Digital Commons Network^™

Rurality’S Impact On Alaska Native Elders’ Levels Of Physical Activity And Obesity, Jessie Doherty

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

While there have been studies on obesity levels and physical activity levels across many populations and age groups, few studies have focused on Alaska Native Elders. The purpose of this study was to examine rurality (urban vs. rural counties), physical activity, and obesity level while controlling for sex, self-reported loneliness, and self-reported stress. The theoretical foundation for this study was based on the socio-ecological model (SEM), and the research questions in this study explored how rurality impacted obesity levels and how rurality impacted physical activity levels in Alaska Native Elders. The methodology of this study was a quantitative cross-sectional design …

A Supplement, Not A Substitute: Accuracy And Completeness Of Chatgpt Responses For Common Elbow Pathology, Phillip Goldman, Pablo Coello, Michael B Gottschalk, Eric R Wagner, Adil Shahzad Ahmed

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Hypothesis: Large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT have increasingly been used as online resources for patients with orthopedic conditions. Yet there is a paucity of information assessing the ability of LLMs to accurately and completely answer patient questions. The present study comparatively assessed both ChatGPT 3.5 and GPT-4 responses to frequently asked questions on common elbow pathologies, scoring for accuracy and completeness. It was hypothesized that ChatGPT 3.5 and GPT-4 would demonstrate high levels of accuracy for the specific query asked, but some responses would lack completeness, and GPT-4 would yield more accurate and complete responses than ChatGPT 3.5.

Methods: …

Rescue Epilepsy Medication And Training: A Comparison Between Midazolam Use, Guidelines, Clinical Practice, And Possibilities In The Uk And Norway, Rohit Shankar

Peninsula Medical School

Objectives: Status epilepticus (SE) is a prolonged epileptic seizure carrying significant risk of long-term disability and death. Rescue therapies are prescribedfor prehospital administration to terminate SE. This study compared prescribingpractices of rescue therapies of midazolam in the UK and Norway.Methods: A cross-sectional, online, 21-item Likert-style survey was administeredto epilepsy professionals in the UK circulated via ILAE/ESNA and in Norway viaILAE/Epilepsinet using a non-discriminatory exponential snowballing techniqueleading to non-probability sampling. Data were collected anonymously and analyzed using descriptive statistics, Mann–Whitney, Chi-square, and Fisher's exact tests. Significance was accepted at p<0.05.Results: All 86 UK and 53 Norway respondents identified buccal midazolam as the first-line rescue medication choice in the community for prolonged and/or generalized tonic–clonic seizures. Norwegian respondents had significantly more experience in epilepsy-related work (p=0.002), were more likely to have a larger caseload on buccal midazolam (p<0.001), prescribed higher midazolam doses (p<0.001), and provided training yearly (p<0.001). UK respondents were more likely to delegate rescue medication prescribing to primary care (p=0.006) and reviewed emergency management plans more frequently (p=0.006). There was an inter-country difference in the period of midazolam non-use that respondents required before withdrawing from treatment plans (p<0.001). Concern about inappropriate use of buccal midazolam was similarly high in both countries.Significance: This study compared epilepsy professionals in two neighboringhigh-income countries. Findings suggest an urgent need for international guidelines to recommend best practices on prescribing doses and withdrawal of buccal midazolam. The potential abuse of buccal midazolam by patients and carers warrants further investigation.

Primary Education In Nigeria: A Case Study Of The Global Mandate On Inclusive Education, Olusola John Ogundola

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines how inclusive education, mandated by Article 24 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), is implemented in primary schools in Oyo State, Nigeria. Using a qualitative case study, I explored administrators’ and teachers’ experiences within contexts shaped by colonial legacies, systemic ableism, and resource constraints. Data sources included policy documents, lesson notes, researcher journals, and interviews. Guided by postcolonial and decolonial theory, Disability Critical Race Theory (DisCrit), and Critical Disability Studies (CDS), the study identified five themes: (1) colonial residues in language and schooling; (2) deficit framings of disability; (3) systemic …

Memories, Realities, And Manifestations: A Fifth Grade Collage Inquiry Of Experiences And Hopes, Idalis Jole' Williams

Theses and Dissertations

In this qualitative study, I used collage inquiry to explore fifth-grade students' educational, social, and emotional experiences in an elementary school. The participating students began kindergarten in 2020, a year marked by the sudden disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic shaped the foundation of their schooling in many ways. This study helped us understand the student experience using the arts-based research method of collage inquiry. As the principal and researcher, I invited fifth-grade students to participate in a Collage Club that meets twice weekly across five weeks. The students reflected on their experiences and expressed their hopes for the …

Intouch Week Of October 6, 2025, New York Medical College

InTouch

• NYMC Goes Pink for Breast Cancer Awareness Month
• Summer Research Fellowships Empower Medical Students to Explore, Innovate, and Lead
• International Symposium on Adolescent and Young Adult NHL Has Far Reach
• A Look Inside NYMC with the 2025-2026 Social Media Ambassadors
• SOM Welcomes New Faculty
• Pet the Stress Away Brings Joy to NYMC
• Stay Warm with Savings on Hoodies
• In The Community: College Joins Forces at Westchester Heart Walk to Fight Heart Disease and Stroke
• In The Community: SHSP Students and Faculty Partner with the White Plains Youth Bureau for Community Health and Wellness Day
• Faculty Spotlight: Christopher Whitehurst, Ph.D., Cracks …

Ndls Communicator: Week Of 10.06.25, Notre Dame Law School

NDLS Communicator

The Latest News

• Faculty profile: Professor Mary Ellen O'Connell, globally influential scholar of international law and peace
• Panel explores Catholic Social Teaching and human rights in Africa

Faculty Briefs

• Nicole Garnett
• Sadie Blanchard
• Patrick Corrigan
• Roger Alford
• Mary Ellen O'Connell
• Christine Venter
• Paolo Carozza
• Avishalom Tor
• Emily Bremer
• Fr. John Paul Kimes
• Derek Muller
• Judy Fox
• Gerard Bradley

ND Law in the News

• Notre Dame Law School's partnership with Harvey AI was featured in a Law360 article.

Student News

• Third-year law student Dennis Weiboldt III wrote an article for First Things Magazine about the Red Mass

Events

• Law and Economics …

Static Malware Analysis For Incident Response: Developing A Tactical Aid With Ember, Joel Meoak, Shengjie Xu

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

Incident responders face a variety of challenges when identifying malware using existing solutions, particularly when rapid tactical decisions are needed. Traditional malware detection methods are often signature-based, limiting their effectiveness to previously known threats detected by anti-virus (AV) engines. Online analysis tools introduce confidentiality risks, potentially alerting adversaries that their actions are under scrutiny. While free sandbox environments offer useful capabilities, they often require substantial setup time and hardware resources that may not be available in the field. This research leverages the Elastic Malware Benchmark for Empowering Researchers (EMBER) dataset to develop a lightweight, portable tactical decision aid that enables …

Benchmarking Modern Day Pencil Beam Scanning Proton Therapy Treatment Times: Insights From Real Time Location Service Treatment Time Data, Kristen Mcconnell, Andrew Wroe, Marie Valladares, Lorrie Legrand, Ulrich Ramos, Michael Chuong, Minesh Mehta, Alonso Gutierrez

All Publications

Purpose: Collecting consistent and accurate treatment time data is challenging, particularly when relying on manual records or predictive models. Our center uses a Real-Time Location System (RTLS), which provides precise, automated tracking of patient movement throughout the clinic. This study leverages RTLS data to benchmark treatment times in a high-volume pencil beam scanning proton facility where ancillary systems like cone beam CT, surface imaging, and ultrasound bladder scans are used to aid in setup.

Materials and methods: We analyzed RTLS data from 12,551 fractions delivered between January 2023 and July 2024 across three gantries of an IBA Proteus Plus system. …

Economic And Policy Drivers Of Climate-Smart Soil Health Practices In The United States, Roderick Rejesus, Serkan Aglasan, Lawson Connor

Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness Faculty Publications and Presentations

Climate-smart soil health practices, such as cover crops and no-till, are considered to be key elements for climate change adaptation and mitigation in agriculture. We examine the empirical literature that provides data-driven evidence on the impact of cover crops and no-till on several economic variables of interest, such as yields, inputs, profits, risk, erosion, and water quality. In general, existing studies provide mixed evidence on the impacts of cover crops and no-till on these outcomes. Moreover, we discuss the empirical literature exploring the impact of economic and policy-related variables on adopting cover crops and no-till. We find that a number …

Atg16l1 Controls Mammalian Vacuolar Proton Atpase, Thabata L A Duque, Masroor Paddar, Einar Trosdal, Ruheena Javed, Lee Allers, Prithvi Akepati, Michelle Salemi, Brett Phinney, Shawn B Bratton, Thomas Wileman, Vojo Deretic

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

The mechanisms governing mammalian proton pump V-ATPase function are of fundamental and medical interest. The assembly and disassembly of cytoplasmic V1 domain with the membrane-embedded V0 domain of V-ATPase is a key aspect of V-ATPase localization and function. Here, we show that the mammalian protein ATG16L1, primarily appreciated for its role in canonical autophagy and in noncanonical membrane atg8ylation processes, controls V-ATPase. ATG16L1 knockout elevated V-ATPase activity, increased V1 presence on endomembranes, and increased the number of acidified intracellular compartments. ATG16L1's ability to efficiently bind V-ATPase was required for its inhibitory role in endolysosomal acidification and for control of Mycobacterium …

Staff Education Program On Perceived Stress Scale, Juliana Mutua

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

This project was a staff education program conducted at a mental health and rehabilitation center in the United States. The program was designed to address a critical gap in practice of limited staff knowledge of using standardized stress assessment tools to assess patient stress, leading to poor patient outcomes. The practice-focused question was: Does staff education on the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) improve staff knowledge as compared pre- to post-education? The purpose was to enhance staff knowledge on the application and interpretation of the PSS. The Johns Hopkins nursing evidence-based practice (JHNEBP) model was used to organize and evaluate the …

Implementation Of The Patient Health Questionnaire-9 As A Screening Tool For Depression, Nathalie Teboh Njofri Bih

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Depression is a common mental health issue that is often misdiagnosed or underdiagnosed in primary care practice due to a lack of appropriate screening. The practice problem addressed by this project was the inconsistent use of standardized tools, like the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9), which hinders timely and accurate depression diagnosis. The practice-focused question was: Does educating staff impact their knowledge of the recommended use and interpretation of the PHQ-9 and their confidence in administering the tool? I aimed to enhance depression screening practices by educating nursing staff on administering, scoring, and integrating the PHQ-9 into routine patient care. For …

Effective Strategies Oil And Gas Business Organizations’ Project Managers Use To Complete Information Technology Projects, Kenneth Uwalaka

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The inability to complete information technology (IT) projects remains a significant concern for project managers in oil and gas industry. These are keen on discovering effective strategies to successfully complete IT projects, as any failures could significantly impact their organization's revenue and future. Grounded in the strategic alignment model, the purpose of this qualitative pragmatic inquiry project was to identify and explore successful strategies project managers of oil and gas business organizations use to complete IT projects to avoid a negative impact on organizational revenue and survival. The participants included seven project managers from different oil and gas business organizations …

Dieticians’ Perceptions Of Pediatric Obesity Education In Children’S Hospitals Located In Northeast Maryland, Constance Bartu

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Dieticians play a vital role in the fight against pediatric obesity in the United States. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore dieticians’ perceptions of internal and external reinforcements and barriers to childhood obesity interventions in children’s hospitals within Northeast Maryland. The study was framed by the social cognitive theory described by Bandura. As applied to this study, the theory focuses on prevention and intervention strategies used by dieticians working in children’s hospitals while offering educational interventions and other health care services. Interviews were conducted with eight dieticians with a minimum of 4 years working in children’s hospitals …

Strategies To Improve Access To Clinical Informatics Specialist Consultations In An Acute Care Hospital System, Holli Miller

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Access to clinical informatics specialist (CIS) consultations is essential for optimizing electronic health record (EHR) use in acute care hospital systems. Limited availability of CIS support contributes to clinician burnout, workflow inefficiencies, and patient safety risks. The purpose of this integrative review was to identify strategies to improve access to CIS consultations in acute care settings. A comprehensive literature search across multiple databases yielded 656 articles, with 24 meeting inclusion criteria based on relevance and methodological rigor, evaluated using the Johns Hopkins Nursing Evidence-Based Practice appraisal tools. These studies, published between 2019 and 2024, underwent thematic analysis guided by the …

Improving Nurse Adherence To Medication Reconciliation During Patient Admissions To Reduce Medication Errors Through Targeted Education, Wendy J. Marlowe

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Medication reconciliation errors are a significant clinical concern because they have the potential to result in serious or even life-threatening harm to patients. Implementing risk-reduction strategies through targeted education and systematic processes for medication reconciliation is crucial to enhancing patient safety and mitigating the risk of errors. Over 40% of medication errors occur during patient transitions, such as admissions, which are mainly due to inadequate medication reconciliation. The project addressed a practice-focused question to increase patient admission medication reconciliation by improving nurse knowledge by 20% and reducing medication errors by 60% within 2 months. I employed a pre-/posttest design in …

School Leaders And Strategies To Address Teacher Shortages In A Rural School District, Phaniki Antwanette Jenkins

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The problem addressed was that education administrators struggle to reduce teacher shortages in rural public school districts in the Southeastern United States. Grounded in transformational leadership theory, the purpose of this basic qualitative study was three-fold: to understand what experiences education administrators had concerning teacher shortages, what practices they used to address shortages, and what strategies they deemed most helpful. Semistructured interviews were conducted with 10 state-certified administrators with at least 3 years’ experience in their role in one rural public school district in the Southeastern United States. Open and axial coding were used to support thematic analysis. Administrative experiences …

Strategies Managers Use To Retain Financial Advisors New To The Industry, Andraes Anthony Alexander

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

High employee turnover can negatively affect a business. Some financial advisor managers are concerned about the retention of financial advisors who are new to the industry, as addressing this issue is vital for organizational efficiency, given the high costs of employee replacement. Grounded in social exchange theory, the purpose of this qualitative, pragmatic inquiry project was to explore the strategies financial advisor managers use to improve the retention of financial advisors who are new to the industry. The participants comprised eight financial advisor managers with successful retention strategies. Data were collected using semistructured interviews and by reviewing organizational websites and …

Teacher Perspectives On Challenges To Close The Reading Achievement Gap For African American Students, Miriam Aliyya Moore

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The problem addressed through this study was that African American students score lower than White students in reading across grade levels, demonstrating a gap in teaching practice in early childhood education. The purpose of this basic qualitative study was to explore early childhood teachers’ perspectives on challenges to increase African American students’ level of reading proficiency and what they believed they needed to close the African American-White student achievement gap in reading. The conceptual framework was Ladson-Billings’s culturally relevant pedagogy. Semistructured interviews were conducted with 10 kindergarten through third grade teachers who were currently teaching reading to African American students …

The Role Of Higher Education Attainment In Mitigating Police Misconduct, Marty Allen Hatfield

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Police misconduct continues to undermine public trust and strain community–law enforcement relationships in the United States. The potential role of higher education in reducing misconduct among officers remains underexamined. The purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to examine whether higher educational attainment is associated with reduced rates of documented misconduct in a large urban police department. Grounded in the social learning and organizational justice theories, the research addressed how postsecondary education influences ethical decision-making and conduct. The overarching research question concerned whether education level predicted misconduct frequency, controlling for gender, rank, and years of service. Archival personnel and disciplinary …

Effective Organizational Succession Planning Strategies For Retaining Knowledge From Retiring Employees, Rodriquez Tremayne Brown

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

A lack of succession planning to retain critical knowledge from retiring employees poses significant risks to organizational revenue and long-term survival. Organizational leaders are particularly concerned about succession planning because failure to capture employee knowledge threatens organizational performance and survival. Grounded in the 7-step model for succession planning theory, the purpose of this qualitative pragmatic inquiry project was to identify and explore effective succession planning strategies that some organizational leaders use to retain knowledge from retiring employees to avoid a negative impact on organizational revenue and survival. The participants included eight senior human resource managers from different organizations in the …

An Examination Of Successful Reentry And Recidivism For Drug-Involved Offenders In Rural Areas, Jacqueline Cottle

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

In rural communities, treatment and supportive resources are limited, putting ex-offenders (EXOs) at an increased risk for relapse or recidivism. The purpose of this qualitative study was to understand, through semistructured interviews, the experiences of EXOs who completed the court residential treatment center, intermediate sanction facility, or substance abuse felony punishment facility, and returned to a rural county in Texas, along with the perspectives of 11 community supervision officers who worked closely with the EXOs. This study was guided by Agnew’s general strain theory, which posits that drug-involved offenders achieve successful reentry in rural areas when positive supports are present, …

Fema Public Policy Impacts On Emergency Preparedness In Florida, Sara Sambolin

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Older adults are at an increased risk of mortality during hazardous emergencies; therefore, it is crucial to comprehend how current emergency preparedness policies are related to preparedness perceptions of older adults. Findings in recent literature identified the underrepresentation of older adults in Emergency Preparedness studies across all areas and Counties of the state of Florida as a gap that needs to be addressed. The purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to examine the relationship between the 2023 FEMA policy on emergency preparedness and the self-reported degree of preparedness among Florida’s older adult residents in urban and rural areas across …

Improving Icu Nurses’ Knowledge Of Early Mobility Through An Educational Intervention, Mohini Chand

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

This doctoral project sought to close a critical knowledge gap in the implementation of early mobility (EM) practices among intensive care unit (ICU) nurses. Guided by the ADDIE instructional design model, the initiative centered on developing and delivering a six-week educational intervention aimed at enhancing nurses’ comprehension and application of EM strategies for critically ill patients. Despite robust evidence supporting EM’s role in mitigating ICU-acquired weakness, reducing delirium, and improving functional outcomes, its clinical adoption remained inconsistent prior to this intervention. The project was anchored by the practice-focused question: “To what extent does an educational intervention improve ICU nurses’ knowledge …

Apoe-Calypse Tau: Apoe-Tau Synergy In Alzheimer's Disease, Matthew Paul Lennol, Chiara Bordier, Léana Kamelher, Jason D Ulrich, David M Holtzman, Maud Gratuze

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Alzheimer's disease (AD), the most common cause of dementia, is characterized by the accumulation of amyloid-β (Aβ) in senile plaques and abnormally hyperphosphorylated tau proteins in neurofibrillary tangles. While much of the research has focused on Aβ, tau-mediated neurodegeneration is more closely associated with synaptic loss and cognitive decline in AD, emphasizing the need for a deeper understanding of tau pathology. In this context, the interaction between tau and APOE, particularly the main genetic risk factor for AD APOE ε4, remains underexplored. APOE encodes apolipoprotein E (apoE), a protein important in lipid metabolism. In addition to promoting Aβ deposition, emerging …

The Taxonomy And Origins Of Folia: A Brief Review, Donald G. Davis, Louise D. Hose, Harvey R. Duchene

International Journal of Speleology

All folia demonstrate a few common elements: folia (singular, folium) are planar or sub-planar speleothems, slanting downward and away from cave walls and ceilings, and genetically associated with fluctuating environmental interfaces. They were first identified and named from examples in western USA hypogenic caves but have since been identified elsewhere in the world. Folia shelves are typically composed of calcite and interweave smoothly along sub-horizontal contours. Calcite accretion, both chemical and mechanical from suspended particles, follows water-surface fluctuations to form protrusions in arrays along walls and ceilings where new accretion tends to follow the water-surface downward during descending phases, gradually …

The Assessment Of Prosodic Writing Skills Among The Students Of The Arabic Language Bachelor Program In The Light Of The Variables Of Gender And Cumulative Average At King Khalid University, Fatimah Shaaban Asiri

University of Bisha Journal for Educational Sciences

The research aimed to identify the level of prosodic writing skills among the students of the Arabic language bachelor program. To achieve the objectives of the research, the descriptive approach was used. The researcher prepared a prosodic writing skills test. The research sample consisted of (187) male and female undergraduate students in the Arabic language major, males and females, at King Khalid University in its various branches. The results resulted in a list of (10) prosodic writing skills. The results showed that the percentage of mastery of students of the Arabic language program at King Khalid University in prosody writing …

A Proposed Training Program For Developing Reciprocal Teaching Skills For Secondary School English Language, Ahmad Atif Alshehri, Ahmed Awad Asiri

University of Bisha Journal for Educational Sciences

This research aims to prepare a proposed training program for devel-oping reciprocal teaching skills for secondary school English language teachers. To achieve this goal, the researcher prepared a list of recip-rocal teaching skills. In the light of this،, a questionnaire was prepared to identify the training needs of English language teachers at second-ary school and their level of the 315 English language teachers in the secondary school which affiliate to the department of education in Asseer Region. The researcher used the descriptive approach in pre-paring the research tool. The results of research resulted in a list of training needs in …

Level Of The Teaching Practices Promoting Collective Mathematical Argumentation In The Intermediate Stage Mathematics Classrooms, Ibrahim Alhussain Khalil

University of Bisha Journal for Educational Sciences

This study aimed to evaluate the teaching practices that promote collective mathematical argumentation in middle school mathematics classrooms. It adopted the descriptive method. The sample consisted of 24 teachers of mathematics in the middle-school stage in the Middle Education Office of the Bisha Education Directorate. Quantitative observation was used as a data collection tool, which consisted of 26 teaching practices divided into four categories. The study reached several results the most notable of which is that the level of teaching practices that promote mathematical argumentation in general amounted to (2.75 - 4.00) at an average level, in the following order: …