Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Reliability and Validity of 2 Self-Report Measures to Assess Sedentary Behavior in Older Adults.

BACKGROUND The purpose of this study was to examine the reliability and validity of 2 currently available physical activity surveys for assessing time spent in sedentary behavior (SB) in older adults. METHODS Fifty-eight adults (≥65 years) completed the Yale Physical Activity Survey for Older Adults (YPAS) and Community Health Activities Model Program for Seniors (CHAMPS) before and after a 10-day period during which they wore an ActiGraph accelerometer (ACC). Intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) examined test-retest reliability. Overall percent agreement and a kappa statistic examined YPAS validity. Lin's concordance correlation, Pearson correlation, and Bland-Altman analysis examined CHAMPS validity. RESULTS Both surveys had moderate test-retest reliability (ICC: YPAS = 0.59 (P < .001), CHAMPS = 0.64 (P < .001)) and significantly underestimated SB time. Agreement between YPAS and ACC was low (κ = -0.0003); however, there was a linear increase (P < .01) in ACC-derived SB time across YPAS response categories. There was poor agreement between ACC-derived SB and CHAMPS (Lin's r = .005; 95% CI, -0.010 to 0.020), and no linear trend across CHAMPS quartiles (P = .53). CONCLUSIONS Neither of the surveys should be used as the sole measure of SB in a study; though the YPAS has the ability to rank individuals, providing it with some merit for use in correlational SB research.
A Bayesian adaptive design for estimating the maximum tolerated dose curve using drug combinations in cancer phase I clinical trials

We present a cancer phase I clinical trial design of a combination of two drugs with the goal of estimating the maximum tolerated dose curve in the two‐dimensional Cartesian plane. A parametric model is used to describe the relationship between the doses of the two agents and the probability of dose limiting toxicity. The model is re‐parameterized in terms of the probabilities of toxicities at dose combinations corresponding to the minimum and maximum doses available in the trial and the interaction parameter. Trial design proceeds using cohorts of two patients receiving doses according to univariate escalation with overdose control (EWOC), where at each stage of the trial, we seek a dose of one agent using the current posterior distribution of the MTD of this agent given the current dose of the other agent. The maximum tolerated dose curve is estimated as a function of Bayes estimates of the model parameters. Performance of the trial is studied by evaluating its design operating characteristics in terms of safety of the trial and percent of dose recommendation at dose combination neighborhoods around the true MTD curve and under model misspecifications for the true dose–toxicity relationship. The method is further extended to accommodate discrete dose combinations and compared with previous approaches under several scenarios. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
On Dimensions of OTA Setups for Massive MIMO Base Stations Radiated Testing

The development of base stations (BSs) with large aperture antenna arrays, enabled partially by the utilization of cmWave and mmWave frequency bands, will require radiated testing in fading conditions. In this paper, the objective is to investigate the suitable measurement distances and physical dimensions of the over-the-air setups for the performance evaluation of massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) BSs in anechoic chambers with multiple probes. Setup dimension is the major cost factor in the test systems and is thus the key issue to be investigated. The purpose is to determine whether the conventional far field criteria must be followed when determining the range of the setup or if they can be relieved. The impact of limited test setup dimension on various metrics, e.g., far field criteria, field performance within the test area, system link budget analysis, direction of arrival estimation algorithm as well as multi-user MIMO sum-rate capacity are investigated to determine the range of the test setup. It was found that the link budget does not support for the measurement distances claimed by the Fraunhofer distance. Most of the utilized metrics, especially the sum rate capacity, indicate that smaller setup sizes can still yield reasonable measurement accuracy. Simulations were performed at 2.6, 3.5, and 28 GHz frequencies.
Weighted Visibility Graph With Complex Network Features in the Detection of Epilepsy

Epilepsy detection from electrical characteristics of EEG signals obtained from the brain of undergone subject is a challenge task for both research and neurologist due to the non-stationary and chaotic nature of EEG signals. As epileptic EEG signals contain huge fluctuating information about the functional behavior of the brain, it is hard to distinguish the fundamental dynamic, complex network of EEG signals without considering the strength among the nodes as they are connected with each other on the basis of these strengths. The prior research on natural visibility graph did not consider this issue in epileptic seizure, although it is a very important key point to have representative information from the signals. Hence, this paper aims to introduce a new idea for epilepsy detection using complex network statistical properties by measuring different strengths of the edges in natural visibility graph theory, which is considered as weight. Thus, the proposed method is named “weighted visibility graph”. In this proposed method, first, the epileptic EEG signals are transformed into complex network and then two important statistical properties of a network such as modularity and average weighted degree used for extracting the imperative characteristics from a network of EEG signals. After that, the extracted features are evaluated by two modern machine-learning classifiers such as, support vector machine with a different kernel function and k-nearest neighbor. The experimental results demonstrate that the combined effect of both features is valuable for network metrics to characterize the EEG time series signals in case of weighted complex network generating up to 100% classification accuracy.
Adopting MDE for Specifying and Executing Civilian Missions of Mobile Multi-Robot Systems

Robots are meant to replace humans for a broad variety of everyday tasks, such as environmental monitoring or patrolling large public areas for security assurance. The main focus of researchers and practitioners has been on providing tailored software and hardware solutions for very specific and often complex tasks. On one hand, these solutions show great potential and provide advanced capabilities for solving the specific task. On the other hand, the polarized attention to task-specific solutions makes them hard to reuse, customize, and combine. In this paper we propose a family of domain-specific modeling languages for the specification of civilian missions of mobile multi-robot systems. These missions are meant to be described in terms of models that are: 1) closer to the general problem domain; 2) independent from the underlying technologies; 3) ready to be analyzed, simulated, and executed; and 4) extensible to new application domains, thus opening up the use of robots to even non-technical operators. Moreover, we show the applicability of the proposed family of languages in two real-world application domains: unmanned multicopters and autonomous underwater vehicles.
Realistic fault models and test procedure for multi-port SRAMs

This paper presents realistic fault models for multi-port memories with p ports, based on defect injection and SPICE simulation. The results show that the fault models for p-port memories consist of p classes: single-port faults, two-port faults, . , p-port faults. In addition, the paper discusses the test procedure for such memories. It shows that the time complexity of the required tests is not exponentially proportional with p, as published by different authors, but it is linear; irrespective of the number of ports the multi-port memory consists of.
Understanding the Accuracy of Parental Perceptions of Child Physical Activity: A Mixed Methods Analysis.

BACKGROUND Interventions to increase children's physical activity (PA) have achieved limited success. This may be attributed to inaccurate parental perceptions of their children's PA and a lack of recognition of a need to change activity levels. METHODS Fifty-three parents participated in semistructured interviews to determine perceptions of child PA. Perceptions were compared with children's measured MVPA (classified as meeting or not meeting UK guidelines) to produce 3 categories: "accurate," "over-estimate," and "under-estimate. " Deductive content analysis was performed to understand the accuracy of parental perceptions. RESULTS All parents of children meeting the PA guidelines accurately perceived their child's PA; while the majority of parents whose child did not meet the guidelines overestimated their PA. Most parents were unconcerned about their child's PA level, viewing them as naturally active and willing to be active. Qualitative explanations for perceptions of insufficient activity included children having health problems and preferences for inactive pursuits, and parents having difficulty facilitating PA in poor weather and not always observing their child's PA level. Social comparisons also influenced parental perceptions. CONCLUSIONS Strategies to improve parental awareness of child PA are needed. Perceptions of child PA may be informed by child "busyness," being unaware of activity levels, and social comparisons.
Multiple imputation in the presence of non‐normal data

Multiple imputation (MI) is becoming increasingly popular for handling missing data. Standard approaches for MI assume normality for continuous variables (conditionally on the other variables in the imputation model). However, it is unclear how to impute non‐normally distributed continuous variables. Using simulation and a case study, we compared various transformations applied prior to imputation, including a novel non‐parametric transformation, to imputation on the raw scale and using predictive mean matching (PMM) when imputing non‐normal data. We generated data from a range of non‐normal distributions, and set 50% to missing completely at random or missing at random. We then imputed missing values on the raw scale, following a zero‐skewness log, Box–Cox or non‐parametric transformation and using PMM with both type 1 and 2 matching. We compared inferences regarding the marginal mean of the incomplete variable and the association with a fully observed outcome. We also compared results from these approaches in the analysis of depression and anxiety symptoms in parents of very preterm compared with term‐born infants. The results provide novel empirical evidence that the decision regarding how to impute a non‐normal variable should be based on the nature of the relationship between the variables of interest. If the relationship is linear in the untransformed scale, transformation can introduce bias irrespective of the transformation used. However, if the relationship is non‐linear, it may be important to transform the variable to accurately capture this relationship. A useful alternative is to impute the variable using PMM with type 1 matching. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Prescribers’ perspectives of the socioeconomic status and important indicators affecting prescribing behavior in a developing country

Patients suffer differential prescribing behavior as a function of their socioeconomic status. The current study was conducted in a qualitative and two observational phases in Lahore metropolitan area to investigate physician’s perspectives of patients’ socioeconomic status and the important indicators influencing prescribing behavior. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with physicians (N=20) from 2 hospitals, 2 diabetes care centers and 2 private clinics and scripts were analyzed for socioeconomic indicators. In the second phase, the opinions of a panel of prescribers (N=43) on the influence socioeconomic indicators on prescribing behavior were elicited. In the third phase a bipolar 5-point Likert rating scale was used to elicit the importance of indicators for physicians (N=100) originated from urban and rural areas. In the interviews physicians gave 15 potential socioeconomic indicators. Following the two Delphi rounds, consensus was reached on 11 (73.3%) of the indicators, the remaining 4 (26.7%) were highly disputable. Bivariate analysis showed that literacy, educational background, compliance, dress and appearance were important indicators at the time of clinical decision making for physicians originating from urban areas than for physicians originating from rural areas. Physicians originating from urban and rural areas perceived the socioeconomic status differently.
Effectiveness of Social Marketing Interventions to Promote Physical Activity Among Adults: A Systematic Review.

BACKGROUND Social marketing managers promote desired behaviors to an audience by making them tangible in the form of environmental opportunities to enhance benefits and reduce barriers. This study proposed "benchmarks," modified from those found in the past literature, that would match important concepts of the social marketing framework and the inclusion of which would ensure behavior change effectiveness. In addition, we analyzed behavior change interventions on a "social marketing continuum" to assess whether the number of benchmarks and the role of specific benchmarks influence the effectiveness of physical activity promotion efforts. METHODS A systematic review of social marketing interventions available in academic studies published between 1997 and 2013 revealed 173 conditions in 92 interventions. RESULTS Findings based on χ2, Mallows' Cp, and Logical Analysis of Data tests revealed that the presence of more benchmarks in interventions increased the likelihood of success in promoting physical activity. The presence of more than 3 benchmarks improved the success of the interventions; specifically, all interventions were successful when more than 7.5 benchmarks were present. Further, primary formative research, core product, actual product, augmented product, promotion, and behavioral competition all had a significant influence on the effectiveness of interventions. CONCLUSIONS Social marketing is an effective approach in promoting physical activity among adults when a substantial number of benchmarks are used and when managers understand the audience, make the desired behavior tangible, and promote the desired behavior persuasively.
Source and Size of Emotional and Financial-Related Social Support Network on Physical Activity Behavior Among Older Adults.

OBJECTIVE To examine the association of source of emotional- and financial-related social support and size of social support network on physical activity behavior among older adults. METHODS Data from the 1999-2006 NHANES were used (N = 5616; 60 to 85 yrs). Physical activity and emotional- and financial-related social support were assessed via self-report. RESULTS Older adults with perceived having emotional social support had a 41% increased odds of meeting physical activity guidelines (OR = 1.41; 95% CI: 1.01-1.97). The only specific sources of social support that were associated with meeting physical activity guidelines was friend emotional support (OR = 1.19; 95% CI: 1.01-1.41) and financial support (OR = 1.28; 95% CI: 1.09-1.49). With regard to size of social support network, a dose-response relationship was observed. Compared with those with 0 close friends, those with 1 to 2, 3 to 4, 5, and 6+ close friends, respectively, had a 1.70-, 2.38-, 2.57-, and 2.71-fold increased odds of meeting physical activity guidelines. There was some evidence of gender- and age-specific associations between social support and physical activity. CONCLUSIONS Emotional- and financial-related social support and size of social support network are associated with higher odds of meeting physical activity guidelines among older adults.
Human Pose Estimation by Exploiting Spatial and Temporal Constraints in Body-Part Configurations

We present an algorithm for estimating a sequence of articulated upper-body human pose in unconstrained videos. Most previous work often fails to locate forearms in those video scenes suffering from illumination varieties, background clutter, camera shake, or occlusion. In order to deal with such intractable cases, we propose a novel algorithm for addressing the problem of certain body parts localization. The proposed approach can be roughly divided into two steps: first, a spatial model is designed to capture the high-order relationship between adjacent parts and meanwhile to generate a set of configurations in each frame under the temporal context constraint; second, a competitive method is presented to select the best body parts among diverse pose configurations. In this paper, the proposed algorithm focuses on the unconstrained video scenes and improves the detection precision of certain body parts with high degree of freedom. Moreover, the proposed algorithm can be well applied to a very challenging dataset named Movies. Experimental results show that the proposed algorithm can dramatically improve performance compared with those related algorithms on two benchmark datasets (MPII and SHPED datasets) and on our Movies dataset.
The Influence of Pay-To-Play Fees on Participation in Interscholastic Sports: A School-Level Analysis of Michigan's Public Schools.

BACKGROUND School districts in the United States are turning toward new sources of revenue to maintain their interscholastic sports programs. One common revenue generating policy is the implementation of participation fees, also known as pay-to-play. One concern of the growing trend of participation fees is how it impacts student participation opportunities. This study looks at how pay-to-play fees are impacting participation opportunities and participation rates in the state of Michigan. METHODS Through merging 3 school-level data sets, Civil Rights Data Collection, the Common Core of Data, and participation information from MHSAA (Michigan High School Athletic Association), bivariate analysis and ordinary least squares regression were used in our analysis. RESULTS Our findings indicate that certain types of schools are able to support pay-to-play fees: relatively large schools that are located in suburban, white communities, with relatively low poverty rates. We also found that participation fees are not decreasing the number of sport opportunities for students, participation opportunities are higher in schools with fees; but participation rates are similar between schools with and without participation fees. CONCLUSIONS Participation fee policy implications are discussed and we offer suggestions for future research.
Admission of the very elderly to the intensive care unit: Family members’ perspectives on clinical decision-making from a multicenter cohort study

Background: Little is known about the perspectives and experiences of family members of very elderly patients who are admitted to the intensive care unit. Aim: To describe family members’ perspectives about care provided to very elderly critically ill patients. Design: Multicenter, prospective, cohort study. Participants and setting: In total, 535 family members of patients aged 80 years or older admitted to 22 intensive care units for more than 24 h. Results: Family members reported that the “patient be comfortable and suffer as little as possible” was their most important value and “the belief that life should be preserved at all costs” was their least important value considered in making treatment decisions. Most family members (57.9%) preferred that life support be used for their family member, whereas 24.1% preferred comfort measures only, and 14.4% were unsure of their treatment preferences. Only 57.3% reported that a doctor had talked to them about treatment options for the patient. Overall, 29.7% of patients received life-sustaining treatments for more than 7 days and 50.3% of these died in hospital. Families were most satisfied with the skill and competency of nurses and least satisfied with being included and supported in the decision-making process and with their sense of control over the patient’s care. Conclusion: There is incongruity between family values and preferences for end-of-life care and actual care received for very elderly patients who are admitted to the intensive care unit. Deficiencies in communication and decision-making may be associated with prolonged use of life-sustaining treatments in very elderly critically ill patients, many of whom ultimately die.
An evaluation of constrained randomization for the design and analysis of group‐randomized trials with binary outcomes

Group‐randomized trials are randomized studies that allocate intact groups of individuals to different comparison arms. A frequent practical limitation to adopting such research designs is that only a limited number of groups may be available, and therefore, simple randomization is unable to adequately balance multiple group‐level covariates between arms. Therefore, covariate‐based constrained randomization was proposed as an allocation technique to achieve balance. Constrained randomization involves generating a large number of possible allocation schemes, calculating a balance score that assesses covariate imbalance, limiting the randomization space to a prespecified percentage of candidate allocations, and randomly selecting one scheme to implement. When the outcome is binary, a number of statistical issues arise regarding the potential advantages of such designs in making inference. In particular, properties found for continuous outcomes may not directly apply, and additional variations on statistical tests are available. Motivated by two recent trials, we conduct a series of Monte Carlo simulations to evaluate the statistical properties of model‐based and randomization‐based tests under both simple and constrained randomization designs, with varying degrees of analysis‐based covariate adjustment. Our results indicate that constrained randomization improves the power of the linearization F‐test, the KC‐corrected GEE t‐test (Kauermann and Carroll, 2001, Journal of the American Statistical Association 96, 1387‐1396), and two permutation tests when the prognostic group‐level variables are controlled for in the analysis and the size of randomization space is reasonably small. We also demonstrate that constrained randomization reduces power loss from redundant analysis‐based adjustment for non‐prognostic covariates. Design considerations such as the choice of the balance metric and the size of randomization space are discussed.
A TEORIA DA ADAPTAÇÃO SUSTENTANDO O CUIDADO DE ENFERMAGEM EM HOSPITAL PEDIÁTRICO: UM ESTUDO DE CASO

Grounded on the theoretical framework of the Adaptation Theory, we report a case study held at a large pediatric hospital in the city of Curitiba/Parana State, Brazil, during the third-term nursing undergraduation clinical studies. The case study was carried out with a hospitalized child and its mother during the clinical teaching activities in the discipline Caring Process in Nursing I. The theoretical models, when used by nursing undergraduates as a framework for care systematization, contribute to practice refinement as well as organization, interpretation and analysis of the caring process, broadening knowledge level in professional education and nursing research. We concluded that the study of nursing theories and its practical use by undergraduates must be encouraged by educational institutions.