Outline This thesis uses network analysis to study the inter-company relationships of Taiwanese business groups, specifically focusing on ¡§licensed¡¨ industries. So-called licensed industries are defined in this context as those that require government approval to enter . In the past, there were many industries that were monopolies or oligopolies as a direct result of government policy. In line with the trend towards greater liberalization and globalization, the Taiwanese government has begun a step-by-step deregulation of these business sectors. This thesis selects two industries, banking and telecommunications, and attempts to discover patterns of cooperative relationships among the participating Taiwanese business groups. Through investigating the licensed industries, we discovered that government permits are generally concentrated among large business groups, due to the capital requirements involved. In addition, we established that existing relationships and connections are very important considerations when these large business groups decide with whom to cooperate. Within the cooperation network as a whole, there exist apparent subgroups (cliques), which routinely form into stable cooperation groups. On the other hand, some business groups chose their partners without any obviously apparent pattern. Finally, and most importantly of all, we observed that a ¡§Birds of a feather flock together¡¨ phenomenon clearly exists in Taiwanese business groups. Large business groups are prone to cooperating with large business groups and small business groups are inclined to choose small ones to cooperate with.

The Occupational Stress Inventory Revised Edition (OSI-R) and an Individual Data Form (IDF) were used to examine the current levels of occupational stress, psychological strain, and coping resources for a random sample of 360 licensed professional counselors (LPCs) in Virginia. Using the OSI-R (Osipow, 1998), a comparison of the results of this study to the Occupational Stress Inventory (OSI), (Osipow & Spokane, 1987) Ryan (1996) used was made. Replicating Ryan's study was needed to determine if significant differences at the level of occupational stress, psychological strain, and coping resources exist over time which would emphasize the importance of occupational stress research for this population. The OSI-R is a concise measure of three dimensions of occupational adjustment: occupational stress, psychological strain, and coping resources. Demographic variables, such as age, gender, ethnicity, marital and parental status, primary work-setting, years of experience, stress related treatment, and years licensed were examined within the three dimensions of stress, strain, and coping. Data were collected via first mailing of 360 surveys with a final response rate of 63.52%. Th e number of responses used for analysis was 183. The majority of the participants were white (93.4%), female (65%), parents (69.9%) of two children (33.9%), and adults averaging 49 years old. There were 120 females (65.6%) and 63 males (34.4%). Private practice either individual (21.9%) or group affiliation (18.6%) was identified as the primary work setting. The majority (86.3%) of the LPCs worked with clients and averaged 19.79 hours per four day week, counseling clients. The average number of daily client sessions was 4.76 and the maximum number of daily client sessions was 6.52. Most (49.2%) of the clients' source of referral were legally mandated. Overall, the T-scores on the OSI-R fell in the average range for stress, strain, and coping. Variables that had no significant differences in level of stress, strain, or coping were marital and parental status, number of children, years experience, average daily client sessions, and stress related treatment. Demographic variables that contributed to differences in levels of stress only included ethnicity and weekly work hours. Demographic variables that contributed to differences in scores of strain only included age and years licensed. Demographic variables that contributed to differences in scores of coping were weekly work hours, number of days per week clients seen. Variables that had significant differences on the levels of stress, strain, and coping were gender, primary work setting, number of work settings, maximum daily client sessions, and referral source of clients. Thus, future research in the counseling profession for occupational stress, psychological strain, and coping resources are warranted. Implications for the profession and recommendations for future research were made. / Ph. D.

Bakgrund: Delegering av hälso- och sjukvårdsuppgifter från legitimerad sjuksköterska till icke-legitimerad personal är vanlig. Tidigare forskning har visat att delegering kan leda till att sjuksköterskans roll blir otydlig. Syfte: Att undersöka hur sjuksköterskors professionsutövning påverkas av att delegering till icke-legitimerad personal förekommer. Metod: Tio vetenskapliga artiklar studerades enligt metod för kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Resultat: Tre huvudteman framstod: ”Sjuksköterskor och inflytande”, ”Sjuksköterskor och interaktion” samt ”Sjuksköterskor och säkerhet”. Sjuksköterskor tyckte om att dela med sig av sin kunskap och uppskattade den avlastning som delegering kunde innebära. Emellertid uttryckte sjuksköterskor i en majoritet av studierna förlust av kontroll i samband med delegering. Många sjuksköterskor brast också i delegeringskompetens. Konklusion: Delegering kan försämra sjuksköterskors helhetssyn och kontroll över omvårdnadssituationen, vilket kan försvåra för dem att ta sitt fulla omvårdnadsansvar. Det finns också brister i sjuksköterskors kunskaper och färdigheter i att delegera. Impliktioner: Sjuksköterskor behöver delta mer i den patientnära omvårdnaden. Delegeringarna bör minska, och sjuksköterskor behöver återta sitt ansvar för omvårdnaden. Sjuksköterskor behöver också mer utbildning och träning i konsten att delegera. Ytterligare forskning kring delegering är nödvändig, särskilt i Sverige. / Background: Delegation of health care tasks from registered nurse to non-licensed personnel is common. Earlier research has shown that delegation can lead to blurring of the nurse’s role. Aim: To examine how the existence of delegation to non-licensed personnel influences the professional work of registered nurses. Method: Ten scientific articles were studied using content analysis. Results: Three major themes emerged: “Nurses and influence”, “Nurses and interaction” and “Nurses and safety”. Nurses enjoyed sharing their knowledge and appreciated the relief that delegation could entail. However, in a majority of the studies nurses expressed loss of control associated with delegation. Many nurses also showed lack of competence with regard to delegation. Conclusion: Delegation can diminish nurses’ holistic view and control of care situations, which may make it difficult for them to take full responsibility for the care. There is also a lack of knowledge and skill concerning delegation among nurses. Implications: Nurses need to participate more in direct patient care. Delegations should be fewer, and nurses need to reclaim their responsibility for nursing. Nurses also need more education and training in the art of delegating. Further research on delegation is necessary, especially in Sweden.

No description available.

Purpose: The purpose of this pilot study was to describe situation awareness (SA) among licensed practical nurses (LPNs) working in direct patient care. Specific Aims: The specific aims for this study are 1) to examine SA scores, as measured by the Situation Awareness Global Assessment Technique (SAGAT), in LPNs working in direct patient care and compare to published data on SA in registered nurses (RNs), 2) to examine the relationship between SA scores and years of LPN experience, 3) to examine differences in SA scores by type of workplace setting and 4) to describe the relationship between levels of satisfaction with simulation, as measured by the Satisfaction with Simulation Experience Scale (SSES) and SA scores among LPNs. Framework: Situation Awareness Theory, as described by Endsley, was used as the framework for this study. Design: A cross-sectional, descriptive design using the Situation Awareness Global Assessment Technique was used to gather data from a convenience sample of LPNs. Results: LPNs (N=24) participated in the study and achieved an average SAGAT score of 72.6%. There were no differences in scores between those LPNs enrolled in an RN program and those who were not enrolled. Individual scores on the SAGAT were comparable or better than scores in a similar study of RNs. Conclusion: LPNs in this study demonstrated adequate situation awareness. Key Words: Situation awareness, licensed practical nurse, patient deterioration, clinical simulation

Background: With the current nursing shortage there are fewer experienced nurses and more newly licensed registered nurses (NLRNs) in the workplace. This shortage may be due in part to inconsistencies between role expectations learned in school and the practice environment. These inconsistencies may make it challenging to transition from nursing school into professional healthcare organizations. Nurses with certain person-level traits, including resilience and emotional intelligence, may be more likely to make a successful transition into practice. Findings may improve our understanding of what person-level traits are important for making the successful transition to the workforce. Purpose: The current study explored whether emotional intelligence (EI) and resilience influenced transition into professional roles. Theoretical Framework: Understanding how cultural shock and adaptation are challenging for many NLRNs is important. Duchscher transition theory provided an overview of how NLRNs engaged in the professional practice role as they are confronted with the realities of the work environment. Methods: A non-experimental research design with descriptive cross-sectional study is used to determine if EI and resilience have any effect on NLRNs transitioning into their professional roles. Results: With a sample size of 63, there is a direct positive linear relationship between resilience and global trait EI and its subscales for NLRNs. The correlation is significant with the exception of the EI subscale emotionality. Also there was no significance with NLRNs who transitioned in a critical care setting and those in other specialty care areas. Conclusions: There is a need for further exploration of this relationship with a larger sample size and the need to investigate person-level characteristics in NLRNs who successfully transition to their professional role.

No description available.

One of the major challenges of Cognitive Radio (CRNs) is the spectrum handoff issue. Spectrum handoff happens when a Primary Users (PUs) appears in a spectrum band that is occupied by a Secondary User (SU). In such a case, SU should empty this spectrum band and perform a handoff procedure and search for an available free one. This process will be continued until the SU completes its data transmission. To avoid multiple spectrum handoffs, the spectrum handoff procedure should be performed in the unlicensed channels rather than the licensed channels. Thus, the number of handoffs can be reduced as no more spectrum handoffs will occur since all users have priority in this type of spectrum channel. This technique will help secondary users' QoS from degradation. This paper proposes a prioritized spectrum handoff decision scheme in a mixture spectrum environment of unlicensed and licensed channels, in order to reduce the handoff delay. The licensed channels in the proposed scheme have been modelled using a pre-emptive resume priority (PRP) M/M/C queue. In contrast, the unlicensed channels have been modelled using an M/M/C retrial priority queue. In order to examine the performance of the implemented model, the handoff and new SUs are considered with equal and different priorities. Experimental results show that the prioritized handoff scheme outperforms the other scheme in terms of average handoff delay under various traffic arrival rates as well as the number of licensed and unlicensed channels used.

Den här avhandlingen handlar om vårdlärares arbete med simulering av arbetsuppgifter i metodrum Ett metodrum kan ses som en hybrid mellan klassrum och sjukhussal. I denna skolmiljö övas arbetsuppgifter som förekommer inom vård och omsorg. Det saknas patienter att öva på och ibland sjukvårdsmaterial, vilket innebär en utmaning för vårdläraren att skapa en autentisk miljö. Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur vårdlärare arbetar med simulering av arbetsuppgifter i metodrumsundervisning för vuxna elever. Avhandlingen grundar sig på ett sociokulturellt perspektiv och har analyserats med hjälp av kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Tre metodrumslektioner från tre olika skolor ljudinspelades digitalt : venprovtagning, urinkatetrisering och såromläggning. Resultatet visar att vårdlärarna arbetar med tre olika simuleringsaktiviteter: Tekniskt utförande, Tolkande och Bemötande. Simuleringsaktiviteternas utförande varierar med lektionsinnehållet. Studien visar vilka redskap i metodrumsundervisningen som är vanligt förekommande och hur de används. Ingela Leibring har bakgrund som barnmorska och arbetar för närvarande som vårdlärare inom kommunal vuxenutbildning i Karlstad samt är utbildningsledare för Yrkeshögskolans utbildning till barnspecialiserad undersköterska. / This study centres on clinical skills laboratory teaching in municipal adult education. This type of teaching takes place in a school setting and is hybrid of a nursing and healthcare environment. Future professional tasks are simulated and practised here. Three different schools were visited and three clinical skills laboratory lessons were recorded with a digital audio recorder. The following tasks were included in the study: venipuncture, urinary catheterisation, and wound dressing. The analysis was performed as a qualitative content analysis informed by a sociocultural perspective. The aim of the study is to extend the knowledge of how teachers approach the simulation of tasks in clinical skills laboratory training. The study identifies three simulation activities and their application: technical performance, interpretation, and treatment.  The main teaching tools used in the lessons were the teacher’s body/hands, different physical tools specific to the respective laboratory session and the teacher’s language. All the simulation tasks – venipuncture, urinary catheterisation and wound dressing ­– were included in the sessions. A similarity was that technical performance on the whole was the most common feature in all the laboratory lessons. A difference emerged when the clinical skills laboratory lesson was divided into the components: introduction, students practise themselves, and conclusion. The lesson introduction included treatment to nearly the same extent as technical performance. Differences related to lesson content were evident in the activities interpretation and treatment. A common pattern was that the teachers shifted between everyday language and professional language when they worked with simulation. They named their patients and gave the students immediate response.

This quantitative non-experimental descriptive correlational design sought to answer the question if there was a difference in newly licensed RN (NLRN) performance at one-year post hire after participation in a nurse residency program that offers a formalized curriculum that extends throughout the entire year, one that offers a formalized curriculum that does not extend throughout the entire year, or one that does not provide a formalized curriculum. The study utilized the Six Dimension Scale of Nursing Performance (SDNP) and evaluated NLRN performance on six subscales: leadership, critical care, teaching/collaboration, planning/evaluation, interpersonal relations/communication, and professional development at one-year post hire. Benner’s novice-to-expert model served as the theoretical framework for this study. The results of the Mann-Whitney U test revealed there was not a statistically significant difference between the type of nurse residency the NLRN participated in and his or her self-reported performance on the individual subscale scores of the SDNP. The results of the point-biserial correlation based on how well the NLRN performed the task did not reveal any significant correlations between the nurse residency and performance. However, a negative correlation was noted within the critical care (r = -.052) and the planning/evaluation (r = -.050) subscale scores. Results from this study corroborate what the literature has previously noted. NLRNs need an experiential opportunity to transition into the practice environment and progress on the novice-to-expert continuum.