Objectives To compare the timelines and recommendations of the Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) and National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), in particular since the single technology assessment (STA) process was introduced in 2005. Design Comparative study of drug appraisals published by NICE and SMC. Setting NICE and SMC. Participants All drugs appraised by SMC and NI...

This paper tackles the challenging task of developing a simple and accurate analytical model for performance evaluation of WiMAX networks. The need for accurate and fast-computing tools is of primary importance to face complex and exhaustive dimensioning issues for this promising access technology. In this paper, we present a generic Markovian model developed for three usual scheduling policies...

We present a socially assistive robot (SAR) system designed to engage elderly users in physical exercise. We discuss the system approach, design methodology, and implementation details, which incorporate insights from psychology research on intrinsic motivation, and we present five clear design principles for SAR-based therapeutic interventions. We then describe the system evaluation, consistin...

This report summarizes the findings of an evaluation of the cross-flow pervaporation technology developed by ZENON Environmental, Inc. (ZENON). This evaluation was conducted under the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Superfund Innovative Technology Evaluation (SITE) Program. The ZENON pervaporation technology was demonstrated over a 5-day period in February 1995 at Naval Air Station N...

Sensor nodes and actuators are becoming ubiquitous and research efforts focus on addressing the various issues stemming from resources constraints and other intrinsic characteristics typically associated with such devices and their applications. In the case of wearable nodes, and especially in the context of e-Health applications, the security issues are exacerbated by the direct interaction wi...

This paper presents a comparison of two versions of an Emergency Automated Response System (EARS), a fully manual version and a partially automated version. User evaluations involving both versions of the system were conducted using a low workload task and a high workload task. The results indicate that the automation employed by the partially automated system decreased overall response time an...

As part of the Face Recognition Technology (FERET) program, the U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) conducted supervised government tests and evaluations of automatic face recognition algorithms. The goal of the tests was to provide an independent method of evaluating algorithms and assessing the state of the art in automatic face recognition. This report describes the design and presents the r...

Wearable computing means a paradigm shift: instead of working at the computer users are supported by computing systems in their primary tasks. Currently wearable computing is still a technology of niches and in a laboratory stage. However, with wearIT@work a project dedicated to applications was launched by the European Commission (EC IP 004216). The first 30 months of this project are over and...

We propose an incentive pay scheme for educators that links educator compensation to the ranks of their students within appropriately defined comparison sets. Because this scheme employs only ordinal information, it allows education authorities to employ new assessments at each testing date without ever having to equate various assessment forms. Thus, our scheme mitigates incentives for teacher...

Early benefit assessment in Germany under the legislative framework of AMNOG (Arzneimittelmarktneuordnungsgesetz) requires direct comparisons of the new drug with appropriate comparators determined by the Federal Joint Committee (G-BA). In case no head-to-head studies are available for direct comparisons, the submission of indirect comparisons is permitted to assess the additional benefit of th...