Video Conference Room Research Articles

A Safe and Feasible Online Dance Intervention for Older Adults With and Without Parkinson's Disease.

Introduction: Dancing is one way of maintaining an active lifestyle, and online dance interventions in group settings can be a solution when in-person classes are impossible. This study investigated the feasibility and potential clinical effects of an online dance program for older adults with and without Parkinson disease (PD). Methods: Participants attended 2 weekly dance classes in the same videoconference room for 2 months. The dance activities were mainly performed while seated (around 75%). Researchers monitored feasibility (ie, adherence, attendance, and technological barriers) and safety. Pre- and post-intervention assessments investigated self-perceptions, effects on emotional domains, quality of life, activity-specific balance confidence, lower-limb functional mobility, and PD non-motor symptoms. Individuals also reported their self-perceptions regarding technology usability, enjoyment, and social interaction. Results: Most of the participants with PD (n = 12) had moderate PD (Hoehn & Yahr score) and presented a greater risk of falls when compared to participants without PD (n = 14). Overall, we found a high rate of adherence (100%), attendance (87.5%-91.7%), and safety (100%) for both groups. No falls or near-falls occurred during the sessions. Only the PD group ameliorated emotional domains (anxiety and depression) and improved lower-limb functional mobility. All participants reported feeling safe and perceived benefits, although over a third of older adults with PD reported moderate difficulties in using technology and in socializing with the group. Conclusion: This online dance protocol is feasible, safe, and a potential strategy to improve clinical parameters in older adults and people with moderate PD.

UNIVERSITAS INDONESIA SYSTEM SUPPORT IN ACCELERATING LECTURERS TO IMPLEMENT ODEL FACILITIES

Directorate of Academic Advancement and Learning Resources Universitas Indonesia (DPASDP UI) established in 2020 and one of sub-directorate "Learning Resources" main role is to support learning activities in UI by managing learning facilities such as learning management system (EMAS), computer laboratory, video conference room, and production house. The covid-19 pandemic forced all learning to be held at a distance and fully online, which was only 20% of courses using LMS before the pandemic. Thousands of classes need to be opened in EMAS, so non-eLearning teachers face confusing situations. Several support-system efforts have been opened and revitalized, such as providing migrate-to-online learning guidelines, organizing more teacher training, upgrading the LMS, and establishing a fully online helpdesk. Moreover, the UI strategic plan year 2022 revision has mandated UI to be more implementing technology and increase the number of MOOCs opened, so more facilities development is certainly needed. This paper elaborates on UI strategies and lesson-learned in facing the situations and some effort to keep relevant.

The Effectiveness of E-Learning Platform in Higher Institutions: A Review on Language, Psychology, and Culture

The effectiveness of e-learning has some uniqueness and challenges in terms of obstacles faced, and its learning model. This research employs the observation method by observing both spoken and written data, survey, and interview. Data was obtained from 80 higher institutions students and 50 lecturers of four state-owned institutions, and four private institutions.The results show that the effective learning conducted through e-learning has met the expected standard. Through the learning process, the students were provided by motivational training, and educated with character building based on their religious belief. Moreover, the lecturers carried out their teaching process through WhatsApps Group, zoom meeting and/ or google meet applications, and provided the students with instructions and guidance. The instructions and guidances were particularly concerned on how to conduct the online classes with the camera on, comprehending the Semester’s Lesson Plan (SLP) for the whole semester, providing feedback on the materials, examples, video assignments, and weekly tasks given. Besides that the instructions and guidances were also specified for the students to seize the opportunities to present their tasks virtually. Likewise, the supports from the institutions are also needed concerning the committee for quality assurance in the implementation of E-learning, draft, attendance list, journal, contract of the course, motivational to the lectures in implementing E-learning, and video conference room (Vicon) as well.

Hybrid Classroom – The Experience оf the 107th Khan Krum Primary School in Sofia, Bulgaria

The COVID-19 pandemic imposed a quick introduction of distance learning for many students. In Bulgaria, the Ministry of Education and Science obliged schools to work synchronously with their pupils using video conference rooms. After the easing of the containment measures, regular classroom education was restored. However, the problems with quarantined students persisted. School principals had to solve new organizational challenges. The hardest and most frequent issue was the split of a given class into students present in school, and students learning online. The article introduces an organizational model of a hybrid classroom where teaching is carried out in a physical and an online classroom at the same time. The authors describe their experience with specific hardware and software used for the first time in Bulgaria for educational purposes. They also show their experience with the organization of traineeships for university students as primary school IT teachers using a hybrid classroom.

Online Education During Pandemic Times: Advantages and Disadvantages

The latest Pandemic has changed not only our lifestyle behavior, but at the same the manner how we work, study, and evolve. We witnessed work from home, or remote working, as well as learning from home changes. The shift from the physical classroom to the online classroom came with advantages, but also with some, disadvantages. In this article, we conducted a research to discover undergraduate and graduate students’ perceptions towards online education. Students and professors are detached for the time being from their universities into online education platforms and video conference rooms, but not without other difficulties and challenges for the academic community. Some universities already had some practice and knew how to manage and use online platforms for different cycle types like: part-time or distance learning programs. Other universities appealed to platforms offered by international organizations like Microsoft or Google. The novelty was that not only the courses and seminars are held online and exams as well, proving to be a provocative issue, both for students and professors. We discovered different factors that influence online education and learning satisfaction. One of the main discoveries was that the future seems to be towards a blended learning system combining physical and online teaching.

Usability Evaluation of a Tablet-Based Intervention to Prevent Intradialytic Hypotension in Dialysis Patients During In-Clinic Dialysis: Mixed Methods Study.

BackgroundPatients on hemodialysis receive dialysis thrice weekly for about 4 hours per session. Intradialytic hypotension (IDH)—low blood pressure during hemodialysis—is a serious but common complication of hemodialysis. Although patients on dialysis already participate in their care, activating patients toward IDH prevention may reduce their risk of IDH. Interactive, technology-based interventions hold promise as a platform for patient activation. However, little is known about the usability challenges that patients undergoing hemodialysis may face when using tablet-based informatics interventions, especially while dialyzing.ObjectiveThis study aims to test the usability of a patient-facing, tablet-based intervention that includes theory-informed educational modules and motivational interviewing–based mentoring from patient peers via videoconferencing.MethodsWe conducted a cross-sectional, mixed methods usability evaluation of the tablet-based intervention by using think-aloud methods, field notes, and structured observations. These qualitative data were evaluated by trained researchers using a structured data collection instrument to capture objective observational data. We calculated descriptive statistics for the quantitative data and conducted inductive content analysis using the qualitative data.ResultsFindings from 14 patients cluster around general constraints such as the use of one arm, dexterity issues, impaired vision, and lack of experience with touch screen devices. Our task-by-task usability results showed that specific sections with the greatest difficulty for users were logging into the intervention (difficulty score: 2.08), interacting with the quizzes (difficulty score: 1.92), goal setting (difficulty score: 2.28), and entering and exiting videoconference rooms (difficulty score: 2.07) that are used to engage with peers during motivational interviewing sessions.ConclusionsIn this paper, we present implications for designing informatics interventions for patients on dialysis and detail resulting changes to be implemented in the next version of this intervention. We frame these implications first through the context of the role the patients’ physical body plays when interacting with the intervention and then through the digital considerations for software and interface interaction.

IT support in emergency remote teaching in response to COVID-19.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic hit the German education system unexpectedly and forced its universities to shift to Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT). The Data Integration Center (DIC) of the University Hospital Magdeburg and the Institute of Biometry and Medical Informatics (IBMI) has developed a concept based on existing structures that can be quickly implemented and used by the Medical Faculty at Otto von Guericke University. This manuscript focuses on the IT support for lecturers, which allows them to concentrate on teaching their lessons, although the authors are aware that this is only a small part of the entire subject. Additionally, there is a great awareness that ERT can never replace well-structured in-person classes.Concept: The key feature of the concept uses the well-working management system for all physical rooms of the university by designing a virtual video conference room for every physical room. This allows high interactivity for lectures and seminars while applying proven teaching methods. Additionally, a collaboration software system to document all lessons learned and a technical support team have been available for the teaching staff. Courses with a hands-on approach require more personal interaction than lectures. Therefore, the issues of practical trainings have not been solved with this concept, but been tackled by using questionnaires and minimizing contacts during attestations.Applied IT tools: The concept’s requirements were met by Zoom Meetings, Confluence, HIS/LSF and Moodle.Discussion and Conclusion: The concept helped the lecturers to provide high-quality teaching for students at universities. Additionally, it allows for a dynamic response to new needs and problems. The concept will be reviewed as part of a higher Universal Design for Learning concept and may support lecturers in the following semesters in hybrid meetings with real and virtual attendees.

Videoconference System Based on WebRTC With Access to the PSTN

The research presented in this paper introduces Rendez-Vous, which is a system oriented to provide its users with a greater communication availability through the convergence of the conventional telephony and the real-time multimedia on the web browsers. The system consists on a web application that provides a videoconference room for multiple users without having to download any additional software. For the cases in which a user with no internet connection might need to participate in a conference, it is possible to dial and answer phone calls to/from the PSTN directly on the web browser, allowing the telephonic user to interact with the others using his/her voice. The aim of the present project is to propose a unified communications system that differs from others mainly in the interaction with the telephone network directly from a web browser while having an active videoconference, allowing real-time exchange of media streams between these two technologies. The system Rendez-Vous was implemented with the use of WebRTC (Web Real-Time Communications) for the transmission of audio and video on real-time, Node.js as a web and signaling server, as well as the software Asterisk for providing telephonic access, along with jsSIP, which is a JavaScript library for implementing a SIP User Agent.

Designing the Perfect Video Conference Room with the End Users in Mind: Telepresence without the High Cost

Designing the Perfect Video Conference Room with the End Users in Mind: Telepresence without the High Cost

Comment manager en Algérie le changement pour l'exploitation du potentiel pédagogique de la visioconférence ?

Ces deux derniêres décennies, l'environnement social et culturel en Algérie a connu, dans les domaines de l'information et de la communication, un grand bouleversement avec l'apparition de nouvelles technologies. Les campus universitaires ont essayé de suivre cette mutation en se dotant de moyens informatiques didactiques adéquats et três performants (laboratoires multimédia, médiathêque, espace Internet, espace audiovisuel, etc). Puis, un Programme National de télé-enseignement três ambitieux a été mis en place par le Ministêre de l'Enseignement Supérieur et de la Recherche Scientifique, ce qui a permis de mettre en service, dès 2008, des cellules de télé- enseignement et de visioconférences dans un grand nombre d'universités. Cependant, malgré ces investissements importants en équipement sophistiqué, les usages des Technologies de l'Information et de la Communication dans l'Enseignement n'ont pas suivi le même rythme de croissance. Il y a une sous-utilisation de ces outils de travail qui sont de puissants outils à potentiel cognitif. Situation aggravée par les routines pédagogiques, administratives, bureaucratiques, et managériales qui ont engendré des inerties à tous les niveaux. Bien que théoriquement les TICE puissent être considéré comme un instrument pédagogique adapté au milieu universitaire, sa mise en pratique est assez difficile à mettre en oeuvre car elle nécessite des changements dans la gestion au sein de l'université. L'objet de cette communication concerne la visioconférence. Si cette derniêre doit correspondre théoriquement à un besoin réel dans l'enseignement au sein des universités algériennes, son usage n'en est rien dans la pratique. L'usage de la visioconférence en Algérie est des plus déconcertants. Aprês cinq ans de sa mise en service, les salles équipées du matériel adéquat sont encore sous utilisées et parfois même pas utilisées!! L'une des plus grandes contradictions entre les objectifs MESRS et l'usage de la visioconférence est que d'une part la tutelle désire diffuser l'enseignement à un três grand nombre d'étudiants (des milliers), et d'autre part les salles de visioconférence ne peuvent recevoir qu'un nombre limité d'étudiants (généralement inférieur à 100). Alors comment concilier cet objectif et l'usage de ce matériel ? Doit-on prendre le risque de faire des investissements supplémentaires alors que les premiers investissements n'ont pas été rentabilisés ? Nous ne croyons pas que ce serait une bonne solution, pour cela nous proposons dans cette communication, aprês la présentation d'un état des lieux de la visioconférence en Algérie (sur la base d'un sondage), des usages pouvant répondre aux besoins nationaux tout en tenant compte des potentialités humaines disponibles.

Research on Nuclear Power Station Video Conferencing System from “Standard Definition” to “High Definition”

Transition is a natural law which means the things gradually developed from one stage to another. It comes to be a natural and logical thing when it moves towards the right direction. In this paper, we will take the nuclear power station video conference room contribution as an example to comb the management of video conference room from three parts: the limitations of “Standard-Definition”, the excellence of “High-Definition” and the necessity of transition. It also discusses the feasibility of nuclear power station’s High-Definition video conferencing system.

Experience from the 1st Year running a Massive High Quality Videoconferencing Service for the LHC

In the last few years, we have witnessed an explosion of visual collaboration initiatives in the industry. Several advances in video services and also in their underlying infrastructure are currently improving the way people collaborate globally. These advances are creating new usage paradigms: any device in any network can be used to collaborate, in most cases with an overall high quality. To keep apace with this technology progression, the CERN IT Department launched a service based on the Vidyo product. This new service architecture introduces Adaptive Video Layering, which dynamically optimizes the video for each endpoint by leveraging the H.264 Scalable Video Coding (SVC)-based compression technology. It combines intelligent AV routing techniques with the flexibility of H.264 SVC video compression, in order to achieve resilient video collaboration over the Internet, 3G and WiFi. We present an overview of the results that have been achieved after this major change. In particular, the first year of operation of the CERN Vidyo service will be described in terms of performance and scale: The service became part of the daily activity of the LHC collaborations, reaching a monthly usage of more than 3200 meetings with a peak of 750 simultaneous connections. We also present some key features such as the integration with CERN Indico. LHC users can now join a Vidyo meeting either from their personal computer or a CERN videoconference room simply from an Indico event page, with the ease of a single click. The roadmap for future improvements, service extensions and core infrastructure tendencies such as cloud based services and virtualization of system components will also be discussed. Vidyo's strengths allowed us to build a universal service (it is accessible from PCs, but also videoconference rooms, traditional phones, tablets and smartphones), developed with 3 key ideas in mind: ease of use, full integration and high quality.

Audio-visual perception system for a humanoid robotic head.

One of the main issues within the field of social robotics is to endow robots with the ability to direct attention to people with whom they are interacting. Different approaches follow bio-inspired mechanisms, merging audio and visual cues to localize a person using multiple sensors. However, most of these fusion mechanisms have been used in fixed systems, such as those used in video-conference rooms, and thus, they may incur difficulties when constrained to the sensors with which a robot can be equipped. Besides, within the scope of interactive autonomous robots, there is a lack in terms of evaluating the benefits of audio-visual attention mechanisms, compared to only audio or visual approaches, in real scenarios. Most of the tests conducted have been within controlled environments, at short distances and/or with off-line performance measurements. With the goal of demonstrating the benefit of fusing sensory information with a Bayes inference for interactive robotics, this paper presents a system for localizing a person by processing visual and audio data. Moreover, the performance of this system is evaluated and compared via considering the technical limitations of unimodal systems. The experiments show the promise of the proposed approach for the proactive detection and tracking of speakers in a human-robot interactive framework.

Room acoustical conditions in coupled video conference rooms

A video conferencing situation combines the acoustical properties of two rooms. The resulting convolution of the two room impulse responses leads to a total impulse response with a reverberation, which is not a classical exponential decay. As a consequence, relationships between parameters such as clarity and reverberation time will be significantly different from those in single rooms, and this will furthermore affect the combination's suitability for speech communication. In this study, a measurement survey is presented from 11 rooms with video conferencing equipment. Their volumes ranged from 24 to 117 m3, and their mid-range reverberation times were between 0.29 s and 0.70 s. Median values were 82 m3 and 0.41 s, respectively. Impulse responses were measured in all rooms and in a subsequent analysis stage, impulse response pairs were convolved, simulating a connection between the corresponding rooms. Those convolved IRs were analyzed in terms of clarity and reverberation time. Recommended parameter values for single rooms were used as guidelines to understand the qualities of convolved rooms.

Structured assessment using multiple patient scenarios by videoconference in rural settings

The assessment blueprint of the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine postgraduate curriculum highlighted a need to assess clinical reasoning. We describe the development, reliability, feasibility, validity and educational impact of an 8-station assessment tool, StAMPS (structured assessment using multiple patient scenarios), conducted by videoconference. StAMPS asks each candidate to be examined at each of 8 stations on issues relating to patient diagnosis or management. Each candidate remains located in a rural site but is examined in turn by 8 examiners who are located at a central site. Examiners were rotated through the candidates by either walking between videoconference rooms or by connecting and disconnecting the links. Reliability was evaluated using generalisability theory. Validity and educational impact were evaluated with qualitative interviews. Fourteen candidates were assessed on 82 scenarios with a reliability of G = 0.76. There was a reasonable correlation with level of candidate expertise (rho = 0.57). The videoconference links were acceptable to candidates and examiners but the walking rotation system was more reliable. Qualitative comments confirmed relevance and acceptability of the assessment tool and suggest it is likely to have a desirable educational impact. StAMPS not only reflects the content of rural and remote practice but also reflects the process of that work in that it is delivered from a distance and assesses resourcefulness and flexibility in thinking. The reliability and feasibility of this type of assessment has implications for people running any distance-based course, but the assessment could also be used in a face-to-face setting.

Telemedicine in the Top End

What Do Aboriginal Prisoners, an obstetrician, and a psychiatry trainee have in common? They all used the same video conference room in Darwin, to make contact with other parts of the country—each for rather different purposes. For the prisoners, a chance to talk to their home communities; the obstetrician participated in an Australia-wide link-up for quality assurance purposes; and we held our weekly supervision session.

Why do users like video?

Three studies of collaborative activity were conducted as part of research in developing multimedia technology to support collaboration. One study surveyed users' opinions of their use of video conference rooms. Users indicated that the availability of the video conference rooms was too limited, audio quality needed improvement, and a shared drawing space was needed. A second study analyzed videotapes of a work group when meeting face-to-face, video conferencing, and phone conferencing. The analyses found that the noticeable audio delay in video conferencing made it difficult for the participants to manage turn-taking and coordinate eye gazes. In the third study, a distributed team was observed under three conditions: using their existing collaboration tools, adding a desktop conferencing prototype (audio, video, and shared drawing tool), and subtracting the video capability from the prototype. Data was collected by videotaping the team, interviewing the team members individually, and recording the teams' usage of the phone, elec-tronic mail, face-to-face meetings, and desktop conferencing. The team's use of the desktop conferencing prototype dropped dramatically when the video capability was taken away. Analysis of the videotape records showed that the video channel was used to help mediate their interaction and convey visual communication. Desktop conferencing substituted for e-mail usage and perhaps substituted for shorter, two-person meetings.