Systematic Evaluation Process Research Articles

Web-Based Decision Support System for Budget Prediction Using the SAW Method for Tourism Recommendations

Tourism plays a crucial role in regional and national economies, with local tourism in Indonesia, particularly in Jombang Regency, East Java, offering substantial development potential. However, tourists often face difficulties in planning trips that align with their budgets due to inadequate integration of information on costs, trip duration, and participant numbers. This study develops a web-based Decision Support System (DSS) utilizing the Simple Additive Weighting (SAW) method to enhance trip planning for tourism in Jombang. The DSS integrates data on budget, trip duration, and the number of participants to provide optimal recommendations based on user preferences and constraints. The SAW method facilitates a systematic and objective evaluation process for recommending tourist destinations. The research follows the ADDIE development model, encompassing Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, and Evaluation stages. Key objectives include creating a system that consolidates cost, duration, and participant data, applying SAW for accurate recommendations, and ensuring an objective evaluation process. The system aims to improve trip planning efficiency, provide accurate recommendations, and enhance user satisfaction. The scope of this study is limited to applying the SAW method for budget prediction in tourism recommendations for Jombang. The developed system is a prototype that may require further refinement for comprehensive implementation.

Human Resource Management Strategy the Role of Managers and Career Development

The process of career development enables employees to identify their career goals within the context of human resource management strategies. Furthermore, the role of the manager is an important aspect to consider. The objective of this study is to ascertain the role of managers at PT XYZ in the career development of its employees. The research method employed was that of qualitative research using a case study model. This approach entails an in-depth and detailed investigation of a specific subject within a defined context, involving a single research subject, document, or event. The findings of this study indicate that PT XYZ's resource management has facilitated the career development of its employees through the implementation of continuous training programs, accompanied by a systematic evaluation process to ensure the efficacy of these programs in aligning with the needs of employee career development. Additionally, the role of the manager in the context of human resource management at PT XYZ has been identified as a crucial factor in this process. Furthermore, the organization has demonstrated its commitment to employee career advancement through the implementation of a promotion structure, which has been duly approved by the board of directors.

Basics of Method Evaluation in Clinical Laboratory Testing: A Mini-Review

Clinical laboratory testing advances have improved diagnostic accuracy, emphasising the need for effective methodologies within evidence-based medicine. Evaluation of methods is an essential function of the monitoring system that guarantees the continuous excellence of a clinical laboratory. This mini-review addresses the basic principles of method evaluation in clinical laboratories, highlighting key factors that support accurate diagnoses. The systematic process of method evaluation involves validation and verification, while considering scope, parameters and regulatory compliance. Analytical performance characteristics, sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, precision, linearity, method comparison, matrix effect and carryover determine test suitability, requiring reference materials and standardisation for accuracy. This comprehensive process includes assessing test performance when there are alterations in reagents, instruments or methodologies. Furthermore, the success of the evaluation procedure hinges on the careful definition of experimental design and subsequent statistical analysis, emphasising their intimate connection, which must be established before initiation. Current trends highlight automation and the transformative impact of artificial intelligence (AI), reshaping the role of laboratory professionals in predicting disease risk and guiding treatment decisions. While advances are celebrated, emphasis is given to the inherent limits of evaluation and clinical methods. Challenges persist, including variations in test accuracy and inconsistencies between laboratories. To address these, proposed solutions include clear guidance, harmonising terminology, setting minimum standards and standardising study design components.

Sudden cardiac arrest in infants and children: proposal for a diagnostic workup to identify the etiology. An 18-year multicenter evaluation in the Netherlands

Sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) studies are often population-based, limited to sudden cardiac death, and excluding infants. To guide prevention opportunities, it is essential to be informed of pediatric SCA etiologies. Unfortunately, etiologies frequently remain unresolved. The objectives of this study were to determine paediatric SCA etiology, and to evaluate the extent of post-SCA investigations and to assess the performance of previous cardiac evaluation in detecting conditions predisposing to SCA. In a retrospective cohort (2002–2019), all children 0–18 years with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) referred to Erasmus MC Sophia Children's Hospital or the Amsterdam UMC (tertiary-care university hospitals), with cardiac or unresolved etiologies were eligible for inclusion. SCA etiologies, cardiac and family history and etiologic investigations in unresolved cases were assessed. The etiology of arrest could be determined in 52% of 172 cases. Predominant etiologies in children ≥ 1 year (n = 99) were primary arrhythmogenic disorders (34%), cardiomyopathies (22%) and unresolved (32%). Events in children < 1 year (n = 73) were largely unresolved (70%) or caused by cardiomyopathy (8%), congenital heart anomaly (8%) or myocarditis (7%). Of 83 children with unresolved etiology a family history was performed in 51%, an autopsy in 51% and genetic testing in 15%. Pre-existing cardiac conditions presumably causative for SCA were diagnosed in 9%, and remained unrecognized despite prior evaluation in 13%.Conclusion: SCA etiology remained unresolved in 83 of 172 cases (48%) and essential diagnostic investigations were often not performed. Over one-fifth of SCA patients underwent prior cardiac evaluation, which did not lead to recognition of a cardiac condition predisposing to SCA in all of them. The diagnostic post-SCA approach should be improved and the proposed standardized pediatric post-SCA diagnostics protocol may ensure a consistent and systematic evaluation process increasing the diagnostic yield.What is Known:• Arrests in infants remain unresolved in most cases. In children > 1 year, predominant etiologies are primary arrhythmia disorders, cardiomyopathy and myocarditis.• Studies investigating sudden cardiac arrest are often limited to sudden cardiac death (SCD) in 1 to 40 year old persons, excluding infants and successfully resuscitated children.What is New:• In patients with unresolved SCA events, the diagnostic work up was often incompletely performed.• Over one fifth of victims had prior cardiac evaluation before the arrest, with either a diagnosed cardiac condition (9%) or an unrecognized cardiac condition (13%).Graphical

Automatic OEE Data Collection and Alert System for Food Industry

The constant demand for food and beverages to sustain human life drives fierce competition among manufacturers, focusing on product excellence in terms of timeliness, quality, and pricing. The key to competitiveness depends in optimizing manufacturing processes by efficiently utilizing company resources. To ensure the overall optimization and reliable flow of manufacturing processes, a systematic evaluation process must be used, Overall Equipment Efficiency (OEE) stands out as a prominent performance measurement metric in manufacturing process efficiency. OEE serves as a valuable diagnostic tool, exposing areas for improvement and losses transparently. Accurate OEE measurement necessitates the implementation of an automated data collection system with minimum human dependencies, human intervention, and conducting on-the-fly calculations to informed the stakeholder/user. Data quality and accuracy in OEE measurement is very critical. Low quality and accuracy data could lead to false decision. OEE categorizes losses into six groups loss to pinpoint significant factors for potential improvement. Once OEE could be maintain at high level with high data accuracy and right improvement point, an optimum manufacturing process, and cost effective in manufacturing expenses will be achieve. Base on the result comparison for OEE result before and after the system implementation, positive improvement in OEE could reach 8.06%. This scenario be adopted by other company, and could become a model for 1st phase journey in company digital transformation.

Person-Centered Models for Cardiovascular Care: A Review of the Evidence: A Scientific Statement From the American Heart Association.

Cardiovascular disease remains the leading cause of death and disability in the United States and globally. Disease burden continues to escalate despite technological advances associated with improved life expectancy and quality of life. As a result, longer life is associated with multiple chronic cardiovascular conditions. Clinical guidelines provide recommendations without considering prevalent scenarios of multimorbidity and health system complexities that affect practical adoption. The diversity of personal preferences, cultures, and lifestyles that make up one's social and environmental context is often overlooked in ongoing care planning for symptom management and health behavior support, hindering adoption and compromising patient outcomes, particularly in groups at high risk. The purpose of this scientific statement was to describe the characteristics and reported outcomes in existing person-centered care delivery models for selected cardiovascular conditions. We conducted a scoping review using Ovid MEDLINE, Embase.com, Web of Science, CINAHL Complete, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials through Ovid, and ClinicalTrials.gov from 2010 to 2022. A range of study designs with a defined aim to systematically evaluate care delivery models for selected cardiovascular conditions were included. Models were selected on the basis of their stated use of evidence-based guidelines, clinical decision support tools, systematic evaluation processes, and inclusion of the patient's perspective in defining the plan of care. Findings reflected variation in methodological approach, outcome measures, and care processes used across models. Evidence to support optimal care delivery models remains limited by inconsistencies in approach, variation in reimbursement, and inability of health systems to meet the needs of patients with chronic, complex cardiovascular conditions.

A Systematic and Traceable MOSA Evaluation Process for Systems Architectures: A Digital Engineering Tool

AbstractA process for evaluating the degree to which an architecture embraces Modular Open Systems Approaches (MOSA) is germane to ensuring that MOSA principles are actually used in the development of defense systems architectures. Furthermore, such a process provides artifacts that can be used by program offices to justify their key architectural decisions and prove they embrace MOSA as required. Therefore, an approach which facilitates the assessment of architecture requirements for MOSA compliance—rather than system designs or products—provides the added benefit of ensuring applicable MOSA quality attributes are incorporated into architectures during the requirements development phase. To this end, a systematic and traceable MOSA evaluation process which uses derived sets of evaluable criteria to evaluate architecture requirements is developed. The process utilizes a digital engineering approach to establish, within the authoritative source of truth (model), traceability relationships that can be queried, analyzed, and used to validate whether the architecture and resultant system will exhibit modularity and openness characteristics.

Users’ evaluation of a digital government collaborative platform (DGCP) in Sri Lanka

Purpose This paper aims to evaluate the Digital Government Collaborative Platform (DGCP), which facilitates collaborations between the citizens and the government to address environmental issues in Sri Lanka. The DGCP is an artifact developed by the value-sensitive design approach. Design/methodology/approach The DGCP is evaluated following the Framework for Evaluation in Design Science Research (FEDS). In total, 224 citizens participated in the survey based on the User Experience Questionnaire (UEQ) and open questions about human values embedded in the design. Fifteen government officers were interviewed to enhance the evaluation. Findings The DGCP received positive evaluations from the citizens and government officers. The platform is attractive, novel and pragmatic, also generating hedonic experiences for the citizens. The users believed that human values are reflected in the DGCP. Furthermore, they shared a few suggestions to improve it. Originality/value The paper contributes knowledge to evaluating digital government systems, especially in developing countries. The human-value-centered DGCP was evaluated using multiple methods of quantitative (i.e. UEQ Survey) and qualitative (i.e. qualitative interviews with stakeholders) techniques. Furthermore, the systematic process of DGCP evaluation produces a case-based guideline for evaluating related and similar digital government systems using FEDS.

Systematic Hearing Performance Evaluation Process for Adolescents with Cochlear Implantation at Early Ages.

Cochlear implant (CI) provision is the most effective clinical treatment to restore hearing performance in individuals with profound sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL). It has been successful in providing improved speech perception outcomes, especially in quiet environments. However, speech perception performance within complex environments, lexical tone recognition, and music perception have been shown to only improve with newer fine structure coding strategies or related techniques. Therefore, the methods used to assess hearing performance in noisy environments, lexical tone recognition, and music perception are of vital importance. These assessments must reflect the postoperative outcomes and also provide guidance for the programming, rehabilitation, and application of new coding strategies. In this study, hearing performance in simple and complex situations was evaluated before and after upgrading to a fine structure strategy. The participants were a cohort of Mandarin-speaking adolescents, who were experienced CI users. The comprehensive clinical workflow involved assessments of speech in quiet conditions, speech in noisy conditions, lexical tone recognition, and music perception. This battery of tests is explained in detail, from the coding strategy to the test methods, including the test process, environment, device, material, and order. The details that require special attention are discussed, such as the position of the participants, the angle of the loudspeaker, the intensity of the sound, the noise type, the practice test, and the way of answering questions. Each test step, method, and material for speech, lexical tone, and music perception is presented in detail. Finally, the clinical results are discussed.

Monitoring of biodiversity of water communities

Biodiversity monitoring is a process of systematic collection, analysis and evaluation of data on the diversity of living organisms, their populations, communities and ecosystems in a certain territory or area. The purpose of biodiversity monitoring is to study changes in the composition and structure of biological systems over time. Biodiversity monitoring is carried out at different levels - from global to local, and may include both long-term programs and short-term studies. It is important to take into account the scale, methods and resources required for monitoring, as well as to ensure proper processing and analysis of the data obtained. Thus, biodiversity monitoring plays a key role in assessing the state of natural systems, adapting to climate change, developing strategies for nature conservation and supporting sustainable development.

Identifying Prenatal Alcohol Exposure and Children Affected by It: A Review of Biomarkers and Screening Tools.

Early identification of prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) and of those in need of services resulting from this exposure is an important public health concern. This study reviewed the existing literature on potential biomarkers and screening tools of PAE and its impact. Electronic databases were searched for articles published between January 1, 1996, and November 30, 2021, using the following search terms: ("fetal alcohol" or "prenatal alcohol" or "FASD" or "alcohol-related neurodevelopmental disorder" or "ARND" or "ND-PAE") and ("screening" or "identification" or "biomarker"). Duplicate articles were electronically eliminated. Titles and abstracts were reviewed for appropriateness, and selected articles were retrieved for further analysis. Additional articles were added that were referenced in the reviewed articles or identified from expert knowledge. Information about the characteristics of the sample, the biomarker or screening tool, and the predictive validity outcome data were abstracted. A narrative analysis of the studies was then performed on the data. A total of 3,813 articles were initially identified, and 1,215 were removed as duplicates. Of the remaining articles, 182 were identified as being within the scope of the review based on title and abstract inspection, and 181 articles were successfully retrieved. Of these, additional articles were removed because they were preclinical (3), were descriptive only (13), included only self-report of PAE (42), included only mean group comparison (17), were additional duplicates (2), focused on cost analysis (9), missed predictive validity data (24), or for other reasons (23). The remaining articles (n = 48) were abstracted. An additional 13 manuscripts were identified from these articles, and two more from expert knowledge. A total of 63 articles contributed to the review. Biomarkers and screening tools of PAE and its impact fall short of ideal predictive validity characteristics. Higher specificity than sensitivity was found for many of the biomarkers and screening tools used to identify PAE and its impact, suggesting that current methods continue to under-identify the full range of individuals impacted by PAE. Exceptions to this were found in recent investigations using microRNAs related to growth and vascular development, proteomic changes associated with PAE, and combinations of markers estimating levels of various cytokines. Replications of these findings are needed across other samples to confirm the limited data available. Future research on biomarkers and screening tools should attend to feasibility and scalability of implementation. This article also recommends a systematic process of evaluation to improve early identification of individuals impacted by PAE so that harm reduction and habilitative care efforts can be implemented.

Patient Selection and Clinical Indication for Chronic Total Occlusion Revascularization-A Workflow Focusing on Non-Invasive Cardiac Imaging.

Percutaneous coronary intervention of chronic total occlusion (CTO PCI) is a challenging procedure with high complication rates and, as not yet fully understood long-term clinical benefits. Ischemic symptom relief in patients with high ischemic burden is to date the only established clinical indication to undergo CTO PCI, supported by randomized controlled trials. In this context, current guidelines suggest attempting CTO PCI only in non-invasively assessed viable CTO correspondent myocardial territories, with large ischemic areas. Hence, besides a comprehensive coronary angiography lesion evaluation, the information derived from non-invasive cardiac imaging techniques is crucial to selecting candidates who may benefit from the revascularization of the occluded vessel. Currently, there are no clear recommendations for a non-invasive myocardial evaluation or choice of imaging modality pre-CTO PCI. Therefore, selecting among available options is left to the physician's discretion. As CTO PCI is strongly recommended to be carried out explicitly in experienced centers, full access to non-invasive imaging for risk-benefit assessment as well as a systematic institutional evaluation process has to be encouraged. In this framework, we opted to review the current myocardial imaging tools and their use for indicating a CTO PCI. Furthermore, based on our experience, we propose a cost-effective systematic approach for myocardial assessment to help guide clinical decision-making for patients presenting with chronic total occlusions.

ELECTRE III for Strategic Environmental Assessment: A “Phantom” Approach

The Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is a systematic evaluation process of the environmental consequences of urban and territorial plans and programs which aims to guarantee a high degree of environmental protection and to contribute to integrating environmental factors during the design, adoption, and approval of plans and programs. Even if in Europe the SEA was already included in the legislation of each European Member State as of 2017, in these countries—and particularly in Italy—there is a diffuse lack of indications on procedures and/or evaluation protocols. In this article, the use of evaluation techniques in SEA is discussed. The specific objective of the research is the construction of an evaluation method to express a synthetic judgement—based on acknowledged, objective parameters—within the SEA procedure. According to the literature review, results regarding the SEA procedure, and its possible supporting methodologies, Multi Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) appears to be the most SEA-coherent approach. Moreover, the ELECTRE method family has shown the highest suitability to perform the evaluation phase of SEA. Hence, an operational development of ELECTRE III is herein proposed and applied to a case study.

Better Ideation Task Results in Web-Based Idea Management Systems

Web-based idea management systems (IMS) have helped many organisations to adapt their creativity processes to the new way of working in response to the global pandemic. IMS provide a systematic and manageable idea generation and evaluation process in the virtual environment. Many well-known organisations in various industries, for example, Etsy, Panasonic, Sony, Electrolux, and Volvo, use IMS. In this paper, the authors identified a clear research gap—what kind of ideation tasks creates the best idea quality and quantity. The aim of this research is to find out how the different ideation task elements influence the quality and quantity of generated ideas. The following methods were used to fill the gap: (1) literature review (data collection: systematic data collection from scientific databases; data analysis: through content analysis) and (2) global survey of n &gt; 500 organisations with web-based IMS experience (data collection: survey; data analysis: statistical inference). The results provide insight into: (1) correlations between the number of created ideation tasks and idea quality and quantity, (2) how results are affected by the duration of ideation tasks, and (3) analysis of different ideation task types and their impact on results.

Validation of a robust method for quantification of three-dimensional growth of the thoracic aorta using deformable image registration.

PurposeAccurate assessment of thoracic aortic aneurysm (TAA) growth is important for appropriate clinical management. Maximal aortic diameter is the primary metric that is used to assess growth, but it suffers from substantial measurement variability. A recently proposed technique, termed vascular deformation mapping (VDM), is able to quantify three‐dimensional aortic growth using clinical computed tomography angiography (CTA) data using an approach based on deformable image registration (DIR). However, the accuracy and robustness of VDM remains undefined given the lack of ground truth from clinical CTA data, and, furthermore, the performance of VDM relative to standard manual diameter measurements is unknown.MethodsTo evaluate the performance of the VDM pipeline for quantifying aortic growth, we developed a novel and systematic evaluation process to generate 76 unique synthetic CTA growth phantoms (based on 10 unique cases) with variable degrees and locations of aortic wall deformation. Aortic deformation was quantified using two metrics: area ratio (AR), defined as the ratio of surface area in triangular mesh elements and the magnitude of deformation in the normal direction (DiN) relative to the aortic surface. Using these phantoms, we further investigated the effects on VDM's measurement accuracy resulting from factors that influence the quality of clinical CTA data such as respiratory translations, slice thickness, and image noise. Lastly, we compare the measurement error of VDM TAA growth assessments against two expert raters performing standard diameter measurements of synthetic phantom images.ResultsAcross our population of 76 synthetic growth phantoms, the median absolute error was 0.063 (IQR: 0.073–0.054) for AR and 0.181 mm (interquartile range [IQR]: 0.214–0.143 mm) for DiN. Median relative error was 1.4% for AR and 3.3% for DiN at the highest tested noise level (contrast‐to‐noise ratio [CNR] = 2.66). Error in VDM output increased with slice thickness, with the highest median relative error of 1.5% for AR and 4.1% for DiN at a slice thickness of 2.0 mm. Respiratory motion of the aorta resulted in maximal absolute error of 3% AR and 0.6 mm in DiN, but bulk translations in aortic position had a very small effect on measured AR and DiN values (relative errors <1%). VDM‐derived measurements of magnitude and location of maximal diameter change demonstrated significantly high accuracy and lower variability compared to two expert manual raters (p<0.03 across all comparisons).ConclusionsVDM yields an accurate, three‐dimensional assessment of aortic growth in TAA patients and is robust to factors such as image noise, respiration‐induced translations, and differences in patient position. Further, VDM significantly outperformed two expert manual raters in assessing the magnitude and location of aortic growth despite optimized experimental measurement conditions. These results support validation of the VDM technique for accurate quantification of aortic growth in patients and highlight several important advantages over diameter measurements.

Level of appropriate primary diabetic eyecare delivered and achievable in optometry practices in Australia

ABSTRACTClinical relevanceCurrent levels of appropriateness for primary diabetic eyecare delivered by Australian optometrists are presented along with realistic targets (benchmarks) for quality improvement. The demonstrated methods can be used in practice evaluation and benchmarking of other clinical practice areas and settings.BackgroundTo examine the appropriateness of diabetic eye-care delivery and establish achievable benchmarks of care (ABCs) for optometry practices in Australia.MethodIn a retrospective audit, clinical records of patients with type-II diabetes obtained from a randomly selected nationally representative sample of optometry practices were assessed against evidence-based clinical indicators. Appropriate care is defined as care delivered in compliance with the indicators. The ABC for each indicator was calculated as the average performance for the top 10% of optometry practices after Bayesian adjustment to account for a low number of eligible records.ResultsThe audit of 420 randomly selected patient records from 42 practices against 12 clinical indicators showed an overall appropriateness of 69% (95% confidence interval (CI) 66%, 73%) for overall diabetic eye care. While a high level of appropriateness was identified for recall period (93%, 95% CI 85%, 100%) and referral (100%, 95% CI 38%, 100%), larger gaps existed in history taking (46%, 95% CI 44%, 52%), dilated fundus examination (80%, 95% CI 76%, 84%) and iris examination (0%, 95% CI 0%, 56%). The ABCs for 8 of 12 indicators were 100%, and the remaining three indicators had ABCs above 80%. An ABC for the iris examination indicator could not be calculated owing to the low number of eligible patient record cards.ConclusionsThis study demonstrated a systematic process of practice evaluation and benchmarking in optometry practices. The diabetic eye care delivered by Australian optometrists was largely appropriate; however, improvement opportunities exist for history taking and physical examination. The ABCs demonstrate that excellence in primary diabetic eye care is attainable and will serve as an important tool in future initiatives to reduce the identified evidence-to-practice gaps.

Perception of the healthcare accreditation system in Colombia.

Introduction: Accreditation is an external, systematic, periodic, and voluntary evaluation process to which health care institutions submit themselves in order to demonstrate compliance with superior levels of quality of care. The Icontec, through an evaluative model, accredits the quality of health institutions in Colombia.Methods: Descriptive cross-sectional study following the recommendations of the survey study report. Using an electronic format, 22 health institutions with experience in the Icontec accreditation process were surveyed. The instrument evaluated three thematic axes of the process: added value provided by the accreditation process, evaluation process and final report. The measurement was carried out using a Likert-type scale and a descriptive statistical analysis to establish the perception of the phases of the process.Results: the items with the best perception were the humanization of care (86.4%) followed by patient safety and teamwork (81.8%). After accreditation, the quality of the processes improved (77.4%), infection prevention and control (68.1%) and physician commitment (63.6%). 54.6% felt that evaluators use different methods of evaluation. 63.6% of the respondents considered that Icontec does not comply with the times defined for the delivery of the report.Conclusion: the Icontec accreditation system adds value to health institutions in most of the thematic areas evaluated, especially in the humanization of care and patient safety. The lowest perception is presented in the increase of physicians' commitment.

The Research Centers in Minority Institutions (RCMI) Consortium: A Blueprint for Inclusive Excellence.

The Research Centers in Minority Institutions, (RCMI) Program was established by Congress to address the health research and training needs of minority populations, by preparing future generations of scientists at these institutions, with a track record of producing minority scholars in medicine, science, and technology. The RCMI Consortium consists of the RCMI Specialized Centers and a Coordinating Center (CC). The RCMI-CC leverages the scientific expertise, technologies, and innovations of RCMI Centers to accelerate the delivery of solutions to address health disparities in communities that are most impacted. There is increasing recognition that the gap in representation of racial/ethnic groups and women is perpetuated by institutional cultures lacking inclusion and equity. The objective of this work is to provide a framework for inclusive excellence by developing a systematic evaluation process with common data elements that can track the inter-linked goals of workforce diversity and health equity. At its core, the RCMI Program embodies the trinity of diversity, equity, and inclusion. We propose a realist evaluation framework and a logic model that integrates the institutional context to develop common data metrics for inclusive excellence. The RCMI-CC will collaborate with NIH-funded institutions and research consortia to disseminate and scale this model.

Learning how to synthesize: The design and evaluation of a reading-writing learning unit for high-school students

This paper reports on the systematic design and evaluation process of a learning unit for 9th grade students, aimed at learning to write synthesis texts. The unit was based on design principles derived from a review of effective synthesis writing interventions and general principles of effective learning. To evaluate the quality of this unit, we considered three aspects: the validity, feasibility, and effectiveness of its design. The design as construct was based on state-of-the-art knowledge which ensured construct validity. Furthermore, user data indicated that the construct's operationalization was valid: the content and structure of the unit reflected the construct. In addition, teachers were generally positive about the unit's overall feasibility and teacher logs indicated that the lessons were mostly taught as intended. Furthermore, student data indicated that the unit was feasible for students, as well. Finally, the effectiveness of the unit was confirmed by the outcomes of an intervention in five classes, using a switching replication design. Some options for further improvement of the design are also proposed.

The Psychosocial Assessment of Transplant Candidates: Internal Consistency, Interrater Reliability, and Content Validity of the Thai Version of the Stanford Integrated Psychosocial Assessment for Transplantation (SIPAT–Thai Version)

Standardized pretransplant psychosocial assessment is critically needed in Thailand to optimize medical and psychosocial outcomes after transplantation. The Stanford Integrated Psychosocial Assessment for Transplantation (SIPAT) is a comprehensive and evidence-based tool that has demonstrated excellent reliability and predictive value in many psychosocial transplant studies. We translated the SIPAT into Thai and explored the validity and reliability of the SIPAT-Thai version among Thai transplant recipients. We translated the original SIPAT into Thai following the World Health Organization's standard forward-backward translation procedure and then cross-sectionally assessed its validity and reliability in 110 Thai solid organ transplant candidates. The correlation between background data, total, and sectional scoring results of SIPAT-Thai were also analyzed. The SIPAT-Thai demonstrated moderate to good reliability, which was represented by internal consistency with a Cronbach α of .751 and interrater reliability with a κ value at 0.767. The index of item-objective congruence value was 0.94, indicating good the content validity. The SIPAT-Thai was systematically translated and shown to have acceptable validity and a moderate to good reliability index. The use of the SIPAT-Thai would provide a standardized, evidence-based, and a more systematic pretransplant psychosocial evaluation process for transplant candidates in Thailand.