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- Comparison of attitudes towards statistics in graduate and undergraduate health sciences' studentsPublication . Pimenta, Rui; Faria, Brigida Mónica; Pereira, Ilídio; Costa, Elísio; Vieira, MargaridaThe ultimate goal of statistical education is to provide an appropriate use of statistical thinking (Schau et al., 1995). This is particularly pertinent in the context of the health sciences since these professionals need to carry out their own investigations and make decisions under uncertainty integrating the best practices of evidence based medicine. Health professionals develop, at times, anxiety towards statistics due to their fear of mathematics. However, biostatistics courses can, nowadays, be conducted without a high level of calculus. Students’ attitudes might influence their learning of statistical concepts as much as their cognitive abilities. The influence of attitudes towards statistics on the development of statistical reasoning and thinking has been studied in different ways (Carmona, 2004; Blanco, 2008). However, the attitudes towards statistics in health sciences’ students are a new kind of research particularly pertinent due to an increasing number of students in this field. The difficulties in the use of statistics by different groups of professionals, particularly by health professionals, are well documented mainly when carrying out research. Health professionals need to promote their statistical abilities in order to be able to recognize when additional knowledge and skills are required, to obtain this additional statistical understanding or, better yet, to claim the consultation of a statistician. Improvement of positive attitudes towards statistics is a critical goal in statistics education. Positive attitudes contribute to a better use of statistical knowledge and to a better understanding of the variation inherent to data, enabling better decision-making under uncertainty when dealing with statistics. In this work, we evaluate, compare and present the first study which analyses the attitudes towards statistics in Portuguese health sciences students enrolling in postgraduate or undergraduate programs.
- GACE - Um portal de apoio à consultadoria estatística em saúdePublication . Pimenta, Rui; Gomes, Paulo Veloso; Vieira, Margarida; Costa, ElísioA sociedade actual. baseada na tecnologia e na comunicação, obriga a uma reformulação dos conteúdos e da metodologia de ensino-aprendizagem da estatística e. simultaneamente. reforça a necessidade de uma formação mais profunda, uma vez que a capacidade estatística é uma competência nuclear para o exercício pleno da cidadania. Emerge, a~sim, uma mudança de rumo. da transmissão mais ou menos passiva de conhecimentos para a construção activa de uma cultura estatística. A Internct e as novas tecnologias de comunicação despoletaram um novo paradigma, modificando a tipologia das relações, entre os diversos actuantes no campo educativo. Os professores especialistas em estatística deverão assumir o papel de consultores e facilitadores das tarefas de investigação. Neste trabalho é apresentada a metodologia de construção de um portal colaborativo de apoio à interacção entre consultores e investigadores, no âmbito do desenvolvimento de projectos de investigação. contribuindo assim com uma ferramenta potenciadora da capacidade estatística e de comunicação entre consultores e investigadores.
- Demand for emergency services during the COVID-19 pandemic and disease burden: a case study in PortugalPublication . Nunes, Alcina ; Costa, Catarina ; Martins, João P.; Ferreira, Pedro L.; Pimenta, RuiThe COVID-19 pandemic brought changes in the pattern of care use. A significant increase in the volume of emergencies was expected. However, a significant decrease was observed worldwide. An observational, analytical and cross-sectional study of all records of emergency episodes of patients aged 18 years or older admitted to the emergency services of the University of Porto Hospital Centre (2018–2022) were analysed. : During the pandemic, a significant reduction in emergency episode admissions (up to 40% during lockdowns), an increase in pre-emergency services, and discharges from Infectious Diseases and Internal Medicine was observed. The discharges from General Practice and General Practice and Family Medicine were residual. The lower use and type of use of emergency services during the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative impact on the disease burden. This could be prevented in future pandemics through the development of strategies to promote confidence in the use of health resources and establishing contingency plans for virtual assistance.
- Affinity coefficient for clustering autoregressive moving average modelsPublication . Nascimento, Ana Paula; Oliveira, Alexandra; Faria, Brígida Mónica; Pimenta, Rui; Vieira, Mónica; Prudêncio, Cristina; Nicolau, Helena BacelarIn various fields, such as economics, finance, bioinformatics, geology, and medicine, namely, in the cases of electroencephalogram, electrocardiogram, and biotechnology, cluster analysis of time series is necessary. The first step in cluster applications is to establish a similarity/dissimilarity coefficient between time series. This article introduces an extension of the affinity coefficient for the autoregressive expansions of the invertible autoregressive moving average models to measure their similarity between them. An application of the affinity coefficient between time series was developed and implemented in R. Cluster analysis is performed with the corresponding distance for the estimated simulated autoregressive moving average of order one. The primary findings indicate that processes with similar forecast functions are grouped (in the same cluster) as expected concerning the affinity coefficient. It was also possible to conclude that this affinity coefficient is very sensitive to the behavior changes of the forecast functions: processes with small different forecast functions appear to be well separated in different clusters. Moreover, if the two processes have at least an infinite number of π- weights with a symmetric signal, the affinity value is also symmetric.
- Incremento no grau de autonomia em pacientes com AVC internados em Unidades de Convalescença da ULSAM-EPEPublication . Esteves, Nury A.; Morais, Carminda; Pimenta, RuiO Acidente Vascular Cerebral (AVC) é a primeira causa de morte em Portugal, afectando sobretudo a população a partir dos 50 anos de idade, sendo responsável pelo internamento de aproximadamente 25.000 doentes por ano. A reabilitação, a readaptação funcional e a reinserção social e familiar é um processo que se impõe, sempre que possível, desenvolvido em contexto de proximidade, designadamente em Unidades de internamento da Rede Nacional de Cuidados Continuados. Pretendeu-se estudar o perfil dos doentes com AVC internados, nas Unidades de Convalescença (UC) da Unidade Local de Saúde do Alto Minho (ULSAM EPE) e analisar o incremento no grau de autonomia para actividades da vida diárias (AVDs).
- Management of tacit knowledge issue of empowerment of patients and stakeholders in the health care sectorPublication . Jacquinet, Marc; Curado, Henrique; Nobre, Ângela Lacerda; Sousa, Maria José; Arraya, Marco; Pimenta, Rui; Martins, António EduardoThere is a growing literature on health and health care dedicated to empowerment of patients; but there is still a gap in the literature to conceptualize knowledge, to extend the discussion of the empowerment of the patients to the stakeholders. The discussion is at the level of managerial processes of empowerment and knowledge management related to health care. The present chapter starts with a review on empow- erment, especially focused on the health sector. The following sections will develop a critical analysis of empowerment, mainly around the concept of tacit knowledge (Polanyi) and knowledge management. One key variable is the proximity of the actors involved in the empowerment process. This key variable is very much related to the tacitness issue of knowledge production and flows. The chapter extends the discussion of the empowerment of the patients to that of the stakeholders and the general debate about health literacy. A model is briefly described for the purpose of illustrating the learning process in a knowledge management implemented in health care.
- Health care expenses impact on the disability-adjusted life years in non-communicable diseases in the European UnionPublication . Torres, Margarida ; Nunes, Alcina ; Martins, João P.; Ferreira, Pedro L. ; Pimenta, RuiNon-communicable diseases are a global health problem. The metric Disability-Adjusted Life Years was developed to measure its impact on health systems. This metric makes it possible to understand a disease’s burden, towards defining healthcare policies. This research analysed the effect of healthcare expenditures in the evolution of disability-adjusted life years for noncommunicable diseases in the European Union between 2000 and 2019. Data were collected for all 27 European Union countries from Global Burden of Disease 2019, Global Health Expenditure, and EUROSTAT databases. Econometric panel data models were used to assess the impact of healthcare expenses on the disability-adjusted life years. Only models with a coefficient of determination equal to or higher than 10% were analysed. There was a decrease in the non-communicable diseases with the highest disability-adjusted life years: cardiovascular diseases (−2,952 years/105 inhabitants) and neoplasms (−618 years/105 inhabitants). Health expenditure significantly decreased disability-adjusted life years for all analysed diseases (p 0.05) whereas public health expenditure did not significantly influence skin and subcutaneous diseases (p > 0.05). Health expenditure have proved to be effective in the reduction of several diseases. However, some categories such as musculoskeletal and mental disorders must be a priority for health policies in the future since, despite their low mortality, they can present high morbidity and disability.
- Knowledge about type 2 diabetes: its impact for future managementPublication . Ferreira, Pedro L. ; Morais, Carminda ; Pimenta, Rui; Ribeiro, Inês ; Amorim, Isabel ; Alves, Sandra Maria; Santiago, LuizDiabetes can cause several long-term complications. Knowledge about this disease can play an important role in reducing diabetes-related complications. In addition, the lack of awareness leads to misconceptions, which joined with inadequate knowledge, are relevant barriers to proper diabetes management. In this study, we aimed to assess the diabetes knowledge of a type 2 diabetes (T2D) population and identify major knowledge gaps, in order to prevent complications and to increase quality of life. In a cross-sectional, observational study in a convenience sample, we identified individuals diagnosed with T2D attending ambulatory visits from five health settings, older than 18 years, with a time diagnosis of at least 1 year, and attending multidisciplinary visits for at least 3 months. To assess the knowledge of T2D individuals, we applied the Portuguese version of the Diabetes Knowledge Test. The sample included a total of 1,200 persons, of whom almost half were female. The age range of the participants varied from 24 to 94 years old, and the mean age was 65.6 ± 11.4 years. Most of the sample had a level of education under secondary and lived with someone. In our sample, 479 (39.9%) were insulin-treated. The percentage of correct answers was 51.8% for non-insulin vs. 58.7% for insulin treated (p < 0.05). There were three items with a percentage of correct answers lower than 15%; the item with the lower value of correct answers was the one related to the identification of signs of ketoacidosis with only 4.4% of correct answers, the errors presented a random pattern; the item related to the identification of which food should not be used to treat low blood glucose with 11.9%, where 56.9% of the sample’s participants considered that one cup of skim milk would be the correct answer (53.1% in non-insulin patients and 62.6% in insulin treated patients; p < 0.001). The item regarding the knowledge of free food presented a 13.3% of correct answers (10.8% non-insulin group vs. 17.1% insulin group; p < 0.01). Two of the three items with lower value of correct answers were related to glycemic control and health status monitoring, the other was related to diet and food.
- Assessing diabetes health literacy, knowledge and empowerment in northern PortugalPublication . Morais, Carminda S.; Pimenta, Rui; Ferreira, Pedro Lopes; Boavida, José M.; Amorim, José P.We evaluated the disease management, knowledge and quality of life (QoL) of people with type 2 diabetes, followed in the ambulatory of a Hospital in the North of Portugal. A questionnaire of socio-demographic and clinical characterization, and Portuguese versions of the DES-SF, DKT and EQ-5D were administered to a random sample of 260 individuals. The results showed that people in general feel able of self-management, with a mean±SD score of 3.7±0.7. DKT registered 63.4±12.3% of correct answers among diabetes non-insulin-treated individuals and 65.7±12.4% among the insulin-treated (p<0.001). The QoL, evaluated through EQ-5D index, presented a mean value of 0.65±0.3. We evidenced a significant positive correlation between the ability to control, the knowledge and the QoL. The conclusions obtained may help promote QoL and literacy enhancement, as well as the empowerment of individuals with type 2 diabetes.
- Satisfaction of users with the health communicationPublication . Silva, Vera; Morais, Carminda; Pimenta, RuiThe Communication processes in health are structuring the relationship between health professionals and users and interactional quality. Is crucial to improve knowledge of communication dimensions in health organizations. Know the user satisfaction degree with the health communication; relate satisfaction with communication and sociodemographic aspects.