Background: Sputum culture conversion at two months is an important indicator for the effectiveness of treatment and the infectivity of a patient with pulmonary TB. This study aimed at investigating factors that are associated with tuberculosis culture conversion at two months as well as investigating whether sputum culture conversion at two months is a reliable predictor of relapse. Methods: The study makes use of data obtained from 347 newly diagnosed tuberculosis patients who participated in a randomized placebo controlled immunotherapy trial at King George V hospital in Durban. Above objectives were met by carrying out statistical analysis of the secondary data. Chi-square tests for categorical explanatory variables such as HIV status and smoking status and (b) t-tests for continuous variables such as age were used for investigating factors associated with 2-month culture conversion. Multivariate models were used to find the most important variables for predicting 2-month culture conversion. Kaplan Meier curves were used for investigating whether culture conversion at two months is a reliable predictor of relapse. Findings: Of the 347 tuberculosis patients, 34 % were HIV sero-positive. Age, body mass index (BMI), smoking status and gender were found to be important variables that affect sputum culture conversion at two months. At 5 % significance level there was no evidence that those who culture convert at two months were less likely to relapse than those who had not culture converted at two months (p=0.1165). However the trend shown is striking to report as it may be of clinical significance. Among those who had not culture converted at two months, more people (40) than expected (34) relapsed an among those who had culture converted at to months, less people (19) than expected (24) relapsed. Interpretation and recommendations: Some behavioral and biological factors affect two month tuberculosis culture conversion therefore successful tuberculosis management need to take into account the effect of these factors. This study did not show that the sterilizing potential of an anti-tuberculosis regimen can be obtained by evaluation of the culture conversion rates at two months and this may be due to small sample size.

There is a well-established connection between adult mortality and the conditions an individual is exposed to while in utero. There is a wealth of research that connects conditions such as asthma and allergies, mortality due to heart disease and diagnoses of schizophrenia to conditions during an individual?s early life and even their time in utero. The aim of this dissertation is to see if this same connection can be made to infant mortality, and further will there be any connection in contemporary cohorts? I use the Linked Birth/Infant Death dataset available from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) for the years 2000 to 2004. This dissertation specifically uses the dependent variable "cause specific infant death" with various measures of the time the infant was born or was in utero. I undertake three multinomial logistic regression models with the dependent variable "cause specific infant death." I then proceed to a multilevel multinomial logistic regression model using state-level climate measures at the second level. I conclude with the construction of maps displaying the spatial relationship between infant mortality and climate. The first analysis uses the independent variable of interest "month of birth," the second analysis uses the independent variable of interest "months of first trimester," and the last level-one analysis uses the independent variable of interest "months of third trimester." After running all three models, I determined that the most effective independent variable of interest is "month of birth," which I use in a multilevel logistic regression model. The multilevel model uses the month of birth variable at level-one and incorporates state level measures of climate at the second level. I find that the humidity index and the temperature index are negatively associated with the month of birth variable and cause specific infant death variables, meaning that the higher these indices, the more the benefit to an infant's chances of survival. The wind index is consistently positive, meaning that the interaction of wind with cause specific infant death and month of birth is detrimental to an infant's survival. The last methods chapter shows the spatial relationship between infant mortality and climate. In this chapter I find that infant mortality in the United States is concentrated in the Southern U.S., which is also where there is a concentration of high temperature states. The connections between wind and humidity with the infant mortality rate are less consistent.

The concerns society has expressed regarding the education of children have prompted educators to relentlessly search for instructional methodologies and organizational designs to maximize student achievement. One instructional organizational design that has surfaced is looping. Looping is the process wherein the teacher remains with the same group of children for a period of two or more years. Looping has been tried at all grade levels with a single teacher or with a team of teachers and with the same students over a period of years. The purpose of this study is to investigate the implementation of looping in four schools and to provide a descriptive account. A case study approach was used. Teachers and principals at four elementary schools using looping were interviewed regarding their experience. Data were analyzed using a qualitative approach for emerging themes. These findings indicated that schools implement the looping concept to build relationships, for instructional advantages, extended time and to lessen anxieties. Also, schools implemented the looping concept by doing an indepth study of the concept and by allowing teachers and parents to participate voluntarily. Finally, specific outcomes as a result of the implementation of looping were as follows: parents were knowledgeable about school functions and the overall program of studies; students had a safe haven; and teachers felt that looping gave them more time with their students. / Ed. D.

Previous research has found that hand preference can be detected reliably in infants as young as 6 months of age through the use of reach-grasp tasks. While many studies have targeted their efforts at discerning hand preference in infants younger than 12-months of age, a lack of knowledge about hand preference during the ages of 1-2 years remain. The aim of the present study was to investigate whether 12-month-old infants demonstrate a clear hand use preference during unimanual reaching and grasping. Participants consisted of 54 healthy, full term 12-month-old infants (+2/-2 weeks). Goal objects were placed at a reachable distance, in front of the infants and randomly allocated to either left, midline or right positions. Infant hand choices and the success of each grasp were coded offline from video recordings made of the reach-grasp sessions and an overall lateralisation index (LI) was calculated later for each infant. The results demonstrated that the 12-month-old infants were generally right-preferred. Additionally, almost double the frequency of grasps were accounted for by right hand grasps. Further, a significant right hand preference was found when children reached across the midline to grasp objects. The findings imply that hand preference may be readily observed in the prehension activities of 12-month-old infants, and particularly prominent when reaching across the midline.

Along with the growth of Taiwan¡¦s capital markets, the public tend to serve stocks as the main investment tool. Underwriting markets are also monitored by investors. Generally, Taiwanese firms¡¦ stocks possess ¡§honeymoon periods¡¨ after they went public, in which the stocks kept gaining prices for consecutive days. Due to the phenomenon, companies tend to went public once the requirements are satisfied. On the other hand, investors are willing to purchase such stocks, thus let the underwriting market prosper. The aspect of initial public offerings (IPOs) is also gaining attention of researchers. This research aims at examining the relation between Taiwanese firms¡¦ IPOs¡¦ initial return and the Monday effect and Intra-month effect. This thesis also tried to discover that whether Taiwanese IPOs possess differences between size and industry groups. The results indicate that Taiwanese IPOs have lower return if issued in Mondays, which is the Monday effect. The reason may be that the closed market in weekends allowed investors to spend more time to search and to analyze information and to hinder themselves from overreaction. In addition, when issuing companies are determining underwriting prices, they tend to serve discount as a risk compensation for the uninformed investors, thus when investors have more time to analyze their investment decisions, the issuing companies need not to discount to induce investors.

Objective: To demonstrate the value of the East Tennessee State University Quillen College of Medicine Library to library users using the vehicle of National Medical Librarians Month. Methods: A descriptive analysis of techniques used to enhance the value of the East Tennessee State University Quillen College of Medicine Library in the eyes of its parent organization and users. Interventions undertaken were exposure on television, a barbeque for students, a library exhibit fair patterned after conference exhibits in which all major facets of library services were presented using handouts and posters of the services and accomplishments of their unit, and a reception for faculty and staff. Results: The Quillen College of Medicine Library had a turnout of 300+ to the barbeque. The library exhibits drew interest and comments from faculty, staff, and students. The promotion of National Medical Librarians Month allowed the library workers from all departments to a chance to interact with the patrons and it gave patrons a chance to put a face to the library workers they normally just email. Conclusions: The Quillen College of Medicine Library will try to incorporate into National Medical Librarians Month this year some more instruction aspects, giveaways, and more exhibits

No description available.

The financial market anomaly can be characterized as the event when observed stock returns differentiate from those expected by concrete pricing model. Many anomalies have been detected so far, and some of them vanished, while other persisted, after they had been published by academics and researchers. The aim of this thesis is to investigate the potential presence of selected types of anomalies in the financial markets and to provide relevant empirical evidence. The theoretical section will supply the reader with the descriptions of several types of financial market anomalies and the results of past studies documenting the existence of these anomalies, with possible reasons justifying the presence of this phenomenon. The analytical section will focus on the few selected anomalies and test whether they are still present in the selected financial markets.

This study explores the marketability of Isak Dinesen's Seven Gothic Tales, published in the US in 1934. The term marketability is used to refer to the book as a potentially desirable object for sale on the market, successfully promoted by the Book-of-the-Month-Club whose members were intent on educating themselves and refining their taste. The set-up and marketing strategies of the Book-of-the-Month-Club are considered in relation to the role of advertising as a discourse teaching social and personal values in a developing consumer culture where identity and personality were represented as never-ending, imperative projects.  The consuming self is an individual freed from the restraints of tradition and communal values, making her free choice of whom to be on an increasingly diverse market, endlessly reinventing her identity. But this self is also a commodity on an increasingly complex and impersonal market where appearance is destiny. A historically contextualized reading of Seven Gothic Tales makes it possible to use the term marketability to refer to the work itself as a literary investigation of the conditions of identity-construction in a culture dominated by market-mediated relationships. In this reading, the Great Depression figures as a moment that reveals the degree to which consumerist ideology and logic had come to determine the possibilities of imagining being and identity, a condition that Seven Gothic Tales both reflects and resists. The effect of globalized transformation of production and consumption were felt in the two places that went into the making of Seven Gothic Tales: the US where it was first published and colonial Kenya where the author lived between 1914 and 1931 and where the book was begun. This study argues that the success of Seven Gothic Tales in the US depended on the way in which Blixen/Dinesen's experience of colonial Kenya was an experience of commercial modernity that reverberated with the experience of the American readers. Central to this argument is the ideal of feudalism as an explicit and decisive element in the creation of colonial Kenya. The aristocratic theme that permeates Seven Gothic Tales must be understood in relation to a colonial socioeconomic context that reinvented the feudal ideal as a marketable commodity at a time when social status and identity had become negotiable on a consumer market.

Purpose - This thesis investigates how London art museums work to deconstruct heteronormative filters. The aim is to study how museums relate to LGBTQ content, and the influence of internal power structures. I have chosen to focus on the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Wallace Collection, and the British Museum.  Method - To answer my questions, I interview eight individuals who work with LGBTQ content in museums. I am also doing some activity-based observations during several LGBT History month events. Analysis - The qualitative data collected through interviews and observations will be analyzed and presented in case studies. I apply an intersectional perspective, and a critical theoretical method, encompassing queer theory. Findings - The findings show that museums are slowly incorporating more LGBTQ content and perspectives. This may be due to changing social norms as well as a conscious effort to address various target audiences to diversify visitor demographics. The current focus is on visibility. Ideally, this will encourage updating terminol- ogy in databases and galleries, staff training, policies explicitly supporting LGBTQ content and LGBTQ staff, increased online presence, publications, and community co-creation, to name some aspects. Museums still think of LGBTQ interpretation as optional. People often work with these efforts in their spare time. Increasingly, the legacy of these events is being evaluated, as well as how museum terminology can become more inclusive. There are no coordinated efforts shared by the museums, but they often look to each other for inspiration.  Originality/value - Previous research on LGBTQ museum projects has not evaluated their legacy. There hasn't been any particular focus on LGBTQ perspectives in art museums. I am taking into account aspects of gender and queer theory, discussing the act of labelling as a means to exercise power through language. Paper type - Two years master's thesis in Archive, Library and Museum studies. / Syfte - Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka och jämföra de insatser som tre konstmuseum i London, Stor- britannien, gör för att dekonstruera heteronormativa filter. Målet är att observera hur olika museum jobbar med HBTQ som tema och innehåll. Jag studerar vem det är som initierar normkritiska projekt på museerna, samt de maktstrukturer som projekten anpassar sig efter. Metod - Jag intervjuar åtta individer som på olika sätt jobbar med HBTQ på museum. Därtill företar jag mig ett antal aktivitetsbaserade observationer. Analys - De kvalitativa data som insamlats genom intervjuer och observationer analyseras utifrån ett intersek- tionellt perspektiv. Teori och metod inspireras även av kritisk kulturteori samt queerteori. Resultat - Resultaten visar bland annat att samhälleliga förändringar och besökarfokus öppnar upp för HBTQ- teman på museer. Synlighet ligger för närvarande i fokus. Detta kan utvecklas till arbete med t.ex. normkritisk personalutbildning, uppdaterade museipolicydokument som inkluderar HBTQ-fokus och skyddar HBTQ- personal, mer inklusiva etiketter och databaser, samt medskapande i dialog med olika sociokulturella grupper.  Värde - Tidigare forskning fokuserar på teoretiska utgångspunkter, och har sällan utvärderat existerande HBTQ- museumprojekt. Konstmuseum och HBTQ har inte heller specifikt utvärderats utifrån ett normkri- tiskt/intersektionellt perspektiv som involverar kritisk teori och queerteoretiska aspekter. Typ av uppsats - Tvåårig masteruppsats inom Arkiv-, biblioteks-, samt musei- och kulturarvsvetenskap.