Plos One
-
Citizen report cards on health care providers have been identified as a potential means to increase citizen engagement, provider accountability and health systems performance. Research in high-income settings indicates that the wording, presentation and display of performance information are critical to achieve these goals. However, there are limited insights on developing effective report card designs for middle- and low-income settings. ⋯ We found some heterogeneity across the two provinces. Overall, our findings are promising regarding the citizens' comprehension of health care report cards in rural Tajikistan, while underscoring the challenges of effectively providing health care performance information to communities. Cognitive interviews and iterative testing can support an effective implementation of reporting initiatives.
-
The distribution of firm sizes is known to be heavy tailed. In order to account for this stylized fact, previous economic models have focused mainly on growth through investments in a company's own operations (internal growth). Thereby, the impact of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) on the firm size (external growth) is often not taken into consideration, notwithstanding its potential large impact. ⋯ In particular, it rationalises shortcomings of past work by quantifying that mergers and acquisitions develop a significant influence on the firm size distribution only over time scales much longer than a few decades. This explains why M&A has apparently little impact on the firm size distributions in existing data sets. Our approach is very flexible and can be extended to account for other sources of external growth, thus contributing towards a holistic understanding of the distribution of firm sizes.
-
Transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) has become a commonplace procedure for the treatment of aortic stenosis in higher risk surgical patients. With the high cost and steadily increasing number of patients receiving TAVR, emphasis has been placed on optimizing outcomes as well as resource utilization. Recently, studies have demonstrated the feasibility of conscious sedation in lieu of general anesthesia for TAVR. This study aimed to investigate the clinical as well as cost outcomes associated with conscious sedation in comparison to general anesthesia in TAVR. ⋯ Conscious sedation is emerging as a safe and viable option for anesthesia in patients undergoing transcatheter aortic valve replacement. The use of conscious sedation was not only associated with similar rates of adverse events, but also shortened ICU and overall hospital stays. Finally, there were significant decreases in all cost categories when compared to a propensity matched cohort receiving general anesthesia.
-
Prognostic impact of delayed intensive care unit(ICU) admission in critically ill cancer patients remains debatable. We determined predictive factors for later ICU admission and mortality in cancer patients initially not admitted after their first ICU request. ⋯ Compared with immediate ICU admission, later ICU admission was not associated with hospital mortality. Clinical respiratory events were independently associated with both later ICU admission and hospital mortality.
-
How competent a politician looks, as assessed in the laboratory, is correlated with whether the politician wins in real elections. This finding has led many to investigate whether the association between candidate appearances and election outcomes transcends cultures. However, these studies have largely focused on European countries and Caucasian candidates. ⋯ Interestingly, the faster the participants made face-based trait inferences, the more strongly those inferences were correlated with real election outcomes. These findings provide new insights into cultural effects and the difficult question of causality underlying the association between facial inferences and election outcomes. We also discuss the implications for political science and cognitive psychology.