Augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) interventions have been shown to improve both communication and social skills in children and youth with autism spectrum disorders and other developmental disabilities. AAC applications have become available for personal devices such as cell phones, MP3 Players, and personal computer tablets. It is critical that ...

Children undergoing surgical procedures may have difficulty communicating. Augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) picture communication may provide a standard communication strategy for postoperative children and facilitate nurse-patient communication. The study purposes were to (1) determine if inconsistency exists between nurse assessments of pain location versus identification of pain location using ...

Background: This study examined the perceived effectiveness of a 15-week community-based program for 46 children exposed to intimate partner violence (IPV) and their mothers. Aims: The primary aims were to describe the children who entered one of the existing community-based programs in terms of behavioral problems and to evaluate the ...

OBJECTIVE: To develop and pretest a decision-aid to help parents facing extreme premature delivery during antenatal counseling regarding delivery room resuscitation. STUDY DESIGN: Semistructured interviews with 31 clinicians and with 30 parents of children born <26 weeks' gestation were conducted following standard methods of qualitative research. These characterized perceptions of ...

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Suicide prevention is given a low priority in many Western Pacific countries due to competing health problems, stigma and poor understanding of its incidence and aetiology. Little is known about the epidemiology of suicide and suicidal behaviour in the Philippines and although its incidence is reported to be ...

Objective: To complement standardized measurement of symptoms, we developed and tested an efficient strategy for identifying (before treatment) and repeatedly assessing (during treatment) the problems identified as most important by caregivers and youths in psychotherapy. Method: A total of 178 outpatient-referred youths, 7-13 years of age, and their caregivers separately ...

Studies have shown that unilateral cochlear implant users who have residual hearing in the contralateral ear can benefit from combining a hearing aid in the nonimplanted ear with their cochlear implant. The purpose of this study was to better understand the factors influencing decision making by adults. Adults who had ...

Cite this as: R. Crameri, Clinical & Experimental Allergy, 2011 (41) 302-304.

Objectives: To determine the efficacy of the pediculate flap with the buccal fat pad in the sealing of orosinusal communications, describe the surgical technique used, and report the main complications. Patients and method: A retrospective study was made of 8 patients seen in the Service of Oral Surgery of the ...

Hearing loss is a common problem encountered in ENT practice. Hearing loss following head injury is a major medical problem in both adults and children, which may go unnoticed when it does not affect speech frequencies. Sensorineural hearing loss at high frequencies is a common finding in minor head injury. ...

This paper reviews the principles of the replica denture technique, including some of the techniques previously described. The failing of any previous technique to cater for specific support problems is brought to light and the remainder of the article is devoted to describing how the replica denture technique may be ...

The cleft-lip nasal deformity presents a formidable challenge in rhinoplasty surgery. A wide variety of techniques have been proposed for the correction of this problem, which is proof of the difficulty of this reconstructive problem. The approach outlined in this article amalgamates many cleft-lip rhinoplasty concepts into a single unified ...

Unsupervised clustering is the ability to automatically partition a set of data patterns into meaningful groups without prior knowledge of the groups or their number. Supervised classification is the ability to automatically recognize a data pattern as an instance from one of a known set of classes. These problems are ...

Multi-objective evolutionary algorithms (MOEAs) have become increasingly popular as multi-objective problem solving techniques. An important open problem is to understand the role of populations in MOEAs. We present two simple bi-objective problems which emphasise when populations are needed. Rigorous runtime analysis points out an exponential runtime gap between the population-based ...

BACKGROUND: The problem of computationally predicting the secondary structure (or folding) of RNA molecules was first introduced more than thirty years ago and yet continues to be an area of active research and development. The basic RNA-folding problem of finding a maximum cardinality, non-crossing, matching of complimentary nucleotides in an ...

Frostbite is frequently seen in high altitude climbers. Many Sherpas, members of an ethnic community living high in the Himalayas in Nepal, help the climbers as a guide or an assistant. They often seem to undertake few precautionary measures thus suffer more from frostbite. A young Sherpa, who had reached ...

Many patients continue to experience problems long after burn wounds have closed. Contracture and deformity are frequent sequelae of the scar tissue that is formed secondary to thermal trauma. A variety of techniques are available to the burn reconstructive surgeon, ranging from simpler grafting methods to complex free-tissue transfers. In ...

This paper presents a new controller design technique for systems driven with impulse inputs. Necessary conditions for optimal impulse control are derived. A neural network structure to solve the resulting equations for optimal control is presented. Solution concepts are illustrated with example problems that exhibit increasing levels of difficulty. Two ...

Good communication between a parent and pediatrician may increase therapeutic adherence and the parent satisfaction. Therefore, a pediatrician's main goal during a consultation is obtaining and giving information. To analyze occurrences during well-child program visits, specifically the communication techniques used by pediatricians. We analyzed 49 visits to 5 pediatricians in ...

The patellofemoral joint historically has been a significant source of poor clinical outcomes in total knee arthroplasty. Patellar maltracking, peeling of the patellar tendon insertion, and difficult exposure are conditions that must be addressed and corrected during surgery. A surgeon with a repertoire of techniques to handle patellofemoral problems intraoperatively ...

The increasing numbers of technology platforms offer opportunities to develop new visual assistive aids for people with autism. However, their involvement in the design of such aids is critical to their short-term uptake and longer term use. Using a three-round Delphi study involving seven Australian psychologists specializing in treating people ...

Intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) is an important assisted reproductive technology (ART). Due to deployment difficulties and low efficiency of the earlier (conventional) version of ICSI, especially in the mouse, a piezo-assisted ICSI technique had evolved as a popular ART methodology in recent years. An important and remaining problem with this ...

Erectile dysfunction (ED) is a common and debilitating condition with physical, psychological, and pharmacological aetiologies. The physical causes can be divided into problems with arterial inflow, structural penile abnormalities, or problems with the venous occlusion mechanism. Penile Doppler sonography is a specialized technique requiring a thorough knowledge of the topic ...

Gaston Labat's textbook Regional Anesthesia: Its Technique and Clinical Application was one of the earliest regional anesthesia texts, and certainly one of the most successful. Although Dr. Labat was working on a third edition at the time of his death, its fate and the reason for a more than 30-year ...

The problem of controlling a single ray bundle with a single reflector is not generally solvable, but approximate solutions may often be found that are acceptable for applications. We introduce a new technique for finding such approximations and apply it to the design of a driver-side mirror for an automobile ...

Various problems with the current state-of-the-art techniques for gated radiotherapy have prevented this new treatment modality from being widely implemented in clinical routine. These problems are caused mainly by applying various external respiratory surrogates. There might be large uncertainties in deriving the tumor position from external respiratory surrogates. While tracking ...

The minimum weight Steiner tree (MST) is an important combinatorial optimization problem over networks that has applications in a wide range of fields. Here we discuss a general technique to translate the imposed global connectivity constrain into many local ones that can be analyzed with cavity equation techniques. This approach ...

Low-dose AI procedures are required by the pig industry to efficiently utilize emerging sperm technologies, such as cryopreservation and sex-sorting. Currently, several different procedures for inseminating with a low or very low number of spermatozoa have been described. Deep intrauterine insemination allows the deposition of the spermatozoa in the depth ...

Birds feeding on landfill sites cause problems in terms of nuisance to neighbors, flight safety, a threat to public health, and affecting the day to day site operation. A number of control measures exist to deter problem species; however, research into their effectiveness across sites and for multiple species has ...

Two papers in this issue report important developments in the field of inorganic nanomaterials. Chen and O'Brien discuss self-assembly of semiconductor nanocrystals into binary nanoparticle superlattices (BNSLs). They show that simple geometrical principles based on maximizing the packing density can determine BNSL symmetry in the absence of cohesive electrostatic interactions. ...

For many years, histones were considered passive structural components of eukaryotic chromatin. Meanwhile it has been proven that histones also participate in gene regulation and repression via post-translational modification. The multitude of these post-translational modifications and the existence of numerous histone variants require particular separation strategies for their analysis, a ...

Recently proposed Sobolev active contours introduced a new paradigm for minimizing energies defined on curves by changing the traditional cost of perturbing a curve and thereby redefining their gradients. Sobolev active contours evolve more globally and are less attracted to certain intermediate local minima than traditional active contours, and it ...

Pulp stones are a frequent finding on bitewing and periapical radiographs but receive relatively little attention in textbooks. A review of the literature was therefore performed, initially using the PubMed database and beginning the search with 'pulp calcifications' and 'pulp stones'. Each term provided more than 400 references, many of ...

We aimed to identify and categorise advanced communication skills used by experienced consultant paediatric anaesthetists to facilitate the induction of paediatric anaesthesia. The communication techniques were both verbal and non-verbal. Communications with potentially negative effects were also noted. Eighty-three inductions were observed over a three-month period. The 12 anaesthetists observed ...

There is a scarcity of research on the impact of trauma team member communication on performance. Anecdotal evidence tells of "talking to the air"--asking for tasks to be completed by no one in particular. Human factors techniques were used to analyze the communication patterns in trauma team performance. Video of ...

Fixed-parameter algorithms can efficiently find optimal solutions to some computationally hard (NP-hard) problems. This chapter surveys five main practical techniques to develop such algorithms. Each technique is circumstantiated by case studies of applications to biological problems. It also presents other known bioinformatics-related applications and gives pointers to experimental results.

Showjumping riders regularly employ various schooling strategies to control the horse's jump stride kinematics (JSK). Strategies include plyometric training regimes with fences of different heights and widths set at specific distances. Gymnastic grids teach the horse to jump cleanly. Rapping, once used almost routinely, is no longer in vogue. However, ...

ABSTRACT: Evolutionary search algorithms have become an essential asset in the algorithmic toolbox for solving high-dimensional optimization problems in across a broad range of bioinformatics problems. Genetic algorithms, the most well-known and representative evolutionary search technique, have been the subject of the major part of such applications. Estimation of distribution ...

We introduce a Monte Carlo scheme for sampling a bold-line diagrammatic series specifying an unknown function in terms of itself. The range of convergence of this bold(-line) diagrammatic Monte Carlo (BMC) technique is significantly broader than that of a simple iterative scheme for solving integral equations. With the BMC technique, ...

Retrieval of polyps during colonoscopic procedures can be technically difficult and time consuming. This is particularly the case when attempting to retrieve large polyps intact through the anal canal of an anxious patient with a hypertonic sphincter. In this paper, we describe a simple technique that permits the complete removal ...

Near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), which was originally designed for clinical monitoring of tissue oxygenation, has been developing into a useful tool for neuroimaging studies (functional near-infrared spectroscopy). This technique, which is completely noninvasive, does not require strict motion restriction and can be used in a daily life environment. It is expected ...

Genitourinary complaints are common in cyclists. Bicycle fit, improper saddle type, and individual anatomic factors are important evaluation criteria to consider when diagnosing symptoms and determining treatment options. By learning how to recognize and treat contributing factors, as well as learning a few simple bike-fitting techniques, physicians can treat and ...

Recent trends toward less invasive technologies for treating varicose veins have led to expanding interest in transilluminated powered phlebectomy. Although initial experience with transilluminated powered phlebectomy was variable, with the newer-generation system and modification of technique that allow for slower oscillation speed, higher suction, and extensive tumescence irrigation and drainage, ...

In addition to the loss of human life, the tsunami event of 26 December 2004 caused extensive damage to coastal areas. The scale of the disaster was such that remote sensing may be the only way to determine its effects on the landscape. This paper presents the results of a ...

A thorough investigation of the application of support vector regression (SVR) to the superresolution problem is conducted through various frameworks. Prior to the study, the SVR problem is enhanced by finding the optimal kernel. This is done by formulating the kernel learning problem in SVR form as a convex optimization ...

Requantization is an important technique for variable-rate data compression and communication and optimal design for requantization is key to guaranteeing the minimization of the requantization noise. Recently, an iterative optimization algorithm for designing the requantization codebook was proposed. We develop further results regarding the acceleration of the algorithm and a ...

Percutaneous balloon rhizotomy is a simple, safe and effective treatment for trigeminal neuralgia. The author will present a description of the technique and a discussion of problems and pitfalls based on personal experience. The relative advantages and disadvantages of the procedure in comparison with the other percutaneous techniques will also ...

Branch-and-bound (BnB) and memetic algorithms represent two very different approaches for tackling combinatorial optimization problems. However, these approaches are compatible. In this correspondence, a hybrid model that combines these two techniques is considered. To be precise, it is based on the interleaved execution of both approaches. Since the requirements of ...

Dead End Elimination (DEE) is a technique for eliminating rotamers that can not exist in any global minimum energy configuration for the protein side chain conformation problem. A popular method is Simple Goldstein DEE (SG-DEE) which is fast and eliminates rotamers by considering single residues for possible elimination. We present ...

This paper presents a novel approach to the problem of splice site prediction, by applying stochastic grammar inference. We used four grammar inference algorithms to infer 1465 grammars, and used 10-fold cross-validation to select the best grammar for each algorithm. The corresponding grammars were embedded into a classifier and used ...