The effectiveness of humanoid diagram teaching strategy on care capacity and retention in novice nurses

AimTo examine the effectiveness of a Humanoid Diagram Teaching Strategy (HDTS) on care capabilities and retention of novice nurses.BackgroundGuiding novice nurses in clinical practice is a matter of concern and the use of diagrams in assisting the learning process and to promote learning efficiency has been acknowledged.DesignThis is a quasi-experimental study with asynchronous repeated measurements for the experimental and control groups.MethodsThe study was conducted in a medical centre in southern Taiwan with 24 novice nurses. The intervention, Humanoid Diagrams Teaching Strategy, contained three parts: the head and neck; trunk; and limbs. The HDTS was applied three time weekly. Each session lasted approximately 30 min and the training lasted 4 weeks. The effectiveness of HDTS was measured using Mini-CEX, CbD and retention rates in the 3rd and 6th months of novice nurses’ experience.ResultsAfter the HDTS, although increases in mini-CEX and CbD scores in the experimental group were greater than the control group, these differences were not statistically significant after considering the time interaction. But the 3rd month and 6th month novice nurses’ retention rates were statistically significantly different by comparing the differences under the time interaction effects in both groups.ConclusionsThe Humanoid Diagram Teaching Strategy is an effective tool for preceptors to use in assisting novice nurses in learning, improving their nursing care knowledge and technical skills and to increase their retention rate.     

Development and validation of standardized severity rating scale to assess the consistency of drug-drug interaction severity among various drug information resources

BackgroundThe consistency in reporting the severity of drug interactions across the drug information resources is important in guiding the appropriate clinical use of drug-pairs, to minimize the associated adverse events. This necessitates the need of a standardized severity rating scale, that can accommodate the different severity ratings of the same interacting drug-pair into a reasonable severity category, that can ease the consistency assessment among different drug information resources.ObjectiveTo develop and validate a standardized severity rating scale that can ease the consistency assessment among the various drug information resources.MethodsThe definitions of various severity rating categories as documented in the eight drug information resources was consolidated to develop a standardized severity rating scale. Thus developed rating scale was validated using twenty commonly used drug-pairs. Fleiss' kappa score was used as an indicator for assessing overall consistency among various drug information resources, whereas, Cohen's kappa was used as an indicator of level of consistency between two drug information resources and between individual drug information resource and newly developed standardized severity rating scale.ResultsThe newly developed standardized severity rating scale classifies the severity of drug-drug interactions into three categories namely mild, moderate and major. The Fleiss' kappa score was improved from 0.047 to 0.176, indicating improved strength of agreement [Average pairwise agreement: 16% Vs 36.7%] among various drug information resources. The average pairwise Cohen's kappa was 0.082 [Strength of agreement: poor] in original severity ratings whereas it was improved to 0.198 [Strength of agreement: almost equal to fair] in standardized severity rating scale.ConclusionThe newly developed standardized severity rating scale can be used as a tool to assess the consistency of severity rating categories among the various drug information resources.     

中国中医药资源配置水平及影响因素探讨＊

目的 分析2013-2019年中国31省市中医药资源配置水平及区域差异，探讨影响资源配置水平的主要因素，为优化中国中医药资源配置提供依据。方法 选取具有代表性的每万人口中医药机构数、每万人口中医药技术人员以及每万人口中医药床位数作为中医药资源配置水平的指标，利用统计年鉴2013-2019年的面板数据，综合运用熵权法、可分解的泰尔指数以及面板时间固定效应模型，分析各省份中医药资源配置水平及区域公平性差异和影响因素。结果 中国中医药资源配置水平均值为0.165，整体呈现递增趋势，不同省份间配置水平有差异；按人口配置的总体泰尔指数优于按面积配置的指数；公平性差异主要来自于四大经济区区域内差异；经济发展水平、城镇化水平和财政自主度是影响中医药资源配置的主要因素（P<0.05）。结论 中医药资源配置整体水平呈增长趋势，资源配置的公平性有待于进一步提高，应重点关注区域内的不公平性。经济发展水平、城镇化水平和财政自主度是影响中医药资源配置水平的主要因素，建议各地区根据当地不同现状精准施策。     

中草药种植品质知识图谱的构建

科学合理地种植中草药是解决中药资源紧缺、保障中药质量的根本方法。中草药品质受种子种苗、种植措施、土壤状况等多种因素影响，各影响因素对中草药品质产生不同的作用，但迄今为止并没有通过调控中草药种植因素分析中药材品质的模型和方法。因此，本研究通过文献调研结合专家种植经验，综合分析影响中草药种植指标的复杂因素，以提高中药材品质为目标，基于图数据库的方法构建影响不同中草药种植品质的知识图谱，探讨中草药种植因素与指标之间的关系，通过调节影响中药材品质的因素，为中草药种植以及提高中药品质提供依据。     

不同产地细辛中主要有效成分含量测定与比较

目的研究47份不同来源、不同表型正品细辛样品的有效成分含量,评价正品细辛样品的质量,揭示有效成分形成与遗传和地域的关系,为细辛优良品种选育与开发利用提供理论依据。方法冷凝回流法提取挥发油、乙醇热浸法提取醇溶性浸出物,HPLC法测定细辛脂素含量、气质联用(GC-MS)分析挥发油组分,组间联接法进行聚类分析。结果 47份细辛样品挥发油量0.81%～3.32%。有5份样品挥发油量超过3.0%。醇溶性浸出物量为9.87%～29.40%,含量超过20%的样品占总数的63.8%。细辛脂素质量分数为0.118%～0.424%,有26份样品细辛脂素质量分数超过0.25%;47份细辛挥发油可分离出的化合物种类48～77种,化合物种类和含量有较大差异。基于有效成分的聚类分析将不同来源地、不同表型的细辛分为10类,聚类方式基本是按照来源地为基础进行聚类,同一来源地的汉城细辛和北细辛聚在一类中。结论在同一栽培环境和条件下,不同来源地、不同植物学表型的样品个体间有效成分含量间存在差异,新品种选育时可依照植物表型选择优良育种材料。大部分样品聚类与来源地域有关而与植物表型以及植物学分类无关。     

Findings from an OMFS journal club: is COVID-19 the catalyst we have needed to embrace technology?

The COVID-19 outbreak has rapidly progressed into a worldwide pandemic, and the need for social distancing has changed the way we learn and work. Our monthly OMFS journal club has been no different, and is currently meeting on the video conferencing application Microsoft Teams. The use of a virtual setting for training in medicine and dentistry is not new and, as in the case of our recent move to a virtual medium, it may be that COVID-19 has fast-tracked this digital transformation. There are of course disadvantages to online teaching that traditional face-to-face teaching overcomes. We conducted a survey to examine how trainees' attitudes and experiences have altered with this change, and to understand whether some elements of this new style of training may be advantageous in the post-pandemic world. We aimed to assess trainees’ attitudes towards online teaching, and which elements, if any, would be beneficial once face-to-face teaching becomes possible again. A survey was created for all trainees taking part in journal club meetings at Bradford Teaching Hospitals. Multiple-choice and Likert scale questions were designed to ascertain the differences in experience between online and face-to-face settings. A Wilcoxon matched pairs signed test was used to analyse the results. Responses were kept anonymous. Results showed that the majority of trainees found it easier to attend the online journal club, and also indicated that the most found Microsoft Teams easy to use, though we did not have another online application for comparison. There was no significant difference in participation comfort between the two settings, though trainees felt that the online setting considerably improved learning effectiveness. Furthermore, 79% (11/14) thought that online tutorials and meetings should replace traditional face-to-face meetings in the future. The use of internet technology such as video conferencing is not new, and although journal clubs are typically held in academic institutions, online and virtual clubs are flourishing. With an array of advantages, there is no shying away from the trend to move our teaching to a virtual medium. COVID-19 may have just provided the stimulus that has forced this transformation to accelerate.