• Title/Summary/Keyword: Queensland

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Geographic Disparities in Prostate Cancer Outcomes - Review of International Patterns

  • Baade, Peter D.;Yu, Xue Qin;Smith, David P.;Dunn, Jeff;Chambers, Suzanne K.
    • Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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    • v.16 no.3
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    • pp.1259-1275
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    • 2015
  • Background: This study reviewed the published evidence as to how prostate cancer outcomes vary across geographical remoteness and area level disadvantage. Materials and Methods: A review of the literature published from January 1998 to January 2014 was undertaken: Medline and CINAHL databases were searched in February to May 2014. The search terms included terms of 'Prostate cancer' and 'prostatic neoplasms' coupled with 'rural health', 'urban health', 'geographic inequalities', 'spatial', 'socioeconomic', 'disadvantage', 'health literacy' or 'health service accessibility'. Outcome specific terms were 'incidence', 'mortality', 'prevalence', 'survival', 'disease progression', 'PSA testing' or 'PSA screening', 'treatment', 'treatment complications' and 'recurrence'. A further search through internet search engines was conducted to identify any additional relevant published reports. Results: 91 papers were included in the review. While patterns were sometimes contrasting, the predominate patterns were for PSA testing to be more common in urban (5 studies out of 6) and affluent areas (2 of 2), higher prostate cancer incidence in urban (12 of 22) and affluent (18 of 20), greater risk of advanced stage prostate cancer in rural (7 of 11) and disadvantaged (8 of 9), higher survival in urban (8 of 13) and affluent (16 of 18), greater access or use of definitive treatment services in urban (6 of 9) and affluent (7 of 7), and higher prostate mortality in rural (10 of 20) and disadvantaged (8 of 16) areas. Conclusions: Future studies may need to utilise a mixed methods approach, in which the quantifiable attributes of the individuals living within areas are measured along with the characteristics of the areas themselves, but importantly include a qualitative examination of the lived experience of people within those areas. These studies should be conducted across a range of international countries using consistent measures and incorporate dialogue between clinicians, epidemiologists, policy advocates and disease control specialists.

Codon usage and bias in mitochondrial genomes of parasitic platyhelminthes

  • Le, Thanh-Hoa;Mcmanus, Donald-Peter;Blair, David
    • Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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    • v.42 no.4
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    • pp.159-167
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    • 2004
  • Sequences of the complete protein-coding portions of the mitochondrial (mt) genome were analysed for 6 species of cestodes (including hydatid tapeworms and the pork tapeworm) and 5 species of trematodes (blood flukes and liver- and lung-flukes). A near-complete sequence was also available for an additional trematode (the blood fluke Schistosoma malayensis). All of these parasites belong to a large flatworm taxon named the Neodermata. Considerable variation was found in the base composition of the protein-coding genes among these neodermatans. This variation was reflected in statistically-significant differences in numbers of each inferred amino acid between many pairs of species. Both convergence and divergence in nucleotide, and hence amino acid, composition was noted among groups within the Neodermata. Considerable variation in skew (unequal representation of complementary bases on the same strand) was found among the species studied. A pattern is thus emerging of diversity in the mt genome in neodermatans that may cast light on evolution of mt genomes generally.

FACTORS AFFECTING PRODUCTIVITY ON DAIRY FARMS IN TROPICAL AND SUB-TROPICAL ENVIRONMENTS

  • Kerr, D.V.;Davison, T.M.;Cowan, R.T.;Chaseling, J.
    • Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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    • v.8 no.5
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    • pp.505-513
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    • 1995
  • The major factors affecting productivity on daily farms in Queensland, Australia, were determined using the stepwise linear regression approach. The data were obtained from a survey conducted on the total population of daily farms in Queensland in 1987. These data were divided into six major dailying regions. The technique was applied using 12 independent variables believed by a panel of experienced research and extension personnel to exert the most influence on milk production. The regression equations were all significant (p < 0.001) with the percentage coefficients of determination ranging from 62 to 76% for equations developed using' total farm milk: production as the dependent variable. Three of the variables affecting total farm milk: production were found to be common to all six regions. These were; the amount of supplementary energy fed, the area set aside to irrigate winter feed and the size of the area used for dailying. Higher production farms appeared to be more efficient in that they consistently produced milk production levels higher than those estimated from the regression equation for their region. Other methods of analysis including robust regression and non linear regression techniques were unsuccessful in overcoming this problem and allowing development of a model appropriate for farms at all levels of production.

Prestress and excitation force identification in a prestressed concrete box-girder bridge

  • Xiang, Ziru;Chan, Tommy H.T.;Thambiratnam, David P.;Nguyen, Andy
    • Computers and Concrete
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    • v.20 no.5
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    • pp.617-625
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    • 2017
  • Prestress force identification (PFI) is crucial to maintain the safety of prestressed concrete bridges. A synergic identification method has been proposed recently by the authors that can determine the prestress force (PF) and the excitation force simultaneously in prestressed concrete beams with good accuracy. In this paper, the ability of this method in the application with prestressed concrete box-girder bridges is demonstrated. A reasonable assumption is made to capture the similarity of the dynamic behavior of the prestressed concrete box-girder bridge and a beam under a certain loading scenario, and the feasibility of this method for application in a prestressed box-girder bridge is affirmed. A comprehensive laboratory test program is conducted, and the effects of PF, excitation, measuring time and uncertainties are studied. Results show that the proposed method can predict the PF and the excitation force in a prestressed concrete box-girder accurately and has a great robustness against uncertainties.

Assessment of recycled concrete aggregates as a pavement material

  • Jayakody, Shiran;Gallage, Chaminda;Kumar, Arun
    • Geomechanics and Engineering
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    • v.6 no.3
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    • pp.235-248
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    • 2014
  • Population increase and economic developments can lead to construction as well as demolition of infrastructures such as buildings, bridges, roads, etc resulting in used concrete as a primary waste product. Recycling of waste concrete to obtain the recycled concrete aggregates (RCA) for base and/or sub-base materials in road construction is a foremost application to be promoted to gain economical and sustainability benefits. As the mortar, bricks, glass and reclaimed asphalt pavement (RAP) present as constituents in RCA, it exhibits inconsistent properties and performance. In this study, six different types of RCA samples were subjected classification tests such as particle size distribution, plasticity, compaction test, unconfined compressive strength (UCS) and California bearing ratio (CBR) tests. Results were compared with those of the standard road materials used in Queensland, Australia. It was found that material type 'RM1-100/RM3-0' and 'RM1-80/RM3-20' samples are in the margin of the minimum required specifications of base materials used for high volume unbound granular roads while others are lower than that the minimum requirement.

Transaction Mining for Fraud Detection in ERP Systems

  • Khan, Roheena;Corney, Malcolm;Clark, Andrew;Mohay, George
    • Industrial Engineering and Management Systems
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    • v.9 no.2
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    • pp.141-156
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    • 2010
  • Despite all attempts to prevent fraud, it continues to be a major threat to industry and government. Traditionally, organizations have focused on fraud prevention rather than detection, to combat fraud. In this paper we present a role mining inspired approach to represent user behaviour in Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems, primarily aimed at detecting opportunities to commit fraud or potentially suspicious activities. We have adapted an approach which uses set theory to create transaction profiles based on analysis of user activity records. Based on these transaction profiles, we propose a set of (1) anomaly types to detect potentially suspicious user behaviour, and (2) scenarios to identify inadequate segregation of duties in an ERP environment. In addition, we present two algorithms to construct a directed acyclic graph to represent relationships between transaction profiles. Experiments were conducted using a real dataset obtained from a teaching environment and a demonstration dataset, both using SAP R/3, presently the predominant ERP system. The results of this empirical research demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach.

User-friendly Application for operability with HL7 in mobile agent of Ubiquitous Health Environment

  • Lee, JeongHoon;Kwock, DongYeup;Moon, KangNam;sahama, Tony;Kim, Jung-Tae
    • Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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    • 2009.10a
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    • pp.866-870
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    • 2009
  • Mobile Health (M-Health) system is a recent term for medical and public health practice supported by mobile devices, such as mobile phones, PDAs, and other wireless devices. Mobile Health system has been successfully establishing at few general hospital in Korea. However, to use diverse devices manufactured by various company cause inoperability, and lack of security disappoints customers often. Although the outstanding health environment, most of hospitals are unavailable to share electronic patient records due to lack of standard protocol to handle the interoperability each other. Health Level 7 (HL7) is the best solution for the problem. In this paper, we will analyse a current M-Health service in terms of security and mobile device, and suggest iPhone for the best device against hospital environment. Also, for keep confidentiality of health information and patient privacy, enhanced security mechanism is introduced. As a consequence, interoperable standard, and most appropriate device for supporting staffs and M-Health performance, and enhanced securirty mechanism will be integrated in order to propose improved M-health model.

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Integrated Hospital Information System with IPv6 for Ubiquitous Healthcare Environment

  • Kwock, DongYeup;Moon, KangNam;Lee, JeongHoon;sahama, Tony;Kim, Jung-Tae
    • Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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    • 2009.10a
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    • pp.1030-1034
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    • 2009
  • IPv6 and Ubiquitous Healthcare Environment (UHE) has become a main stream of the next generation technologies. IPv6 is designed in many ways with enhanced features such as a routing, mobility, scalability, QOS and security as a replacement of IPv4. Also, UHE is developed to provide patients with convenience and efficient healthcare services using the remote home healthcare system. However, IPv4 currently used as an Internet protocol does not have enough capability to fully support UHE. It may result in a restricted implementation of UHE. As a result, research on IPv6 implementations in UHE is increasingly becoming an issue within the healthcare industry. IPv6 has enhanced features to implement the remote healthcare system such as Neighbour Discovery process and address auto-configuration. In this paper, a basic of IPv6 and UHE will be firstly introduced and secondly, benefits brought by IPv6 in UHE will be discussed. In addition, security issues in IPv6 will be analysed to conclude this paper.

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A Relationship of Managing Impacts of FOREX Fluctuations and Organizational Capabilities in Construction Business

  • Mohamed, Mohd Amizan Bin;Teo, Melissa;Kajewski, Stephen;Trigunarsyah, Bambang
    • International conference on construction engineering and project management
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    • 2015.10a
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    • pp.477-480
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    • 2015
  • Construction projects are high-risk activities. When undertaking such projects in an international setting, it can be complicated by foreign exchange (FOREX) fluctuation risk. This affects the construction business performance in various ways, namely its progress due to delays, which in turn create further problems, specifically cost overruns as a result of price increase in raw materials, disputes, arbitration, litigation and even, total abandonment. Thus, the effective management of FOREX fluctuations is crucial. Previous studies have focused on the need for contract safeguards, adequate insurance, careful planning and management, as well as foreign exchange futures hedging to address some of the risks triggered by FOREX fluctuations. An analysis of FOREX fluctuations in the international construction industry revealed that more often it was focused on project-specific issues. Currently, there is a relative lack of awareness on Organizational Capabilities (OC), the abilities that owned by the organization, which is essential in managing the impact of FOREX fluctuations. Where research has focused on OC, these are viewed in isolation. Therefore, this study attempts to close the gap by proposing a framework on managing the impact of FOREX fluctuations in the international construction industry, employing the OC perspective.

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