Aims: Prescribing medication is a complex process that, when done inappropriately, can lead to adverse drug events, resulting in patient harm and hospital admissions. Worldwide cost is estimated at 42 billion USD each year. Despite several efforts in the past years, medication-related harm has not declined. The aim was to determine whether a prescriber-focussed participatory action intervention, initiated by a multidisciplinary pharmacotherapy team, is able to reduce the number of in-hospital prescriptions containing ≥1 prescribing error (PE), by identifying and reducing challenges in appropriate prescribing. Methods: A prospective single-centre before- and after study was conducted in an academic hospital in the Netherlands. Twelve clinical wards (medical, surgical, mixed and paediatric) were recruited. Results: Overall, 321 patients with a total of 2978 prescriptions at baseline were compared with 201 patients with 2438 prescriptions postintervention. Of these, m456 prescriptions contained ≥1 PE (15.3%) at baseline and 357 prescriptions contained ≥1 PEs (14.6%) postintervention. PEs were determined in multidisciplinary consensus. On some study wards, a trend toward a decreasing number of PEs was observed. The intervention was associated with a nonsignificant difference in PEs (incidence rate ratio 0.96, 95% confidence interval 0.83–1.10), which was unaltered after correction. The most important identified challenges were insufficient knowledge beyond own expertise, unawareness of guidelines and a heavy workload. Conclusion: The tailored interventions developed with and implemented by stakeholders led to a statistically nonsignificant reduction in inappropriate in-hospital prescribing after a 6-month intervention period. Our prescriber-focussed participatory action intervention identified challenges in appropriate in-hospital prescribing on prescriber- and organizational level.
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Building on the Millennium Development Goals, Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and Education for Sustainable Development Goals (ESDG) were established. Despite the willingness of many educational institutions worldwide to embrace the SDGs, given escalating sustainability challenges, this article questions whether ESDG is desirable as “an education for the future”. Many challenges outlined by the SDGs are supposed to be solved by “inclusive” or “sustainable” economic growth, assuming that economic growth can be conveniently decoupled from resource consumption. Yet, the current hegemony of the sustainability-through-growth paradigm has actually increased inequalities and pressure on natural resources, exacerbating biodiversity loss, climate change and resulting social tensions. With unreflective support for growth, far from challenging the status quo, the SDGs and consequently, the ESDGs, condone continuing environmental exploitation, depriving millions of species of their right to flourish, and impoverishing future generations. This article creates greater awareness of the paradoxes of sustainable development and encourages teaching for sustainability through various examples of alternative education that emphasizes planetary ethic and degrowth. The alternatives include Indigenous learning, ecopedagogy, ecocentric education, education for steady-state and circular economy, empowerment and liberation. “This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in 'Journal of Environmental Education' on 01/20/20, available online: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00958964.2019.1710444 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenkopnina/
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This is the editorial paper for the virtual special issue “Using Q methodology in higher education: Opportunities and challenges”, consisting of nine original research studies from different international contexts. In addition to presenting novel findings, contributors were invited to discuss the following two questions at the center of the special issue call: In what sense has Q methodology served as a fitting approach to investigate subjectivity in higher education? What methodological opportunities and challenges arise with Q methodology in higher education settings? This editorial provides an overview and discussion of the various justifications mentioned for Q methodology. Furthermore, it collates the opportunities and challenges contributors discuss in relation to their studies using this almost 90-year-old methodological approach. The editorial paper concludes with recommendations for future Q methodological studies in higher education and beyond.
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The project’s aim is to foster resilient learning environments, lessen early school leaving, and give European children (ages 4 -6) a good start in their education while providing and advancing technical skills in working with technology that will serve them well in life. For this purpose, the partnership has developed age appropriate ICT animation tools and games - as well as pedagogical framework specific to the transition phase from kindergarten to school.
During the coronavirus pandemic, the use of eHealth tools became increasingly demanded by patients and encouraged by the Dutch government. Yet, HBO health professionals demand clarity on what they can do, must do, and cannot do with the patients’ data when using digital healthcare provision and support. They often perceive the EU GDPR and its national application as obstacles to the use of eHealth due to strict health data processing requirements. They highlight the difficulty of keeping up with the changing rules and understanding how to apply them. Dutch initiatives to clarify the eHealth rules include the 2021 proposal of the wet Elektronische Gegevensuitwisseling in de Zorg and the establishment of eHealth information and communication platforms for healthcare practitioners. The research explores whether these initiatives serve the needs of HBO health professionals. The following questions will be explored: - Do the currently applicable rules and the proposed wet Elektronische Gegevensuitwisseling in de Zorg clarify what HBO health practitioners can do, must do, and cannot do with patients’ data? - Does the proposed wet Elektronische Gegevensuitwisseling in de Zorg provide better clarity on the stakeholders who may access patients’ data? Does it ensure appropriate safeguards against the unauthorized use of such data? - Does the proposed wet Elektronische Gegevensuitwisseling in de Zorg clarify the EU GDPR requirements for HBO health professionals? - Do the eHealth information and communication platforms set up for healthcare professionals provide the information that HBO professionals need on data protection and privacy requirements stemming from the EU GDPR and from national law? How could such platforms be better adjusted to the HBO professionals’ information and communication needs? Methodology: Practice-oriented legal research, semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions will be conducted. Results will be translated to solutions for HBO health professionals.
A world where technology is ubiquitous and embedded in our daily lives is becoming increasingly likely. To prepare our students to live and work in such a future, we propose to turn Saxion’s Epy-Drost building into a living lab environment. This will entail setting up and drafting the proper infrastructure and agreements to collect people’s location and building data (e.g. temperature, humidity) in Epy-Drost, and making the data appropriately available to student and research projects within Saxion. With regards to this project’s effect on education, we envision the proposal of several derived student projects which will provide students the opportunity to work with huge amounts of data and state-of-the-art natural interaction interfaces. Through these projects, students will acquire skills and knowledge that are necessary in the current and future labor-market, as well as get experience in working with topics of great importance now and in the near future. This is not only aligned with the Creative Media and Game Technologies (CMGT) study program’s new vision and focus on interactive technology, but also with many other education programs within Saxion. In terms of research, the candidate Postdoc will study if and how the data, together with the building’s infrastructure, can be leveraged to promote healthy behavior through playful strategies. In other words, whether we can persuade people in the building to be more physically active and engage more in social interactions through data-based gamification and building actuation. This fits very well with the Ambient Intelligence (AmI) research group’s agenda in Augmented Interaction, and CMGT’s User Experience line. Overall, this project will help spark and solidify lasting collaboration links between AmI and CMGT, give body to AmI’s new Augmented Interaction line, and increase Saxion’s level of education through the dissemination of knowledge between researchers, teachers and students.
