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Using Simulation To Evaluate And Improve Performance Of The Contact Center At Bluecross Blueshield Of Tennessee, Charat Siriphongvuttikorn

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee is a not-for-profit organization in health care financing with more than 4,300 employees and has a service area covering ninety five counties in Tennessee. The company now has three customer service divisions and the regional division is the biggest customer service division of the company.The objectives of this study are to evaluate the performance of the contact center of the regional division and improve its performance through the simulation while still maintaining the standard service level required by the BlueCross BlueShield Association. The simulation model was built by using Pro Model 2002 to represent the operation …

Race, Menopause, Health-Related Quality Of Life, And Psychological Well-Being In Obese Women, Blandine Laferrère, Shankuan Zhu, Jennifer R. Clarkson, Marianne R.M. Yoshioka, Katherine Krauskopf, John C. Thornton, F. Xavier Pi-Sunyer

School for Social Work: Faculty Publications

Race, menopause, health-related quality of life, and psychological well-being in obese women. Obes Res. 2002;10:1270 –1275.

Objective: To investigate the health-related quality of life (HR-QOL) in African-American (AA) and white (W) obese women.

Research Methods and Procedures: Participants were 145 obese women (80 AA and 65 W; 87 premenopausal and 58 postmenopausal) who completed the Medical Outcomes Study short form, the Brief Symptom Inventory, the Life Distress Inventory, the Satisfaction With Life Scale, and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale before entering a weight-loss study. The mean age of the subjects was 46.3   11.1 years and the mean body mass index was …

Adaptation Of Project Finance To Small Contractor Financing, Ragunathan Venkateswaran

Masters Theses

One key reason for the poor performance of small construction establishments in securing a higher chunk of the annual project volume is funding. While construction industry does not require a large capital investment it does require a large working capital to start up the project and generate bills so that the resulting cash flow may take over the remaining funding requirements. Unfortunately for small contractors there are very limited options available from the banks or other lending institutions to cover this large working capital requirement in the absence of sufficient collateral. The "Project Finance" method, which has been used in …

Vol. 1, No. 01 (December 2002)

Indiana Law Update

No abstract provided.

Ocean Zoning For The Gulf Of Maine: A Background Paper, Fara Courtney, Jack Wiggin

Urban Harbors Institute Publications

Coastal and ocean management is a constantly evolving practice. For at least two decades, coastal communities around the world have been experimenting with new ways to control a multitude of activities in their urban and rural harbors. The number and diversity of Marine Protected Areas are growing, with an increasing focus on protecting integrated biological communities, rather than individual species of concern. The United States and Canada are each developing new, comprehensive ocean polices, looking to better integrate management functions at all levels of government.

All of these initiatives – from local to national - reflect some common truths about …

Mandatory Child Abuse Reporting: Behaviors, Attitudes And Beliefs Among Psychologists Regarding Current And Proposed Statutes, Angela Marie Cavett

Theses and Dissertations

Child abuse is a serious societal problem that has occurred throughout history. However, only recently has society begun to formally confront child maltreatment by requiring professionals, including psychologists, to identify children who are being abused or neglected, through formal, mandated reporting. Child abuse reports are general addressed by social workers from Social Service Departments. However, this system is not always effective. Despite the mandates to report, psychologists have chosen to not report some cases, especially cases of mild physical abuse.

Psychologists make decisions regarding whether or not to report. This study elaborates on and extends what is known about psychologists' …

The Antecedents And Consequences Of Body Image Dissatisfaction: A Structural Modeling Analysis And A Controlled Laboratory Task, Dana M. Borowiak

Theses and Dissertations

Recent covariance structural equation modeling investigations have begun to examine factors thought to play a role in body image dissatisfaction and eating disturbance (Thompson et al., 1999). The current investigation extended this line of research using structural equation modeling to examine a tripartite model of body image dissatisfaction. Female participants (N = 200) completed an informed consent, the Survey of Background Information, the Body Comparison Scale, the Restraint Scale, the Three Factor Eating Questionnaire, the Body Esteem Scale-Revised, the Inventory of Peer Influence on Eating Concerns, the Perception of Teasing Scale, the Eating Disorders Inventory, the Parent Involvement Scale, the …

Law, Media And Political Dissent: The Case Of The Faln, Yanira Reyes

Open Access Dissertations

Inspired on the works of scholars and activists that had denounced state repression of political activists in the United States, this research explores the theoretical proposal about the criminalization of political dissidence. The proposal of the criminalization of political dissidence is analyzed through the study of the case of Puerto Rican pro-independence organization Fuerzas Armadas de Liberaci6n Nacional, F.A.L.N. The subjects of this research were charged with seditious conspiracy and other charges. They claimed the status of prisoners of war and deny the jurisdiction of US courts over them. Affirming their right to fight for the independence of Puerto Rico, …

Southern Alumni, Siu Alumni Association

SIU Alumni Magazine

No abstract provided.

Farm And Home Research: 53-4, Mary Brashier, Lance Nixon, Marianne Stein

Farm and Home Research: 1999 - 2007

Contents: [Page] 3- Director’s comments [Page] 4- Ray Moore: A mentor, a scientist, a visionary, a family man, an honest man [Page] 6- Reflections on changes in farming and agricultural research [Page] 8- Distillers grains: Just because you’re out of hay doesn’t mean you’re out of the cattle business [Page] 13- Distillers grains: Swine producers “can take edge off” feed bill [Page] 16- Crop varieties of tomorrow with biotechnology [Page] 21- Gene transfer rarely happens between soybeans varieties

What’S In A Name?, Jonathan Zittrain

Federal Communications Law Journal

Book Review: Ruling the Root, Milton L. Mueller, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2002, 301 pages.

A review of Milton L. Mueller's Ruling the Root, The MIT Press, 2002. In the spring of 1998, the U.S. government told the Internet: Govern yourself. This unfocused order-a blandishment, really, expressed as an awkward "statement of policy" by the Department of Commerce, carrying no direct force of law-came about because the management of obscure but critical centralized Internet functions was at a political crossroads. In Ruling the Root, Mueller thoroughly documents the colorful history both before and after this moment of inflection, and gives …

Rush Prudential Hmo V. Moran: Federal Intervention Looms As Supreme Court Rules That Erisa Does Not Preempt State Laws Requiring Independent Review Of Medical Necessity Decisions And Lays Groundwork For Different Independent Review Provisions From All Fifty States, Lindsey G. Churchill

Georgia State University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Traumatic Fat Embolism Syndrome, Tarig S. Al-Khuwaitir, Abdurahman M. Al-Moghairi, Suphia M. Sherbeeni, Hamed M. Subh

Saudi Medical Journal

Traumatic fat embolism syndrome occurs most often following fractures of long bones sustained in road traffic accidents and is a common cause of medical consultation from the orthopedic surgery department. The sub-clinical presentation is subtle and expresses itself by the presence of hypoxemia, while the full clinical syndrome compromises respiratory insufficiency, an altered consciousness and a characteristic petechial rash. Recognition is simple once the patient is viewed in the context of his or her clinical setting. Diagnosis is aided further by the presence of hematological and biochemical abnormalities including anemia, thrombocytopenia, an elevated erythrocyte sedimentation rate and fat macroglobulinemia. Imaging …

Oncolog, Volume 47, Number 12, December 2002, Dawn Chalaire, Karen Stuyck, Raymond Sawaya Md

OncoLog MD Anderson's Report to Physicians (All issues) Archives

• Advances in Imaging Lead to More Targeted Radiation Treatments
• Imaging Techniques Follow the Movements of Tumors During and Between Radiation Treatments
• Evolution of Conformal Radiation Therapy Continues: IMRT Called 'the Next Level of Conformality'
• DiaLog: The Caregiver: An Unsung Hero, by Raymond Sawaya, MD, Professor and Chair, Department of Neurosurgery
• Support Groups, Classes Teach Caregivers How to Care for Patients and Themselves

Contents

The Prairie Light Review

No abstract provided.

Mechanized Health Care Via The Ford Plan, Robert Gockman

The Prairie Light Review

No abstract provided.

An Outcomes Analysis Of Scope Of Review Standards, Paul R. Verkuil

Articles

No abstract provided.

Testing The Effectiveness Of Behavioral Activation Therapy In The Treatment Of Acute Unipolar Depression, Jenifer M. Cullen

Dissertations

The present study sought to investigate the clinical effectiveness of Behavioral Activation (BA) Therapy, the behavioral activation component of Beck's Cognitive Therapy (CT; Beck, Rush, Shaw, & Emery, 1979). Seventeen adults seeking mental health services for Unipolar Depression were recruited from the Kalamazoo and Southwestern Michigan regions. All participants were randomly assigned to either (a) an Immediate Treatment Group, or (b) a waitlist control group, while both received 10 weeks o f BA therapy. Depressive symptomatology for both conditions were assessed at pretreatment, post-treatment, and 3-month follow-up with the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II; Beck, Steer, Ball, & Ranieri, 1996), the …

Constitutional Prohibition On The Execution Of The Mentally Retarded Criminal Defendant, Lyn Entzeroth

Tulsa Law Review

No abstract provided.

Befogged Vision: International Environmental Governance A Decade After Rio, Nicholas A. Robinson

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

No abstract provided.

Introduction: Communities In Crisis, Susanna Trnka

Pacific Studies

This introduction sets the stage for a volume of essays exploring the social, political, and cultural upheavals experienced in Fiji during and after the May 2000 coup led by George Speight. While media and political discourse have largely focused on national-level implications and ethnic divisions, this collection shifts attention to grassroots perspectives, highlighting how ordinary citizens experienced and interpreted the crisis. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork conducted during or shortly after the coup, contributors examine local discourses, community reactions, and the reconfiguration of identities and power dynamics. The introduction contextualizes the coup within Fiji's broader history of political instability, including the …

Disjunctures In Discourse: Emerging Identities After The 2000 Coup In Rakiraki, Fiji, Karen J. Brison

Pacific Studies

This essay examines the way the coup of 2000 crystallized a new ethnic identity among Rakiraki villagers based on opposition to dominant groups within the Fijian ethnic community. The most obvious source of support for the coup was fear and resentment of Indo-Fijians, and it was evident that the coup both drew on and catalyzed such resentments. However, listening to villagers' reactions convinced me that they also supported the coup because they saw it as an attempt by a western Fijian (Speight, whose mother was rumored to be a Ra woman) to overthrow a Bauan-Lauan monopoly on government power, as …

Research To Practice: Collaboration Between Medicaid And Other State Agencies- Findings From The National Survey Of State Systems And Employment For People With Disabilities, Jennifer Sullivan Sulewski, Dana Scott Gilmore, Susan Foley

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Many state Medicaid agencies are playing a greater role in multi-agency efforts to promote employment for people with disabilities. This brief uses data from the National Survey of State Systems and Employment for People with Disabilities to explore the varieties of collaboration Medicaid agencies are using and the agencies they are collaborating with.

Non-Prescriptive Behavior Therapy: Effectiveness Of A Self-Help Book In Teaching Parents How To Manage Their Child’S “Picky Eating” Behavior, Sean T. Smitham

Masters Theses

The term "nonprescription" behavior therapies was first used by Rosen (1979) to describe behavioral interventions that could be totally self-administered without professional consultation. In his article, Rosen warned that empirical validation of self-help programs was needed. The present study examines the effectiveness of one such self-help program intended to help parents manage a minor pediatric feeding problem - "picky eating". "Picky Eating" (i.e., mild selectivity or selective eating) appears to be a common and relatively persistent feeding concern of otherwise typically developing children. Mild selectivity is usually regarded as a sub-clinical feeding problem. In the present study, five families with …

Linking The Heuristic-Systematic Model And Depth Of Processing, Robert J. Griffin, Kurt Neuwirth, James K. Giese, Sharon Dunwoody

College of Communication Faculty Research and Publications

This study draws a nexus between heuristic-systematic information processing and the theory of planned behavior through a model of risk information seeking and processing. The model proposes that the form of information processing individuals apply to risk information from the media and other sources affects beliefs, evaluations, and attitudes considered important to making judgments about performing risk-reducing behaviors. This study found that deeper, more systematic processing of risk information is positively related to evaluation strength, attitude strength, and the number of strongly held behavioral beliefs actively considered by respondents when thinking about environmental hazards. The relationships were consistent, appearing across …

Impulsivity And Friends Who Smoke As Predictors Of Adolescent Smoking, Brady Reynolds

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The present study sought to examine relations between different stages of adolescent cigarette smoking and the variables of impulsivity (delay and probability discounting) and peer friend smoking behavior. Participants were 75 adolescents (40 females) between 14 and 16 years of age. Participants were categorized according to the following patterns of smoking behavior: "never smokers" (n = 19; 10 females) were those who had not tried even one cigarette; "triers" (n = 17; 9 females) were those who had recently tried cigarettes (M = 3.76 cigarettes) for the first time; "past experimenters" (n = 20; 12 females) were those who had …

Effects Of Response-Independent Stimulus Delivery And Functional Communication Training, Shannon S. Haag

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Two individuals with developmental delays with a history of problem behavior participated in this study. Its purpose was to examine the efficacy of combining two treatments demonstrated to reduce problem behavior: response-independent stimulus delivery and differential reinforcement of an alternative behavior. This study examined whether the response-independent delivery of an alternative preferred stimulus and differential reinforcement of manding resulted in increases in manding and suppression of problem behavior prior to and during the fading of the schedule of response-independent stimulus delivery. The study also examined the necessity of extinction to obtain suppression of problem behavior. The response-independent delivery of an …

Helping Graduate Level Administrative Courses Support The Importance Of The School Asset, John C. Maciha

Journal of Catholic Education

Facilities management, preventative maintenance, and capital improvements are the concern of many principals, presidents, and boards. University preparation programs for school administrators often lack serious concentration on these areas, mostly due to the increased standards for licensure, certification, and academic degrees. This article attempts to fill that void by inviting school leaders to consider preventative maintenance as an integral part of facilities management.

Roman Catholicism In America, By Chester Gillis, Gregory Hine

Journal of Catholic Education

No abstract provided.

Health Services Social Workers' Activities With People With Disabilities: Predicters Of Community Practice, Richard L. Beaulaurier

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

The purpose of this study was to explore the extent to which hospital based social workers were actively involved in community practice on behalf of disabled people. The study attempted to identify what variables influence social workers in health settings to engage in community practice. A sample of 286 social workers employed in 57 different hospital and rehabilitation settings participated in a survey that focused on advocacy and related topics. A questionnaire explored participants' perspectives and the levels and kinds of practice activities they engaged in relation to the needs of people with disabilities. Most respondents indicated that community practice …