Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Towards positive diagnosis of the irritable bowel.

of the symptoms preceding sudden and unexpected deaths at home when these are compared with their general rate of occurrence in the child population. Since the conclusions of the study are based on these findings some independent assessment of their reliability is desirable. The conclusion of this paper is that the prevention of cot deaths is dependent firstly on the recognition by parents ofthe significance of certain non-specific symptoms and on their decision to involve the primary care services, and secondly on the efficacy of medical intervention at this stage. Consideration does not appear to have been given to the difficulties that will face parents who are asked to undertake such close surveillance of their children or the anxieties that this is likely to cause; nor has any estimate been made of the presumably very large proportion of cases in which this will prove "unnecessary. " Conversely, the implications of the increased work load for the primary care services has yet to be determined. Concerning intervention, the investigators recognise that the value of either hospital referral or drug therapy is at present doubtful, leaving close supervision and observation of the child at home as the only alternative. It has yet to be established what this can achieve. By the nature of the condition, sudden and unexpected death in children is an exceedingly difficult area of study, especially in its community aspects, and many of the criticisms raised here are clearly recognised by the study group and are the subject of further investigation. But because of these unresolved difficulties it would seem premature to urge the "need to improve the recognition by both doctors and parents of non-specific symptoms as markers of severe illness in young children and their understanding of the necessity for rapid and appropriate action. "
A Survey Study of Benefits and Limitations of using CellaVision™ DM96 for Peripheral Blood Differentials

In most clinical laboratories, hematologists rely on the microscopic analysis of stained blood films to accurately classify cells, aiding in the diagnosis and monitoring of a variety of disorders and conditions. Use of the microscope, although considered the gold standard in performing white blood cell differentials, presents a variety of limitations Digital image technology can facilitate a variety of essential job functions in clinical hematology such as: consulting with colleagues, improving training, referencing an abnormal cell, and utilizing archived images for quality assurance and competency assessment. A questionnaire was developed to survey medical laboratory professionals about their perceptions regarding the benefits and limitations for using digital images in clinical hematology. The questionnaire was sent in March 2012 to an entire list of 81 current CellaVision™ DM96 (CellaVision AB, Sweden) consumers. A response rate of 46% was obtained. Background information on participants, 5-point Likert scale averages, percentage agreement (strongly agree and agree), and disagreement (strongly disagree and disagree) were calculated and analyzed. The benefits of using the CellaVision™ DM96 rated the strongest by respondents included: decreased eyestrain, consistency among patient results and advantages in training personnel. Respondents reported notable limitations as being: restrictions with accurately estimating platelets and red cell morphology. Digital image software is currently being utilized in pre-clinical and clinical hematology and offers potential benefits. With upgrades in slide scanning features and improved capabilities to view platelet and red cell morphology, a transition to digital image technology from the conventional method for performing peripheral blood cell differentials is possible. ABBREVIATIONS: MLP - medical laboratory professionals; MLS - Medical Laboratory Science; FDA - Food and Drug Association; CLIA - Clinical Laboratory Improvement Acts; CAP - College of American Pathologists
U.S.-Canadian Unemployment and Wage Differences Among Young Low-Skilled Males in the 1980s

During the mid 1980s young, low-skilled adults in Canada were much more likely to be out of work than their U.S. counterparts. The unemployment rate gap for this cohort was 7 percentage points. At the same time wage inequality was higher in the United States. Using panel data from the U.S. National Longitudinal Survey of Youth and the Canadian Labour Market Activity Survey, in this study a general equilibrium search model of the labor market is employed to identify structural differences contributing to these gaps. The results reveal that both wage and unemployment differences are driven by a higher job destruction/separation rate in Canada and higher job offer arrival rates in the United States. In general, the model characterizes the U.S. labor market as having less search frictions than that of Canada. That is, Canadian firms are found to have more monopsony power than their U.S. counterparts.
An empirical study of the ISO 9000 standards’ contribution towards total quality management

This paper presents the results of an empirical study on the contribution of ISO 9000 standards towards total quality management (TQM). The paper is a continuation of the authors’ research on the ISO 9000 standards effectiveness and capability as an entry key to TQM. The literature review of the above issue revealed the need for a formal empirical study to resolve the existing debate about the standards’ long‐term contribution and true value to ISO 9000‐certified companies. For the purposes of this study, a TQM measurement instrument was developed and tested for its reliability and validity to measure TQM performance improvement in certified companies in Greek industry. This performance improvement was then used to test the basic research hypothesis: “Can ISO 9000 standards provide a good first step towards TQM? ”. The results of the study are presented in eight basic TQM categories, showing the certified companies’ performance improvement in the basic elements of each category, and revealing their strengths and weaknesses on their way to TQM.
Disease activity courses in a regional cohort of Crohn's disease patients.

BACKGROUND The study was a follow-up of an inception cohort of 373 patients with Crohn's disease. METHODS Annual assessments, life table analyses, and Markov chain analyses, estimating the probability for remission and relapse with time, and working capacity were carried out. RESULTS The clinical course of Crohn's disease differs markedly over time, from ever-relapsing cases to a quiescent course with remission for several years, interrupted by years with relapse. No predictive factors have been found for the subsequent course with regard to age, sex, extent of disease at diagnosis, and treatment in the year of diagnosis. The relapse rate within the year of diagnosis and the following 2 years, however, does correlate positively (p = 0.00001) with the relapse rate in the following 5 years. Furthermore, the relapse rate for 1 year during the disease course influences the relapse rate the following year, indicating a disease pattern over time with waves of at least 2 years' duration. A slight tendency towards burning out was found. The disease course reflected in working capacity for the patients showed that a minor part--up to 15% after 15 years--will become incapable and obtain disablement pension, while 75% of the patients each year are fully capable of work. Within 10 years 50% of the patients will not have experienced any year with impaired capacity for work.
Option Prices, Implied Price Processes, and Stochastic Volatility

This paper characterizes all continuous price processes that are consistent with current option prices. This extends Derman and Kani (1994), Dupire (1994, 1997), and Rubinstein (1994), who only consider processes with deterministic volatility. Our characterization implies a volatility forecast that does not require a specific model, only current option prices. We show how arbitrary volatility processes can be adjusted to fit current option prices exactly, just as interest rate processes can be adjusted to fit bond prices exactly. The procedure works with many volatility models, is fast to calibrate, and can price exotic options efficiently using familiar lattice techniques.
Antecedents of Zakat Payers’ Trust: The Case of Nigeria

Zakat payers’ trust is vital to zakat organizations because its absence will undermine the institutional effectiveness of zakat. Unlike other forms of voluntary donations, zakat is a religious duty guided by divine rules. However, zakat payers have choices to turn to collection channels of their preference either through governmental or voluntary zakat institutions. With increasing number of charitable organizations, competition for limited zakat and other donation becomes intense. Understanding the zakat payers’ compliance behavior is central to the development of zakat institutions because their effectiveness to help the poor and other beneficiaries are heavily dependent on zakat collections. However, such studies are sparse. therefore the aim of this paper is to fill this gap by developing and validating the model of zakat payers’ trust in zakat institutions. The constructs of trust’s antecedents were drawn from resource dependence theory, legitimacy theory, and donor trust literature. Through structural equation modeling test, we found perceptions of board capital, legitimacy management and stakeholders’ orientation are important to determine zakat payers’ trust. The trust model represents the main contribution of this study. Importantly, necessity of understanding zakat payers’ trust are more pertinent at the place where proper zakat administration is still in its infancy stage as in the case of Nigeria.
Identifying Valuable Travelers and Their Next Foreign Destination by the Application of Data Mining Techniques

The purpose of this research is to identify “valuable travelers” from Northern Taiwan and to predict their “next foreign destination” by applying data mining techniques. Three data mining procedures were used in this research. First of all, researchers used the RFM (the recent year of traveling abroad, the frequency of traveling abroad and the monetary value spent on traveling abroad) model to identify valuable travelers. A C4.5 decision tree was then applied to discover the tourist characteristics of valuable travelers, such as demographics, buying and decision-making behavior patterns, and destinations visited. A market basket analysis then mined the travelers' preferred destination for the next possible foreign destination via cross-selling. The results of the C4.5 decision tree indicated several tourist characteristics that will be the criteria for distinguishing high value travelers from low value travelers. The results of the market basket analysis suggest that Asian countries are the preferred cross-selling destination for Taiwanese outbound travelers.
The Meta-Problem for Conservative Mal'tsev Constraints

In the algebraic approach to CSP (Constraint Satisfaction Problem), the complexity of constraint languages is studied using closure operations called polymorphisms. Many of these operations are known to induce tractability of any language they preserve. We focus on the meta-problem: given a language G, decide if G has a polymorphism with nice properties. We design an algorithm that decides in polynomial-time if a constraint language has a conservative Mal'tsev polymorphism, and outputs one if one exists. As a corollary we obtain that the class of conservative Mal'tsev constraints is uniformly tractable, and we conjecture that this result remains true in the non-conservative case.
A Modified Quality-of-Life Measure for Youths: Psychometric Properties

In the Diabetes Control and Complication Trial (DCCT), a Diabetes Quality of Life (DQOL) measure was developed to assess the psychosocial impact of intensified regimens. Its applicability for use with children and adolescents was limited by the exclusion criteria of the DCCT. In this study, the DQOL was modifiedfor specific use in young diabetes populations. The result is an instrument composed of three intercorrelated scales—a Diabetes Life Satisfaction scale, a Disease Impact scale, and a Disease-Related Worries scale—with satisfactory levels of reliability. While the scale variances were independent of glycosylated hemoglobin values, they were related to adolescents' perception of their general health status. Self-perceived quality oflife related to diabetes management is an important alternative outcome for diabetes education programs.
Open coordination against poverty: the new EU `social inclusion process'

Until the mid 1990s, the notion of Social Europe was primarily associated with the introduction of binding supranational rules aimed at safeguarding and possibly upgrading the social protection systems of the Member States. The political and institutional obstacles to such kind of rules were well known in practice and well understood in theory - especially in the wake of the negative vs. positive integration debate. But 'hard law' seemed to be the only effective strategy of action, given the low impact of weaker institutional tools such as recommendations, on the one hand, and the growing incentives for 'social dumping' generated by the completion of the internal market, on the other hand. The second half of the 1990s witnessed a gradual change of climate and perspective. Binding legislation continued to be seen as a very important ingredient of Europe's social dimension: indeed the debate on fundamental rights and on a possible fully-fledged EU constitution shifted the front of legal ambitions even further. But at the same time another strategy of policy intervention started to be considered and experimented with, resting on a complex mix of soft institutional ingredients, endowed with a strong potential of conditioning the direction of change at the national level. Originally applied in the area of employment, this new approach was then extended to other policy sectors - and most notably, policies to combat social exclusion - under the name of 'open method of coordination' (OMC), coined during the Portuguese Presidency in 2000. The main institutional ingredients of the OMC are common guidelines, national action plans, peer reviews, joint evaluation reports and recommendations. None of such instruments has a binding character, underpinned by legal enforcement powers. Moreover, while providing policy actors with a relatively clear agenda, the mix of these ingredients leaves ample room
Vendor selection and supply quantities determination in a bakery by AHP and fuzzy multi-criteria programming

One of the possible conceptions for the survival in a turbulent world market is a chain cooperation among the producer, his suppliers and customers, according to the concept of supply chain management. The problem of vendor selection and determination of material quantities supplied is one of the most important activities in the supply chain. The purpose of this article is to propose a model for vendor selection and determination of supply quotas in the area of flour supply by using the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and multi-objective linear programming (LP) model solved by fuzzy LP method, based on the decision-making in a fuzzy environment, and to point to the advantages of the proposed model in comparison to some other vendor selection and supply quantity determination models. The proposed model applied in the concrete problem of vendor selection and determination of supply quotas proved to be very efficient in determining the priority of alternatives, taking into account all the criteria and sub-criteria, as well as in defining criteria weights that express the decision-maker's preferences, which allows a simple sensitivity analysis of the obtained solutions.
What Drives the January Effect?

The January anomaly has attracted much academic interest and has been explained in different ways. However, the multitude of explanations has created confusion about the validity and relative importance of those explanations. In some cases, the hypotheses are examined individually though the evidence may be consistent with more than one hypothesis. Furthermore, prior work has not adequately controlled for the bid-ask bounce. Therefore, the results leave the reader somewhat confused regarding the January effect: is it caused by tax-loss selling, window-dressing, information, bid-ask bounce, or a combination of these causes? In this paper, we try to disentangle different explanations of the January effect and identify its primary cause. We find that past losers are more likely to be sold in December than in January to realize the tax advantage of capital losses. Past winners are more likely to be sold in January than in December to postpone payment of taxes. The selling is accompanied by changes in volume around turn of the year consistent with the tax-related selling hypotheses. The results are not materially affected when we use the midpoint of quotes instead of actual prices: the bid-ask bounce accounts for about 20-25% of the observed returns. To verify the window-dressing hypothesis, we examine stock returns around June-July, the period of semi-annual reporting by institutional managers that is not contaminated by tax-related trading. We do not find an economically meaningful difference between the 5-day return at the end of June and the 5-day return at the beginning of July, which is not consistent with window dressing. If the January effect occurs due to release of new information in January that affects the information-poor firms more than the information-rich firms then the returns in January should be related to availability of information (for example, with the number of analysts as a proxy). We do not find a correlation consistent with the information hypothesis. There is no information-related effect in June-July. The evidence here supports the tax-related selling hypotheses as the drivers of January effect.
PRELIMINARY NOTES - WORK IN PROGRESS PLEASE DO NOT CIRCULATE

The paper studies a simple commons problem, as in Moulin (2001). A set of agents collectively own a technology that produces many identical units of an indivisible object. Each agent needs and has use for only one unit of the object. A solution specifies how many units to produce, who should receive the object, and defines monetary transfers to compensate the agents that cannot consume the object. Simple axioms, adapted from the recent literature on queueing (see Maniquet, 2003), characterize a unique solution. It is the benefit analogue of the serial cost sharing rule already discussed in the literature, and is therefore called the serial surplus sharing rule. Assuming decreasing returns to scale, we also show that it coincides with the Shapley value of the coalitional form transferable utility game where the worth of a coalition is the ecient outcome in the absence of the complement coalition. We also develop a dual analysis, as Chun (2004) did for queueing problems.
Knowledge, perceptions and attitude of a community living around a colony of straw‐coloured fruit bats (Eidolon helvum) in Ghana after Ebola virus disease outbreak in West Africa

A large population of straw‐coloured fruit bats (Eidolon helvum) colonizes a prime area in the city of Accra where several public amenities are located. Although the colony is positive to several zoonotic viruses including the Ebola virus, there is limited information on the social dimensions of the existence of the bats. As a step towards effective response to health risk and conservation of the bats, this study assessed the knowledge and attitude of the community living around the bats and determined their level of environmental and public health consciousness. The community generally lacks interest in bat bushmeat consumption but had low knowledge and disease risk perception of the bats. Despite major campaigns during the recent Ebola outbreak in West Africa, elements of risky behaviour including disbelief and disregard for some preventive measures and lack of interest in post‐bat exposure prophylaxis were recorded among a limited proportion of the community. There was the need to focus public health education on the community and possibly others that may have E. helvum colonies in West Africa.
Association between state laws governing school meal nutrition content and student weight status: implications for new USDA school meal standards.

IMPORTANCE This study assessed whether stronger school meal nutrition standards may improve student weight status. Results have immediate implications because of the ongoing implementation of new nutrition standards for the National School Lunch Program. OBJECTIVE To determine if state laws with stricter school meal nutrition standards are inversely associated with adolescent weight status, while controlling for unmeasured state-level confounders. DESIGN Quasi-experiment. SETTING Public schools. PARTICIPANTS Four thousand eight hundred seventy eighth-grade students in 40 states. Students were categorized by type of school lunch they usually obtained (free/reduced price, regular price, or none). INTERVENTIONS State laws governing school meal nutrition standards. States with standards that exceeded US Department of Agriculture (USDA) school meal standards were compared with states that did not exceed USDA standards. The parameter of interest was the interaction between state laws and student lunch participant status, ie, whether disparities in weight status between school lunch participants and nonparticipants were smaller in states with stricter standards. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Body mass index percentile and obesity status. RESULTS In states that exceeded USDA standards, the difference in obesity prevalence between students who obtained free/reduced-price lunches and students who did not obtain school lunches was 12.3 percentage points smaller (95% CI, -21.5 to -3.0) compared with states that did not exceed USDA standards. Likewise, differences in mean body mass index percentile between those student populations were 11 units smaller in states that exceeded USDA standards (95% CI, -17.7 to -4.3). There was little evidence that students compensated for school meal laws by purchasing more sweets, salty snacks, or sugar-sweetened beverages from other school venues (eg, vending machines) or other sources (eg, fast food). CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE Stringent school meal standards that reflect the latest nutrition science may improve weight status among school lunch participants, particularly those eligible for free/reduced-price lunches.
The effect of procedural justice in the relationship between charismatic leadership and feedback reactions in performance appraisal

In this study, the relationship between procedural justice, charismatic leadership and feedback reactions (i.e. perceived feedback utility and feedback accuracy) is investigated. We conducted both regression analyses and path analyses (n = 299) to establish whether there is a moderating or mediating effect of charismatic leadership in the relationship between procedural justice and feedback reactions of teachers. Our results indicate there is a mediating effect of charismatic leadership. This demonstrates that besides the appraisal system, charismatic leadership is important for feedback reactions. Hence, supervisors should take into account that they have an important function to fulfill when conducting performance appraisals and not see performance appraisal as just another perfunctory system in human resource management.