, allow time at each coalition meeting for partners to discuss their assets and needs. Foster an environment where partners feel comfortable requesting assistance from one another and exchanging resources. Second, use an outside facilitator to help define the course of work for the coalition. In our case, this meant having a facilitator—who was chosen by researchers and partners—lead a strategic planning session whereby the goals and objectives of the coalition were identified. This helped build trust by keeping the planning process open. Third, maintain regular and ongoing communication, preferably face-to-face, with key managers and supervisors from partner organizations, even if those individuals do not regularly attend coalition meetings. Ensure that high-level staff has a clear understanding of the coalition's work. In our experience, this helps to facilitate a productive and trusting coalition environment, because coalition members are more likely to be active participants. In general, building trust between researchers and community members requires multifaceted and creative approaches. Strategies must be tailored, and researchers must be committed over the long haul.

The Relationship of Computer Attitudes to Reported Use and Observed Behavioral Proficiency

ABSTRACT The current health care delivery system increasingly relies upon information technology (IT) to more effectively and efficiently meet patient needs. This paper reports findings from an observational field study that examined the relationship of computer self-efficacy, computer anxiety, and perceived computer usefulness to behavioral performance utilizing IT programs by clinical staff in a hospital-based social work and nursing case management department. The results indicated significant relationships between observed behavioral proficiency on a computer resource directory search task and self-reported ratings of computer self-efficacy and computer anxiety. Higher task proficiency was associated with higher computer self-efficacy ratings. Lower task proficiency was associated with higher computer anxiety. More frequent self-reported use of the computer resource directory was significantly associated with higher ratings of computer usefulness.

The Evolution of Burn Care Facilities in the United States

This historical review documents the establishment and current status of specialized burn care facilities opened in the United States since 1947, describes trends in their physical configuration and burn bed availability and discusses the terms used to classify those facilities. Lists of active burn care facilities were reviewed, including primarily the Burn Care Resource directories of the American Burn Association, which date back to 1976, along with the results of special surveys carried out by the authors in 1992 and 2006. Of the burn facilities at 175 US hospitals which had reported the presence of specialized burn beds since 1947, 25 had closed before 1992, 153 have been active as recently as 1992, and 125 were active as of early 2007. Between 1979 and 2007, total burn beds listed as available in annual surveys of hospitals reporting specialized burn care facilities ranged between about 1700 and 1800 beds. Average burn beds in those facilities increased from approximately 11.2 to 14.4. Specialized burn care facilities provide burn care in various configurations of units dedicated primarily to burns and those shared with other patients. Despite the closing of 50 such facilities in recent decades, total reported burn beds in the United States have remained essentially stable during the past 30 years. Issues related to concentrating burn beds in a smaller number of facilities and external factors affecting their past and future operations merit additional review.

‘WE WILL INVENT OURSELVES, THE AGE OF THE NEW IMAGE IS AT HAND’

We became very evangelistic trying to tell as many women as possible about this thing that we had discovered, and in those circumstances we began making a film to use for propaganda purposes. (Anon...

Illustrated Dictionary and Resource Directory of Environmental &amp; Occupational Health, 2nd Edition. Herman Koren. 2005. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL. 702 pp. $139.95 hardcover.

Illustrated Dictionary and Resource Directory of Environmental & Occupational Health , 2nd Edition. Herman Koren. 2005. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL. 702 pp. $139.95 hardcover. According to the Foreword, the 1st Edition contained 7,500 entries, whereas this 2nd Edition contains 16,000; clearly, a substantial upgrading has been accomplished in response to a professional need. As the Introduction eloquently describes the field, “Environmental and occupational health is not a single topic, but rather a colorful, complex, and diversified range of interrelated subjects including all the basic sciences, engineering, computer science, government, disease, injury identification, prevention, and control.” It goes on to list a plethora of other subtopics that are covered. Considering the facts presented thus far, this volume should be an exhaustive compilation of information critical to the effectiveness of the environmental, health, and safety professional. The inclusion or exclusion of a particular term is not an objective of this review; of particular importance are the readability, accessibility, completeness, and user friendliness, which are critical factors in creating a usable, reliable reference volume.

Moderate Sedation in the Burn Center: A Need for Evidence Based Guidelines

Moderate sedation protocols developed to ensure patient safety typically follow the outlines set by the American Society of Anesthesiologists. These guidelines do not address the unique needs of burn patients receiving moderate sedation during daily major dressing changes. Many of the requirements, such as NPO for 8 hours prior to sedation, if followed, may be detrimental to the healing process. A consistent approach to providing safe, efficient moderate sedation to burn patients that meets JCAHO requirements is needed. The purpose of this study is to determine if other Burn Centers share our concerns and would be interested in developing an ABA position on safe moderate sedation for burn dressing changes. Questionnaires were mailed to Nurse Managers of all 128 of the Burn Centers identified in the ABA's on-line 2005 Burn Care Resource Directory. The questionnaire requested information related to demographic data, type of sedation provided, drugs used, policy issues and...

A model for knowledge transfer and adoption: a systemic approach to science communication

Abstract This article describes a new model for science communication relevant to natural resource management as well as any other sector with the need to integrate and find pathways through an extensive body of information. The model comprises a hardcopy resource directory and a companion interactive CD-ROM. Together, the approach represents the first integrated and readily accessible repository of information on dryland salinity in Australia, and probably in the natural resource management sector more generally, and targets the many thousands of catchment managers. The advice of more than 150 people involved in salinity research and management informed the structure and content of the resource materials. This article discusses the strengths and limitations of the approach and its potential for broader application, the need for adaptive management and on-going learning, and some prospects for further investment.

Resources for Medical Mycology on the World Wide Web

Searching the World Wide Web for information on medical mycology can be challenging. We provide the reader with an organized overview of the available resources on the Internet, including authoritative sites from academic institutions, professional societies, government agencies, and personal sites. This article reviews clinically relevant Internet resource directories, comprehensive sites of interest to clinicians, clinical trials in medical mycology, clinically relevant Web sites devoted to specific fungal pathogens and their infections, genomic resources in medical mycology, culture collections, images of fungi on the World Wide Web, medical mycology lecture and teaching materials, environmental health and safety information, and a listing of Web sites of medical mycology professional societies.

Illustrated dictionary and resource directory of environmental &amp; occupational health

Illustrated dictionary and resource directory of environmental &amp; occupational health

Representación de los Estudios de Género en los índices temáticos

This papers reviews how gender studies are represented in information resource directories available on the internet and explains the best search strategies for locating web pages about Women's Studies. The methodology used is based on a sampling of five US/UK search engines with hosts in Spain and with Spanish translation. The differences between these are studied, with a special emphasis on the position occupied by Women's Studies in the hierarchical structure of their thematic indexes.

The encyclopedia of suicide

Statistics show that about 11 out of every 100,000 Americans commits suicide each year. A comprehensive A-to-Z introduction to the phenomenon of suicide from ancient times to the present. The Encyclopedia of Suicide, Second Edition is a heavily expanded, updated, and revised edition that reflects the most current data available on the topic. The encyclopedia covers a wide range of aspects of the subject, including the causes, history, and psychology of suicide. Presenting more than 500 entries that detail the philosophical and religious issues, psychological and sociological viewpoints, and recent statistics, it also discusses new trends in research and treatment. Extensive appendixes provide national and international suicide statistics and resource directories listing associations, clinics, and hot lines.

Gateways, Portals, and Websites

SEARCHING the Internet for K-12 educational materials using a multipurpose search engine like Google is a waste of time. The educational materials you are looking for will be all mixed in with millions of noneducational materials. Fortunately, there are better ways. You can use a or website designed strictly for educators. I have not found a clear distinction between how people use the terms gateway and portal. The word portal means door or special entrance. My university website, for example, has a special page that faculty members use to access class lists, grade rolls, and so forth. I believe that gateway usually refers to a website that maintains a database of resources you can search. The distinction here, however, is artificial, since nearly all large websites have their content stored in a back end database -- i.e., one that you don't see. Regardless of the term you use, there are two generic ways to give educators access to content. You can either maintain a database of educational materials that can be searched, or you can organize the content in some kind of directory or hierarchical structure -- not unlike the outlines you used to give your English teacher. Either of these approaches is far better than using a multipurpose search engine that accesses the entire Web. GEM or Gateway to Educational Materials (www.geminfo.org) is an initiative of the U.S. Department of Education. GEM is currently housed at the Information Institute of Syracuse University. The purpose of this particular is to expand educators' capability to access Internet-based lesson plans, curriculum units, and other educational materials. GEM's goal is to improve the organization and accessibility of the substantial, but uncataloged, collections of materials that are already available on various federal, state, university, nonprofit, and commercial Internet sites. When teachers connect to The Gateway, they are able to access the educational resources of participating GEM Consortium members. When educators connect . . . they are able to: browse through lists organized by subject, keyword, or grade/education level; search by subject, keyword, title, or full-text of the resource's catalog [and] go directly to the resource from The Gateway. The introductions continue: GEM is a set of metadata standards [explained below] used by Consortium members to organize and improve access to their own educational materials. Sites 'Powered by GEM' include: AskERIC, Canadian Heritage Information Network's Learning with Museums, MCI WorldCom Foundation's MarcoPolo Project, NASA Space Science Education Resource Directory, and the U.S. Department of Education's Federal Resources for Educational Excellence. Since this was written and posted, many new members have been added to the Consortium, including Disney, PBS, and National Geographic. A metadata is a record about a record, or in this use, a database of a Web page or resource. The GEM metadata is similar to a card in a library catalog, with many similar fields, such as a keyword field. Since I will be teaching an elementary science methods class this fall, I decided to test the GEM Gateway to find information about biomes and habitats. There are a variety of ways to set up a GEM search, but I will explain only a few here. The GEM search page lets you search on two variables, and you can search the database by full text, keyword, title, or description. I found that the best way to search the GEM is to use either title or keywords. (Keywords are simply the controlled vocabulary used to describe entries.) These options were the most useful since they are more restrictive, and you don't have to browse through so many hits. You can also restrict your search to a single grade level or choose several. And you can specify a broad field or school subject, such as science, and a narrow field, such as ecology. …

Forging Gay Identities: Organizing Sexuality in San Francisco, 1950-1994 (review)

Reviewed by: Forging Gay Identities: Organizing Sexuality in San Francisco, 1950–1994 Susan Kathleen Freeman Forging Gay Identities: Organizing Sexuality in San Francisco, 1950–1994. By Elizabeth A. Armstrong. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002. Pp. xix + 272. $60.00 (cloth); $22.50 (paper). In Forging Gay Identities, Elizabeth Armstrong narrates and conceptualizes the shift from homophile organizing to gay liberation to a gay identity-based movement during the second half of the twentieth century. Using primary and secondary sources, Armstrong addresses her work to sociologists interested in social movements and social change. Her analysis of San Francisco's gay movement serves to revise existing theories of organizational sociology, political process/resource mobilization theory, and new social movement theory. Although mostly derived from existing historical research and interpretations, the book offers an analytical perspective that is distinctive. From the vantage point of the turn of the twenty-first century, Armstrong demonstrates how the gay movement came to focus on identity and valorize individual expression. As displayed since the 1970s in the ubiquitous gay pride parades, the process of "coming out" has brought together a heterogeneous population to celebrate various identities and lifestyles, more recently including bisexual and transgender along with gay and lesbian. Whereas ideological, gender, race, and class differences have fragmented other recent social movements, the success story of organizers' unification of the gay movement around gay identity and visibility is the central focus of this book. Armstrong self-consciously departs from the sociological tradition of evaluating movement outcomes in terms of formal political gains and institutionalization; rather, she examines the informal realm of identity and culture while tracing the growth of the gay movement in San Francisco. [End Page 637] After laying out her theoretical premises in chapter 1, the author proceeds chronologically to demonstrate the often overlapping transitions from a homophile ("interest group") logic in the 1950s and 1960s to a short-lived revolutionary ("redistributive") logic in the late 1960s and early 1970s to a visibility ("identity") logic from the 1970s to the 1990s. She illustrates her model with original quantitative data compiled from resource guides and directories, using several charts and graphs to display her information on organizational growth and decline; on the whole, however, this is a qualitative study that draws from movement periodicals and scholarly research. Historians will not find much new empirical information, and even the differences in argument are often slight. John D'Emilio's research on the homophile movement and San Francisco gay liberation is much in evidence. Armstrong concurs with D'Emilio that the homophile movement of the 1950s and 1960s solidified a concept of collective identity among homosexuals. (See John D'Emilio, Sexual Politics, Sexual Communities: The Making of a Homosexual Minority in the United States, 1940-1970 [Chicago, 1983].) Yet she conceptualizes the emergence of a gay identity as a definitive point in the creation of a gay/lesbian "field," her terminology for the process of "creating and expanding gay social and political space" (13). While sensitive to the political and cultural climate and change over time, Armstrong nevertheless reiterates throughout the book that the homophile movement adopted a "limited" interest group model (41). Although homophile groups did resemble interest groups in several respects, electoral and legal battles for homosexual rights were only part of the homophile agenda. Just as significant but largely neglected by the author were education (of professionals and other homosexuals) and ending social isolation. Political action—pursuing the right to congregate, publish newsletters, and secure telephone directory listings—was a means to an end, not the end in itself, and this Armstrong recognizes. Yet closer attention to a wider range of activities and evidence might have led the author to less reductive conclusions about homophile politics. Whereas homophiles "could not take that final step" (56) toward publicly announcing their sexual orientation, gay liberation activists did. New Left-influenced radicalism and notions of authenticity, Armstrong argues, contributed redistributive and identity-politics logic to the movement a full year before New York City's 1969 Stonewall Riots. Unlike gay movement scholars who treat the New Left as a context for the emergence of revolutionary ideas and militant action, Armstrong views the New Left as responsible for...

Directory of Internet documents for consumers on quality of care.

Healthcare professionals have an important role in helping patients and families understand the concept of healthcare quality and gain access to available information on quality care. Information about quality of healthcare is available from many reputable sources on the Internet. A resource directory that leads consumers to these sites would be a useful tool for patient education. This article describes (a) the process of retrieving and evaluating Web site documents on quality care, using criteria developed by the Health Information Technology Institute, and (b) the method of organizing them into a logical structure using Mind Map software. The 32 documents that make up the directory are included in a table under subheadings developed with concept mapping.