Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Assessing the need for an online decision-support tool to promote evidence-based practices of psychosocial counseling in HIV care

Abstract Psychosocial counselors have a vital and challenging role in supporting persons living with HIV/AIDS (PLWH/A) to better manage their disease. However, gaps in training, education, and skills limit the effectiveness of counselors’ efforts. We propose that the use of a decision-support tool for counselors at the point of care can support them in their work as well as help alleviate many training and practice gaps. Decision-support tools aimed at reducing knowledge and practice gaps are used extensively to assist clinical providers at the point of care; however, there is a need for decision-support tools designed specifically for HIV/AIDS counselors. To identify requirements for such a tool, we conducted a needs assessment through interviews of 19 HIV/AIDS clinic counselors who provide 20 or more hours per week of psychosocial support to PLWH/A. The assessment explored their education and training backgrounds, the extent to which evidence-based practices are implemented, and how a decision-support tool can support counselor work practices. Qualitative analysis was organized around seven main categories: counselor characteristics, patient characteristics, barriers, definitions of key concepts, use of guidelines, client assessments, and resources. The resulting coding schemes revealed knowledge and practice gaps among the interviewees, as well as barriers and challenges of counseling. Education and training background of the counseling staff varied widely. When asked to define five key concepts related to HIV counseling, 26–47% of respondents were unable to articulate an adequate definition. Less than half of the interviewees recalled sources of guidelines used in their work and specific models of care introduced during trainings. Interviews identified environmental barriers, language and literacy, patient education, and patient communication as the most prominent challenges to counseling work. The results from this study inform the need for and development of a decision-support tool to support the training and practices of HIV/AIDS counselors.
Ultrastructural Changes in Islets of the Rat Produced by Tolbutamide

The results of several different studies now indicate that the hypoglycemic effect of sulfonylurea compounds is apparently mediated by the release of increased amounts of insulin from the pancreas. " Yalow et al. have demonstrated with the immunochemical assay for insulin that the administration of tolbutamide to normal human subjects produces an increase in the level of serum insulin. Pfeiffer et al., using the epididymal fat pad assay, have reported an increase of insulin-like activity of serum from normal patients and elderly diabetics and of serum from rats after treatment with sulfonylurea compounds. Morphological evidence of accelerated insulin release after sulfonylureas is seen in degranulation of pancreatic beta cells. " Intact beta cells are necessary for this response as shown by the absence of a hypoglycemic effect of sulfonylureas following total pancreatectomy,' in alloxan-diabetic animals and in most juvenile diabetics. The mechanism by which sulfonylureas increase release of insulin from beta cells is unknown at the present time. The accumulation of information concerning their mechanism of action is of basic importance in the study of the etiology and pathogenesis of maturity-onset diabetes in man. In these patients, sulfonylureas apparently release sufficient quantities of insulin to maintain normoglycemia whereas the elevated blood sugar present in their diabetic state fails to stimulate the release of adequate amounts of insulin from their beta cells. Therefore, the objective of the present study was to utilize electron microscopy in determining the changes produced in the ultrastructure of beta cells of rats following treatment with tolbutamide. In order to obtain a closer correlation of the functional status of the beta cells with their morphologic appearance, the
Marketing in the C-Suite: A Study of Chief Marketing Officer Power in Firms' Top Management Teams

Abstract Some chief marketing officers (CMOs) are more powerful than others. The authors investigate the drivers and outcomes of this phenomenon using a hierarchical measure of power for the CMO in the top management team (TMT), or corporate executive suite (C-suite). Theory suggests that CMO power in the TMT should increase with (1) the CMO's control over resources required by other executives in the C-suite, (2) the criticality and (3) effective provision of these resources, and (4) the nonsubstitutability and (5) centrality of the CMO. The authors use these rationales to identify factors that affect CMO power in public U.S. firms with the CMO position for at least two of the five observed years. The findings show that CMO power increases when the CMO has the additional responsibility of sales, as TMT marketing experience decreases, and as firms with low levels of TMT marketing experience pursue innovation. Furthermore, CMO power in highly divisionalized TMTs and the CMO's additional responsibility of s.
VGLUT 2 is required for central respiratory rhythm generation but not for locomotor central pattern generation Abbreviated title : The role of VGLUT 2 in respiration

Glutamatergic excitatory neurotransmission is dependent on glutamate release from presynaptic vesicles loaded by three members of the solute carrier family, Slc17a6-8, which function as vesicular glutamate transporters (VGLUTs). Here we show that VGLUT2 (Slc17a6) is required for life ex utero. Vglut2 null mutant mice die immediately after birth due to the absence of respiratory behavior. Investigations at embryonic stages revealed that neural circuits in the location of the pre-Bötzinger (PBC) inspiratory rhythm generator failed to become active. However, neurons with bursting pacemaker properties and anatomical integrity of the PBC area were preserved. Vesicles at asymmetric synapses were fewer and malformed in the Vglut2 null mutant hindbrain, probably causing the complete disruption of AMPA/Kainate receptor mediated synaptic activity in mutant PBC cells. The functional deficit results from an inability of PBC neurons to achieve synchronous activation. In contrast to respiratory rhythm generation, the locomotor central pattern generator of Vglut2 null mutant mice displayed normal rhythmic and coordinated activity suggesting differences in their operating principles. Hence, the present study identifies VGLUT2 mediated signaling as an obligatory component of the developing respiratory rhythm generator.
Evaluation of the malignant grade of thymoma by morphometric analysis

To determine the histologic grade of malignancy of thymoma, the nuclear areas of epithelial cells of 42 thymomas, 14 thymic hyperplasias, and ten normal thymuses were measured by morphometry and the results were compared with the extent of disease, association with myasthenia gravis (MG), and histologic subtypes of the thymomas. The nuclei of epithelial cells of thymomas were significantly larger than those of both of thymic hyperplasias and normal thymuses (P < 0.01). The nuclei of epithelial cells of invasive thymomas were significantly larger than those of noninvasive ones (P < 0.001). In the noninvasive group, the nuclei of epithelial cells of thymomas associated with MG were significantly larger than those without MG (P < 0.02), and were similar to those of invasive thymomas. These results confirm that invasive thymomas are morphometrically malignant tumors, and suggest that noninvasive thymomas associated with MG might have malignant potential.
Website and Social Media Usage: Implications for the Further Development of Wine Tourism, Hospitality, and the Wine Sector

This study examines winery entrepreneurs' usage of websites and social media. Italian, Spanish and “New World” wineries, the majority (84%) of them currently involved in wine tourism, were selected. The findings demonstrate that wineries are not fully exploiting the potential benefits of a website, and much less so that of social media. More importantly, facing increasing competition from other wine regions and tourist destinations, wineries may be foregoing opportunities to strengthen their region's destination image. Implications of the findings for wineries' promotional, marketing, and other business development strategies designed to draw and “convert” visitors to their brand are discussed.
Customer acceptance of internet banking in Estonia

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to study technology acceptance of internet banking in Estonia, an emerging east European economy.Design/methodology/approach – The present paper modifies the technology acceptance model and applies it to bank customers in Estonia, because Estonia, a country with a developing economy, has focused on internet banking as an important distribution channel.Findings – The findings suggest that internet bank use increases insofar as customers perceive it as useful. The perceived usefulness is central because it determines whether the perceived ease of internet bank use will lead to increased use of the internet bank. Put differently, a well‐designed and easy to use internet bank may not be used if it is not perceived as useful. We thus conclude that the perceived usefulness of internet banking is, for banks, a key construct for promoting customer use. We also suggest that models of technology acceptance should be re‐formulated to focus more on the key role of the perceived .
Rural Finance and Agricultural Technology Adoption in Ethiopia: Does Institutional Design Matter?

Financial cooperatives and microfinance institutions (MFIs) are the two major sources of rural finance in Ethiopia. Whereas MFIs are relatively new, financial cooperatives have existed for centuries in various forms. The coexistence of two different institutions serving the same group of people, and delivering the same financial services, raises several policy questions. Those questions have become particularly relevant, as the government has embarked on developing a new strategy for improving rural financial services delivery. This study is expected to serve as an input to that policy discussion. Using a unique household survey dataset and the propensity-score-matching technique, we examine the impacts of the two financial service providers on agricultural technology adoption. The results suggest that access to institutional finance has significant positive impacts on both the adoption and extent of technology use.
The Iranian Foreign Exchange Policy And The Black Market for Dollars

As a result of the oil price shocks, the 1979 revolution, and the eight-year war with Iraq, fundamental changes have taken place in Iran's foreign exchange position as well as in its exchange rate policy. The viable data over the period 1979–1980 to 1988–1989 clearly show that, despite the revolutionary rhetoric, very little has been done to reduce the country's dependence on oil exports as a source of foreign exchange and government revenues. Instead, in the face of falling oil revenues and the country's increasing international isolation, coupled with the regime's unwillingness to incur foreign debt, the government has adopted a severe ‘import compression’ policy through selective tariffs and quotas, strict control of private and government imports by means of import licenses, and the imposition of foreign exchange allocations on government agencies. The result has been an ever-rising premium on the U.S. dollar in the ‘black’ market, a highly overvalued official exchange rate, a substantial increase in rent-seeking activities at the expense of production, a severe misallocation of resources, and loss of output and industrial capacity.
An Empirical Investigation of the Effect of Black Economic Empowerment Transactions on Share Prices: 1996 to 2006

Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) remains one of the most important drivers for corporate restructuring in South Africa and, given the strategic significance of BEE transactions, successfully implementing such transactions poses a critical challenge for corporate South Africa. This paper argues that, in line with standard financial theory, if BEE transactions are perceived by the market to represent an increase in the future earnings potential of the firm or a reduction in the riskiness of future earnings then the announcement of a BEE transaction should result in an increase in a firm‟s share price. An event study approach is employed to test this hypothesis for 254 BEE transactions between 1996 and 2006. BEE transactions are not found to be associated with negative abnormal returns and in a limited number of cases they are associated with positive abnormal returns suggesting that the reaction may be related to firm specific and/or transaction specific characteristics.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Revisited: The Case of International Shipping

This study examines the relationship between Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and corporate performance using a sample of listed shipping companies. Recognizing heterogeneous CSR behavior across shipping companies, we employ Markov Chain Monte Carlo techniques for Bayesian inference and estimate the marginal effects of profitability and financial structure on our CSR index for each firm. The relationship between CSR behavior and corporate performance is positive for 52% and negative for 48% of the companies. This different impact of profitability on CSR behavior is attributable to the choice of the flag state and to the location of stock exchange listing.
Corporate Governance and Firm Performance: An Exploratory Analysis of Indian Listed Companies

In this article we propose to study whether firm level good corporate governance (CG) leads to better firm performance, leading to higher value creation. Limited evidence exists concerning the impact of CG practices on firm level performance or valuations in the Indian context. This study attempts to fill this gap. Our motivation is to explore the linkage between good CG practices and firm performance in Indian listed companies. We use a panel of 58 top Indian listed companies in terms of market capitalisation (BSE 100 and NSE 100), over the five year period from 2007–08 to 2011–12 for our analysis. Our measurement analysis starts with a broad sample of 37 structural indicators of CG relating to directors, boards committees, audit considerations, ownership and capital structure characteristics and our defined set of control variables. We have used two measures of firm performance, Market to Book Value Ratio (MTBVR) and Return on Asset (RoA). We use principal component analysis to identify the underlying dimensions of CG and determine which indicators are associated with each factor. We conclude that firm performance, measured by RoA, results in R-square of 43.7 per cent, and is significantly influenced by the 7 factors. Firm performance, measured by MTBV Ratio, results in R-square of 34.5 per cent, and is significantly influenced by the 8 factors.
First-line treatment of acute lymphoblastic leukemia with pegasparaginase riccardo

Correspondence: Andrea Pession Oncologia ed ematologia Pediatrica “Lalla Seràgnoli”, Clinica Pediatrica, Università di Bologna, via Massarenti, 11, 40138, Bologna, italy email andrea.pession@unibo.it Abstract: Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) accounts for almost 4000 cases annually in the United States, approximately two thirds of which are in children and adolescents. Treatment results of ALL have improved considerably in the past decade, due to an optimal stratification of patients and a rational use of different antileukemic agents among which L-asparaginase (L-ASNase) plays a fundamental role. This drug has been used in pediatric ALL chemotherapy protocols for almost 3 decades. In the 1970s and 1980s a chemically modified form of this enzyme called pegasparaginase (PEG-ASNase) was rationally synthesized to decrease immunogenicity of the enzyme and prolong its half-life. The different advantages of PEG-ASNase have been demonstrated in many clinical studies, the last of which underline the utility of this drug in front-line therapy of ALL. In this review, we discuss the pharmacological advantages and clinical potential of PEG-ASNase and its important use in first-line treatment of ALL.
Communication in the Transition to Self-Directed Work Teams

Although adopting self-directed work teams (SDWTs) presents a challenge, this study shows that subordinates’ perceptions of managers’ influence strategies affect the success of change within organizations. Using data collected over 18 months, this study examined employees’ perceptions of managerial communication used prior to and during the implementation of SDWTs at a manufacturing firm as well as the effect of team and organizational communication on team members’ participation. First, the results indicated that managers who communicated persuasively using “soft” influence tactics in the team development process were perceived to be more effective. Second, team communication was found to have a significant positive effect on team members’ participation. Thus, the findings provide strong support for use of soft influence tactics in managerial communications when implementing SDWTs.
A Resource-Based Theory of Market Structure and Organizational Form

We argue that combining the insights from both the industrial organization and organizational ecology perspectives is likely to produce value added. We develop a resource-based theory of market structure, where resources pertain to the environmental assets (together forming the resource space) without which a firm cannot operate viably. We propose that the distributive shape of the resource space, together with the presence or absence of exploitation economies, molds market structures in terms of density and concentration. Our theory unifies many unconnected strands of theory in the organization sciences domain.
Acromegaly incidence, prevalence, complications and long-term prognosis: a nationwide cohort study.

DESIGN Valid data on acromegaly incidence, complications and mortality are scarce. The Danish Health Care System enables nationwide studies with complete follow-up and linkage among health-related databases to assess acromegaly incidence, prevalence, complications and mortality in a population-based cohort study. METHOD All incident cases of acromegaly in Denmark (1991-2010) were identified from health registries and validated by chart review. We estimated the annual incidence rate of acromegaly per 10(6) person-years (py) with 95% confidence intervals (95% CIs). For every patient, 10 persons were sampled from the general population as a comparison cohort. Cox regression and hazard ratios (HRs) with 95% confidence intervals (95% CIs) were used. RESULTS Mean age at diagnosis (48.7 years (CI: 95%: 47.2-50.1)) and annual incidence rate (3.8 cases/10(6) persons (95% CI: 3.6-4.1)) among the 405 cases remained stable. The prevalence in 2010 was 85 cases/10(6) persons. The patients were at increased risk of diabetes mellitus (HR: 4.0 (95% CI: 2.7-5.8)), heart failure (HR: 2.5 (95% CI: 1.4-4.5)), venous thromboembolism (HR: 2.3 (95% CI: 1.1-5.0)), sleep apnoea (HR: 11.7 (95% CI: 7.0-19.4)) and arthropathy (HR: 2.1 (95% CI: 1.6-2.6)). The complication risk was also increased before the diagnosis of acromegaly. Overall mortality risk was elevated (HR: 1.3 (95% CI: 1.0-1.7)) but uninfluenced by treatment modality. CONCLUSION (i) The incidence rate and age at diagnosis of acromegaly have been stable over decades, and the prevalence is higher than previously reported. (ii) The risk of complications is very high even before the diagnosis. (iii) Mortality risk remains elevated but uninfluenced by mode of treatment.
Diagnostic and physiologic implications of the angiotensin infusion test.

MUCH effort is currently expended to separate patients with hypertension due to stenosis of the renal arteries from those with hypertension due to diseases that are not amenable to surgical therapy. The tests involved are difficult and have a significant morbidity. Kaplan and Silah1 described a relatively simple procedure that held out promise of differentiating patients with hypertension into those with and without renal-artery stenosis. They noted that patients with stenosis, when given infusions of angiotension II, required a larger dose than patients with essential hypertension to elevate the blood pressure. Eventually, the procedure was simplified to a screening test .
Electron microscopic and autoradiographic characterization of hindlimb muscle regeneration in the mdx mouse

The pattern of postnatal growth and development of skeletal muscle in mdx mice was studied by light and transmission electron microscopy and by autoradiography and was compared with that in their normal age‐matched controls at 4 and 32 weeks of age. The muscle weights of both the extensor digitorum longus (EDL) and soleus muscles of mdx mice were significantly greater than those in control mice at both ages. Body weights of male and female mdx mice were also increased over controls up to 12 weeks of age. At 4 weeks, both the EDL and soleus muscles exhibited focal areas of degeneration, necrosis; and regeneration of centrally nucleated extrafusal fibers resulting in a wide range of fiber sizes. By 32 weeks, the majority of fibers in both muscles were centrally nucleated, and focal areas of recent regeneration were observed. By electron microscopy, the course of macrophage infiltration into areas of degenerating fibers and the ongoing regeneration of myofibers within redundant cylinders of external lamina were noted. This pattern was frequent in 4‐week‐old mdx muscles and was present to a lesser degree at 32 weeks. A notable lack of both adipose tissue infiltration and fibrotic change in the endomysium were observed in muscles at both ages. Autoradiograms of muscles from 4‐week‐old mdx mice injected with tritiated thymidine showed an increased proportion of labeled sublaminal nuclei at 24 and 48 hours after injection compared to controls. At 32 weeks of age, labeling of nuclei in muscles of mdx mice was also greater than in controls, but was reduced compared to muscle labeling in 4‐week‐old mdx mice. The observed features of mdx muscle tissue suggest that this animal model is more applicable to the study of regeneration dynamics than to Duchenne‐type human muscular dystrophy.