Liquidity Risk Management and Financial Performance: Are Consumer Goods Companies Involved?

he study examines the effect of liquidity risk management on the financial performance of consumer goods companies. It was aimed at establishing the extent of concern of consumer goods companies in the management of their liquid cash, cash defensive intervals, long term debts, and quick ratios, for the purpose of turning around their financial performance. Data were obtained from the annual reports and accounts of studied companies and were converted to liquidity measurement parameters. Analyses were done using multiple regression analysis methods and findings show that long term debts, quick ratios, and cash defensive intervals have a significant effect on EPS and ROA, while cash ratio and long term debts affect ROCE only. Specifically, it was empirically established that there exists a significant relationship between liquidity risk management and the financial performance of consumer goods companies .Findings further reveal that companies’ non-concerned attitude to liquidity risk management affects the financial performance of consumer goods companies significantly. The study recommends that consumer goods companies should incorporate a clear liquidity risk management approach in their strategic policy framework and communicate the same to all functional units. Because of the strategic importance of consumer goods companies to the living standards of consumers, these companies should also establish and monitor risk warning dashboards to promptly arrest and manage risk variability and risk volatility in this very important sector of the economy.

Benchmarking Study of Prospective Preferability of Various Investment Patterns

The article offers the evaluation of investment performance in stock markets, money markets, product markets and others. The comparison is based on the «Return-Risk» Model grounded on the fundamental principles of H. Markowitz’s portfolio analysis. The quantitative comparison is conducted on return-risk ratio as well as return-risk variability intervals. In the formed group of leaders, the return-risk ratio was minimal (0,12) for the money market, and maximal (0,43) for the US stock market. The patterns in focus were grouped as follows: 1. High risk aversion: US branch analysis, currency index models, currency index models (sell) and intercontinental branch analysis.2. Medium risk aversion: US stock market, world stick indexes, precious metals market and exchange goods as a whole.3. Low risk aversion: Russia’s stock market. The practical evaluation of «Return-Risk» Models received for various investment patterns proved their practical validity. The empirical estimators of investment horizons computed for various groups of investment tools are of practical use.

Peculiarities of heart risk in patients with non - alcoholic fatial liver disease

Aim. The purpose of the study is to assess the characteristics of heart risk variability in patients with non - alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Materials and methods. The study included 103 patients. All patients were divided into three groups. The first group is 34 healthy patients. The second group - 34 patients with a diagnosis of coronary artery disease; exertional angina II-III FC. The third group - 35 patients diagnosed with NAFLD and type 2 diabetes. An assessment of abdominal circumference, body mass index, ALT, AST, XC, HDL, LDL, TG, glucose and the level of glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c), liver ultrasound and daily ECG monitoring with the determination of HRV were evaluated. Evaluated HRV using statistical analysis: avNN, ms; pNN 50%; SDNNidx, ms; SDNN, ms; SDNNidx, ms; RMSSD, ms. HRV characteristics were evaluated: VLF, LF, HF, LF/HF. Results. Compared with the first group, the increase in cholesterol in patients in the second group was noted by 38.8%, in the third group - by 43.7%, TG - by 34.6 and 41.95%. In patients with NAFLD + DM of the second type, SDNN and SDNNidx decreased in comparison with the healthy patients by 15% (p

WHAT ANATOMIC FEATURES GOVERN PERSONAL LONG-TERM HEALTH RISKS FROM BREAST CANCER RADIOTHERAPY?

Breast cancer radiotherapy may in the long term lead to radiation-induced secondary cancer or heart disease. These health risks hugely vary among patients, partially due to anatomy-driven differences in doses deposited to the heart, ipsilateral lung and contralateral breast. We identify four anatomic features that largely cover these dosimetric variations to enable personalized risk estimates. For three exemplary, very different risk scenarios, the given parameter set reproduces 63–74% of the individual risk variability for left-sided breast cancer patients. These anatomic features will be used in the PASSOS software to support decision processes in breast-cancer therapy.

Safeuristics! Do Heuristic Evaluation Violation Severity Ratings Correlate with Patient Safety Severity Ratings for a Native Electronic Health Record Mobile Application?

Objective Usability of electronic health records (EHRs) remains challenging, and poor EHR design has patient safety implications. Heuristic evaluation detects usability issues that can be classified by severity. The National Institute of Standards and Technology provides a safety scale for EHR usability. Our objectives were to investigate the relationship between heuristic severity ratings and safety scale ratings in an effort to analyze EHR safety. Materials and Methods Heuristic evaluation was conducted on seven common mobile EHR tasks, revealing 58 heuristic violations and 28 unique usability issues. Each usability issue was independently scored for severity by trained hospitalists and a Human Factors researcher and for safety severity by two physician informaticists and two clinical safety professionals. Results Results demonstrated a positive correlation between heuristic severity and safety severity ratings. Regression analysis demonstrated that 49% of safety risk variability by clinical safety professionals (r = 0.70; n = 28) and 42% of safety risk variability by clinical informatics specialists (r = 0.65; n = 28) was explained by usability severity scoring of problems outlined by heuristic evaluation. Higher severity ratings of the usability issues were associated with increased perceptions of patient safety risk. Discussion This study demonstrated the use of heuristic evaluation as a technique to quickly identify usability problems in an EHR that could lead to safety issues. Detection of higher severity ratings could help prioritize failures in EHR design that more urgently require design changes. This approach is a cost-effective technique for improving usability while impacting patient safety. Conclusion Results from this study demonstrate the efficacy of the heuristic evaluation technique to identify usability problems that impact safety of the EHR. Also, the use of interdisciplinary teams for evaluation should be considered for severity assessment.

Effectiveness of the water resources allocation institution in Tunisia

This paper examines the water allocation system and its effects on water use, users' behavior and on the country's achievement of desirable goals. It investigates efficiency, equity, and sustainability issues that arise under this allocation rule. The current allocation system functions according to a queuing system of priorities, where the urban allocation is found to be the most efficient and least risky allocation, while the ecological sector bears the highest degree of climate risk variability. The rule of priority is applied to crops as well; the non-strategic crops have the least efficient and riskiest allocation. The current system allows the country to secure drinking water supply, but it does not create sufficient incentives for entitlement holders that have priority to increase their water use efficiency, does not guarantee ecosystem health and integrity and does not equally distribute the risk among users. An institutional reform is especially relevant to improve water use performance in the agriculture sector and the country's ability to manage drought. The nonpriority system that allows farmers to exchange their water-use entitlement might increase social welfare of water use.