Heteroptera research in Latin America and the Caribbean (Insecta, Hemiptera): status and perspectives in the 21st century.

Latin American and the Caribbean regions (LAC) harbor one of the most biodiverse areas of the world, the Neotropics. True bugs (Hemiptera: Heteroptera) are a diverse lineage of insects, with more than 45,000 species, particularly speciose in the Neotropical region. True bugs are fundamental in the dynamics of natural and modified ecosystems, with several species critical to agriculture and public health. We compiled Heteroptera research in LAC from 1998-2022 using bibliographic databases. Productivity, collaborative networks, and the main topics studied were analyzed. A total of 1,651 Heteroptera studies from LAC were found, with continuous growth being 2021 the most prolific. Four categories (Taxonomy of extant species, Faunistic inventories and new records, Pest species biology, and Community ecology) represent most of the published research. About 60 percent of the records evaluated correspond to five families (Pentatomidae, Reduviidae, Coreidae, Miridae, and Rhyparochromidae). We emphasize the need to keep working on Heteroptera taxonomy because it will allow further advances in other areas such as phylogenetic analyses, biogeography, ecology, and natural history, among others. The results of our analyses characterize the current state of heteropterology in the region, establishing a baseline for future studies and efforts to broaden the knowledge of the group.

Body Mapping and Story Circles in Sexual Health Research With Youth of Color: Methodological Insights and Study Findings From Adolescent X, an Art-Based Research Project.

We describe the implementation and select findings from Adolescent X, an arts-based research project that used story circles and body mapping to elucidate how young people understand the relationship between their social contexts and their sexual and reproductive health, with a particular focus on youth's understandings of gender, sexuality, and the body as sites of possibility and power. A community-based sample of N = 24 youth of color was recruited from the South and West Sides of Chicago to participate in 3-day workshops. In addition to story circles and body mapping, data were collected via brief surveys with N = 24 youth, debriefing groups (n = 10 youth), and focus groups (n = 14 youth). Study data consisted of (1) body map visuals, that is, legends, mini-, and full-body maps; (2) written body map narratives; and (3) audio recordings of the story circles, body mapping activities, debriefing groups, and focus groups. All audio recordings were transcribed, deidentified, and uploaded in Dedoose for qualitative thematic analysis. Data analysis was conducted by a team of independent coders. Across all sources of data, three major themes were identified: (1) strong feelings of unsafety related to how young people's bodies are gendered, sexualized, and racialized in different social settings; (2) the extent to which adults and institutions foster youth safety; and (3) sources of young people's coping and resilience. Implications for public health research, practice, and policy are discussed.

Mapping palliative and end of care research in Australia (2000-2018).

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study is to map the existent research undertaken in Australia into broad thematic areas and identify the characteristics of the studies and areas of future research in the literature. METHODS: A scoping review methodology was employed to map the current areas of research undertaken in Australia since January 2000 until the end of December 2018 according to years of publications, types of studies, populations studied, research themes, and areas of focus. RESULTS: Our review identified 1,405 Australian palliative care research publications between January 2000 and December 2018. Nearly 40% of the studies were quantitative (39%) and a third were qualitative studies (31%). The remainder of the studies were reviews, mixed methods, quality improvement projects, and others. One-third (30%) of the research was done with carers' participants followed by nurses (22%) and doctors and physicians (18%). The most frequently reported diagnosis in the studies was cancer with 42% of the publication total. The most frequently explored theme was physical symptoms (such as pain, breathlessness, nausea, delirium, and dyspnea) with a total of 16% of all articles followed by communication (15%). There was a large gap to the next most frequently explored theme with service delivery (9%) and coordination of care (8%). Assessment of patients (7%), end-of-life decision-making (6%), and rural/regional (6%) all produced a similar number of publications. Very few studies addressed topics such as quality of life, E-Health, after-hours care, spirituality, and health economics. Moreover, there were only 15 (1%) studies focused on the last days of life. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE RESULTS: The current review presented a comprehensive search of the literature across almost two decades in Australia in the palliative care setting. It has covered a breadth of research topics and highlighted urgent areas for further research.

Malaria research in Malawi from 1984 to 2016: a literature review and bibliometric analysis.

BACKGROUND: Malaria research can play a vital role in addressing the malaria burden in Malawi. An organized approach in addressing malaria in Malawi started in 1984 by the establishment of the first National Malaria Control Programme and research was recognized to be significant. This study aimed to assess the type and amount of malaria research conducted in Malawi from 1984 to 2016 and its related source of funding. METHODS: A systematic literature search was conducted in the Medline/PubMed database for Malawian publications and approved malaria studies from two Ethical Committees were examined. Bibliometric analysis was utilized to capture the affiliations of first and senior/last authors, funding acknowledgements, while titles, abstracts and accessed full text were examined for research type. RESULTS: A total of 483 publications and 165 approved studies were analysed. Clinical and basic research in the fields of malaria in pregnancy 105 (21.5%), severe malaria 97 (20.1%) and vector and/or agent dynamics 69 (14.3%) dominated in the publications while morbidity 33 (20%), severe malaria 28 (17%) and Health Policy and Systems Research 24 (14.5%) dominated in the approved studies. In the publications, 146 (30%) first authors and 100 (21%) senior authors, and 88 (53.3%) principal investigators in approved studies were affiliated to Malawian-based institutions. Most researchers were affiliated to the Malawi-Liverpool Wellcome Trust, College of Medicine, Blantyre Malaria Project, Ministry of Health, and Malaria Alert Centre. The major malaria research funders were the National Institute for Health/USA, Wellcome Trust and the US Agency for International Development. Only three (2.5%) out of 118 journals publishing research on malaria in Malawi were from Africa and the Malaria Journal, with 76 (15.7%) publications, published most of the research from Malawi, followed by the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene with 57 (11.8%) in comparison to only 13 (2.7%) published in the local Malawi Medical Journal. CONCLUSIONS: Clinical and basic research, which is mostly funded externally, in the fields of malaria in pregnancy, severe malaria and vector and/or agent dynamics dominated, while health policy and system research was least supported. The quantity may reflect scientific research activity but the initial primary impact is contribution to policy development.

Addition of a Decision Point in Evidence-Based Practice Process Steps to Distinguish EBP, Research and Quality Improvement Methodologies.

This column shares the best evidence-based strategies and innovative ideas on how to facilitate the learning of EBP principles and processes by clinicians as well as nursing and interprofessional students. Guidelines for submission are available at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1741--6787.

The RICHE taxonomy - an innovative means of classification of child health research.

BACKGROUND: Research outputs increase inexorably. Health is now a required element in all policies of the European Union. There is a need for a system that helps to navigate the vast body of children's health research, identify pertinent research institutions, discover ongoing and recently funded research projects and identify gaps where there is little knowledge. METHODS: The European Commission funded the Research Inventory of Child Health in Europe (RICHE) project through the Framework 7 Programme, to identify gaps in child health research in Europe. A necessary first step was to identify and index current research, for which a website repository was created. As a basis for this task, an innovative taxonomy was necessary to encompass the many arenas of children's health and development, including subjects outside the traditional areas of children's health. Drawing inspiration from existing taxonomies, library systems and other forms of classification, a multi-axial approach was selected as the best way to encompass the many influences on children's health. Six axes were identified and their contents defined. All of the axes can be viewed and searched independently, as well as in relation to each other. The axes encompass factors and service areas that impact on children, including health, education, justice, the environment and others. This has created a system that is consistent and impartial, but adaptable to an enormous variety of uses. RESULTS: The taxonomy has been tested and validated by a number of well-respected academics, researchers and practitioners across Europe. It forms the basis of an intuitive and accessible database. This allows research knowledge to be easily identified and for networking to take place. CONCLUSIONS: The RICHE taxonomy facilitates retrieval of knowledge - ongoing research as well as findings - in order to inform researchers and policy makers who wish to include children's health as an element of new policy.

The global stock of research evidence relevant to health systems policymaking.

BACKGROUND: Policymakers and stakeholders need immediate access to many types of research evidence to make informed decisions about the full range of questions that may arise regarding health systems. METHODS: We examined all types of research evidence about governance, financial and delivery arrangements, and implementation strategies within health systems contained in Health Systems Evidence (HSE) (http://www.healthsystemsevidence.org). The research evidence types include evidence briefs for policy, overviews of systematic reviews, systematic reviews of effects, systematic reviews addressing other questions, systematic reviews in progress, systematic reviews being planned, economic evaluations, and health reform and health system descriptions. Specifically, we describe their distribution across health system topics and domains, trends in their production over time, availability of supplemental content in various languages, and the extent to which they focus on low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), as well as (for systematic reviews) their methodological quality and the availability of user-friendly summaries. RESULTS: As of July 2013, HSE contained 2,629 systematic reviews of effects (of which 501 are Cochrane reviews), 614 systematic reviews addressing other questions, 283 systematic reviews in progress, 186 systematic reviews being planned, 140 review-derived products (evidence briefs and overviews of systematic reviews), 1,669 economic evaluations, 1,092 health reform descriptions, and 209 health system descriptions. Most systematic reviews address topics related to delivery arrangements (n = 2,663) or implementation strategies (n = 1,653) with far fewer addressing financial (n = 241) or governance arrangements (n = 231). In addition, 2,928 systematic reviews have been quality appraised with moderate AMSTAR ratings found for reviews addressing governance (5.6/11), financial (5.9/11), and delivery (6.3/11) arrangements and implementation strategies (6.5/11); 1,075 systematic reviews have no independently produced user-friendly summary and only 737 systematic reviews have an LMIC focus. Literature searches for half of the systematic reviews (n = 1,584, 49%) were conducted within the last five years. CONCLUSIONS: Greater effort needs to focus on assessing whether the current distribution of systematic reviews corresponds to policymakers' and stakeholders' priorities, updating systematic reviews, increasing the quality of systematic reviews, and focusing on LMICs.

Development of advance care planning research priorities: a call to action.

The objective of this study was to develop a national, prioritized research agenda for advance care planning (ACP). We first identified a list of comprehensive ACP research topics and determined priority criteria through focus groups. We next conducted a survey wherein importance weights were assigned to priority criteria and each ACP topic was rated. We combined weights and ratings into overall scores. A total of 17 ACP topics were developed and placed into four categories: patients and family members, the general public, professionals, and the healthcare system. Four main priority criteria were created: feasibility, consistency with ethical and societal values, economic considerations, and impact. Of the 100 individuals we invited to participate in the survey, 62 accepted. Prioritized topics centred largely on the impact of ACP on health resource utilization, communicating advance care planning across settings, and the preferred manner of engaging patients in ACP.

[Rating and ranking of medical journals: a randomised controlled evaluation of impact factor and number of listed journals]. / Rating und Ranking medizinischer Zeitschriften: Randomisiert kontrollierte Evaluation von Impact Factor und Zahl der gelisteten Journale.

BACKGROUND: The impact factor is a purely bibliometric parameter built on a number of publications and their citations that occur within clearly defined periods. Appropriate interpretation of the impact factor is important as it is also used worldwide for the evaluation of research performance. RESEARCH QUESTION: It is assumed that the number of medical journals reflects the extent of diseases and patient populations involved and that the number is correlated with the level of the impact factor. METHOD: 174 category lists (Subject Categories) are included in the area Health Sciences of the ISI Web of Knowledge of Thomson Reuters, 71 of which belong to the field of medicine and 50 of which have a clinical and/or application-oriented focus. These alphabetically arranged 50 category lists were consecutively numbered, randomized by odd and even numbers, respectively, into 2 equal-sized groups and then grouped according to organ specialities, sub-specialities and cross-disciplinary fields. By tossing up a coin it was decided which group should be evaluated first. Only then the category lists were downloaded and the number of journals, as well as the impact factors of journals ranking number 1 and 2, as well as the impact factors of journals at the end of the first third and at the end of the first half of each category list were compared. RESULTS: The number of journals per category list varies considerably between 5 and 252. The lists of organ specialties and cross-disciplinary fields include more than three times as many journals as those of the sub-specialities; the highest numbers of journals are listed for the cross-disciplinary fields. The level of impact factor of journals that rank number 1 in the lists varies considerably and ranges from 3,058 to 94,333; a similar variability exists for the journals at rank 2. On the other hand, the impact factor of journals at the end of the first third of the lists varies from 1,214 and 3,953, and for those journals at the end of the first half of a respective category list it varies from 0,609 and 2,872. The slope of the straight correlation line between the level of impact factors of journals at rank 1 and 2 with the number of listed journals varies from 0,0756 and 0,2651 (correlation coefficients between 0,49 and 0,96). For the journals ranking further down in the lists the straight correlation lines run almost horizontally or with inverse slope. CONCLUSIONS: This current analysis adds to the knowledge for an appropriate interpretation of the impact factor. Generally, greater importance should be given to the ranking of a journal within a corresponding category list.

Living through multispecies societies: Approaching the microbiome with Imanishi Kinji.

Recent research about the microbiome points to a picture in which we, humans, are 'living through' nature, and nature itself is living in us. Our bodies are hosting-and depend on-the multiple species that constitute human microbiota. This article will discuss current research on the microbiome through the ideas of Japanese ecologist Imanishi Kinji (1902-1992). First, some of Imanishi's key ideas regarding the world of living beings and multispecies societies are presented. Second, seven types of relationships concerning the human microbiome, human beings, and the environment are explored. Third, inspired by Imanishi's work, this paper develops the idea of dynamic, porous, and complex multispecies societies in which different living beings or species are codependent on others, including microbiota and human beings.

Pluralism and incommensurability in suicide research.

This paper examines the complex research landscape of contemporary suicidology from a philosophy of science perspective. I begin by unpacking the methods, concepts, and assumptions of some of the prominent approaches to studying suicide causation, including psychological autopsy studies, epidemiological studies, biological studies, and qualitative studies. I then analyze the different ways these approaches partition the causes of suicide, with particular emphasis on the ways they conceptualize the domain of mental disorder. I argue that these different ways of partitioning the causal space and conceptualizing mental disorder result in incommensurabilities between the approaches. These incommensurabilities restrict the degrees to which the different approaches can be integrated, thus lending support to explanatory pluralism in the study of suicide causation. They also shed light on some of the philosophical underpinnings of the disagreement between mainstream suicidology and the emerging area of critical suicidology.

Paulo Freire's research itinerary: contributions for promoting health in the teaching profession.

OBJECTIVES: examine Paulo Freire's research itinerary as a theoretical-methodological framework and its contributions for promoting health in the teaching profession. METHODS: qualitative participatory action research coordinated with Paulo Freire's itinerary, carried out in culture circles, from April 18, 2018 to June 26, 2018. It involved the participation of 21 teachers from a federal teaching institution. RESULTS: the method that was used promoted dialogue and reflection among the participants, enabling a health promotion intervention. It facilitated self-knowledge and reflection, resulting in significant changes in the participants, in a process in pursuit that seeks transformations. Final Considerations: Paulo Freire's research itinerary was opportune, as a possibility for promoting health, mainly in terms of providing a framework that assists in the practical construction of knowledge and encourages participants to examine their reality in the pursuit of enhanced quality of life.