Within Canada, the specialty of female pelvic medicine and reconstructive surgery stands on the brink. The needs of Canadian women for pelvic floor services are not presently met. There are inadequate academic programs to train surgeons, and the existing programs are inconsistent in scope. Consequently, the physicians who are interested ...

Many scenarios in the living world, where individual organisms compete for winning positions (or resources), have properties of auctions. Here we study the evolution of bids in biological auctions. For each auction, n individuals are drawn at random from a population of size N. Each individual makes a bid which ...

Science, engineering and mathematics-related disciplines have relied heavily on a researcher's ability to visualize phenomena under study and being able to link and superimpose various abstract and concrete representations including visual, spatial, and temporal. The spatial representations are especially important in all branches of biology (in developmental biology time becomes ...

Audience response systems (ARS) are increasingly being used to heighten participants' involvement. Knowledge of technical and pedagogical challenges is, however, limited. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate ARS as a tool for 1) evaluation, 2) knowledge testing, 3) attention raising and 4) discussion stimulation. ARS was used 33 ...

This is an unusual moment in the history of psychology because of landmark advances in digital information technologies, computational linguistics, and other fields that use the computer to analyze language, discourse, and behavior. The technologies developed from this interdisciplinary fusion are helping students learn and think in ways that are ...

The exploits of Martina Navratilova and Roger Federer represent the pinnacle of motor learning. However, when considering the range and complexity of the processes that are involved in motor learning, even the mere mortals among us exhibit abilities that are impressive. We exercise these abilities when taking up new activities ...

PATHOWIKI (http://www.pathowiki.org) is a new specialized information system in the form of a web-based wiki with content from all sub-disciplines of human pathology. Essential components are articles and specimens which are located thematically in dermatopathology. The project is presented on the basis of impressive examples and possibilities. The ability to ...

The online resources offered on the Internet have become complements or even alternatives to traditional resources for acquiring new knowledge. Among other advantages, online training tools are accessible 24hours a day from anywhere provided there is an internet connection. Furthermore, there is no limit to the number of simultaneous users ...

Emotional intelligence (EI) can determine the quality of our relationship with ourselves and others. Whether we are students, teachers, or managers or are in the clinical arena, EI influences our stress level, our ability to perform, and our effectiveness when working with others.

This Teaching Resource provides lecture notes, slides, and a student assignment for a two-part lecture on the principles underlying bistability in biochemical signaling networks, which are illustrated with examples from the literature. The lectures cover analog, or graded, versus digital, all-or-none, responses in cells, with examples from different types of ...

Determining the registration accuracy rate is fundamental to improving revenue cycle key performance indicators. A registration quality assurance (QA) process allows errors to be corrected before bills are sent and helps registrars learn from their mistakes. Tools are available to help patient access staff who perform registration QA manually.

Last year 82 community colleges launched health IT training programs in a hurry. After a slow and sometimes bumpy start, the programs are picking up steam and the students are graduating. Now comes the next test: are the jobs out there?

Quite a few books are available to support reflection, from self-help guides, through theoretical underpinning with practical suggestions, to books that are designed more for educators to help them support reflection as part of learning, teaching and assessment.

Two backpropagation algorithms with momentum for feedforward neural networks with a single hidden layer are considered. It is assumed that the training samples are supplied to the network in a cyclic or an almost-cyclic fashion in the learning procedure, i.e., in each training cycle, each sample of the training set ...

A visit to the ED represents a vital opportunity for victims of human trafficking to break free from their exploiters, but this opportunity is often lost, either because ED personnel don't recognize the subtle cues that a person may be a trafficking victim, or because they don't know how to ...

The authors discuss the factors to be considered in selecting locations in which to train and to practice, and in conducting successful interviews and site visits. The advantages and disadvantages of different types of surgical practice (ie, solo vs group) are also reviewed, as are issues surrounding negotiations related to ...

We identify employees at seven companies whose 401(k) investment choices are dominated because they are contributing less than the employer matching contribution threshold despite being vested in their match and being able to make penalty-free 401(k) withdrawals for any reason because they are older than 59½. At the average firm, ...

Participants in advanced resuscitation courses are often expected to learn to perform intraosseous access (IO). But how many learning modalities are needed to achieve procedural confidence in IO? We distributed an online questionnaire to members of emergency medicine, paediatric and anaesthesiology societies in Scandinavia. The responders without real-life experience with ...

Periodic audits of the charge description master are a key piece of an organization's compliance program. But they can do more than verify compliance--they can help improve the business.

True/false multiple choice items, commonly referred to as true/ false multiple choice questions (MCQs), were previously a widely used selected response examination format. They can be written relatively easily and cover a wide range of content. Educational researchers have however highlighted several adverse features of this format that make it ...

Objective:  This paper reports on an evaluation of the John Flynn Placement Program (JFPP) for medical students. JFPP aims for medical students to experience both rural medicine and rural life as a way of increasing rural career intentions. Design:  Medical students experience two weeks a year over four years with ...

Abstract The Athlete's Biological Passport (ABP) is an evaluation of hematological parameters, hemoglobin (Hb), reticulocytes (Ret), and their combination in the OFF-score. Recently, the Court of Arbitration for Sport accepted it as a suitable indirect method for detecting blood doping. There are various topics which are not defined and scientifically ...

Standardized patient (SP) performances are staged clinical encounters between health-professional students and people who specialize in role-playing the part of patients. Such performances have in recent years become increasingly central to the teaching and assessment of clinical skills in U.S. medical schools. SP performances are valued for being both "real" ...

As nanolithography becomes increasingly important in technology and daily life, a variety of inexpensive and creative methods toward communicating the concepts underpinning these processes in the classroom are necessary. An experiment is described that uses simple CD-Rs, C-clamps, an oven, and a freezer to provide concrete examples and insights into ...

The importance of the preschool period for becoming a skilled reader is highlighted by a significant body of evidence that preschool children's development in the areas of oral language, phonological awareness, and print knowledge is predictive of how well they will learn to read once they are exposed to formal ...

In this study we argue that drivers have to make an assessment of their own driving skills, in order to sufficiently adapt to their task demands in traffic. There are indications that drivers in general, but novice drivers in particular, overestimate their driving skills. However, study results differ on the ...

The association between religiosity and happiness has been the focus of much recent research. The majority of them report a positive correlation between a religious attitude and behavior and the level of happiness. However, different findings have been reported. The aim of the current study was to test link between ...

Botulinum toxin (BTA) is a safe and effective therapeutic tool for many neurological conditions but few studies have investigated its real cost in neurological practice. We evaluated the daily cost of botulinum toxin type A (BTA) treatment through a cost effectiveness analysis alongside a prospective study of BTA injections at ...

Specialist skills We have been aware for a while that there are disparities in specialist skill provision both between and within deaneries-and the SAC is working hard to identify problems in this area. More recently, the issue of funding for specialist skills has been raised. It seems that some deaneries ...

Through training, skilled parkour athletes (traceurs) overcome everyday obstacles, such as walls, that are typically insurmountable. Traceurs and untrained novices estimated the height of walls and reported their anticipated ability to climb the wall. The traceurs perceived the walls as shorter than did novices. This result suggests that perception is ...

Despite the significant attention that drugs and alcohol receive on college campuses, few resources and supports are available to students who are recovering from an addiction. Student affairs professionals are uniquely positioned to support these students with a variety of strategies. This article summarizes what is currently known about college ...

While many quality improvement and performance measurement initiatives are under way in Canada and beyond, there are challenges to be met around effectively coordinating the national quality agenda, sharing expertise and reducing duplication. An important first step has been recognizing the vital connection between quality and efficiency.

The purpose of this study is to understand the status of Pathology in Iraq evaluating health problems in the country. Pathologists in Iraq are at the top of the level of scientific knowledge and professional responsibility. Although there are adequate modern equipment, lack of chemicals and experienced technical service inadequacies ...

Restraint and seclusion are unsavory topics within a discipline that cherishes verbal interventions. As such, the principles of use are haphazardly taught by in-house clinicians or private agencies. Policy standards were published in the 1980s, but they have not been officially updated, despite the fact that an American Psychiatric Association ...

To compare the efficacy of instructional programs for adult learners with basic reading skills below the seventh grade level, 300 adults were randomly assigned to one of three supplementary tutoring programs designed to strengthen decoding and fluency skills, and gains were examined for the 148 adult students who completed the ...

Medicaid enrollees have nearly twice the smoking rates (37%) of the general adult population (21%), and smoking-related medical costs are responsible for 11% of Medicaid expenditures. In 2008, the Public Health Service released clinical practice guidelines recommending comprehensive coverage of effective tobacco-dependence medications and counseling by health insurers. Healthy People ...

The Medicare cost report can help you understand your organization's financial performance by providing a means to: Analyze costs. Assess departmental and payer margins. Compare performance with the competition.

The Medicare bundled payment pilot program is scheduled to begin in January 2013 and will run for five years. The program holds the promise of increased alignment between hospitals and physicians, presenting opportunities for hospital cost reduction and improvements in quality. Nonetheless, the program carries fixed costs and assumption of ...

Westernization in the Pacific, as in the world, brought with it many old truths and new ideas. It brought new belief systems that were widely accepted and technologies that mostly proved useful. But it also brought something that it never fully put into words, although the brightest of students attending ...

The Department of Defense is publishing this final rule to implement section 4 of the Hubbard Actand section 734 of the Duncan Hunter National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2009. These Acts provide two new categories of beneficiaries for the Transitional Assistance Management Program (TAMP). Specifically, a member who ...

TRICARE has recognized the unique circumstances existing in Alaska which make the provision of medical care to TRICARE beneficiaries through the TRICARE program operated in the other 49 states unrealistic. Recognizing these unique conditions and circumstances, the Department of Defense has conducted a demonstration project in the state of Alaska ...

Medicare is not working as well for its eight million disabled beneficiaries under age sixty-five as it is for its older beneficiaries. We report on a 2008 survey that found significant differences between the two Medicare populations, with the younger group experiencing more problems of cost and access. Even with ...

This final rule implements provisions from the Children's Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2009 (CHIPRA) (Pub. L. 111-3) with regard to the Medicaid Eligibility Quality Control (MEQC) and Payment Error Rate Measurement (PERM) programs. This final rule also codifies several procedural aspects of the process for estimating improper payments ...

This interim final rule establishes requirements and procedures for implementation of TRICARE Retired Reserve. This interim final rule addresses provisions of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 (NDAA-10). The purpose of this interim final rule is to establish the TRICARE Retired Reserve program that implements section 705 ...

The final rule on the EHR incentive plan offers more "flexibility and choice" than the daunting proposed rule, adjusting the objectives and scaling back some of the measures. Now interested providers just need to figure out how to get with the program.

families of dementia patients receiving skilled homecare do not receive supportive services. We evaluated whether a proven intervention, Environmental Skill-building Program (ESP), which reduces caregiver burden and enhances skills managing patient functioning, can be integrated into homecare practices of occupational therapists (OTs) and reimbursed through Medicare Part B. a 2-year ...

Knowledge of Medicare policies and procedures is integral to the practice of geriatric medicine. Within the past several years, there has been a focus on Medicare fraud, abuse, and waste in healthcare spending. One program, Medicare Recovery Audit Contractors (RAC), has recently been launched to identify improper payments by performing ...

Hospital leaders making headway in anticipating the potential impact of possible RAC audits under the Medicare program are examining their revenue cycle management programs and making those RCM programs more rigorous and specific. Hospitals with experience in the early federal RAC audit demonstration project have accumulated numerous learnings from their ...

This final rule makes revisions to the regulations governing the Medicare Advantage (MA) program (Part C) and prescription drug benefit program (Part D) based on our continued experience in the administration of the Part C and D programs. The revisions strengthen various program participation and exit requirements; strengthen beneficiary protections; ...

In the months before and years since Medicare Part D's implementation in January 2006, many have been concerned with beneficiaries' ability to benefit from the complex program. A systematic review of published Medline and gray literature from January 1, 2005, to August 20, 2009, was undertaken to evaluate Medicare beneficiaries' ...