Training Substance Use Disorder Counselors in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Depression: Development and Initial Exploration of an Online Training Program.

Introduction: Evidence based psychotherapies (EBPs) remain underutilized. Models for EBP training and implementation that are cost-effective, minimally disruptive, and sufficiently flexible are needed. Internet-based technology is a promising platform, but questions remain about how this technology can address the barriers to implementation.

A screening tool for dengue fever in children.

Background: Dengue fever (DF) is a significant public health issue in Asia. We aimed to use clinical and laboratory data to derive a rapid and accurate case-finding tool for DF in children.

Methods: This retrospective study used 24 DF-related characteristics and clinical features (17 clinical; 7 laboratory) of 177 pediatric patients (69 diagnosed with DF).

A web-based computerized adaptive testing (CAT) to assess patient perception in hospitalization.

Background: Many hospitals have adopted mobile nursing carts that can be easily rolled up to a patient's bedside to access charts and help nurses perform their rounds. However, few papers have reported data regarding the use of wireless computers on wheels (COW) at patients' bedsides to collect questionnaire-based information of their perception of hospitalization on discharge from the hospital.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relative efficiency of computerized adaptive testing (CAT) and the precision of CAT-based measures of perceptions of hospitalized patients, as compared with those of nonadaptive testing (NAT).

Applying the revised Chinese Job Content Questionnaire to assess psychosocial work conditions among Taiwan's hospital workers.

Background: For hospital accreditation and health promotion reasons, we examined whether the 22-item Job Content Questionnaire (JCQ) could be applied to evaluate job strain of individual hospital employees and to determine the number of factors extracted from JCQ. Additionally, we developed an Excel module of self-evaluation diagnostic system for consultation with experts.

Methods: To develop an Excel-based self-evaluation diagnostic system for consultation to experts to make job strain assessment easier and quicker than ever, Rasch rating scale model was used to analyze data from 1,644 hospital employees who enrolled in 2008 for a job strain survey.

Web-based computer adaptive assessment of individual perceptions of job satisfaction for hospital workplace employees.

Background: To develop a web-based computer adaptive testing (CAT) application for efficiently collecting data regarding workers' perceptions of job satisfaction, we examined whether a 37-item Job Content Questionnaire (JCQ-37) could evaluate the job satisfaction of individual employees as a single construct.

Methods: The JCQ-37 makes data collection via CAT on the internet easy, viable and fast. A Rasch rating scale model was applied to analyze data from 300 randomly selected hospital employees who participated in job-satisfaction surveys in 2008 and 2009 via non-adaptive and computer-adaptive testing, respectively.

Reliability of 95% confidence interval revealed by expected quality-of-life scores: an example of nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients after radiotherapy using EORTC QLQ-C 30.

Background: Many researchers use observed questionnaire scores to evaluate score reliability and to make conclusions and inferences regarding quality-of-life outcomes. The amount of false alarms from medical diagnoses that would be avoided if observed scores were substituted with expected scores is interesting, and understanding these differences is important for the care of cancer patients. Using expected scores to estimate the reliability of 95% confidence intervals (CIs) is rarely reported in published papers.

A randomized trial comparing two models of web-based training in cognitive-behavioral therapy for substance abuse counselors.

This study compared training outcomes obtained by 147 substance abuse counselors who completed eight self-paced online modules on cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) and attended a series of four weekly group supervision sessions using Web conferencing software. Participants were randomly assigned to two conditions that systematically varied the degree to which they explicitly promoted adherence to the CBT protocol and the degree of control that they afforded participants over the sequence and relative emphasis of the training curriculum. Outcomes were assessed at baseline and immediately following training.

Clinico-pathological features of intussusception in children beyond five years old.

Background: The pathoetiology and outcomes of intussusception in older children are different from those in young children. This study aims to investigate the characteristics and outcomes of intussusception in children older than 5 years in a tertiary referring hospital.

Methods: A retrospective review of patients aged older than five years having received a postoperative or roentgenographic diagnosis of intussusception between 1988 and 2005 was conducted.