Employment conditions and mental health of overseas female migrant domestic workers in Hong Kong: a parallel mediation analysis.

BACKGROUND: Female migrant domestic workers (MDW), approximately 8.5 million globally, often live in their employer's home under vulnerable conditions. In Hong Kong, MDWs currently comprise 5% of the population. This study was conducted to assess the association between employment conditions and mental health, and the mediating roles stress and job satisfaction have, among female MDWs in Hong Kong. METHODS: Participants completed an online cross-sectional survey. A total of 1,965 survey were collected between August 2020 and August 2021. Questions in the survey were related to MDWs background information, employment conditions, stress, job satisfaction, and two mental health outcomes: anxiety and depression. An employment conditions score was created to assess the cumulative effect poor employment conditions had on mental health. A multicategorical parallel mediation analysis was used to assess the direct effect employment conditions have on mental health and the indirect effects through stress and job satisfaction. RESULTS: Overall, 17.7% of MDWs were reported to be suffering from anxiety and 30.8% from depression. An increase in poor employment conditions was statistically associated with an increase in both outcomes, while stress levels and job satisfaction mediated this association. CONCLUSIONS: The findings call for increased scrutiny of employment conditions and mental well-being of MDWs.

Systematic review of patient-reported outcome measures in clinical vestibular research.

OBJECTIVE: To identify the most commonly used patient-reported outcome (PRO) measures in clinical vestibular research, and to assess their test characteristics and applicability to the study of age-related vestibular loss in clinical trials. DATA SOURCES: We performed a systematic review of the PubMed, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, and PsycINFO databases from 1950 to August 13, 2013. STUDY SELECTION: PRO measures were defined as outcomes that capture the subjective experience of the patient (eg, symptoms, functional status, health perceptions, quality of life). Two independent reviewers selected studies that used PRO measures in clinical vestibular research. Disparities were resolved with consensus between the reviewers. Of 2260 articles initially found in the literature search, 255 full-text articles were retrieved for assessment. Of these, 104 met inclusion criteria for data collection. DATA EXTRACTION: PRO measures were identified by 2 independent reviewers. The 4 most commonly used PROs were evaluated for their applicability to the condition of age-related vestibular loss. Specifically, for these 4 PROs, data were collected pertaining to instrument test-retest reliability, item domains, and target population of the instrument. DATA SYNTHESIS: A total of 50 PRO instruments were identified. The 4 most frequently used PROs were the Dizziness Handicap Inventory, Activities-specific Balance Confidence scale, Vertigo Symptom Scale-short form, and visual analog scale. Of these 4 PROs, 3 were validated for use in patients with vestibular disease and 1 was validated in community-dwelling older individuals with balance impairments. Items across the 4 PROs were categorized into 3 domains based on the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health: activity, participation, and body functions and structures. CONCLUSIONS: None of the most commonly used PRO instruments were validated for use in community-dwelling older adults with age-related vestibular loss. Nevertheless, the 3 common domains of items identified across these 4 PRO instruments may be generalizable to older adults and provide a basis for developing a PRO instrument designed to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions targeted toward age-related vestibular loss.

Prevalence of oropharyngeal dysphagia in the Netherlands: a telephone survey.

Recent and specific data on the prevalence and/or incidence of oropharyngeal dysphagia in the general population are scarce. This study focuses on obtaining this data by means of a literature review and telephone survey. A literature review was performed to obtain data on the prevalence of dysphagia in the general population. Secondly, a quasi-random telephone survey using the functional health status questionnaire EAT-10 was conducted with the aim of establishing prevalence data on oropharyngeal dysphagia in the Netherlands. The literature review revealed six articles which met the inclusion criteria. The prevalence data on oropharyngeal dysphagia in the general population varied between 2.3 and 16 %. For the telephone survey, a total of 6,700 individuals were contacted by telephone, of which, 2,600 (39 %) participated in the study. Of the 2,600 participants, as many as 315 (12.1 %) were identified as having swallowing abnormalities and showed increased risk of oropharyngeal dysphagia with age. Prevalence data on oropharyngeal dysphagia in the Dutch general population were as high as 12.1 %. This data are in line with the retrieved prevalence data from the literature.

Nurse staffing is an important strategy to prevent medication error in community hospitals.

The prevalence of medication administration errors continues to be a problem requiring the attention of nurse leaders. In this study the relationship between nurse staffing and the occurrence of medication errors was examined. Using a retrospective design, researchers analyzed secondary data from administrative databases of one hospital containing 801 weekly staffing intervals and 31,080 patient observations. The current study shows that increasing the number of RN hours and decreasing or eliminating LPN hours can be a strategy to reduce medication errors.

Community under stress: trust, reciprocity, and community collective efficacy during SARS outbreak.

The study of epidemics is almost non-existent in sociological literature, even though such outbreaks can have detrimental effects on communities. The occurrence of SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) in 2003 provides a rare opportunity to understand the social functioning of a community during the outbreak of an epidemic. To evaluate the extensive social impact of such an outbreak, we focus on the effects of perceived collective efficacy. Specifically, we focus on how the collective efficacy of a community, measured by trust and reciprocal relations, is related to collective action in places where SARS occurred and those where SARS did not occur. The study is based on a unique data set, the 2003 Taiwan Social Image Survey, collected during the outbreak of SARS in Taiwan. Our findings show that community collective efficacy, measured by trust and reciprocity, is not associated with community collective action when an outbreak of an epidemic occurs.

Linking Dichotomous Segregation with Multi-group Segregation: Weighted Segregation Ratios in Selected U. S. Metropolitan Areas.

The U. S. residential landscape is increasingly multi-racial and multi-ethnic, giving rise to the question of how to compare dichotomous segregation among multiple groups living in the same area. To address the problem in the existing dichotomous approach, which offers no common basis for comparing dichotomous segregation among multiple groups, this paper develops a weighted segregation ratio approach based on Theil's segregation index and its additive decomposability. This approach can be used to bridge information obtained from dichotomous segregation between specific groups (such as black-white and black-Hispanic), and dichotomous segregation between group and non-group (such as white-non-white and black-non-black) in previous studies. We apply both dichotomous and weighted segregation ratio approaches to 1990 and 2000 U. S. census data. Results are interpreted for five selected metropolitan areas as well as for the weighted national average. This new approach yields distinctive findings that portray the complicated process of residential segregation, including the increasing significance of Hispanic segregation and Asian segregation in the decade from 1990 to 2000.

Is ethnic representation in an industrial cluster related to earnings of co-ethnic employers and employees?

Our study expands understanding of the ways in which ethnic embeddedness is related to the earnings of co-ethnic members by exploring the relationship between ethnic representation in an industry cluster and the earnings of co-ethnic employers and employees working there. Drawing from the 2011 Canadian Household Survey, our findings confirm the relationship. However, the relationship is different for employers and employees, and sometimes opposite. Specifically, a larger portion of Chinese ethnic economies in an industry cluster is negatively related to the earnings of Chinese employers, but is not related to the earnings of Chinese employees. A larger portion of employment niches in an industry cluster is negatively related to the earnings of Chinese employers, but positively related to the earnings of Chinese employees.

Notre étude examine le lien entre l'enracinement ethnique et les gains en explorant la relation entre la représentation ethnique dans un domaine industriel et les gains des employeurs et des employés coethniques qui y travaillent. En analysant les données de l'Enquête auprès des ménages canadiens de 2011, notre étude confirme la relation. Cependant, la relation est différente pour les employeurs et les employés, et parfois opposée. Plus précisément, une plus grande partie des économies ethniques chinoises dans un secteur industriel est négativement corrélée aux gains des employeurs chinois, mais n'est pas liée aux gains des employés chinois. Une plus grande partie des niches d'emploi dans une grappe industrielle est liée négativement aux revenus des employeurs chinois, mais positivement liée aux revenus des employés chinois.

Patent lifecycle management strategies in open innovation projects.

Proper implementation of lifecycle management strategies is important for profit maximization in the pharmaceutical industry. This article investigates the ownership of follow-on patents for approved drugs in the USA. We discover that a considerable number of follow-on patents are originally developed by, and issued to, external partners and not drug sponsors. We also find that the use of follow-on patents is more common in some therapeutic areas than in others. Based on these findings, we develop lifecycle strategies to effectively manage and use external patents in open innovation projects. These strategies include proper license contract design, post-FDA-approval acquisition and open innovation.

The Legal Consequences of Research Misconduct: False Investigators and Grant Proposals.

In a survey on research misconduct, roughly 20% of the respondents admitted that they have submitted federal grant proposals that include scholars as research participants even though those scholars were not expected to contribute to the research effort. This manuscript argues that adding such false investigators is illegal, violating multiple federal statutes including the False Statements Act (18 U.S.C. §1001), the False Claims Act (31 U.S.C. §3729), and False, Fictitious, or Fraudulent Claims (18 U.S.C. §287). Moreover, it is not only the offending academics and the false investigators that face civil and criminal penalties because administrators may also be liable if they sign off on proposals and are in a position to know that false investigators might be included. Policy recommendations that should reduce the use of false investigators include changing institutional cultures, better training and oversight of the responsible conduct of research, and, most importantly, making all grant reviews double blind.

Mnemonic Institutions and Residential Clustering: Jewish Residential Patterns in Toronto.

In this paper, we envisage how the sociohistorical experiences of groups are related to their residential patterns. We posit that the residential clustering of a group can be strongly related to the group's mnemonic institutions, which are organizational symbols of collective identity that link the present to the past. We present the case of Jewish residential clustering patterns in Toronto to demonstrate our arguments. We employ 2001 Canadian Census tract-level data to show Jewish residential clustering patterns in relation to the presence of a synagogue or Jewish community center, the mnemonic institutions of Jews.

Systematic review of patient-reported outcomes after revision endoscopic sinus surgery.

BACKGROUND: Revision endoscopic sinus surgery (RESS) may be required for partially controlled or uncontrolled chronic rhinosinusitis. Studies that reported technical success, e.g., sinus ostia patency after RESS, do not address whether the patient's symptoms and quality of life (QOL) improve after surgery. However, patient-reported outcome measures (PROM) are useful to assess the impact of sinus surgery on a patient's symptoms and QOL. OBJECTIVE: This systematic review was undertaken to evaluate the impact of RESS on PROMs. METHODS: Medical literature databases were searched for studies in English. References from retrieved articles and relevant reviews were examined for additional studies. Those studies that reported QOL outcome tools in patients who underwent RESS and with a minimum follow-up of 6 months were included. RESULTS: A search of the sources yielded 1856 citations. There were 72 articles after abstract review and exclusion, identified for full-text review, with 12 studies (which contained data from 1308 patients) that met the inclusion criteria for this systematic review. There were four "good" and eight "fair" studies. Three studies used the Rhinosinusitis Disability Index and Chronic Sinusitis Survey in tandem; two each used the 20-item Sino-Nasal Outcome Test and the 22-item Sino-Nasal Outcome Test; the remaining studies used either the Adelaide Disease Severity Score, Patient Response Score (PRS), Rhinosinusitis Symptom Inventory, Rhinosinusitis Outcome Measure 31, or the Chinese version of the University of Pennsylvania Smell Identification Test. All studies used validated PROMs apart from the study that used PRS. Studies consistently reported improvement in the five key symptoms of nasal obstruction, rhinorrhea, postnasal drip, facial pain, and anosmia, although improvement in halitosis, fever, dental pain, and cough were modest. CONCLUSION: Several PROMs demonstrated that RESS improves patient's QOL symptoms. Future studies that examine QOL should use a consistent PROM to allow a meta-analysis.

Authorship and citation manipulation in academic research.

Some scholars add authors to their research papers or grant proposals even when those individuals contribute nothing to the research effort. Some journal editors coerce authors to add citations that are not pertinent to their work and some authors pad their reference lists with superfluous citations. How prevalent are these types of manipulation, why do scholars stoop to such practices, and who among us is most susceptible to such ethical lapses? This study builds a framework around how intense competition for limited journal space and research funding can encourage manipulation and then uses that framework to develop hypotheses about who manipulates and why they do so. We test those hypotheses using data from over 12,000 responses to a series of surveys sent to more than 110,000 scholars from eighteen different disciplines spread across science, engineering, social science, business, and health care. We find widespread misattribution in publications and in research proposals with significant variation by academic rank, discipline, sex, publication history, co-authors, etc. Even though the majority of scholars disapprove of such tactics, many feel pressured to make such additions while others suggest that it is just the way the game is played. The findings suggest that certain changes in the review process might help to stem this ethical decline, but progress could be slow.

Transcranial non-invasive brain stimulation in swallowing rehabilitation following stroke--a review of the literature.

BACKGROUND: This descriptive review of the literature outlines the current evidence-base underpinning the potential of transcranial brain stimulation techniques to modulate swallowing function in healthy individuals and in treating post-stroke dysphagia. METHODS: Published research was identified by review of scientific databases (Scopus, Medline Ovid, Science Direct, AMED and Google Scholar) using relevant keywords. In addition, the reference lists of identified articles were scrutinized to identify further potentially relevant papers. Studies employing variants of transcranial magnetic or direct current stimulation for the purpose of modulating swallowing motor cortical excitability in healthy participants or dysphagia following stroke were included. Due to a significant heterogeneity in stimulation paradigms, all included studies were summarised and descriptively analysed in relation to the participants tested, cortical representations targeted by brain stimulation and outcome measures used. RESULTS: Seventeen studies met inclusion criteria (seven evaluating healthy participants, 10 evaluating participants presenting with post-stroke dysphagia). Cortical stimulation most commonly targeted pharyngeal motor representations (13/17 studies). In the 10 clinical studies, stimulation was applied contralesionally (5/10 studies), ipsilesionally (3/10 studies) or bilaterally (2/10 studies). A range of behavioural and neurophysiological outcome measures demonstrated positive effects on swallowing function across studies. CONCLUSION: There is promising proof of concept that non-invasive brain stimulation may provide a useful adjunct to post-stroke swallowing rehabilitation practice. Eventual transition of optimal paradigms into routine clinical practice will be accompanied by practical considerations in relation to local and national frameworks, e.g. the prescription and provision of treatment.

Effects of ethnic enclosure of neighborhoods, workplace, and industrial sectors on earnings.

In this study, we extend prior work on how ethnic boundaries in specific contexts affect the earnings of racial and ethnic groups by simultaneously exploring how levels of ethnic enclosure, measured by co-ethnic concentration, of neighborhoods, workplaces, and industrial sectors, and their "moderating" effects on the earnings of six major recent racial and ethnic immigrant groups in the eight largest Canadian cities. The consideration of ethnic boundaries in multiple contexts portrays a more realistic picture of the effect of ethnic boundaries on earnings. The study helps us to understand how ethnic enclosure in various contexts affects the economic attainments of groups with higher proportions of immigrants. The study is based on 2006 Canadian census data. The findings show that most members of the six included racial/ethnic minority groups live and work in environments with high levels of ethnic enclosure. Besides, in general, the earnings of employees are negatively related to co-ethnic concentration in neighborhood and workplace, while the relationship with industrial co-ethnic concentration is not consistent. The earnings of employers are negatively related to co-ethnic concentration in the workplace only. The moderating effects of various co-ethnic contexts on earnings are mostly positive for both employers and employees, although they are more likely to be significant among employees. In addition, the findings show variations among the six groups.