Monday, September 30, 2019

Flowers

Beauty of a Flower â€Å"We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses. – Abraham Lincoln† Most important living organism other than human beings are animals and plants. Flowers and weeds have a huge role in life that they tend to play. Flowers and weeds are completely different in which they grow to reproduce or grow to destroy. Knowingly that weeds also reproduce. Flowers are known to be a brightly colored and conspicuous example of such a part of a plant together with its stalk essay writer service, typically used with others as a decoration or gift.While weeds are not capable of giving to one another as a gift or using them as decorations. Weeds are normally known to be wild plants growing where they are not wanted and are in competition with cultivated plants. Weeds are usually able to grow in disturbed environments in which their soil has already been damaged. Reproduction and growth of a new plant comes when the plant blossoms into the beauty of a flower. Weeds also have reproduction and growth, but are reproduced aggressively. Exploring the different factors of flowers and weeds is to know the attraction to a human, development, and its symbolic factor.Flowers are important than weeds because of how they are attracted to a living eye, the way that they grow, and symbols and significances of flowers. A flowers beauty attracts the eyes, while the scents travel towards human nasal. Being the complete opposite of weeds flowers have a unique scent and to each individual Not only are humans attracted to the beauty of flowers, bees tend to be attracted because of the scent and its pollen that is produced. Flowers attract the bees because of the nectar guides that at times only bees and other insects can notice.But, not all flowers have an appealing scent of pollination that humans desire. Flowers usually pollinate during the night usually by bats and moths because they like the scent and usually white flowers. Bats and moths, but not all humans like the scent of these flowers neither, because they can either carry a pleasant or even resentful scent. Humans are attracted to flowers because of its color and unique form of petals and scents. Usually, flowers are given on special occasions or can be given as a sign of love for one person.Weeds usually do not attract the humans eye because they appear to damage the beauty of the flower. Weeds that grown out of control and are usually unwanted because of the fact they can spread pathogens to infect growth of plants. As flowers are being grown so are weeds in the same way, because once the seed is planted and begins to grow weeds follow the roots of the flower until they are treated. Neglecting the flowers will grow weeds to attack the flower. A weed is a random sort of handle that we put to certain plants that we do not like for any reason.Most weeds do not have a sense to them because it is a pesticide that just grows on top of plant s to destroy the beauty of the flowers blooming. Out of the two plants flowers have the beauty that humans are looking for. Flowers start off from buds to grow into a beautiful flower. Comparing flowers and weeds as they develop have another noticeable difference. To produce a flower, usually seeds are planted within the soil while watered after to blossom. As time goes by and watering of the seeds under the soil, the flowers begin to grow.The first sign of the flower you will see the leaves of the flowers growing as days pass by. Once the majority of the leaves and stems grow the flowers bud begins to blossom into the beauty of the flower it is. Not all flowers bloom within one day, because it takes time for the flower to develop into its beauty. Weeds grow for one reason only, because of the nutrients that are needed for plants. Weeds do not normally grow in large mass they just grow in where the nutrients of their needs are. Weeds usually tend to steal crops moisture, sunlight, a nd nutrients.But, farmers claim that they only borrow the three aspects that are needed and return for future crop usage. Weeds are not given the preservation that has been given to the domestic crops from insects, disease, and other adverse growing conditions, causing weeds, or wild plants, to conserve strength. Weeds hardly become damaged by insects or even any type of diseases. Mostly all flowers have different symbols and significances. Red roses are given in sign of love, beauty, and passion. Poppies are given for commiserations of a death and irises are a symbol of giving a life back during a burial.Daises have been the significance of innocence. Most weeds do not have symbols except for the fact that they are only growing to kill existing beautiful plants. Weeds can symbolize the damage that they have against flowers and its beauty. Weeds also tend to grow in river banks, deltas, and other areas that have soil shifting. There is no significance of weeds because they are usual ly grown with no intentions of being given as a gift or a sign of love to a significant other. Weeds do not have the look of love that is wanted by your loved one.It does not catch the human eye either, because it usually is a messy plant that has no scent to itself either. No matter of who the person is, it all matters if the flower has the right look. There are many different types of flowers and it all depends on that one person to choose which the one that they prefer. Flowers are usually the ones that are often looked at because of its outer beauty. Most of the flowers have a beauty sight on the outside. Looking at weeds, which are hardly looked at unless they are destroying the beauty of a flower and needs removal.Nobody will ever pick weeds over flowers because flowers have a finer quality than weeds. It is better to choose flowers over weeds because of their scent, outer beauty, and symbolic reasoning of that flower. Flowers and weeds differ because flowers give a warm lovin g feeling inside when a woman has received them. Weeds give women a shattered feeling within as she watches her flowers become destroyed. â€Å"What is a weed? I have heard it said that there are sixty definitions. For me, a weed is a plant out of place. †~Donald Culross Peattie

Sunday, September 29, 2019

Mutations in Dna Essay

Although most mutants are either impersonal or harmful they are besides the natural stuff for development. Such mutants from allelomorphs. surrogate signifiers of a given cistron that may bring forth differences in construction or map such as black. brown or blond hair in worlds. or different coupling calls in toads. Phases of Mitosis~1 ) Parent cell.2 ) Chromosomes make indistinguishable transcripts of themselves.3 ) They line up along the Centre.4 ) They move apart.5 ) Two girl cells form with indistinguishable chromosomes to the parent cell. Homologous chromosomes have the same cistrons. but each homologue may hold the same allelomorphs of some cistrons and different allelomorphs others. The cell rhythm is tightly controlled. Both during the embryologic development and during the care and fix of the grownup organic structure. come oning through the cell rhythm is regulated chiefly by two interacting procedures. ( 1 ) Production of. and responses to. growing factors that by and large speed up the cell rhythm ; ( 2 ) Intracellular checkpoints that stop the cell rhythm if jobs such as mutants in the Deoxyribonucleic acid or misalignment of the chromosomes have occurred. Most malignant neoplastic diseases develop because one of both of these procedures goes amiss. Many different molecules control the cell rhythm ; Porto-oncogenes: Any cistron whose proteins tends to advance mitotic cell division if called a proton-oncogene. The cistrons for growing factors. turn factor receptors. and some cyclins and Cdks are proton-oncogenes. In most instances. advancement through the cell rhythm existences when a growth-stimulating protein such as cuticular growing factor ( EGF ) binds to a receptor on the surface of a cell. This stimulates the synthesis of cyclins which bind to Cdks and trip them. Therefore. these proton-oncogenes are indispensable to the normal control of the cell rhythm. Tumor suppresser cistrons: The protein merchandises of tumour suppresser cistrons prevent uncontrolled cell division and the production of girl cells with mutated Deoxyribonucleic acid. both of which are common in tumours. Cdks modulate the activity of other proteins by adding a phosphate group to them. One such protein is Rb. Normally. Rb inhibits written text of several cistrons whose protein merchandises are required for DNA synthesis. Phosphorylation of Rb by Cdks relieves this suppression in the G. stage of the cell rhythm. leting the cell to continue to the S stage and retroflex its DNA. This concatenation of events. from growing cabal stimulation to phosphorylation of Rb. ensures that the cell rhythm starts up merely when the organic structure needs it to. Another tumour suppresser protein. called P53 proctors the unity of the cell’s DNA and indirectly regulates Rb activity. Healthy cells with integral DNA. contain small P53. However. when Deoxyribonucleic acid has been damaged ( for illustration by ultraviolet beams in sunshine ) . P53 degrees rise. The P53 proteins that inhibit Cdks. If Cdks are inhibited so Rb is non phosphorylated and DNA synthesis is blocked ; this prevents the cell from bring forthing girl cells with damaged Deoxyribonucleic acid. The P53 stimulated the synthesis of DNA fix enzymes. After the Deoxyribonucleic acid has been repaired. P53 degrees decline. Cdks become active. Rb becomes phosphorylated and the cell enters the S stage. If the Deoxyribonucleic acid can non be repaired. P53 triggers a particular from of cell decease called programmed cell death. in which the cell cuts up its Deoxyribonucleic acid and efficaciously commits suicide.

Saturday, September 28, 2019

Great Depression Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

Great Depression - Essay Example Among those most affected by the consequences of this catastrophe were white people especially us women. This is because we were tasked to look after families when men lost jobs and banks lacked sufficient amount of money for borrowing. It implies that marriages suffered several hiccups that often delayed courtship and eventually decreased divorce rates. According to government statistics, the expensive legal fees of supporting two families compelled many women to avoid cases of separation of divorce (Berton, 2001). Another consequence as white women involved a significant drop in birth rates thus causing an alarm in the replacement level in the country. A drop of 35 percent during Herbert Hoover’s regime resulted to a loss of income in a span of four years totaling to a drain of $15 million. Therefore, ordinary families experienced a strain in affording household items that could sustain them for a longer period. However, instances of falling apart in case of a decline in res ources and income became common, hence, changing roles of both men and women. Roles and responsibilities hugely affected women who had to fend for their suffering children and jobless husbands. As a result, men suffered a loss of self confidence and esteem forcing a majority to abandon completely the institutions of marriage. In a 1940 survey, close to 1.5 million married women faced divorce cases as a consequence of disagreements with their husbands. Additionally, women broke boundaries and started seeking for employment outside to sustain the welfare of their fledgling families (Freedman, 2005). It indicates the liberties and freedoms that expanded for women because the Great Depression under F.D. Roosevelt’s administration. The New Deal programs were equally a part of government relief initiative because they directly benefited women. For example, the program expanded lower pay scales and enacted

Friday, September 27, 2019

Assignment 1 F&A Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Assignment 1 F&A - Research Paper Example Nonetheless, the executive are predicting low consumer confidence and high unemployment rate as two most important factors that will hinder the recovery of the retail industry. (KPMG, 2012) (Farfan, 2011) Note 1 to the financial statements provides a complete description of the RadioShack Corporation’s business. The company deals in electronic items and services through 4,395 retail stores under its brand name in the US. The company also operates in Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands and Mexico. In 2009, the company launched ‘Target Mobile Centers’ to increase their sales and revenue. However, due to its failure, the company has decided to wind up these centers by the first quarter of 2013. It is very important to understand this note because its helps to identify and comprehend the business operations of the company and its future plans of discontinuation of any product line. (RadioShack Corp. Annual Report, 2012) Best Buy and Wal-Mart are two of the important competitors of RadioShack Corporation because they tend to have the same business as well as operate in the same environment. This will allow us to compare their financial and non financial metrics against each other such as profitability, efficiency, leverage and earning potential. Similarly, through a survey, the position of the RadioShack can be compared against its competitors in the consumers’ minds. Compared to the industry average debt to total assets ratio of 0.72, RadioShack Corporation has a better financial position. The company’s 61% of the assets are financed by debt. However, RadioShack Corporation is highly leveraged company as compared to industry benchmarks. The company has raise $1.58 of debt for every $1 of equity in the company as compared to $1.2 raised by the industry. This signifies an increased riskiness in the company and a poor rating amongst the external stakeholders. (Bloomberg Businessweek,

Thursday, September 26, 2019

Equity and Trusts Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 2

Equity and Trusts - Essay Example As anyone who has read Dickens, Bleak house will know, by the 18th century, equity had itself become rigid. The origins of the jurisdiction have been prevailed and the principles of equity can now be applied in every civil court in the land. One of equity’s greatest inventions has been the ‘trust’. The trust is a form of ownership that developed in England through the courts of Chancery. Trust can be defined as the written instruments that give title to or an interest in real estate. A trustee holds title on behalf of the lender, known as the beneficiary who is the legal owner. Trust law applies whenever one person has placed trust and confidence in another person to manage his or her affairs. The full force of the law of equity governs such relationships and the trust now provides a mechanism for a number of situations, family relationships, charities, pension funds, to name but a few. The common benefits that a trust offer includes are: (i) Providing financial a nd personal safeguard for family and other beneficiaries, (ii) Establishing a means of controlling or administering property, taxes, (iii) Meeting other social or commercial goals, and (iv) Postponing or avoiding unnecessary.

Wednesday, September 25, 2019

Cold War Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 3

Cold War - Essay Example Moreover, the Soviet Union was very fearful of the American acquisition of atomic weapons, this led to its rush of building up its own arsenal, causing a nuclear arms race between these two states. In addition, these two states feared an attack from the other, which would lead to a mutual mass destruction due to their possession of nuclear weapons. The United States became very suspicious of the Soviet Union and its intentions when this state took over most of Eastern Europe leading to a rise of the tensions between them (McConnell 54). One of the factors, which determined the future relationship of these two states and the eventual policies towards one another, was the personal dislike, which the American president, Harry Truman had for the Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin. There was also the constant fear by the Soviets that the United States would use Western Europe as a base for an attack against it, hence, the creation of the Iron Wall to separate completely the west of Europe from the Soviet occupied east. The Cold Car had some major effects on the United States and this was on the economic and political scene. The capitalist system, which was greatly depended upon by the United States, came to be greatly strengthened because it was used as a tool by the government as a counter to the Soviet ideal of communism. Furthermore, on the political scene, the United States invested heavily in the support of allied regimes all over the world and in some cases intervened militarily. While its involvement in Korea was largely considered a success, its military intervention in Vietnam was a disaster because thousands of American soldiers were killed in this war and America was forced to withdraw from Vietnam without achieving any of the goals it had set out to achieve. However, not all turned out badly for the United States because it managed, along with its allies, to form a defense pact (NATO) which came to ensure

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

How collaborative media technologies can be used in the planning, Essay

How collaborative media technologies can be used in the planning, design, development and delivery of multimedia projects - Essay Example vious limitations in accessing media and sharing methods are now resolved through the implementation of the contemporary collaborative media and associated sharing and recommendation methods, because, the contemporary collaborative media methods utilize agents on media players/devices to enlarge the extent of media sharing situations (Lamoureux & Rehak, 2007). The method supports a client in finding out media items and which are appealing to the user. The collaborative media commendation and sharing method contemporaneously find out a users media preferences foundational on media stored on a group of media devices as well as suggest media for potential sharing foundational on these assessable regarding user preferences (Diercks-O’Brien & Sharratt, 2002). The emergence of new technology for the development, designing and planning has offered a huge number of advantages to developers. In addition, at the present, we have a lot of applications those are helpful in collaboration a nd mutual data sharing. A project is a collection of various similar activities. All the activities are involved with each other, especially in multimedia projects. So the collaboration is the main thing in the successful implementation or completion of a multimedia project. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the new and more effective aspects of the collaboration technology and it’s utilization for the better project development and implementation. This paper presents a detailed analysis and investigation of the collaborative media technologies that can be used in the planning, designing, development, and delivery of multimedia projects. According to Kellerman (2009) a multimedia project is a substantial task that requires effective planning, management and organization of tasks. In this scenario we need to pay greater attention to management and handling of the multimedia project. A successful outcome relies on the time as well as effort that we spend in planning the project in an

Monday, September 23, 2019

Vitamin K Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Vitamin K - Essay Example Later, after several weeks, Dam found severe bleeding among the chickens, thus discovered the need for the coagulation vitamin. At present, vitamin K is introduced to newly born babies hours upon birth in order to prevent bleeding in the brain. Babies are said to have very low levels of vitamin K in their body after they are born (Croucher & Azzopardi, 1994). Breastfed infants are more prone to the deficiency because infant formulas have high levels of vitamin K compared to breast milk. Croucher and Azzopardi (1994) mention that due to low levels of coagulation vitamin in their body, late haemorrhagic diseases have been discovered in breast fed infants who received a single oral dose of vitamin K. As such, repeated dosage is recommended for breastfed babies as a standard practice in many countries such as the U.K. and the U.S. Golding, Greenwood, Birmingham and Mott (1992) report a decreased risk of cancer among infants whose mothers were given vitamin K during labor. However, there is a tendency for the presence of intramuscular vitamin K compared with babies who were given oral vitamin K and those who did not receive vitamin K at all.

Sunday, September 22, 2019

Contributing Factors to Nurse Burnout Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Contributing Factors to Nurse Burnout - Essay Example Nurses play a crucial role for the patients in hospitals. For that, they should be well motivated and avoid anything that can distract their attention and driving force for work resulting in burnout. The work associated factors involve nurses being overworked, especially in the case of those working in the emergency section. Most of them have no control over their job and they frequently find themselves working for long hours and at times they are forced to forego sleep. Their timetable is not regular and one cannot plan for another task after finishing his/her session.Some encounter complicated and new challenges that require them to improve their skills continuously especially on machines and technology. Their tasks are done in a specific place like within a hospital ward that can become monotonous. Additionally, clinicians are the ones normally recognized for successful treatment and not the nurse who manages the patient. The people related to the patient can sometimes expect too much from the nurse to save the life of the patient. In the case of misfortune, these can affect the nurses and mostly to perfectionists who are reluctant to delegate duties or ask for support.The human mind is created in such a way that it requires rest after work. This makes people take a rest and join their social groups away from their work environment.This can be limited by professions like nursing. Nurses should be involved in decision-making and their grievances taken critically.

Saturday, September 21, 2019

Explain Each of the Terms Essay Example for Free

Explain Each of the Terms Essay Explain Each of the Terms: Speech, Language, Communication and Speech Language and Communication Needs. Explain each of the terms speech, language, communication, speech, language and communication needs. EYMP5 (1. 1) The dictionary explanation of speech is â€Å"The expression of or the ability to express thoughts and feelings by articulate sounds† or â€Å"A persons style of speaking† To speak is to physically be able to produce the individual sounds and sound patterns of our language, or articulate, to be able to produce speech with appropriate rhythm, and free of stuttering behaviour, and to produce speech with an appropriate vocal quality for age and sex. While speech involves the physical motor ability to talk, language is a symbolic, rule governed system used to convey a message. In English, the symbols can be words, either spoken or written. We also have gestural symbols, like shrugging our shoulders to indicate â€Å"I don’t know† or waving to indicate â€Å"Bye Bye† or the raising of our eye brows to show that we are surprised by something. Language can be defined as being made up of socially shared rules that include the following: †¢What words mean (e. g. , â€Å"star† can refer to a bright object in the night sky or a celebrity) †¢How to make new words (e. g. , friend, friendly, unfriendly) †¢How to put words together (e. g. , â€Å"Peg walked to the new store† rather than â€Å"Peg walk store new†) What word combinations are best in what situations (â€Å"Would you mind moving your foot? could quickly change to â€Å"Get off my foot, please! † if the first request did not produce results) You can have language without having speech. Though speech and language are related, you do not have to have speech to have a language. How? The best example of this is the use of Sign Language. Communication is the process of conveying a message or meaning to establish a shared understanding to others. You don’t need speech or a shared language to communicate. How? Let’s say you decide on a trip to Rome, but you don’t speak one word of Italian. You get off your plane, and you want to pick up your [continues]

Friday, September 20, 2019

The Social And Cultural Implications Of The Internet Media Essay

The Social And Cultural Implications Of The Internet Media Essay The remit of this essay is to discuss the social implication of the internet. It will focus on research findings and the work of authors and theorist in this field. A critical approach will raise arguments both in support and against the implications of the internet. An evaluation of the evidence will assist in the conclusion of the essay. In 1973 American computer scientist, Vinton Cerf contributed to the invention of the Internet and its development of transmission protocols. This project was sponsored by the United States Department of defence, Advanced Research projects agency and directed by American engineer Robert Kahn. Ament (2007) Worldwide network of thousands of computers and computer networks. It is a public, voluntary, and cooperative effort between the connected institutions and is not owned or operated by any single organization. If we single out the section that states is not owned or operated by any single organisation this alone should raise questions regarding social intrusion and its social implication and ramification, the most important issue here, is that there is no control on what is available via this extensive accessible medium. With technological advancement and public accessibility the internet has become a mass medium and has changed our world dramatically. It has evoked strong public discussions from one extreme to the next on its implications on society. On one hand, the internet can be seen for its great benefits, it has become a public forum in the form of freedom, connectivity and many other social benefits which continue to evolve at an accelerating rate. However, others recognise its faults and its harm within various social structures, to culture, morality and human relations and others who are not so extreme in their views but are able to recognise both its advantages and disadvantage but remain vigilant of its existing negative impacts. The following is an excerpt from the book Release; author Esther Dyson, where she acknowledges the social and cultural implications of the internet. The net offers us a chance to take charge of our own lives and to redefine our role as citizens of local communities and of global society. It also hands us the responsibility to govern ourselves, to think for ourselves, to educate our children, to do business honestly, and to work with fellow citizens to design rules we want to live by. (Dyson 1997) Esther Dyson is implying that the internet enables individuals who share the same interest, values and beliefs to come together and offers them the chance to build a society or community. Here these individuals are able to converse their work, engage in truth-telling which allows trust to be built between people, and can act as a second home for many. The internet has given religious leaders cause for concern as this extreme position depicted by the Council of Torah sages who are a group of orthodox rabbis in Israel who enforced a rule in the banning of the internet from all Jewish homes in 2000. According to a news bulletin posted online by Linda Harrison (2000) which states that the internet is described as the worlds leading cause of temptation. It is also said that the internet is 1,000 times more dangerous than television and were banned thirty years earlier, although the Council were able to recognise some benefits that the internet possesses, they saw and defined the internet as moral pollution. They considered the possibility of internet addiction in many youths which would stop any motivation to learn the Torah. In support of this according to online Islamic news website claims that a new law has been enforced in Syria of the banning of certain websites for example, websites which publish information criticising the presi dent and his family. Not quite as extreme as the council of Torah sages, Syria too wants to have control over what it being made available online and hope this new internet law will be effective. Many internet critics, unlike the Council of Torah sages, see some positives in the internet and its technology, and many of them are able to recognise its faults to the medium. In the main the general public form their own opinions on what they believe to be advantages and disadvantage of the internet and can differ in the way in which they are able to use them against one another. Underneath these is the different value systems people hold in relation to the internet. For example, Esther Dyson values a libertarian system, where a persons freedom, property rights and free market capitalism are maximized. This positive attitude towards the internet is based on the potential she believes that technology uses to promote these values. In contrast to this, the values held by the Council of Torah sages are of a Hareidi nature. These are a variety of orthodox Jews, which according to them the highest good is the obedience of Gods law which has been laid out in the Torah, they formulate and base many of their values according to what is written in the Torah and conclude that the internet is harmful. The internet is best known for providing the ability for freedom of speech, connectivity, access to information, communication, and entertainment, developing and maintaining social relations. All of these are functions; the internet has been designed specifically to provide services for individuals allowing them to successfully perform many different tasks. It is claimed that the internet has adapted other benefits which were not intentional such as, development and understand of a variety of different cultures and social backgrounds. This is due to the vast amount of information the internet houses which allow anyone, anywhere to access. Information is continuously being made available by millions of individuals who are lucky enough to have access to the internet. Reliable information is of huge importance to the functioning for those who use the internet. If people trust the information provided on the internet they will continue to use and pass around information encouraging more people to access it. It allows individuals to gain more knowledge and acquire information which is seen as a huge benefit to our society. Another advantage of the internet is known as Information dissemination this enables anyone easily and inexpensively to upload and disseminate any information which can be made available to a wide audience, which can very quickly become widespread reaching millions of people. This helps promote freedom of speech by giving people the ability to share and voice there opinions, where they can inform and influence others. This is considered to be a benefit however; how people interpret this information can determine whether freedom of speech can be considered a benefit. The internet has a huge impact on how users are able to communicate with each other. The internet allows one-to-one, one-to-many, and many-to-many to communicate over the internet easily and inexpensively through the use of social networking sites and chartrooms such as Facebook, Myspce, and MSN Messenger. Users are able to communicate with a variety of individuals across the globe; this goes far beyond the idea of dissemination of information. Communication over the internet allows two or more people to express and share their values and opinions with each other, which could lead to the creation of intimacy and the following of actions. Communication is of great importance to individuals and the internet is used to enhance communication and is considered a great benefit. The internet allows development and maintenance of social relations to take place with people outsides ones surrounding area. It is very important that social relations are able to function in society between individuals. The internet provides services which allow the development and the maintenance of social relations to continue to grow. For example social networking sites like Facebook and forms of leisure and entertainment. For example, individuals are able to set up forums where they are able to interact with each other playing games, discussing hobbies and interest which allow sharing and trading to take place, Individuals are able to share cultural jokes, pictures, software, music and videos. Despite this, the internet has some frequently mentioned flaws. These disadvantages come directly from the internets benefits. One can not deny the fact that the internet creates new possibilities for communication, social interaction, entertainment and many more. However, it can be argued that when these services are performed over the internet they tend to become much more harmful than they would be when performed in reality. According to Hubert Dreyfus a Professor of Philosophy at the University of California who suggested that online social relationships tend to be less profound, valuable and durable than offline relationships, and that computer-mediated communication less expressive and authentic than face-to-face communication (Dreyfus, 2001), meaning that if relationships are started and developed over the internet between two people, when meeting each other for the first time face-to-face complications may occur. The ways in which two people interact with each other over the internet differ from when face-to-face. For example, body language and facial expression is made visible when face-to-face compared to when interacting online. It can be said that because people are able to interact over the internet they tend to take less time and make less effort to involve in face-to-face interactions, which is harmful to how they react in social interactions. Communicating over the internet can tend to be harmful. Conversations can at times become aggressive and violent. The internet can contain a large amount of disrespectful texts which have been posted by individuals using the internet that others may find offensive. The internet has been used as a form of harassment where the victim has no control over what is being displayed concerning their personal life, compared to if this were being communicated verbally in reality. Although the internet provides a vast amount of information which can be seen as a positive, it can also be seen as a negative. It is suggested that because of the lack of selection mechanisms the information provided on the internet can at times be false and unreliable. It is difficult to locate sources of different text found of the internet making it loose value. If the information found on the internet can not be trusted less and less people will feel the need to use it giving more traditional ways of finding information more power. With a vast amount of information comes harmful information. Almost anything and everything can be found on the internet because of the lack of selection mechanisms what is being posted on the internet is hard to locate and remove. The internet contains a large amount of disturbing material which can be easily accessed by anyone using it for example, pornography, violence towards animals and other human beings, extremist ideologies and so on. Most of this is shown in the media compared to the internet it is being controlled and censored to what is being seen. In concluding the evidence found though research it is clear that the internet raises mix reaction from both it users and its critics. In order to begin to understand the social and cultural implications of the internet it is vital that one is able to recognise the internets positive and negative aspects and how each service provided by the internet is used to benefit the individual. The internet allows people to gain a vast amount of knowledge and communicate with people across the globe. Individuals are able to share and receive information concerning personal interests with those with similar interest. The idea of freedom of speech has no limit although; this can be seen as a concern It is not possible to control everything that is being circulated over the internet therefore it is up to us as individuals in how we process and use the information which is being made available. Only if we can acquire an understanding of the social and cultural implications of the internet and relate this to our own values and beliefs as individuals can we then determine whether or not the internet is harmful or has a positive effect. What is clear is that the internet is a significant part of our modern culture its invasive and has its own social norms encapsulating societies from around the globe whatever our personal or collective opinions may be it will continue to grow and the question of diluting, restricting or even licensing the internet could have implications on this very unique social structure. Many critics would like to see these restrictions being imposed and like the internet this debate will also continue to grow dividing those for and those against.

Thursday, September 19, 2019

pitfalls of herbal supplements :: essays research papers

The four billion a year supplement industry sells steroid supplements and herbal speed to millions of teenage boys and girls. There are many types of supplements; among the most popular are Creatine, Andro (androstenedione), and ephedrine. All of these supplements are legal but are they safe? In this paper I will explore why the FDA has failed to put stronger regulations on these supplements, what they are and what they do, who endorses them, and were and how you can purchase these potentially harmful supplements; with the help from Jay McMahan and his expertise as a personal trainer and user of these herbal supplements.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Creatine, Andro, and Ephedrine are among the most popular supplements, but do we know what they are and what they do? Creatine is an amino acid compound naturally produced by the kidneys, liver and pancreas, it helps muscles quickly regenerate after exertion. There are no known harmful side effects, though there is evidence that Creatine can cause dehydration, muscle cramps, weight gain and nausea. The supplement Andro (Androstenedione), is produced naturally in the human body, androstenedione is a precursor hormone for testosterone and estrogen. Its structural similarity to steroids suggests it may pose the same risks (liver damage, heart disease, low sperm counts, development of breasts and violent mood swings), though there have been no long-term studies. The stimulant Ephedrine from ma huang or ephedra, a plant used to treat asthma, fevers, and body and joint pain. Though widely available it has been banned from the NFL, the NCAA and the IOC, and the FDA repor ted anecdotal evidence linking it to eighty-one deaths since 1994.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  You don’t need a dealer or even an ID card to buy these herbal supplements. All teenagers have to do is go to their local mall and purchase it from GNC (General Nutrition Center). Clerks sell these potentially harmful supplements to any one regardless of their age. It seems that they are even marketing towards kids with products such as Creatine Candy and smoothies in a variety of fruit flavors and loaded with the supplement of their choice. Why hasn’t the Food and Drug Administration put stronger regulations on the purchasing of these supplements? For the ease with which supplements can be gotten we can thank Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah. Ten years ago the sport supplement industry was reeling from a string of disasters. The Food and Drug Administrarion began petitioning congress the right to treat supplements like the drugs most scientists say they are and subject them to long, costly such as pharmaceuticals get before they can go to the market.

Wednesday, September 18, 2019

Essay --

The null hypotheses of this study are: 1) There is no difference between control group and EPS group’s pre-test anxiety and poet-test anxiety. 2) There is no difference between control group and EPS group’s pre-test presentation and poet-test presentation performance. 3) There is no relation between students’ anxiety level and language performance. Based on the literature review which showed the positive effect of EPS tasks and ways in reducing students’ classroom anxiety, the alternative hypotheses are: 1) There is difference between control group and EPS group’s pre-test anxiety and poet-test anxiety. 2) There is difference between control group and EPS group’s pre-test presentation and poet-test presentation performance. 3) There is relation between students’ anxiety level and language performance. The independent variable of this study is EPS tasks, whose presence or absence will definitely affect the dependent variable – students’ classroom pre-test anxiety and post-test anxiety. A quasi-experimental design is used to identify the relationship between EPS group and control group’s language classroom anxiety. In addition, an interview can be conducted to find out the most important characteristic of EPS tasks that help reduce students’ classroom anxiety. In this article, I will mainly focus on the quantitative research part, which is to find out the characteristics of students’ classroom anxiety. Research Methods Population and sampling The population of this study is English majors in Chinese colleges. These students have at least 6 years’ English learning experience, they like English study and their English proficiency is acceptable because they passed college entrance exam and learn English as their major. The sampling m... ... the same time, paired-samples t-test should be conducted to get the p-value and t-value. From descriptive statistic figures, we can see the average score of the two groups and make basic comparison between them. If we want to know whether the difference reaches statistical significance, we need to look at the t-test figure. If the significance is smaller than 0.05, the difference will be considered as true. To answer the third question, we need to conduct correlation analysis. Pearson r coefficient will be used to test the relationship between students’ anxiety level and presentation performance. If the p-value is less than 0.05, the null hypothesis can be rejected. The correlation coefficient may range between -1 to +1. If the coefficient is 0, it means there is no relationship between the two variables. Otherwise, a high coefficient reveals a strong relationship.

Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Government and Education: Partners or Competitors Essay

The United States government has been subsidizing education for decades in increasingly stronger ways. Today, government invests multi-billion dollar price tags in education on all levels. Secondary education is highly subsidized by government on a federal, state and local level. K-12 education has a hand in the subsidy game as well. There has been controversy regarding whether or not subsidizing secondary education is beneficial to the students, staff and institution. There are also those that say that government involvement with K-12 education can be more of a hindrance than effective assistance. Another hot topic regarding education subsidies is charter schools and what their impact is on public education, and whether or not the programs should be eligible for government subsidies as well. â€Å"The Higher Education Act of 1965 is the basis for many of today’s postsecondary education subsidies, including student loan and grant programs, college library aid, teacher training programs, and other subsidies†¦ Federal aid for higher education soared from $10 billion in fiscal 2000 to $30 billion in fiscal 2008. (McCluskey & Edwards, 2009) Education subsidies have given students that might not otherwise have been able to afford college the opportunity to attend. Grants are funds that do not have to be repaid. Loans are funds that must be repaid, after the student stops taking classes; and have very low interest rates. â€Å"The rise in student subsidies over the decades appears to have fueled inflation in education costs. Tuition and other college costs have soared as subsidies have risen. † (McCluskey & Edwards, 2009) The costs of college tuition and fees has risen dramatically over the years. The steep rise in costs directly correllates with the rise in subsidy funds. â€Å"Federal control over K-12 education has risen dramatically in recent decades. Congress has increased funding for the schools while imposing layers of rules and regulations on local school districts. † (McCluskey, K-12 Education Subsidies, 2009) The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) states that it is, â€Å"To close the achievement gap with accountability, flexibility, and choice, so that no child is left behind. † (Ed. ov, 2012) â€Å"Members of Congress and the Department of Education readily admit that the current NCLB requirements†¦ ask too much of students too quickly. Unfortunately, folks in Washington have neglected to make any changes and are moving forward with a flawed system that is setting up students, schools and states to fail. † (O’Connor, 2012) It is thought that the idea behind NCLB is a good one because it encourages schools and school districts to increase standards for education of all students. The program, however, seems to expect more of students than can be achieved in such short time frames. It is not always possible to take a failing group of students and transform them into high achievers in a one year span of time. (O’Connor, 2012) An additional aspect of education includes the charter school model. Charter schools were introduced originally to give parents and students a free alternative to public education. Charter schools are freed from the traditional bureaucracy and regulations that some feel divert a school’s energy and resources toward compliance rather than excellence. Proponents of charter schools argue that instead of jumping through procedural hoops and over paperwork hurdles, educators can focus on setting and reaching high academic standards for their students. † (Unknown) There are multiple sources for funding for Charter Schools according to the National Charter School Resource Center website. Not all forms of funding come from the government. There is private, foundation, state and federal funding opportunities for these charters. Most charter organizations boast high achievement of their students with staggering graduation statistics. These entities are concentrating on teaching children at their own speed and seem to be quite successful on a total scale. Overall, education subsidies are utilized for the positive assistance for students and institutions to enhance educational availability and experiences. The purpose of this government funding is to assist educational facilities with improvement and competitiveness with a global educational marketplace; as well as providing funding for students to pay tuition and fees. In elementary education, this assistance provides funding for school districts for each child in attendance. Although the details of this government funding may need some updating, the program is still quite necessary. There would be many students who could not attend school without government assistance; as well as schools that would surely close without government funding.

Monday, September 16, 2019

Total Quality Management in Higher Education

TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT IN HIGHER EDUCATION Ranjana, Lecturer Doaba College of Education ABSTRACT In this world of ever-growing competition, rapid changes of technology, privatization and internalization in education have led to the use of the concept of TQM in higher education. Student is nowadays considered as a customer and the system of education needs to be according to the needs of the customer (Student). In India, inspite of a large number of Universities, deemed universities, medical, engineering, arts and science colleges the quality of higher education leaves much to be desired. Therein lays the need of applying TQM in higher education. The paper answers to the question as how to apply TQM in higher education. PAPER Excellence-Whether in a National Endeavour, a Company, an Athletic competition or a Personal Goal-Comes from the Never Ending Pursuit of Improvement. Introduction In this world of ever increasing competition, rapid changes of technology, declining quality, changing demographics, privatization and internalization in education have led to the use of the concept of TQM in education. The student nowadays is considered as customer and the system of education needs to be according to the requirement of the customer (student). India has 350- plus Universities and deemed universities and over 14,000 medical, engineering and arts and science colleges. Despite this the quality of higher education in India has left much to be desired. All this highlights the need for TQM in higher education. In this paper I intend to throw light on the application of TQM in higher education, simultaneously highlighting the benefits of applying TQM and the Accreditation agencies in India. For this, I surveyed the relevant literature on the topic. Conceptual background of TQM The three major figures in the TQM movement are: W. Edwards Deming, originator of fourteen points of TQM, Dr. J. M. Juran, author of the Juran Trilogy and Philip B. Cresby, who outlined the four Absolutes of Quality Management. Dr. W. Edwards Deming, an American by origin is known as the â€Å"Father of the concept of TQM†. He framed the concept of TQM in 1946 after World War II for production of goods and services in consumer sector. It was intended to satisfy the quest by customers for quality in products The Americans didn’t realize its importance but the Japanese embraced the concept. As a result, Japanese secondary markets were rebuilded and its Tertiary economy also nurtured. This led the American Industrialists in 1980’s to adopt TQM as a vital component in their operations. TQM: Meaning Total Quality Management or TQM is a management strategy aimed at embedding awareness of quality in all organizational processes. Everyone in organization strives and creates customer satisfaction continually at lower real costs. Quality assurance through statistical methods is a key component. TQM aims to do things right the first time, rather than need to fix problems after they emerge. Higher education: Meaning Higher education is the education beyond secondary school level. It includes the colleges and the Universities. TQM in Higher Education TQM has been recently introduced and experimented in higher education. Many Universities and Colleges enhance the quality of higher education by applying Total Quality Management as a tool. We can understand the meaning of TQM in higher education in light of a definition given by Tulsi (2001) TQM in higher education means improving the quality of courses, input, instructional process, resource management processes and structure as well as student support service output and linkages with world of work and other organizations. † As the definition embraces a vast area of educational activity, therefore the support and cooperation of Faculty and Staff members are needed for quality improvement. Participatory team work of all occupies a critical place in the practice of TQM. TQM is total in 3 senses:- 1) Customer focus 2) Involvement of staff members ) Continuous Quality Improvement( CQI) The student is the customer, who buys the study course, thus he has a right to get the relevant course material, fairness, congenial learning environment, access and expertise of the teacher and also access to course material (Sytsma, 1996). It involves the combined and continuous efforts of all those involved with system of education, directly or indirectly: may they be the College Board, superintendent, principal, students, faculty, administrative staff, Universities and Accrediting agencies in India. In India we have Accrediting Agencies like NAAC and ISO (The International Organization for Standardization Accreditation) which are enforcing standards of TQM in higher Education institutions. Benefits of Applying TQM Application of TQM in Higher education Institutions ensures improved communications, increased involvement, improved quality and efficiency in a general context, and increased potential for productivity. How to Apply TQM in Higher Education The essential elements of TQM in higher education may be summed up as:- †¢ Awareness and commitment for everyone To promote an al-round development of the student in terms of his linguistic, kinesthetic, visual and mathematical talents every participant in the teaching-learning process needs to put his/her best efforts to promote the highest possible quality at each step of the developmental process. For this everyone should be made aware of TQM. For this a staff meeting between the staff parents and college management should be held where the overview of TQM elements should be given and a clear commitment from the College Board, principal should be made for applying TQM in their system of education. A clear mission There should be a clear customer-focussed mission statement accompanied by necessary programmes to achieve it. The programmes should be set according to local, state and employer needs. In other words they should enable the students to face the problems of real life rather than mere memorization of subject matter. †¢ A Systems Planning Approach Instead of compartmentalizing kno wledge into separate subjects, it should be provided as an integrated whole so that a student can use his scientific or mathematical knowledge effectively by combining it with the communication skills of English. For this, there should be an Inter-department planning. †¢ Teaming Replacing Hierarchy The administrators, supervisors and department chairpersons should extend full support towards the Task improvement teams so as to make TQM a success. They should insist on clear missions and should coordinate between the task improvement teams †¢ Enablement and empowerment replacing fear Instead of generating fear among the members of improvement teams, they should be given opportunities to become experts by giving them authority to take informed decisions. This will eventually motivate them to work with dedication. Focus on Mastery-Learning In traditional classrooms, teachers often follow the sequence:- As a result many students fail to learn up to the highest possible level. The TQM alternative is In â€Å"Check† step, formative (Not-for-grade) testing is used to determine which learning some students missed. Then that portion is taught to students in some other styles. The chec king and revised teaching can be repeated if it is needed. The students who have mastered the material either move to enrichment learning or assist other students with their instructions. This ensures complete mastery over learning material for most of the students. Management by measurement The teacher should measure the data in Steps#3 and Step#4 to study the relationship of the remedial program and final learning result. This recorded data results in improved learning and cost effectiveness. †¢ Development of student TQM Skills The college staff should integrate TQM in the learning courses of students or provide it as a separate course. †¢ A Humanistic Focus on learning environment William Glasser has given some conditions for quality work based upon his translation of TQM principles as:- o Give a warm, supportive environment. Ask students to do useful, best possible work and to evaluate their own work. o Quality work should feel good and should be constructive. Conclus ion In the end we can say that Total quality Management in Higher education is the need of the hour. It would motivate teachers to contribute to educational standards and development of academic culture. It would inculcate a team spirit among teachers and administrators to promote harmonious development of students, so as to make them befitting citizens of tomorrow. REFERENCES Herzler, Elizabeth, TQM in Higher Education: What does the Literature say? , www. google. com P. S. Mohan Kumar, Total Quality Management in Higher Education and Relevance of Accreditation, www. google. com Hardik Vachhrajani, TQM in Education: Renewing the Research Agenda, University News P. K. Tulsi (2001), Total Quality in Higher Education, Reforms and Innovations in Higher Education, AIU, New Delhi. Deming’s Rules, Higher Education in India . ———————– PLAN TEACH TEST PLAN TEACH (Do) CHECK REVISED TEACHING (ACT) TEST

Sunday, September 15, 2019

Bumrungrad International Hospital

TEAM Pangaea Vanguard Hospital IT Infrastructure: Problems, and Implementations Prepared For A]. Therapy Piccalilli Dry. Scripps Planking's An Daddy Honorable English Instructors Prepared By Terrace Tiramisu Eukaryote Lackawanna Chauncey Returnable's Picaroon Running Natal Superpose Contents Introduction There is no doubt that technology has become a great part in our lives, and the importance of it is admittedly increasing as time passes by. The longer the time passed, the more essential technology will be toward our dally routines.When It comes to Information Technology or IT, It Is hard to believe that there Is someone out here who did not actually know about IT. The definition of IT, according to Walked, Is simply the application of computers and telecommunications equipment to store, retrieve, transmit and manipulate data, often in the context of a business or other computer or the network of computers, but it includes all the technologies that help distributing the information, for instance, televisions and telephones.Therefore, there are actually a bunch of industries related to information technology, no matter if they are computer hardware and software, internet, e-commerce and other computer-based services. As same as technology, IT has been developing continuously during the past years and the range of the applications is getting wider and wider day by day. Nowadays, many companies adapted the IT system into their company as the communication is the key in developing a successful organization. With the help of IT system, people inside the organization could communicate with each other faster, easier, and more reliable.The loss of communication, or even a small glitch in the communication process, might slow down the decision making process which, in some cases, could mean the termination of the company itself. In comparison, if any company has a good IT system in their possession, the company could accomplish so much beyond imagination; the company m ight be capable of working more systematically and have the upper hand in the competition. Thus, the IT system is considered one of many significant factors in bringing more revenue to a company and guaranteeing the well-being of a company as well.From the vision of the executive manager of Vanguard Hospital, the economy of Thailand could be substantially developed which the results could be seen in the near future. As a consequence, they gathered all the people involved in the placement of the hospital and came up with the plan for the business in order to make sure that the hospital has the capability to handle the continuous growth in the amount of patients in each year in effective manner. For the current situation, it seems like it is the best opportunity for the IT to save the day†¦Company Description Vanguard Hospital Public Company Limited (the â€Å"Company') runs a famous private hospital business in Bangkok, Vanguard Hospital. The hospital was established in 17th Se ptember 1980 in the form of private hospital on Summit Road, which is considered as one of many business districts in Bangkok. In an average of 1. 1 million patients (both inpatients and outpatients) were accommodated by this hospital annually; about half of the figure is foreigners from over 190 countries globally. In the past 2013, the company earned around 14,651 million baht from the given services.The hospital started in 1980 with 200-bed facility with 90 million Thai baht investment. Currently, the hospital has approximately 580 authorized bed and support the total capacity of over 5,500 outpatients daily. On the 1st January 1997, the ewe main facility building named â€Å"Bandager International† was first utilized. The 12-storey building is known to be the largest private hospital compound in Southeast Asia which is equipped with underground parking lot and the international standard rooftop helipad for helicopter landing. Later on, in 2008, the outpatient clinic facil ity was opened.This outpatient clinic facility is a 21 -storey building with a parking lot that supports about 700 cars, spacious sky lobby on the 10th floor for business negotiation, international medical cooperation, and even visa extension services, and extensive range of sophisticated medical equipment. The cashier and the pharmacy customers. Moreover, other than Wi-If, LCD directories, and TV's, there is also an automated lab so provided faster and more liable results allowing the doctors to access the customers' files from inside their exam rooms.With the utmost concern about the quality of the health care services given by the hospital, this company pays extra attention in the process of recruiting the physicians and staffs. Presently, there are more than 4,800 employees, 1,200 internationally certified doctors and dentists, and 900 nurses working inside the hospital. Since the company has been kicked off, the company has been continuously providing complete healthcare servic es for both inpatients and outpatients with extra precautions.Taken all of dedication into account, there is no question that this company is one of the leading health care providers in Thailand and in Southeast Asia. According to Oversimplifications. Com, Vanguard Hospital is considered one of the world's popular medical tourism destinations. In the past 2012, the hospital serviced about 520,000 international patients who seek for high quality, International standard services, and the lower cost healthcare. Vanguard Hospital is the first Thai candidate that received the US standard certification from Joint Commission International OIC Accreditation).The hospital has also been given the Chic's Clinical Care Program Certification (CAP) for specialties programs including the Primary Stroke Program, Acute Myocardial Infarction, Diabetes Mellitus Type I and II and Chronic Kidney Disease Stage I to ‘V. Other than that, the hospital also received many accreditations from many other famous institutions in both international and domestic levels, including the Thai Hospital Accreditation (HA). The company later Joined the public market and being enlisted on the Stock Exchange of Thailand in 1989.The majority shareholders in the hospital can be classified into companies in Thailand and other countries such as Bangkok Dusts Medical Services Public Company Limited, Bangkok Insurance Public Company Limited, Bangkok Bank Public Company Limited and the Sycophantic family, which is one of Thailand leading business families, Limited, and HASH (Singapore) Nominees Pete Ltd. Mission, Principle, and Policy The hospital was established with the main objective to make sure the world class tankard healthcare service would be provided to the customers with care and compassion.It has been operating with the following principles: 1 . Strive to exceed our customer's expectations 2. Committed to our Medical and Hospital staffs welfare, education, training and development. 3. Contin uously improve the safety and quality of the services. 4. Strive for professional excellence and innovation in the services. 5. Embrace cultural diversity with Thai hospitality. 6. Strive to make the services† World Class†. 7. Being trustworthy, honest, and act ethically in all the dealings 8. Work as a team ND share what is known. 9. Highly value the corporate social responsibilities (CARS) 10.Operate in an environmentally responsible manner. After reading the points above, it might seem like all the company thinking is about themselves, but actually, the company has also been operating with the global environment and conserve energy and natural resources. To make sure that the environment will be properly preserved, the hospital maintains a serious aim to follow the regulation enacted by the government and the world standards. Moreover, the hospital is also very careful about the water management system to prevent the eater streams nearby the hospital from getting poll uted and affect the neighboring community.Corporate Social Responsibility (CARS) Corporate Social Responsibility (CARS), in a nutshell, is the responsibility towards the society and the environment of an organization. In other words, CARS is a systematic management under good morals, which leads to a sustainable development of an organization. For Vanguard Hospital, the Vanguard Hospital Foundation (UHF) was set up in May 1990 as the CARS of the company. The UHF is a registered non-profit foundation founded by the founders of Vanguard International Hospital.The foundation is involved in many charitable activities for those unprivileged Thai citizen all around the country who did not receive a proper healthcare services with the intention to promote their well-being and to give them proper knowledge of being healthy. Any donation made to this foundation can be used to reduce the tax (tax-deductible). Recent fund-raising programs and activities of this foundation are as follows: 1 . 5 0 Pediatric Heart Surgeries: This is a follow up campaign after the 72 Pediatric Heart Surgeries. In this campaign, 50 unprivileged people will be selected to get the heart surgery without being charged a single baht. 72 Pediatric Heart Surgeries 3. â€Å"Mend-A-Broken Heart† Charity Heart Surgeries: This campaign was established in 2001. In cooperation between UHF and other business entities, 20 unprivileged people were selected to get free heart surgery. 4. Thompson Fund Mobile Free Clinic: The UHF and Thompson Fund cooperatively sent out mobile free clinic to give medical care to 100,000 people in underprivileged area. 5. Charity Medical Relief: The UHF and the Bangkok Insurance Company work together to send out the officers to help many people in Saxon angora and Musician province every single year.They also introduce them to more Job opportunity and offer them chances to improve their quality of life. 6. Patients in Need: The foundation offers the financial aids to those who are in need of medical assistance but cannot afford the medical treatments. Other than offering decent healthcare to those who are unprivileged, the foundation also aids those people in the field of education by giving them proper education, training, and also scholarships for children with insufficient budget. This foundation gets the money from the donations received from the patients of the hospital, other business entities, and even each individual person.Anyhow, the foundation does not only rely on the donations but also fund-raisin events and charitable art exhibitions. Additionally, the UHF also concern about those who are underprivileged in other countries as they have started charity such as, eyes operation for Laos kid who got a piece of the bomb embedded in the eyeball. Current Status, Direction, and Goals Judging from the information above, it can be clearly seen that the status of this company is on the rising trend with increasing number of patients in each year.I t seems like the longer humans live in this cruel world, the more â€Å"natural selection† is Charles Darwin which simply implies that only the strongest will survive. More people are getting infected by some new diseases that no one has ever seen before. In fact, it is undeniable that no matter how strong a person is, everyone needs to be treated by doctors even once in a blue moon. Thus, the healthcare provider as Vanguard Hospital is becoming more and more profitable compared to other good or service providers.This is the main reason why Vanguard Hospital is keeping on developing the hospital to provide better healthcare services to those who needed to be treated. Position in the Strategic Impact Grid The Development of Vanguard Hospital's IT System In the year 1997: The hospital was facing trouble as Thailand faced the economic crisis as it affects the middle class people which are considered the main customer base of the hospital. Thus, all the people chose the hospital that is operated by the government with lower payment.Under the circumstances, the hospital saw the opportunity to expand the customer base to international level. At the end of this period, the hospital received ISO 9000 Certification. In the year 1999: The hospital started to use the internet as the mean for information distribution. At the time, the hospital's website had been visited for about 800 views per day. In the next revolution, the hospital brought in the US IT Consultant Service and started up the company called Global Care Solution (GAS) in Thailand for assembling the system for the hospital.Later on, during December of the same year, the â€Å"Hospital 2000† was implemented as a substitute for the older platform. The software was regarded as the first hospital system that connects everything together from the front office, system for doctors, pharmacist, nurses, and radiologist, patients' registration, time schedule of the operating room, exam room, and wards t o the patients' profiles. The hospital invested on 450 clients to be set up around different sections of the hospital. In the year 2002-2004: The Hospital 2000 system was developed to support PASS (Picture Archive Communication System).The hospital got reward from the Intelligent Enterprise Asia magazine for being 1 in 20 top organizations that uses IT to maximize the ability to provide the services to the customers. The hospital also got an appraised from CIO Asia for being top 100 organizations that implemented the hospital information system. In the late 2003, the hospital invested on another 450 clients which causes less system breakdown as increase the uptime for 99. 99% In the year 2007: Microsoft took over the Global Care Solution (GAS).As a result, Vanguard Hospital is now not only a user but also another invisible hand in the development of the system. In the year 2008: Microsoft started launching â€Å"Microsoft Amalgam† which is the combination of Xiii and Hospital 2000. The hospital also started using more sophisticated technologies inside the outpatient facility, for instance, Wife internet, LCD directories, automated lab for more precise and faster exults, online patient registry, diagnostic image that the doctors can access. Later on, management for inpatients. The idea of using robot came up from the concern the safety of the patient.From implementing the robot, the hospital can spend less time on the medicine of each patient. Other than that, the hospital also started up the laptop rental service for the inpatients. The laptop was designed to use inside the hospital as it is attached to the table on the side of the patient's bed and it is equipped with silicone keyboard, sterilized optical mouse, WebMD for video conference, and voice-over system. Hospital 2000 Hospital 2000 is the system specialized for hospital systems with the scope of almost every activity inside the hospital.For the usage inside the hospital, the system has the capa bility to handle the information of the patients or other employees, transaction processes, accounting, pharmacy, registrations, human resources, and even the patient transfer processes inside the clinic. All these sub functions are collected inside one big database in one system that supports almost every language available on this world. Microsoft Amalgam Hospital Information System (Amalgam HIS) Amalgam HIS is the developed version of Hospital 2000.This sophisticated system was designed to systematically take care of the IT system inside the hospital by collecting all the necessary data inside the database. Amalgam HIS was created based on the Electronic Medical Record (EMMER) which is composed to patient management, bed management, operating room management, pharmaceutical management, and even management system for radiologists. In addition, the system is also capable of storing and transferring the image data (IRIS/PASS), doing some complex accounting calculation, and managing both inventories and human resources.PASS (Picture Archive Communication System) is the system produced to digitally store the medical images and x-rays results without using any film. By using this system, the doctors could access the images by using the Internet from remote distance. In addition, the system also allows the long-term storage. In the normal situation, where the physical films are used to store the images, the images could be changed or damaged as time passed by and not to mention that it took so long to find the record in the form physical films whenever it is needed.Thus, using PASS will elf ease out all the processes for easy retrieval and increase reliability. Current IT Infrastructures At the moment, Vanguard Hospital is using the Amalgam Hospital Information System (Amalgam HIS). This system has been implemented in the hospital since 1997. Thus, the information system for Vanguard Hospital is considered an essential component in the management processes that oc cur inside the hospital. It is clearly seen that if it is not because of the marvelous IT system, the hospital might not be able to come this far as one of the best hospitals in Southeast Asian region.The actors who are involved in the system are as follows: 1 . Doctors: The Amalgam System takes a great part in helping the doctors to look at the overview of the profile of each patient. The doctor can glance at the profile of the patient and suddenly have the idea of who they are treating which will prevent any mistakes from happening. Another good point is that the doctor can write the medicinal prescriptions and schedule the next appointment via the online system.The appointment and the prescription will then be sent to the cashier and the pharmacy so that the patient will safety of the patient, the system also provides options for the doctors available for operating the patient as each doctor has different specialty and different schedule. The system will filter out the doctors wh o are the best for operating each specific patient. However, it does not mean that every doctor knows how to use the system. The elder doctors might not be accustomed to using the IT system and the part-time doctors might think that it is unnecessary to learn how to use the system as the come from time to time.To handle this problem, the hospital decided not to banish the old IS system which is manually writing the prescriptions and recording the patients' records. The information recorded manually will be transferred to the QUA department in which the information will be recorded into the system to make sure that the information of the patient will be available by the next time the customer uses the hospital service again Just as same as other patient that the information were recorded by the doctors.By implementing this IT system, it ensures that the hospital is using its resources of 1,200 doctors efficiently and the customers can be assured that the appropriate healthcare will b e given to them as the total amount of the patients will be distributed equally among doctors to ensure the maximum ability n providing the services. 2. Hospital Officers: Every hospital employee is obligated to know how the system works no matter if they are the receptionists, accountants, nurses, radiologists, pharmacist, or even human resources.All the officers will have to work in harmony to be able to maintain the fast-paced work and provide the information needed in a short period of time. Although all the systems are connected together, it does not mean that everyone will be seeing the same information. As an example, this is what happens in steps when Mr.. A visited Dry. B. Mr.. A visited Dry. B in he year 2012 with the symptoms of Acute Tuberculosis. Later on, in 2014, Mr.. A came back to the hospital again with the intestinal infection which he was assigned to Dry. C. Dry. C will be able to see the whole medical report of Mr..A including the medicines that he is allergic t o, who was his former doctors, what were his symptoms, and all the medical implications. When Dry. C wrote the medical prescription, the lists of medicine will be sent to the cashier and the pharmacy. The pharmacy will only see the lists of the medicine that Mr.. A will get so that they could pack everything he deed while the cashier will only see the list of the medicines and the price so that Mr.. A will be charged correctly. These two departments would not be able to see the medical report related to Mr.. A. When the pharmacy packed all the medicine for Mr..A, the total amount of each medicine inside the inventories will be updated which will be easier to keep track of all the drugs inside the stocks to prevent those drugs from running out. In case that the report is needed, the system also provide the function to generate the report of the patients who were treated by Dry. C in each day. With the help of the system, all the information from the doctors to other departments and e mployees will be synchronized which will increase the speed, reliability, precision, and accuracy of the service that will be provided in daily routines. . Patients: Other than hospital's employees, another actor that cannot be neglected is the patients. Patients are considered an important part in the development of the hospital system as the system was designed for convenience of the customers and to reduce the waiting time. Moreover, in case that the patient is ready to be transferred perhaps in the form of hard copies or CDC. While those data re being transferred, the copy of the data will still be inside the hospital system in case that the patients wanted to be transferred back for further medical treatments. . Executives: When it comes to the executive officers of the hospital, it is important that they can get the overall status report of the hospital whenever it is needed. The report that is provided by Amalgam HIS is in the form of interactive report in which the executive can sit back and relax as the report generated will make the analysis process a whole lot easier. For simplicity, the interpretation will be made from the data collected from each patient.As soon as the report reaches the executives, for example the CEO, the CEO will be able to notice the trend of the symptoms at the moment so that the hospital can be prepared for the situation that might happen in the future. 5. The competitors: The competitors of Vanguard Hospital are not only private hospitals but also those hospitals that operate by the government. It is easy to say that Vanguard hospital is one of the first hospitals that implemented the hospital information system. But as time passes by, the IT system becomes more affordable for every organization.The competition becomes more and more intense s more hospitals also implemented the IT system which will introduce newer dimensions of giving the services to the customers luring in more customers. Though the system that the other u sed might not be as good as what Vanguard implemented but it surely enough to become more frightful business competitor. Workflow inside the Hospital 1 . Make an appointment: The patients can choose whether they want to make an appointment using telephones or using the online services. For the foreigners, they can make schedule an appointment on www. Vanguard. Mom where they can select the doctors that they wanted to get treated from. . The patient reached the hospital: When the patients arrived at the hospital, they need to hand in the patient card or tell them the patient id in which the id will be keyed into the system to report that this patient has already arrived at the hospital and is ready to be called into the examination room. 3. Preparation of the patient's profile: As soon as the patients have confirmed an appointment with the hospital, the hospital needs to prepare the profile of that patient before they even reached the hospital.With the information, the nurse in each counter will be able to make a schedule for the doctor and get the attain ready whenever they arrived at the hospital. 4. Seeing the doctor: The doctors inside the examination room will be able to see how many patients are waiting for the examination. Moreover, the doctors also can access the profile of each patient to see the former medical diagnosis, drug allergic history, all the taken lab results which can be changed into the form of graphs for analysis. 5.Lab & X-Ray results: Whenever the doctors see that the extra labs need to be tested on the patient, the direct order from the doctor will be sent directly to the lab and x-rays room. Nowadays, there are many technologies and one many interesting breakthroughs is the digital x-rays which allows the doctors to get the x-rays results digitally without using any film. 6. Payment: When the patients got the medical care that they need, the payment information and the information about the patients' insurance will be sent to the acco unting and financial department.In this step, the patients queuing sit still and wait for the system to manage their queues and call out their names. 7. Get the medicines: Practically, when the doctors ordered the medicine, the prescriptions will be automatically sent to the pharmacy. Thus, the patients can get their medicine as soon as the patients made the payment. 8. Executive operations: The executive officers can access the system to get the overall analysis of the current situation for management and make plans for the future.In the data analysis, the system will use the system called OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) which is already pre-equipped in the Microsoft SQL Server. OLAP helps the executives in gathering the information from the data warehouse for analysis, for instance, the proportions between domestic and international patients, the nation where the international patient are from so that the hospital will be able to get the translators ready for assisting the int ernational patients who are incapable of communicating directly with the doctors.Hardware Development For optimum efficiency, the hospital chose the computer system from Dell which is believed to be more stable compare to other brands. Since the computer system from Dell has been implemented, the hospital admitted that the expenses of the hospital were enormously reduced that the left hospital with enough budget to invest on another secondary storage station, which will manage the data in real-time manner, to prevent any system failure. In the hospital system, there consisted of 4 servers from Dell, 1 main memory, and 6 desktop computers connected in the form of cluster.Moreover, the hospital also set up extra 450 computers around the hospital to support the increasing amount of patients. For maximum functionality and for ease of accesses, the hospital also spent some amount of money on 100 laser printers and 120 scanners to keep the data of the patients. In the term of system funct ionality, if in case of an emergency that the power supply of the system was cut off, the system will be automatically shut down and rely will cause devastating damages to the system. Thus, the hospital made the decision to use the Infrastructure system offered by the APPC.The Infrastructure is the architectural design for data center IT room, which is scalable and adaptable, that dramatically reduces time and complexity from concept and design through installation. This Infrastructure system is composed of 2 40 KAVA N+l Redundancy UPS systems. The two systems are working in harmony in load sharing manner. Each UPS system will be powered from different sources from different sides of the building to ensure the maximum security from the electrical problems that might occur.If something happened to the first UPS, the other UPS will be able step up and take all the workload. From doing so, there is less probability of system failure and all the systems that are essential for providing the services to the customer will work continuously. Another good point of this APPC system is that there is built-in self-test software called â€Å"Powerhouse† which will automatically do the self-test to find if there is any hardware in the system needs replacement.If the software found out that there is actually a hardware that needed to be replaced, the software will notify the arson who is in charge of taking care of the data center to replace the hardware without turning off the whole system. For the linkage of the system, Vanguard Hospital entrusted the Motorola, Inc. To together, the hospital used more than 300 wireless switches and access points. For the switch, the Motorola REFORMS Wireless Next Generation, which is capable of layer-3 roaming, was utilized.The layer-3 mobility allows the users to roam without losing its IP address and sessions which is great for large areas with many stories as the users can use the network while they are walking with the maximum b andwidth ND noise-free. This is considered as something that can benefit the hospital in the long run. This wireless system can be used not only by the users but also the doctors and other staffs as well to ensure the availability of the data in real-time in the range of 90,000 square meters of the hospital's area.For security issue which is the main key in the designing process of the hospital system, the security system invented by Motorola, the Wireless Intrusion Protection System (WIPES), is taking care of everything Software Development As has been mentioned above, the hospital has implemented the Amalgam HIS to ease up the work processes of the doctors and other employees by making everything faster, more convenient, more effective, more precise, and easier for maintenance. Not to mention that using the system will also make the communication with the users more understandable and more cost-effective.The system works dependently with the Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and Micro soft SQL Server 2000, which is the software for managing the database. All information will be kept inside one big database inside the IT department which causes the hospital system to be in the form of computerized system in which every department ND every computer can communicate with each other via computer system. No matter in what direction that the patients were leaded to, the computer system can help the hospital to prepare what is needed in a short period of time.Nowadays, many people are getting treated by the hospital in each day which means high amount of the transaction between each department in each day. Thus, the system needs to be scalable; the hospital can add in more machines or take out some machines to be appropriate with the number of patients at the specific period of time. In the software perspective, the system needs to be adaptable, reliable and e ready for any further system expansion in the future. The Amalgam HIS can be divided into 3 tiers. . Presentatio n Tier: This tier includes all the 1,000 work station across the hospital which are used to get the data by accessing the central database of the Amalgam HIS that is set up of the machine that runs on Microsoft Windows 2000. 2. Middle Tier: The middle tier is in between the presentation tier and the database. Here, the Windows Server will be regarded as the Transaction server which is the main medium in managing the flow of the transactions that are being sent to the database.When the transactions were generated, they will be sent to different servers to prevent one specific server from overloading. An extra server can be added whenever it is needed to handle the customers' need without having to shut down the whole system. All in all, the hospital got a lot of assistance from the software from Microsoft as the software allows the hospital system to work faster, more consistent, more precise, and also help the hospital to control the number of employees needed inside the hospital. 3 . Database Tier: All the information that will be processed by the

Saturday, September 14, 2019

Google Books Essay

The Google Books project has been a working progress ever since Google was created. The co-founders of Google, Sergey Brin and Larry Page had been working on a research project that was supported by the Stanford digital Library Technologies Project in 1996. Google intends to scan every book ever published and make all of the text searchable so that people can find the relevant information they need about book. They want to make books more accessible to the public and create an easy mechanism of sorting a book’s content and relevance to a subject. In 2002 a secret â€Å"books† project was launched and research was underway to identify the challenges that lay ahead of them. Over this period, Googlers discovered a quick and harm free way to scan books and began to meet with Libraries to begin the digitalization of books. In December 2004 Google announces the launch of the â€Å"Google Print† Library Project thanks to partnerships from Harvard, The University of Michigan, The New York Public Library, Oxford and Stanford. Together it is said that these libraries exceed 15million volumes. In 2005 Google Print is renamed Google Books which is a more fitting title as it better explains it’s use. With the launch of Google Books and its fast development many will argue of the advantages and disadvantages of the site. The whole project seems a little bit overly ambitious and it obviously has many flaws in its system. It is a timely process to scan hundreds of millions of books and the pivotal question here is â€Å"Are Google books doing it right? † Scanning books is an extremely time consuming process so once Google books have done it, it seems unlikely that the books will be rescanned. If some of the books are not scanned properly, important literature and information could become obscured or lost through the process of digitalization. Geoff Nunberg (2009) published an article Google books: A Metadata Train Wreck and pointed out many errors in the system. One example being that he googled the name of an author and restricted the search to the works published before their year of birth. It was found that 182 hits came up for Charles Dickens alone. The Chief Engineer for Google Books, Dan Clancy claimed that the incorrect dates where the fault of the libraries. However, when the matter was investigated further it shows that the first ten full read books published before 1812 and that mention Charles Dickens are correctly dated in the catalogues that they had come from. Although one can argue that the correct information is given on the title page, there have been some other inexcusable errors too. Google Books has classified many of its books incorrectly and once again Dan Clancy has claimed that both the libraries and publishers where to blame because the classifications were drawn from the BISAC codes that is given to booksellers. BISAC codes have only been around for about 20 years meaning that any book that was put in the wrong category before this time is a mistake of Google themselves. Google have decided to take on an extremely large project but it seems apparent that they are not doing it very well. They are quick to push the blame on others and the whole project is based more towards commercialism rather than to help make knowledge available to the world. Project Gutenberg was one of the first â€Å"digital† libraries and was created by volunteers. This project seems to focus more on the importance of literature and the quality of the books available are much greater than those on Google Books. The books are proof read by human beings and their workers are not paid which is a clear sign that they actually care about making books more available to people. Google Books produces books in a much larger mass but they should be aware that people will value â€Å"quality over quantity† most. Google quickly scan these books and it’s obvious that they rarely check them for errors. In Paul Duguid’s (2007) essay Inheritance and Loss? A Brief Survey of Google Books, He addresses the Google books system hands on by using Laurence Sterne’s The Life and Opinion of Tristram Shandy as an example. He choose the first link that appeared in the search engine and claims his results were as follows; The book he was examining did not start with the word â€Å"wish† meaning that the left hand side of the page that had the word â€Å"I† was missing. On page seventeen the left hand side of the page is not legible because the gutter of the book is blocking the first few letters and by page twenty-seven, Sterne quoted Hamlet’s phrase â€Å"alas, poor Yorick! † and inserted a black page of mourning. However the version that is on Google books has left out this page and is somewhat ignorant to the fact of how iconic it is to the astute reader. On further investigation of Duguid’s essay I clicked on the links that were given to the book and realised that it was no longer a link to the book. I then searched Tristram Shandy just had Duguid had done into Google Books. I clicked on the first link which is the same Harvard edition that Duguid was referencing and discovered that the first page had the word â€Å"I† before â€Å"wish† and page seventeen was now fully legible. Although some corrections had been made the black page that was to follow on from page twenty seven has still not been inserted. This is perhaps due to the fact that the people scanning these books are not scholars themselves. It is very easy to recognise a page with a missing word or one that is not fully legible but many would mistake a black page as an error in printing. Another flaw in the digitalization in books is the actual book itself. There is something so pleasant about flicking through a book and holding it in your hand while you read. The book in its own physically is magnificent, depending on how old it is it could have been passed on from generation to generation. The book itself is a story in its own right. Throughout its lifespan the book can acquire various annotations, signatures and other interesting characteristics. There has also been a lot of conflict with regard to the publishing industry and the digitalization of books. Google has offered to provide a search engine what they aspire to be every book ever published but for those which are copyrighted and cannot be viewed online, Google provides the option to purchase them online through sites such as Amazon or Barnes. In January 2007, Google held a conference on the future of the publishing industry. The conference quoted Charles Darwin and projected it on a screen: â€Å"It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor is it the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change. † Toobin (2007) states in an article Google’s Moon Shot: â€Å"As Laurence Kirschbaum, a long time publishing executive who recently became a literary agent, told me at the conference, â€Å"Google is now the gatekeeper. They are reaching an audience that we as publishers and authors are not reaching. It makes perfect sense to use the specificity of a search engine as a tool for selling books. †Ã¢â‚¬  This statement has a lot of truth because since the growth of technology, the popularity of books has fallen drastically. People in the 21st century care more for mindless television shows and tacky magazines than a good well written piece. Reading books challenges the mind and fuels the imagination and by incorporating literature with technology it is a great attempt to try and revive such an excellent thing. Despite Google’s attempts, it looks as if they are not doing a good job. Many authors and publishers filed a lawsuit against Google Books claiming that Google has violated their copyrights by scanning the books, creating an electronic database and displaying short excerpts without their permission. The Authors Guild filed a lawsuit against Google Books alleging copyright infringement and after four years of discussion a settlement was finally reached in 2009. It was decided that Google was allowed to copy, display and sell millions of books that were out of print but still in copyright. However the agreement was reviewed several times and was summarily rejected in March 2011. This gave organizations a chance to voice their concern about the privacy policy for users of the system. Google claims that it has reviewed its privacy policy and that an advance policy has been created for Google Books but it seemed that the policy still left a large number of gaps and something appeared to be quite vague. On September 4th 2009 the Electronic Privacy Information Centre (EPIC) entered a motion to intervene in the Google settlement case to help the readers of Google Books regarding their privacy online. EPIC states that readers will be required to part with particular information that will be stored in a database to create detailed profiles of preferences of the reading with regard to their purchases and browsing. Marc Rotenberg appeared in court on February 18th 2010 and stated that: â€Å"A person at any library or any university in the United States that attempted to retrieve information from Google’s digital library would be uniquely tagged and tracked. There is simply no precedent for the creation of such power†. The court rejected the settlement but it did however state that Google should review it’s privacy policy to better protect its users. Google should not have the right to disclose any information to government or third parties and secure browsing should be a priority. Many people do not realise that these profiles are being created or that their privacy is being invaded. If this is supposed to be the library of the future, then it should be dealt with in the correct manner. People should be able to browse through books anonymously and have their own thoughts kept private. Google Books seem to have rushed the whole process of scanning such a vast amount of literature and by doing so they seemed to have forgotten about â€Å"quality over quantity. † It seems that the dream of creating a digital library will remain one for the foreseeable future due to the numerous flaws that the system has. Whilst Google Books are trying to correct their many errors it is apparent that the whole project was done quite carelessly and insufficiently. It is evident that Google Books motive leans more to the commercial side of things rather than making knowledge available to a wider audience. This is particularly clear with regards to their privacy policy. Google will suggest recommended pages and sites by analysing all of your browsing. The option to purchase a book that is not available online makes Google Books more of a digital bookstore rather than a digital library. The concept of Google Books is a great one and though it has some advantages, the disadvantages outweigh the good. Bibliography: †¢Duguid, Paul. â€Å"Inheritance and Loss? A Brief Survey on Google Books. † N. p. , Aug. 2007. Web. 12 Nov. 2012. . †¢Nunberg, Geoff. â€Å"Language Log. † A » Google Books: A Metadata Train Wreck. N. p. , 29 Aug. 2009. Web. 11 Nov. 2012. http://languagelog. ldc. upenn. edu/nll/? p=1701 †¢McSherry, Corynne. â€Å"Good and Bad in Google Book Search Settlement Decision | Electronic Frontier Foundation. † Good and Bad in Google Book Search Settlement Decision | Electronic Frontier Foundation. N. p. , 23 Mar. 2011. Web. 11 Nov. 2012. . †¢Rogers, T. â€Å"Google Books: Good for Knowledge, Bad for Privacy. † Information Privacy Law. N. p. , 28 Mar. 2011. Web. 12 Nov. 2012. http://www. brianrowe. org/infoprivacylaw/2011/03/28/google-books-good-for-knowledge-bad-for-privacy/ †¢Ã¢â‚¬ Google Books. † Google Books. N. p. , n. d. Web. 11 Nov. 2012. .