Use of an intelligent tutoring system for a curriculum on augmentative and alternative communication: Feasibility for implementation.

BACKGROUND: Over 8 million children with disabilities live in Africa and are candidates for augmentative and alternative communication (AAC), yet formal training for team members, such as speech-language therapists and special education teachers, is extremely limited. Only one university on the continent provides postgraduate degrees in AAC, and other institutions provide only short modules at an undergraduate level. The need for an introductory training course on AAC that is accessible by university students continent-wide was identified. An online programme, namely an intelligent tutoring system (ITS), was identified as a possible option to facilitate interactive learning without the need for synchronous teaching. The use of an ITS is shown to be effective in developing knowledge and clinical reasoning in the health and rehabilitation fields. However, it has not yet been applied to student teaching in the field of AAC. AIM: To determine both the feasibility of an ITS to implement an AAC curriculum for students in four African countries, and the usability and effectiveness of such a system as a mechanism for learning about AAC. METHOD & PROCEDURES: The study included two components: the development of a valid AAC curriculum; and using the ITS to test the effectiveness of implementation in a pre- and post-test design with 98 speech-language therapy and special education students from five universities. OUTCOMES & RESULTS: Statistically significant differences were obtained between pre- and post-test assessments. Students perceived the learning experience as practical, with rich content. CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS: The findings suggest that the ITS-based AAC curriculum was positively perceived by the students and potentially offers an effective means of providing supplementary AAC training to students, although modifications to the system are still required. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS: What is already known on the subject Professionals typically lack formal training in AAC. In Africa, this presents a serious challenge as there are over 8 million children who are candidates for AAC. A need for an introductory training course on AAC, which can be accessed by university students continent-wide, was identified. What this paper adds to existing knowledge An AAC curriculum was developed and integrated into an ITS, an online programme allowing interactive learning through asynchronous teaching. Students from four African countries completed the AAC ITS curriculum. The curriculum was positively received by the students and statistically significant changes in knowledge were identified. What are the practical and clinical implications of this work? This feasibility study shows that the use of an ITS is an effective means of providing AAC training to university students in these African countries. The results provide a valuable contribution toward ensuring the equitable distribution of AAC training opportunities in the African context. This will have a significant positive impact on those who are candidates for AAC.

Occupational therapy assessment and interventions for young autistic children in South Africa.

Background: Occupational Therapy is among the top interventions for autistic children, hence the need for equitable and effective services in the public and private health and education sectors. Ongoing research into the therapies for autism spectrum disorders in different contexts is also required. Objectives: To explore and describe occupational therapists' assessment and intervention for autistic children in South Africa. Methods: A descriptive qualitative research design using semi-structured interviews to gather data from purposively recruited OTs (n=20). Data were audio-recorded, transcribed and analysed thematically, and compared across three sectors public health, special needs schools and private practice. Results: South African practice across all three sectors was similar to international patterns of informal play-based assessment, sensory processing and Ayres Sensory Integration (ASI®) treatment. Developmental frameworks guided specific approaches. Strong team collaboration was present across sectors, with some transdisciplinary teamwork and co-treatment. Undergraduate and postgraduate training opportunities were, however limited. Conclusions: Occupational therapy assessments had diagnostic value. Informal tools such as developmental checklists were found to have clinical utility, whilst standardised tools were most commonly used to assess sensory processing and visual perception. Recommendations included incorporating ASI® into undergraduate curricula and postgraduate training opportunities with multidisciplinary input to develop ASD professionals in South Africa. It is imperative to advocate for services in under-resourced rural areas and marginalised communities that lack financial and social resources. Occupational therapists need to find new ways of working collaboratively across sectors to ensure effective and comprehensive services in public health and special schools.

Deep learning classifiers for computer-aided diagnosis of multiple lungs disease.

BACKGROUND: Computer aided diagnosis has gained momentum in the recent past. The advances in deep learning and availability of huge volumes of data along with increased computational capabilities has reshaped the diagnosis and prognosis procedures. OBJECTIVE: These methods are proven to be relatively less expensive and safer alternatives of the otherwise traditional approaches. This study is focused on efficient diagnosis of three very common diseases: lung cancer, pneumonia and Covid-19 using X-ray images. METHODS: Three different deep learning models are designed and developed to perform 4-way classification. Inception V3, Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) and Long Short Term Memory models (LSTM) are used as building blocks. The performance of these models is evaluated using three publicly available datasets, the first dataset contains images for Lung cancer, second contains images for Covid-19 and third dataset contains images for Pneumonia and normal subjects. Combining three datasets creates a class imbalance problem which is resolved using pre-processing and data augmentation techniques. After data augmentation 1386 subjects are randomly chosen for each class. RESULTS: It is observed that CNN when combined with LSTM (CNN-LSTM) produces significantly improved results (accuracy of 94.5 %) which is better than CNN and InceptionV3-LSTM. 3,5, and 10 fold cross validation is performed to verify all results calculated using three different classifiersConclusions:This research concludes that a single computer-aided diagnosis system can be developed for diagnosing multiple diseases.

Frequency of low birth weight and its relationship with maternal serum zinc: a cross-sectional study.

Fetal and neonatal mortality and morbidity are connected to low birth weight (LBW), which is also associated with slow growth and cognitive development. Several factors, such as maternal nutrition, LBW deliveries, and additional dietary intake, contribute to pregnancy outcomes. This study aimed to compare the maternal serum zinc levels between the LBW and normal birth weight neonates. Moreover, we will also determine the frequency of LBW in the local population. Material and method: This cross-sectional study was conducted at a tertiary care hospital from June 2021 to June 2022. Three hundred eighty-two gravid females with active labor (≥2 uterine contractions in 10 min) were enrolled in the study. Neonates at birth were weighed and divided into two groups: LBW and average or normal birth weight. Maternal serum zinc levels were performed by serum multi-element spectrometry (ICP-DRC-MS method). The data were analyzed using SPSS software. Results: Three hundred eighty-two patients enrolled in this study. The results showed the mean age of patients was 24.04±3.49 years, and the mean maternal zinc levels were found to be 75.32±13.80 µg/dl, respectively. Babies delivered at LBW had low maternal mean serum zinc levels (63.88±10.95 mg/dl) compared to babies with normal birth weight whose levels were comparatively high (83.83±8.57 mg/dl). Conclusion: It can be concluded that maternal dietary factors and nutrition are essential during fetal development and have an important association with birth weight.Zinc supplementation and other minerals should be prioritized because they may increase these infants' birth weight. Increasing maternal zinc consumption has a significant positive linear relationship with infant birth weight.