BACKGROUND Many studies have found considerable variations in the resource intensity of physical therapy episodes. Although they have identified several patient- and provider-related factors, few studies have examined their relative explanatory power. We sought to quantify the contribution of patients and providers to these differences and examine how effective Swiss regulations are (nine-sessi...

BACKGROUND The combined tuberculosis (TB) and HIV epidemics in South Africa (SA) have created enormous operational challenges for a health service that has traditionally run vertical programmes for TB treatment and antiretroviral therapy (ART) in separate facilities. This is particularly problematic for TB/HIV co-infected patients who need to access both services. OBJECTIVE To determine wheth...

SETTING South Africa. OBJECTIVE To evaluate the long-term effectiveness of infant modified vaccinia Ankara virus-expressing antigen 85A (MVA85A) vaccination against tuberculosis (TB). DESIGN We analysed data from a double-blind randomised placebo-controlled Phase 2b MVA85A infant TB vaccine trial (2009-2012), with extended post-trial follow-up (2012-2014). Isoniazid preventive therapy (IPT)...

BACKGROUND There is little practical guidance on how contextually relevant mental healthcare plans (MHCPs) can be developed in low-resource settings. AIMS To describe how theory of change (ToC) was used to plan the development and evaluation of MHCPs as part of the PRogramme for Improving Mental health carE (PRIME). METHOD ToC development occurred in three stages: (a) development of a cross...

BACKGROUND In many countries, the referral-consultation process faces a number of challenges from inefficiencies and rising demand, resulting in excessive wait times for many specialties. We collected referral data from a sample of family doctors across the province of Ontario, Canada as part of a larger program of research. The purpose of this study is to describe referral patterns from primar...

INTRODUCTION While parent-adolescent sexual and reproductive health (SRH) communication is one potential source of SRH information for adolescents, it appears to be inadequately practiced in Ethiopia. This study was designed to investigate the factors that limit or improve parent-adolescent SRH communication in Harar, Eastern Ethiopia. METHODS A community based cross-sectional study was done ...

the rank-k numerical range has a close connection to the construction of quantum error correction code for a noisy quantum channel. for noisy quantum channel, a quantum error correcting code of dimension k exists if and only if the associated joint rank-k numerical range is non-empty. in this paper the notion of joint rank-k numerical range is generalized and some statements of [2011, generaliz...

OBJECTIVE The main purpose of the present study was to calculate percentile curves for total sleep duration per 24 hours, for nighttime and for daytime sleep duration from early infancy to late adolescence to illustrate the developmental course and age-specific variability of these variables among subjects. METHODS A total of 493 subjects from the Zurich Longitudinal Studies were followed usi...