Learning from a clinical microsystems quality improvement initiative to promote integrated care across a falls care pathway.

Aim: To identify learning from a clinical microsystems (CMS) quality improvement initiative to develop a more integrated service across a falls care pathway spanning community and hospital services.

Background: Falls present a major challenge to healthcare providers internationally as populations age. A review of the falls care pathway in Sheffield, United Kingdom, identified that pathway implementation was constrained by inconsistent co-ordination and integration at the hospital-community interface.

Predicting the distribution of Phortica variegata and potential for Thelazia callipaeda transmission in Europe and the United Kingdom.

Background: Male fruitflies Phortica variegata (Drosophilidae, Steganinae) are the intermediate host of the zoonotic nematode Thelazia callipaeda (Spirurida, Thelaziidae). More than 10 years ago, when T. callipaeda was confined to remote regions of southern Italy, ecological niche models were used to predict the potential distribution of P.

Alteration of the magnetosphere of the Vela pulsar during a glitch.

As pulsars lose energy, primarily in the form of magnetic dipole radiation, their rotation slows down accordingly. For some pulsars, this spin-down is interrupted by occasional abrupt spin-up events known as glitches . A glitch is hypothesized to be a catastrophic release of pinned vorticity that provides an exchange of angular momentum between the superfluid outer core and the crust.

Introducing on-ward volunteers to work with patients with dementia.

This article reports on an evaluation of the effect of an on-ward volunteer service in an acute orthopaedic ward with a number of dementia patients. A mixed-methods evaluation was undertaken in 2012. This included interviews with individuals who have strategic, management, operational and clinical roles in the voluntary organisation and the NHS trust, focus group discussions with volunteers, non-participant observations of practice and focused conversations with ward staff.

Magnetically labelled gold and epoxy bi-functional microcarriers for suspension based bioassay technologies.

Microarrays and suspension-based assay technologies have attracted significant interest over the past decade with applications ranging from medical diagnostics to high throughput molecular biology. The throughput and sensitivity of a microarray will always be limited by the array density and slow reaction kinetics. Suspension (or bead) based technologies offer a conceptually different approach, improving detection by substituting a fixed plane of operation with many individually distinguishable microcarriers.