scholarly journals Contribution of Spatial Concentration in Exaggerating Inequalities: Across Various Urban Regions of Pakistan

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 187-214
Author(s):  
Uzma Tabassum ◽  
Shaista Alam ◽  
Ambreen Fatima
Keyword(s):  
Resource Availability ◽  
Recent Literature ◽  
Labour Force ◽  
Industrial Agglomeration ◽  
Industrial Concentration ◽  
Urban Regions ◽  
Significant Coefficient ◽  
Index Value ◽  
Treat All ◽  
Positive Index

Industrial agglomeration and inequalities are much of the concerns in recent literature. Pakistan, being a developing country, is also restricted by resource availability to treat all regions equally with respect to investment and development. As a result, regions with growing agglomeration experience higher income levels relative to other regions. To investigate this empirically this study employed propensity score matching (PSM) across urban regions in Pakistan using Labour Force Survey data 2017-18. For agglomeration regional herfindhal indices were estimated and regions with above average index value along with having positive index growth were considered as treated or agglomerated regions. The positive and significant coefficient of regions with treatment signifies that regions with agglomeration were found to have higher relatively income. Hence introducing industrial concentration in untreated regions would be effective in reducing inequalities rather tackling them by reducing agglomeration in agglomerated regions.

scholarly journals Incident atrial fibrillation and its risk prediction in patients developing COVID-19: A machine learning based algorithm approach

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ash Genaidy
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Adverse Outcomes ◽  
Good Prediction ◽  
Main Effect Model ◽  
Effect Model ◽  
Main Effect ◽  
Index Value ◽  
Treat All ◽  
Better Than

Background The elderly multi-morbid patient is at high risk of adverse outcomes with COVID-19 complications, and in the general population, the development of incident AF is associated with worse outcomes in such patients. We therefore investigated incident AF risks in a large prospective population of elderly patients with/without incident COVID-19 cases and baseline cardiovascular/non-cardiovascular multi-morbidities. We used two approaches: main-effect modeling and secondly, a machine-learning (ML) approach accounting for complex dynamic relationships. Methods We studied a prospective elderly US cohort of 280592 patients from medical databases in a 8-month investigation of new COVID19 cases. Incident AF outcomes were examined in relationship to diverse multi-morbid conditions, COVID-19 status and demographic variables, with ML accounting for the dynamic nature of changing multimorbidity risk factors. Results Multi-morbidity contributed to the onset of confirmed COVID-19 cases with cognitive impairment (OR 1.69; 95%CI 1.52-1.88), anemia (OR 1.41; 95%CI 1.32-1.50), diabetes mellitus (OR 1.35; 95%CI 1.27-1.44) and vascular disease (OR 1.30; 95%CI 1.21-1.39) having the highest associations. A main effect model (C-index value 0.718) showed that COVID-19 had the highest association with incident AF cases (OR 3.12; 95%CI 2.61-3.710, followed by congestive heart failure (1.72; 95%CI 1.50-1.96), then coronary artery disease (OR 1.43; 95%CI 1.27-1.60) and valvular disease (1.42; 95%CI 1.26-1.60). The ML algorithm demonstrated improved discriminatory validity incrementally over the statistical main effect model (training: C-index 0.729, 95%CI 0.718-0.740; validation: C-index 0.704, 95%CI 0.687-0.72). Calibration of ML based formulation was satisfactory and better than the main-effect model. Decision curve analysis demonstrated that the clinical utility for the ML based formulation was better than the ‘treat all’ strategy and the main effect model. Conclusion COVID-19 status has major implications for incident AF in a cohort with diverse cardiovascular/non-cardiovascular multi-morbidities. Our approach accounting for dynamic multimorbidity changes had good prediction for incident AF amongst incident COVID19 cases.

scholarly journals Measuring the Level of Financial Development of U.E. Member Countries

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 221-232
Author(s):  
Alexandra Nastu ◽  
Stelian Stancu ◽  
Andreea Dumitrache
Keyword(s):  
Financial Development ◽  
Poverty Reduction ◽  
Composite Index ◽  
Financial System ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Literature Study ◽  
Eu Member States ◽  
Index Value ◽  
To Receive ◽  
Positive Index

Abstract A financial sector that is developed and well functional is a key component of an economy. Numerous articles in the literature study the influence of financial development on the poverty reduction or on the economic growth. However, this paper proposes to compare the level of financial development of EU member states, but also to discover a shortcut in defining the financial level of a country. The methodology that allows this is composed of three steps: creating a composite index based on the main principal components that measure the level of the financial system; creating a categorical variable based on the values of the index (financial developed countries have a positive index value and vice versa) and applying the Decision Trees algorithm to the extended dataset. The results of the study show an underdeveloped financial level for Romania, which is at the opposite pole from Luxembourg, the country with the highest level of the financial system. Among the definition patterns found, is the following condition: if the percent of accounts used to receive wages is greater than 49.74%, the saved using a savings club in the past year (%) is greater than 3.95%, the customer price index is greater than 106.99 and the debit card (%) is greater than 90.69%, then this indicate a good financial development level.

scholarly journals Performance of a Commercial Immunoglobulin M Antibody Capture Assay Using Analyte-Specific Reagents To Screen for Interfering Factors during a West Nile Virus Epidemic Season in Nebraska

2006 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony R. Sambol ◽  
Steven H. Hinrichs ◽  
Wayne R. Hogrefe ◽  
Beth K. Schweitzer
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
West Nile Virus ◽  
Cerebral Spinal Fluid ◽  
Immunoglobulin M ◽  
Epidemic Season ◽  
Capture Assay ◽  
Value Range ◽  
Antibody Capture ◽  
Index Value ◽  
Positive Index

ABSTRACT In 2003, the Nebraska Public Health Laboratory tested more than 10,371 serum and 516 cerebral spinal fluid specimens. Results showed that without performing the interfering factors screen for specimens in the low positive index value range of >1.1 to ≤3.5, a false positivity rate of 6.5% would have been realized.

scholarly journals Partner Power: A study of two distance education consortia

2006 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Banks Pidduck ◽  
Tom Carey
Keyword(s):  
Distance Education ◽  
Social Network ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Resource Availability ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Recent Literature ◽  
Partner Selection ◽  
Business Plans ◽  
Network Diagrams

This research reports findings from a study which explored the process and criteria of partner selection – how and why partners are chosen – for two distance education consortia. The researchers reviewed recent literature on partnerships and partner selection. Two Canada-wide distance education consortia were identified as large-scale case studies for investigation of the research theory. A total of 34 informants were contacted. Written business plans, contracts, documents, partner network diagrams, and 231 archival emails from 36 correspondents were collected and analyzed for the two consortia. The research identified four criteria that influence why specific partners are chosen: requirements, resource availability, social network, and reputation. These findings suggest that the formation of partnerships and the process of partner selection are both very complex.

scholarly journals Divergence of some socio-economic indicators between rural and urban areas in Slovakia

2008 ◽  
Vol 53 (No. 6) ◽  
pp. 256-262 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Buchta ◽  
Z. Štulrajter
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Labour Force ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Economic Indicators ◽  
Demographic Structure ◽  
Rural Regions ◽  
Urban Regions ◽  
Active Population ◽  
Cheap Labour

The article is dealing with the evaluation of socio-economic development in Slovakia from the point of view of urban and the rural regions in 1999−2005, based on analysis of regional socio-economic indicators. This development is characterised by deepening differentiation between the urban and rural districts in the demographic structure of population, employment, unemployment, level of wages and salaries and private enterprising activities. Demographic structure in the rural regions, compared to the urban regions, is characterised by the increase of the share of population in post-productive age, ageing index and the unfavourable index of economic burden. Employment in the rural regions decreased at a more rapid rate than in the urban regions. From the unemployment point of view, there are significant regional differences in the SR. The worst affected are the regions of Eastern and south of Central Slovakia which suffer from the underdeveloped economic infrastructure, lower level of education, bankruptcy of the dominant industrial employers and a large share of agrarian population, where impact of transformation measures was the most severe. Unemployment rate in the rural regions was 2.2 times higher than in the urban regions in 2005. Growth rate of average wages and salaries is slower in the rural regions compared to the urban ones and the average of the SR. In the period of 1999–2005, the level of average wages and salaries in the rural regions accounted for 62.4% of average wages and salaries in the urban regions, during which the time trend of increasing wage disparity was continuing all the time. The trend of utilisation of cheap labour force for short part-time jobs is evident, particularly in the rural regions, which is in contrast to the growth of the standard of living and sustainable development of underdeveloped regions. The differentiation of economic level between urban and the rural regions is expressed also in the share of entrepreneurial entities in economically active population which tells against the rural regions in spite of the diminished differentiation in this indicator in 1999–2005. The declining rate of growth in number of entrepreneurs in the urban regions is a consequence of the saturation of spatial and employment opportunities, while there is a substantially larger potential of acceleration of private enterprising in the rural regions. Continuation of this development leads to the socially unacceptable differentiation and undesirable development of dual economies in the country and that is why it is necessary to solve this issue as a priority within the framework of the strategy of economic development of the SR.

Materials for Electron Beam Information Storage

1969 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 152-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. E. Speliotis
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Electron Beam ◽  
Recent Literature ◽  
Electron Beams ◽  
Information Storage ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Magnetic Field

The interaction of electron beams with a large variety of materials for information storage has been the subject of numerous proposals and studies in the recent literature. The materials range from photographic to thermoplastic and magnetic, and the interactions with the electron beam for writing and reading the information utilize the energy, or the current, or even the magnetic field associated with the electron beam.

Optical characteristics of the hitachi HF-2000 cold field-emission TEM

1993 ◽  
Vol 51 ◽  
pp. 1076-1077
Author(s):  
L. F. Allard ◽  
E. Völkl ◽  
T. A. Nolan
Keyword(s):  
Field Emission ◽  
Recent Literature ◽  
Electron Gun ◽  
High Brightness ◽  
Condenser Lens ◽  
Illumination System ◽  
High Resolution Images ◽  
Imaging Mode ◽  
Better Than ◽  
Illuminating System

The illumination system of the cold field emission (CFE) Hitachi HF-2000 TEM operates with a single condenser lens in normal imaging mode, and with a second condenser lens excited to give the ultra-fine 1 nm probe for microanalysis. The electron gun provides a guaranteed high brightness of better than 7×l08 A/cm2/sr, more than twice the guaranteed brightness of Schottky emission guns. There have been several articles in the recent literature (e.g. refs.) which claim that the geometry of this illumination system yields a total current which is so low that when the beam is spread at low magnifications (say 10 kX), the operator must “keep his eyes glued to the binoculars” in order to see the image. It is also claimed that this illuminating system produces an isoplanatic patch (the area over which image character does not vary significantly) at high magnification which is so small that the instrument is ineffective for recording high resolution images.

Aging and Autism

2012 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 69-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pamela A. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Autism Spectrum Disorders ◽  
Patient Group ◽  
Older Patients ◽  
Geriatric Patients ◽  
Recent Literature ◽  
Communication Disorders ◽  
Autism Spectrum ◽  
Need For Support ◽  
Spectrum Disorders

In this article, I will review the available recent literature about the aging population with autism, a patient group that researchers know little about and a group that is experiencing a growing need for support from communication disorders professionals. Speech-language pathologists working with geriatric patients should become familiar with this issue, as the numbers of older patients with autism spectrum disorders is likely to increase. Our profession and our health care system must prepare to meet the challenge these patients and residents will present as they age.

Measuring Impact of Stress in Sandwich Generation Caring for Demented Parents

GeroPsych ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 171-179 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence M. Solberg ◽  
Lauren B. Solberg ◽  
Emily N. Peterson
Keyword(s):  
Factor Analysis ◽  
Exploratory Factor Analysis ◽  
Social Worker ◽  
Resource Availability ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Sandwich Generation ◽  
Item Questionnaire ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Adult Caregivers ◽  
The Impact

Stress in caregivers may affect the healthcare recipients receive. We examined the impact of stress experienced by 45 adult caregivers of their elderly demented parents. The participants completed a 32-item questionnaire about the impact of experienced stress. The questionnaire also asked about interventions that might help to reduce the impact of stress. After exploratory factor analysis, we reduced the 32-item questionnaire to 13 items. Results indicated that caregivers experienced stress, anxiety, and sadness. Also, emotional, but not financial or professional, well-being was significantly impacted. There was no significant difference between the impact of caregiver stress on members from the sandwich generation and those from the nonsandwich generation. Meeting with a social worker for resource availability was identified most frequently as a potentially helpful intervention for coping with the impact of stress.

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