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The need to reduce carbon emissions calls for more use of renewable generation, particularly distributed resources. The intermittency of renewable generation, and concerns about energy security, require us to become more independent of central grid operation by use of local or regional (micro-grid) electricity systems. Distributed generation, allied to the commercial availability of battery storage products, permits this–the pathway to energy autonomy. This paper reviews the contribution of different renewable energy sources (RES), trends in energy storage technologies to enable energy autonomy, and the centralised and decentralised techniques that coordinate the associated energy management. The paper covers energy autonomy at different scales, ranging from household levels to district levels. The improvements in grid independency are measured accordingly. There is discussion of this measurement and of the economic and ecological benefits from energy autonomy in the context of policy frameworks.
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Background: Clinicians are currently challenged to support older adults to maintain a certain level of Functional Independence (FI). FI is defined as "functioning physically safely and independent from another person, within one's own context". A Core Outcome Set was developed to measure FI. The purpose of this study was to assess discriminative validity of the Core Outcome Set FI (COSFI) in a population of Dutch older adults (≥ 65 years) with different levels of FI. Secondary objective was to assess to what extent the underlying domains 'coping', 'empowerment' and 'health literacy' contribute to the COSFI in addition to the domain 'physical capacity'. Methods: A population of 200 community-dwelling older adults and older adults living in residential care facilities were evaluated by the COSFI. The COSFI contains measurements on the four domains of FI: physical capacity, coping, empowerment and health literacy. In line with the COSMIN Study Design checklist for Patient-reported outcome measurement instruments, predefined hypotheses regarding prediction accuracy and differences between three subgroups of FI were tested. Testing included ordinal logistic regression analysis, with main outcome prediction accuracy of the COSFI on a proxy indicator for FI. Results: Overall, the prediction accuracy of the COSFI was 68%. For older adults living at home and depending on help in (i)ADL, prediction accuracy was 58%. 60% of the preset hypotheses were confirmed. Only physical capacity measured with Short Physical Performance Battery was significantly associated with group membership. Adding health literacy with coping or empowerment to a model with physical capacity improved the model significantly (p < 0.01). Conclusions: The current composition of the COSFI, did not yet meet the COSMIN criteria for discriminative validity. However, with some adjustments, the COSFI potentially becomes a valuable instrument for clinical practice. Context-related factors, like the presence of a spouse, also may be a determining factor in this population. It is recommended to include context-related factors in further research on determining FI in subgroups of older people.
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Ageing potentially poses a threat to independent functioning of older adults. Although clinicians commonly focus on physical factors limiting Functional Independence (FI), it is likely that personal and environmental interactions also seem important to maintain FI. Herewith, FI exceeds several professional borders and calls for a uniform, multidisciplinary interdisciplinary supported definition of FI. This study aims to provide such a definition of FI in community dwelling older people. A scoping review was performed. Pubmed/Medline, Psychinfo and CINAHL were searched for studies describing aspects of FI. A literature-based definition of FI was discussed by experts (n = 7), resulting in a formulated final definition of FI and insight into contributing factors to FI. A multidisciplinairy focusgroup a stakeholder consultation (n = 15) ensured clinical relevance for daily practice. Data from the focusgroup stakeholder consultation were analyzed by using Atlas.ti (version 8). Based on the literature search, 25 studies were included. FI was finally defined as “Functioning physically safely and independent from another person, within one’s own context”. The contributing factors of FI comprised physical capacity combined with coping, empowerment and health literacy. Moreover, the level of FI is influenced by someone’s own context. This study confirms the relevance of the physical aspect of FI, but additionally stresses the importance of psychological factors. In addition, this study shows that one’s context may affect the level of FI as well. This underlines the importance of a holistic view and calls for multidisciplinary interdisciplinary collaboration in community-dwelling older people.
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Op 1 januari 2007 is officieel bij de faculteit Economie en Management (FEM) van Hogeschool Utrecht het kenniscentrum InnBus van start gegaan. InnBus kan gezien worden als een faculteitsbreed kenniscentrum1 waarbinnen alle lectoraten worden ondergebracht. De naam InnBus staat daarbij voor Innovatie en Business. Bij de inrichting van dit kenniscentrum naar domeinen voor de lectoraten is op een specifieke wijze aansluiting gezocht bij bestaande, algemeen geaccepteerde indelingen naar de Business-deelvakgebieden: Finance; Accountancy; Organisatie & Strategie; Informatiekunde; Marketing. Door hergroepering, splitsing en het uitlichten van International Business is een centrum in ontwikkeling ontstaan, waarbinnen in de nabije toekomst zes lectoraten functioneren. De achterliggende gedachte is het positioneren van de faculteit Economie en Management als kennisonderneming met taken op het gebied van kennisontwikkeling en kennisspreiding, gericht op de versterking van het innoverende vermogen van bedrijven en instellingen in de regio. De daarbij geformuleerde randvoorwaarden luiden: Te ontwikkelen kennis ontstaat vanuit aangetoonde maatschappelijke behoeften; De nieuwe kennis is gericht op professionalisering van de beroepspraktijk; De kennisontwikkeling voldoet aan methodische vereisten. Kort samengevat: binnen het faculteitsbrede kenniscentrum wordt bedrijfeconomisch relevant toegepast onderzoek gedaan, gericht op bedrijven en instellingen in de regio. De keuze voor de regio heeft tot gevolg dat er een zekere voorkeur voor branches of sectoren ontstaat. Kennisspreiding binnen de FEM-organisatie ontstaat door zowel docenten als studenten bij de uitvoering van dit onderzoek te betrekken en op onderzoek gebaseerde curricula verder te ontwikkelen. Sinds 1 januari 2007 heb ik de eervolle taak om samen met mijn medewerkers het proces van kennisontwikkeling en kennisspreiding gestalte te geven binnen het vakgebied van de kenniskring Lectoraat Marketing, Marktonderzoek en Innovatie. In deze openbare les wil ik aangeven wat dit voor ons inhoudt door allereerst aandacht te besteden aan de begrippen innovatie en innoveren en daarna de koppeling te leggen met het vakgebied Marketing en Marktonderzoek.
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Background Although enhancing physical activity (PA) is important for physical and cognitive recovery of stroke patients, the role of nurses in supporting an active lifestyle is underused during the inpatient rehabilitation treatment. Objective 1) To identify nurses’ perspectives on their current and potential role; 2) To identify influencing factors to support an active lifestyle of stroke patients during inpatient rehabilitation treatment. Methods - Three focus groups with 18 nurses (EQF level 3-6) were conducted in three Dutch rehabilitation centres (Den Haag, Leiden, Arnhem) each focus group consisting of 5-8 nurses. - The transcribed data were analysed using framework method. The data was coded by 2 researchers. Afterwards checked to align the codes and themes until consensus was reached.
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The present study evaluates the Youth Initiated Mentoring (YIM) approach in which families and youth care professionals collaborate with an informal mentor, who is someone adolescents (aged twelve to twenty-three) nominate from their own social network. The informal mentor can be a relative, neighbour or friend, who is a confidant and spokesman for the youth and a co-operation partner for parents and professionals. This approach fits with the international tendency in social work to make use of the strengths of families’ social networks and to stimulate client participation. The current study examined through case-file analysis of 200 adolescents (YIM group n ¼ 96, residential comparison group n ¼ 104) whether the YIM approach would be a promising alternative for out-of-home placement of youth with complex needs. A total of 83 per cent of the juveniles in the YIM group were able to nominate a mentor after an average of thirty-three days. Ninety per cent of the adolescents in the YIM group received ambulatory treatment as an alternative for indicated out-of-homeplacement, while their problems were largely comparable with those of juveniles in Dutch semi-secure residential care. Results suggest that the involvement of important non-parental adults may help to prevent out-of-home placement of adolescents with complex needs.
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Dutch National Sports Organizations (NSFs) is currently experiencing financial pressures. Two indications for this are described in this paper i.e. increased competition in the sports sector and changes in subsidy division. Decreasing incomes from subsidies can be compensated with either increasing incomes from a commercial domain or increasing incomes from member contributions. This latter solution is gaining interest as a solution for the uncertainties. Many NSFs have therefore participated in a special marketing program in order to enlarge their marketing awareness and create a marketing strategy, in order to (re)win market share on the sports participation market and gain a more stable financial situation. This paper introduces my research related to the introduction of marketing techniques within NSFs and the change-over to become market oriented. An overview of existing literature about creating marketing strategies, their implementation, and market orientation is given. This outline makes obvious that the existing literature is not sufficient for studying the implementation of marketing techniques and market orientation within NSFs. Therefore, it shows the scientific relevance of my research. The paper concludes with the chosen research methodology.
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This paper describes a model for education in innovative engineering. The kernel of this model is, that students from different departments of the faculty of Applied Science and Technology are placed in industry for a period of eighteen months after two-and-a-half year of theoretical studies. During this period students work in multi-disciplinary projects on different themes. Students will grow to fully equal employees in industry. Therefore it is important that besides students, teachers and company employees will participate in the projects. Also the involvement of other level students (University and high school) is recommended. The most important characteristics of the model can be summarized in innovative, interdisciplinary and international orientation.
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