الصفحة 17
الصفحة 17
Improving Healthcare : A Dose of Competition
Improving Healthcare: A Dose of Competition systematically examines the American health care system from a competition-oriented perspective. The volume surveys the performance of each major sector of the health care system, and identifies impediments to more effective competition. Improving Healthcare examines such issues as competition v. regulation, public and private sector approaches to health care financing, cross-subsidies, licensure, provider market concentration, financial and clinical integration, payment for performance, quality, pharmacy benefit managers, direct-to-consumer advertising of pharmaceuticals, certificates of need, mandates, unionization, the significance of organizational status (nonprofit v. for-profit), and the role of antitrust and consumer protection in health care. It offers concrete recommendations to improve the quality and cost-effectiveness of the American health care marketplace.
Improvements in System Safety ; Proceedings of the Sixteenth Safety-critical Systems Symposium, Bristol, UK, 5-7 February 2008
Improvements in System Safety contains the full complement of papers presented at the sixteenth annual Safety-critical Systems Symposium, held at Bristol, UK, in February 2008.The Symposium is for engineers, managers and academics in the field of safety, across all industry sectors, and so the papers included in this volume offer a wide-ranging coverage of major safety issues as well as a good blend of academic research and industrial experience. They include discussions of some of the most recent developments in the field.
Implementing Strategic Environmental Assessment
More countries are now using Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) than ever before. This timely and comprehensive Handbook describes the implementation of SEA in 18 countries around the world, as well as a critical analysis of different SEA methodologies. The Handbook starts by introducing key SEA principles and the legal requirements of the new European SEA Directive (which became law in 2004). It then describes the implementation of SEA in 11 European Union countries, as well as the USA, Canada and New Zealand. This is contrasted with SEA requirements of four developing countries. The Handbook explores public participation issues and the wide-range of SEA methodologies used in terms of resources (soils, water and biodiversity) and sectors of activity (transport, agriculture, waste management and industry). The Handbook concludes with a discussion on best practice, capacity building and the future of SEA.
Implementing an Electronic Health Record System
"Implementing an Electronic Health Record System" addresses the range of issues and opportunities that implementing an electronic health records system (EHR) poses for any size of medical organization - from the small one-man operation to a large healthcare system. The book is divided into sections on preparation, support, implementation and a summary and prospects section, enabling the clinician to define the framework necessary to implement and evaluate a clinically effective EHR system. With the increasing involvement of clinicians in the day-to-day running of the practice, interest is now focused on EHR as a key area for improving clinical efficiency. This book uniquely provides the guidance a clinical team needs to plan and execute an effective EHR system within any clinical setting. Practical in its scope and coverage, the authors have provided a tool-kit for the medical professional in the often complex field of medical informatics. Designed for senior clinicians, decision-makers and EHR teams, the book is of use to anyone involved in the efficient management of clinical records.
Implementation and Application of Functional Languages ; 19th International Workshop, IFL 2007, Freiburg, Germany, September 27-29, 2007. Revised Selected Papers
This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-proceedings of the 19th International Workshop on Implementation and Applications of Functional Languages, IFL 2007, held in Freiburg, Germany in September 2007.The 15 revised full papers presented went through two rounds of reviewing and improvement and were selected from 33 submissions. The papers address all current theoretical and methodological issues on functional and function-based languages such as type checking, contract checking, compilation, parallelism, development and debugging, data structures, parsing as well as various performance related concepts.
Implementation and application of functional languages ; 18th International Symposium, IFL 2006, Budapest, Hungary, September 4-6, 2006, Revised Selected Papers
This volume constitutes the post-proceedings of the 18th International Workshop on Implementation and Applications of Functional Languages. Each one was submitted to two rounds of reviews to ensure accuracy, thoroughness, and readability. The papers address all current theoretical and methodological issues in functional and function-based languages.
Implant therapy : Clinical approaches and evidence of success
Brings together the knowledge of the foremost leaders in implant dentistry, covering all aspects of the treatment process, from decision-making and treatment planning through imaging, surgical techniques, bone and soft tissue augmentation, multidisciplinary approaches, loading protocols, and finally strategies for preventing and treating complications and peri-implantitis as well as providing effective implant maintenance therapy. Filled with expert knowledge based on decades of research and clinical experience as well as abundant illustrations and clinical case presentations, this book is an indispensable resource for clinicians seeking to provide implant treatment at the highest standard of care.
Immunology and Immunopathogenesis of Malaria
This collection of reviews addresses many of these important issues of malarial immunity and immunopathology. They are of interest not only to malariologists, but hopefully also to the broader immunological community. Strong interactions with, and feedback from immunologists working in other infectious diseases and in basic immunology will help us to move the field of malaria immunology and therapeutic intervention forward more quickly.
Immunogenetics of Autoimmune Disease
Utoimmunity is the downstream outcome of a rather extensive and coordinated series of events that include loss of self-tolerance, peripheral lymphocyte Aactivation, disruption of the blood-systems barriers, cellular infiltration into the target organs and local inflammation. Cytokines, adhesion molecules, growth factors, antibodies, and other molecules induce and regulate critical cell functions that perpetuate inflammation, leading to tissue injury and clinical phenotype. The nature and intensity of this response as well as the physiological ability to restore homeostasis are to a large extent conditioned by the unique amino acid sequences that define allelic variants on each of the numerous participating mol ecules. Therefore, the coding genes in their germline configuration play a primary role in determining who is at risk for developing such disorders, how the disease progresses, and how someone responds to therapy. Although genetic components in these diseases are clearly present, the lack of obvious and homogeneous modes of transmission has slowed progress by prevent ing the full exploitation of classical genetic epidemiologic techniques. Furthermore, autoimmune diseases are characterized by modest disease risk heritability and m- tifaceted interactions with environmental influences. Yet, several recent discoveries have dramatically changed our ability to examine genetic variation as it relates to human disease. In addition to the development of large-scale laboratory methods and tools to efficiently recognize and catalog DNA diversity, over the past few years there has been real progress in the application of new analytical and data-manage ment approaches
Immunobiology of natural killer cell receptors
Natural Killer (NK) cells are large granular lymphocytes of the innate immune system. They are widespread throughout the body, being present in both lymphoid organs and non-lymphoid peripheral tissues. NK cells are involved in direct innate immune reactions against viruses, bacteria, parasites and other triggers of pathology, such as malignant transformation, all of which cause stress in affected cells. Importantly, NK cells also link the innate and adaptive immune responses, contributing to the initiation of adaptive immune responses and executing adaptive responses using the CD16 FcgRIIIA immunoglobulin Fc receptor. Such responses are mediated through two major effector functions, the direct cytolysis of target cells and the production of cytokines and chemokines. The authors focus here on the nature of recognition events by NK cells and address how these events are integrated to trigger these distinct and graded effector functions.
Immune mediators in cancer : Methods and protocols
Provides a comprehensive collection of classic and cutting-edge methodologies as well as bioinformatics and genome-editing approaches that are used to quantify immune mediators and analyze their function and biological activity in cancer cells and tissues. Beginning with a section on the detection of immune mediators in samples, the volume continues with sections covering cytokine bioassays, the expression and regulation of immune mediators in cancer cells, and methods to navigate the enormous datasets created by modern DNA and RNA sequencing and proteomic technology. Written in the highly successful Methods in Molecular Biology series format, chapters include introductions to their respective topics, lists of the necessary materials and reagents, step-by-step, readily reproducible laboratory protocols, and tips on troubleshooting and avoiding known pitfalls.
Immobilisation of DNA on Chips II
DNA chips are gaining increasing importance in different fields ranging from medicine to analytical chemistry with applications in the latter in food safety and food quality issues as well as in environmental protection. In the medical field, DNA chips are frequently used in arrays for gene expression studies to identify diseased cells due to over- or under-expression of certain genes, to follow the response of drug treatments, or to grade cancers), for genotyping of individuals, for the detection of single nucleotide polymorphisms, point mutations, and short tandem reports, or moreover for genome and transcriptome analyses in the quasi post-genomic sequencing era. Furthermore, due to some unique properties of DNA molecules, self-assembled layers of DNA are promising candidates in the field of molecular electronics.the main focus of these two volumes is on the immobilization chemistry, considering the various aspects of the immobilization process itself, since different types of nucleic acids, support materials, surface activation chemistries and patterning tools are of key concern.
Imaging of Soft Tissue Tumors
This book provides a comprehensive survey of the growing role of medical imaging studies in the detection, staging, grading, tissue characterization, and post-treatment follow-up of soft tissue tumors. For each tumor group, imaging findings are correlated with clinical, epidemiologic, and histologic data.
Imaging in Transplantation
This book covers all topics related to the imaging of organ transplantation. An introductory section addresses such issues as organ procurement, patient selection, immune responses, and ethical and economic considerations. The main part of the book then offers in-depth coverage of heart, renal, liver, lung, bone marrow and pancreatic and intestinal transplantation.
Imaging in Drug Discovery and Early Clinical Trials
Efficient tools for the selection and validation of drug targets both at the preclinical and clinical level are required. Non-invasive imaging and in particular molecular imaging methods are becoming essential technologies to support drug discovery and dvelopment. Imaging provides structural, functional, metabolic and molecular readouts that are being applied to characterize a disease phenotype (diagnosis), to elucidate molecular mechanisms involved, to evaluate drug efficacy and safety, and to identify potential biomarkers of the drug's mechanism-of-action, efficacy and safety. Non-invasive imaging techniques constitute a bridge between preclinical and clinical drug evaluation. In this monograph the contribution of imaging modalities to the various stages of drug discovery and development, from early target validation to their use in clinical development programs, is described. Chapters are devoted to the description of the drug discovery process as such, to the various imaging modalities being used both preclinically and clinically, to applications of imaging during the optimization of a lead compound (addressing issues such as bioavailability and efficacy) and during the drug safety evaluation.
Image-Guided IMRT
Intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT), one of the most important developments in radiation oncology in the past 25 years, involves technology to deliver radiation to tumors in the right location, quantity and time. Unavoidable irradiation of surrounding normal tissues is distributed so as to preserve their function. The achievements and future directions in the field are grouped in the three sections of the book, each suitable for supporting a teaching course.
Image and video processing and recognition based on artificial intelligence (Vol. II)
Focuses on challenging issues in the field of AI-based image and video processing and recognition, including the topics of AI-based image processing, understanding, recognition, compression, and reconstruction; AI-based video processing, understanding, recognition, compression, and reconstruction; computer vision based on AI; AI-based biometrics; AI-based object detection and tracking; approaches that combine AI techniques and conventional methods for image and video processing and recognition; explainable AI (XAI) for image and video processing and recognition; generative adversarial network (GAN)-based image and video processing and recognition; and approaches that combine AI techniques and blockchain methods for image and video processing and recognition.
Image Analysis, Sediments and Paleoenvironments
This seventh volume of the DPER series examines imaging techniques for sedimentologists, paleolimnologists, paleoceanographers and microscopists working on issues related to paleoenvironmental reconstruction. It will help the researcher or graduate student to understand every step involved in the imaging process, from image acquisition to measurements.nbsp; Procedures are described to ensure that the right protocols and methodology are selected to solve a particular issue, and to evaluate the validity of scientific results. Case studies illustrate the wide range of information that can be obtained from many kinds of sediments (marine, lacustrine and aeolian) and different types of samples (cores, embedded blocks, microscopic slides) using different regions of the electromagnetic spectrum (visible, UV, IR, X-ray). The volume provides comprehensive protocols, guidelines, and recommendations for the use of low cost image analysis techniques, to facilitate intercomparisons of measurements.
Image Analysis and Processing – ICIAP 2005 ; 13th International Conference, Cagliari, Italy, September 6-8, 2005, Proceedings
This volume contains the Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Image Analysis and Processing (ICIAP 2005), held in Cagliari, Italy, at the conference centre “Centro della Cultura e dei Congressi”, on September 6–8, 2005. ICIAP 2005 was the thirteenth edition of a series of conferences organized every two years by the Italian group of researchersa?liated to the International Association for Pattern Recognition (GIRPR) with the aim to bring together researchers in image processing and pattern recognition from around the world. As for the previous editions, conference topics concerned the theory of image analysis and processing and its classical and Internet-driven applications. The central theme of ICIAP 2005 was “Pattern Recognition in the Internet and Mobile Communications Era”. The interest for such a theme was con?rmed by the large number of papers dealing with it, the special session devoted to pattern recognition for computer network security, and the emphasis of two invited talks on Internet and mobile communication issues. ICIAP 2005 received 217 paper submissions. Fifteen papers were collected into the two special sessions dealing with Pattern Recognition for Computer Network Security and Computer Vision for Augmented Reality and Augmented Environments.
IFRS for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises : Structuring the Transition Process
In the process of converting to IFRS, a number of practical questions arise concerning the structures of the accounting area department of medium-sized enterprises as well as the issue of effectively updating financial statements once converted, which have thus far not been addressed in the debate. Richard Wittsiepe analyses the relevant IFRS statements with a view to possibly integrating them into existing workflows in an annual audit. He weighs the key issues of conversion by comparing them with the 4th EU Directive for accounting within the EU. The aim is to visualise the workflows as the basis for creating support software which can make a key contribution to cost-effective conversion.
