Health literacy support for Australian home-based care recipients: A role for homecare workers?

© 2019, © 2019 Taylor & Francis. Clear links have been established between low health literacy (HL) levels and poor health outcomes. One means of improvement may be found in the rapidly growing paid home care workforce, whose direct and frequent contact with aged/disabled care recipients positions them to provide HL support. This study examines Australian homecare worker (HCW) experiences in HL when providing assistance to their care recipients. A self-reported cross-sectional survey collected data from 75 HCWs. They reported concerns about their clients’ HL, yet were cautious about providing support in this area. HL levels of the HCWs themselves were unconvincing, and the majority requested targeted education and training. Further research is needed into HL levels of both HCWs and care recipients, client demographics, the types of HL support being requested of HCWs, a more detailed scoping of the HCW role, and the curriculum and pedagogies which may comprise a HL education and training program for HCWs

Visuo-spatial ability in colonoscopy simulator training

Visuo-spatial ability is associated with a quality of performance in a variety of surgical and medical skills. However, visuo-spatial ability is typically assessed using Visualization tests only, which led to an incomplete understanding of the involvement of visuo-spatial ability in these skills. To remedy this situation, the current study investigated the role of a broad range of visuo-spatial factors in colonoscopy simulator training. Fifteen medical trainees (no clinical experience in colonoscopy) participated in two psycho-metric test sessions to assess four visuo-spatial ability factors. Next, participants trained flexible endoscope manipulation, and navigation to the cecum on the GI Mentor II simulator, for four sessions within 1 week. Visualization, and to a lesser degree Spatial relations were the only visuo-spatial ability factors to correlate with colonoscopy simulator performance. Visualization additionally covaried with learning rate for time on task on both simulator tasks. High Visualization ability indicated faster exercise completion. Similar to other endoscopic procedures, performance in colonoscopy is positively associated with Visualization, a visuo-spatial ability factor characterized by the ability to mentally manipulate complex visuo-spatial stimuli. The complexity of the visuo-spatial mental transformations required to successfully perform colonoscopy is likely responsible for the challenging nature of this technique, and should inform training- and assessment design. Long term training studies, as well as studies investigating the nature of visuo-spatial complexity in this domain are needed to better understand the role of visuo-spatial ability in colonoscopy, and other endoscopic techniques

Glycaemic control and its associated factors in patients with type 2 diabetes in the Middle East and North Africa: An updated systematic review and meta-analysis.

AIMS: To examine the patient-related factors that have been linked to glycaemic control in people living with type 2 diabetes mellitus in Middle Eastern countries. DESIGN: A systematic review and meta-analysis. DATA SOURCES: A computerized search was conducted using the databases MEDLINE (via PubMed and Ovid), EMBASE, Scopus and CINAHL to identify peer-reviewed articles published in English between 1 January 2010 and 21 May 2020. On 28 June 2021, the search was updated with the same keywords and databases; however, no further relevant studies were identified. REVIEW METHODS: Extracted data were analysed using Review Manager 5.4. RESULTS: The final sample consisted of 54 articles with a total of 41,079 participants. Pooled data showed an increased risk of inadequate glycaemic control in smokers [OR = 1.26, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.05, 1.52; p = .010], obese patients (OR = 1.30, 95% CI: 1.10, 1.54; p = .002), patients with elevated waist to hip ratio (OR = 1.62, 95% CI: 1.16, 2.26; p = .004) and longer disease duration (OR = 2.01, 95% CI: 1.64, 2.48; p < .001). A lower risk of inadequate control was associated with physical activity (OR = 0.40, 95% CI: 0.24, 0.67; p < .001) and self-management (OR = 0.49, 95% CI: 0.29, 0.82; p = .006). CONCLUSION: These findings highlight the opportunity to address factors to improve glycaemic control. Further longitudinal studies are required to better understand these variations, to assess all predictors of glycaemic control in participants with type 2 diabetes, and to provide a strong basis for future measures to optimize glycaemic control

D-dimensional metrics with D-3 symmetries

Hidden symmetry transformations of D-dimensional vacuum metrics with D-3 commuting Killing vectors are studied. We solve directly the Einstein equations in the Maison formulation under additional assumptions. We relate the 4-dimensional Reissner-Nordstr\"om solution to a particular case of the 5-dimensional Gross-Perry metric.Comment: 8 page

Cell division and DNA segregation in Streptomyces: how to build a septum in the middle of nowhere?

Microbial Biotechnolog

Diversity and health inequalities: the role of the practice nurse

General Practice Nurse (GPN) practice is becoming increasingly diverse, due to a changing patient base and political climate which impacts upon their role. Over the last decade there has been an increase in the number of foreign born individuals living in the UK, the number of individuals identifying as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual or Transgender (LGBQT) as well as the number of people living with a long term health condition or disability. Yet all of these groups also experience greater health inequalities, despite increasing political drives in the UK and internationally to address this. General Practice Nurses are ideally placed to address health inequalities by facilitating health access for diverse groups however in order to do this they have to recognise and respond to the cultural values of the patient they are working with

Generalization Of The Gross-Perry Metrics

A class of SO(n+1) symmetric solutions of the (N+n+1)-dimensional Einstein equations is found. It contains 5-dimensional metrics of Gross and Perry and Millward.Comment: 9 page

Competition between DivIVA and the nucleoid for ParA binding promotes segrosome separation and modulates mycobacterial cell elongation

Although mycobacteria are rod shaped and divide by simple binary fission, their cell cycle exhibits unusual features: unequal cell division producing daughter cells that elongate with different velocities, as well as asymmetric chromosome segregation and positioning throughout the cell cycle. As in other bacteria, mycobacterial chromosomes are segregated by pair of proteins, ParA and ParB. ParA is an ATPase that interacts with nucleoprotein ParB complexes - segrosomes and non-specifically binds the nucleoid. Uniquely in mycobacteria, ParA interacts with a polar protein DivIVA (Wag31), responsible for asymmetric cell elongation, however the biological role of this interaction remained unknown. We hypothesised that this interaction plays a critical role in coordinating chromosome segregation with cell elongation. Using a set of ParA mutants, we determined that disruption of ParA-DNA binding enhanced the interaction between ParA and DivIVA, indicating a competition between the nucleoid and DivIVA for ParA binding. Having identified the ParA mutation that disrupts its recruitment to DivIVA, we found that it led to inefficient segrosomes separation and increased the cell elongation rate. Our results suggest that ParA modulates DivIVA activity. Thus, we demonstrate that the ParA-DivIVA interaction facilitates chromosome segregation and modulates cell elongation