Square Register for iPhone and iPad has just received an update that adds new features to both iPhone and iPad. For the iPhone, you can finally view your item libraries which means no more having to key in manual amounts. On the iPad you'll now have the ability to create kitchen tickets to keep your line of customers moving faster as well as the ability to pair your Bluetooth barcode scanner.
This update is probably the most exciting for anyone using an iPhone with Square Register considering the fact that you've always had to manually key in amounts and never could create or view item libraries you may have on an iPad. If you've already got an item library set up, it'll automatically import into the iPhone version of Square Register. If you don't use the iPad version, you can now create items directly from your iPhone.
The iPad version of Square Register has also been updated to include order modifiers, customizable kitchen tickets, and the ability to pair Bluetooth barcode readers to keep your line moving even faster. If you already use Square Register for your business and plan on using any of these features, let us know how it goes in the comments!
UFC president Dana White started the post-UFC 159 press conference with these words. The event featured a nasty broken thumb on Yancy Medeiros, and equally nasty broken toe on Jon Jones, two fight stoppages because of eyepokes, and one fight that was canceled hours before it was supposed to happen.
But the craziest part of all? The demonic voice that was heard between rounds of Michael Bisping's win over Alan Belcher.
Did the gates of hell open before the fight, and did Satan send his minions to New Jersey? Were Bisping's cornermen, who were bathed in creepy red light, actually demons? Middle Easy thinks it was a spell from "Passages of the Dead."
It's possible the UFC ticked off the wrong person and got the evil eye thrown its way. The bigger question: Are we all cursed for watching the bouts?
Are you committed to sustainable living but unsure where to start? Here is a small guide for you with 10 tips for a healthier, more ecological, and happier home. And the best part? You don?t need to undertake any major remodelling or reconstruction. You just need to take tiny steps that will contribute to a better environment ? because being a good global citizen starts at our doorsteps.
1. Greener Appliances
Did you know that getting rid of the old refrigerator standing in your garage would save you $150 a year?
Electrical appliances such as a vacuum cleaner, food processor, refrigerator, or washing machine account for about 18 per cent of a typical home?s total energy bill, and the fridge is one of the biggest energy hogs because it?s switched on 365 days a year. You should change your appliances every 10 years at most and always look for the A++ or ?Energy Star? labelled models. These appliances use from 10 to 50 per cent less energy and water than standard models. According to the Energy Star site, if just one in ten homes used energy-efficient appliances, this would be equivalent to planting 1.7 million new acres of trees ? and that is a big change!
Now that you have a new, energy-efficient fridge, think a little about what you put inside. Living green and eating green should be everybody?s priority, so next time you go grocery shopping, pick apples that are not placed on a polystyrene tray and wrapped up in plastic so that you minimize waste. The best way to buy produce is to support your local community by buying food at farmers markets. You will get healthier groceries, support local farmers and producers (and the local economy), and save the planet from burning fossil fuels to get food to you from the other side of the planet.
2. Heating and Cooling
Did you know that almost half a home?s energy consumption is spent heating and cooling?
Shades by Daniel Hsia
Energy saving is the topic right now, but what more can we do except switching off the light and TV? Thermoregulation is the answer. If you?re planning to have a new house built, consult the building company about wall and roof insulation, as this is the best way to minimize energy waste. If you, on the other hand, live in a house that won?t be reconstructed any time soon, don?t worry. There is a way to lower your energy bill as well.
Turn down the thermostat during winter and keep it higher in summer. Each degree below 20?C during cold weather and above 25?C during summer saves from 3 to 5 per cent of your heating energy. If you don?t own a programmable thermostat, it?s a good idea to invest in one, and it will do the work for you automatically.
Clean the filter on your furnace at least once a month during the period of heavy use. The same rule as with electrical appliances applies here: if your furnace is older than 10 years, consider replacing it with a newer model. Today?s furnaces are about 25 per cent more efficient than they were in the 1990s. Once again, don?t forget to look for the A++ or ?Energy Star? label.
Keeping your house cooler during summer months is easy and very cost-efficient with shades or blinds (hardwood or textile). This is a trick used in the Caribbean: you close them at around 10:00 A.M. and open them again at around 4:00 P.M. when the sun starts to set. You will be surprised how nice and cool your rooms will be, even without air conditioning.
Replace your air conditioning with a ceiling fan. Moving air feels cooler, and perhaps with a fan running, you won?t even have to think about switching the air conditioning on.
3. Shut Off the Tap
Did you know that turning the water off when you brush your teeth will save 17 litres each time?
Tap by Rickard B
The ?save water, drink wine? rule won?t really work here ? sorry! Canadian households use excessive amounts of water every day, and most of the time it wouldn?t hurt us if we shut off the tap.
Stop washing dishes under running water. Some people find it uncomfortable to shut off the water completely, soap the dishes, and then rinse them all at once. If this is your case, shut off the water as you go. You don?t need a waterfall in your sink.
Install a low-flow toilet. They use only 7 litres per flush, compared to 15 litres per flush for pre-1994 models. If you have an older model, adjust your float valve to admit less water into the toilet?s tank.
Behavioural changes are the cheapest and most effective techniques. Next time you decide to clean the driveway, use a broom instead of the garden hose. It can save you 364 litres of water!
4. Clean Green
Did you know that last year, cleaning products were responsible for nearly 10 per cent of all toxic exposures?
No one knows how toxic household cleaners and detergents really are because manufacturers don?t need to list ingredients. What seems like a great stain remover may actually be disastrous for the environment. Every personal care or cleaning product we use is flushed down with our water, and many times nature can?t deal with the harsh chemicals that were used. Given our obsession with clean homes, the amount of hazardous chemicals entering the soil and water is alarming.
Household cleaners were produced during World War II for the first time as a soap substitute. How did people keep their homes clean before? Surprisingly easily. They used mixtures of hot water and soap, vinegar, or baking soda. Such cleaning products are nature-friendly, wallet-friendly, and definitely the enemy of all stains. Have a look here for homemade cleaning product recipes.
5. See the Light
Did you know that on average we have our lamps switched on for 2.7 hour per day and 1,000 hours per year?
Lamps by Chris Corwin
Replacing old light bulbs hurts those who love the warm, soft, bright light of old-fashioned bulbs. Compact fluorescent lightbulbs replace old incandescent bulbs in most cases. They use 66 per cent less energy than a standard incandescent bulb and last up to 10 times longer. Replacing a 100-watt incandescent bulb with a 32-watt fluorescent can save $30 in energy costs over the life of the bulb. The only disadvantage is their design and their neon blue light that couldn?t be further from the soft yellow we?ve come to prefer.
However, there is a remedy for this problem as well. For those of you who still hesitate, try to replace a halogen light bulb with a new LED bulb and you?ll be surprised. Philips has made the most eco-friendly LED light bulb to date. The 3W Econic spotlight is a direct replacement for the ubiquitous 35W halogen bulb and claims to have the same light output. Try it and see for yourself that Philips wasn?t exaggerating. This is brighter than any other LED on market.
The most amazing thing about LED light bulbs is that they contain absolutely no hazardous materials, and that makes them safe for any room and convenient to recycle.
6. Tree-Free
Did you know that recycling a four-foot stack of newspapers saves the equivalent of one 12-metre fir tree?
Stack of newspapers by Cas
It?s surprising that our paper consumption is rising despite the fact that we use tablets instead of restaurant menus, read books on ereaders, and write emails instead of letters. Where is the all the paper going then? Packaging and junk mail. While the offices and corporations pay close attention to their paper usage levels and they use recycled paper for draft prints, high-quality paper is wasted elsewhere. If you receive tons of junk mail every week, try to unsubscribe. Maybe you even forgot that once, five years ago, you ticked a box and agreed to be mailed a new catalog or list of products and services every now and then. If you automatically move the envelope to the bin, unsubscribing will save you time and bin space ? and in the long run you can save some trees as well.
When you?re buying a new box of paper, go for the unbleached variety. Many paper products, including some made from recycled fibres, are bleached with chlorine. The bleaching process can create harmful byproducts, including dioxins, which accumulate in our air, water, and soil over time.
Set up a paper bin or paper box where you will store all read newspapers and magazine and other paper waste. This box can then be taken directly back into newsprint recycling.
7. No Unnecessary Plastics
Did you know that each year, we throw away some 100 billion polyethylene plastic bags ? from grocery and trash bags to those convenient sandwich bags?
Plastic bag by zeevveez
Plastics are made from petroleum, the processing and burning of which is considered one of the main contributors to global warming, according to the EPA. Moreover, not-recycled plastics kept in landfills contribute to the increase of greenhouse gases.
How can we lower our dependance on plastics? Using other materials or no material at all is the key. Plastics used for packaging are the most harmful ? not because they are made differently but because people seldom recycle them. Next time you walk your dog, try to count how many plastic packages there are on the street and let me know in the comments below. It would be interesting to know.
Buying groceries directly from producers can decrease the amount of packaging you use dramatically. So does carrying your purchases home in your own canvas tote that can be used over and over, and when you decide to retire the tote, nature will take it back with much more enthusiasm than any plastic bag.
8. Hardwood Flooring
Did you know that about 2.5 acres of bamboo sequesters 62 tonnes of CO2 per year, compared with the same area of a young forest, which holds on to 15 tonnes of CO2?
Harwood flooring by Mitch Barrie
Bamboo flooring is beautiful and can replace your hardwood flooring with charm. Maybe you have heard of it and maybe you haven?t, but bamboo is considered an environmentally friendly flooring material mainly due to its high yield and the relatively fast rate at which it replenishes itself.
Bamboo is technically a grass, not a tree, and once the young bamboo is planted, it takes anywhere from four to ten years for the useable ?wood? to mature. After that, the plant can grow new shoots each year. And the shoots grow quickly ? as many as 30 centimetres per day. Impressive, don?t you think?
Bamboo starts with rhizomes ? stems that grow underground and send shoots and leaves above ground. Therefore the plant can be harvested regularly without killing it. Trees, on the other hand, can be used only once, and it takes decades for a tree to mature.
Thanks to the rapid growth rate of bamboo, it absorbs more carbon and produces more oxygen. It generates around 35 per cent more oxygen than the equivalent number of trees.
Beyond these advantages, high-quality bamboo is stronger than regular hardwood floors, partly due to the fact that it?s a grass that bends in the wind. Because of its flexibility, high-quality bamboo is as durable as most types of hardwood.
Are you hooked on bamboo yet? If so, don?t forget to use formaldehyde-free glue to finish off your nature-friendly floor with style.
9. I Paint, You Paint, Healthy Paint
Did you know that conventional paints contain solvents, toxic metals, and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that can cause smog, ozone pollution, and indoor air quality problems with negative health effects?
The problems with most commonly available paints is their ingredient list. Besides VOCs, you can find fungicides and biocides as well. Toxic fungicides prevent mildew growth, and biocides acts as preservatives to extend shelf life. Toxic biocides can be detected in the air five years after the paint containing the chemicals is applied.
What should you look for when buying an indoor paint? Ideally you will want to use paint that meets all three health requirements: low VOCs (the Environmental Protection Agency?s minimum requirements are 250 grams per litre of VOCs in ?low-VOC? latex paints and no more than 380 grams per litre for ?low-VOC? oil-based paints), low fungicides and low biocides, and natural pigments.
Use pigments that come from a plant and are not made in a plant. Milk paint and natural paints are the most widely used interior paints. Natural paints derive from substances such as citrus and balsam, as well as minerals. Although these paints are made with natural materials and are petroleum-free, they often contain terpenes, which are VOCs derived from plants. However, they don?t usually contain fungicides and biocides. Milk paint, which is made with milk protein (called ?casein?) and lime is excellent for interiors and also gives wood a rich, deep colour.
10. Garden Green
Did you know that compost provides a full complement of soil organisms and the balance of nutrients needed to maintain soil?s well-being without the chemicals of synthetic fertilizers?
Perennial plants by InAweofGodsCreation
Have you decided to take up gardening? Great choice! Nothing beats the feeling of topping your yoghurt with fresh, home-grown strawberries. Gardening is not difficult when you choose the right combinations of plants and fertilizers.
Try to use native plants as much as possible. Ask your neighbour for sprouts of plants that are obviously growing happily and without problems. Local plants have adapted over time to the environment and support native animals. They also use less water and require less of your attention.
Make perennial plants at least 70 per cent of your home garden. Perennials live more than one year, and that means you don?t have to pay for new plants every spring. It also saves the resources required for growing annuals.
Don?t use chemical pesticides, and set up a compost at the furthest corner of your garden. You can then proudly call your fruit and veggies organic.
While there are many other tips to help you save energy and be more nature-friendly, our list of the top 10 should be viewed as a solid starting point. If you?re hungry for one last eco tip, here it is: dig up the old-fashioned push mover from the back of your garage and start using. The only energy it uses is your own.
If you have a great energy-saving idea, please share it with us in a comment below!
Jim Miller is 5-foot-8, fights at 155 lbs., and has a bushy red beard. Pat Healy is 5-foot-9, fights at 155 lbs., and sported a trimmed red beard at UFC 159. Can you blame UFC announcer Bruce Buffer for mixing them up?
Healy, who returned to the UFC after spending much of his career in Strikeforce, put Miller to sleep with a rear naked choke in the third round of their thrilling bout. As the two stood on either side of referee Herb Dean to have the fight result announced, Buffer announced the winner by submission was Jim Mill-Pat Healy!
Healy smiled and corrected Buffer, who rarely makes such errors. It was a lighthearted moment that Healy laughed about after a thrilling bout.
Miller started out landing leg kicks and used ground and pound to beat up Healy in the first round. Near the end of the round, Healy was saved by the bell as Miller's ground and pound was close to ending the bout before the horn sounded.
It was in the third that Healy turned the bout around. Healy weakened Miller with striking, then took him down and took his back. He sunk in the rear naked choke, and Miller's arms went limp. The fight was stopped at 4:02 in the third because Miller was out.
Miller wanted to use the bout to convince UFC president Dana White that he was ready for a title shot. Instead, it was Healy who stood out. In his post-fight interview with UFC commentator, he warned other UFC lightweights to watch out because he was "putting them on blast."
The promise of OpenMobile's Application Compatibility Layer is enticing: seamlessly run Android apps on another operating system as if it was meant to be there. Unfortunately for fans of Palm's last hurrah, the project's webOS port died with the HP Touchpad. That won't stop dedicated fans, however -- Phoenix International Communications plans to resurrect webOS ACL. Taking the project to Kickstarter, the team is showing an early build on an HP Touchpad, seamlessly running Android apps in cards alongside native webOS applications. Phoenix hopes that a functional ACL will reduce Touchpad owner's reliance on dual-booting Android, giving them the freedom to enjoy webOS without sacrificing functionality. The team is promising a relatively short development time, thanks to OpenMobile's early work, and hopes to deliver a consumer ready build in July. But first the Kickstarter campaign will need to meet its $35,000 goal. Interested in pitching in? Check out the Kickstarter link at the source.
Google Glass may represent the future of wearables, but its components are a vestige of the past -- 2011, to be exact. That's according to developer Jay Lee who dug up some interesting Glass tidbits using Android Debug Bridge. Taking to his Google+ page, Lee verified that Google's smart eyewear currently runs on Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich - a fact CEO Larry Page has apparently fessed up to -- incorporates an OMAP 4430 processor running at an unspecified frequency and is paired with about 682MB RAM (out of a likely 1GB), though it's not clear if this is a dual-core setup. For non-mobile industry historians, this particular Texas Instruments OMAP chipset hasn't been used since the Droid Bionic and Atrix 2 in 2011, making it relatively ancient by industry standards. So, what other surprises lurk beneath the Glass? We'll leave those mysteries to our EIC Tim Stevens to suss out in his Glassdiaries.
Zoologger is our weekly column highlighting extraordinary animals ? and occasionally other organisms ? from around the world
Species:Otomys sloggetti Habitat: The Drakensberg and Maluti mountains in eastern South Africa
All human beings think of themselves as good people ? kind to others and behaving as decently as possible. In reality, we're all dishonest, as psychologists have shown and, under the right circumstances, even seemingly nice people can behave abominably.
Seemingly "nice" animals are just as inconsistent. Did you watch the video of cute sleeping sea otters holding hands so that they don't drift apart? It went viral, and it's authentic. But otters have a dark side: they sexually assault seal pups, wounding and even drowning their victims.
Then there's the African ice rat, another perfect illustration of this dichotomy. In their shared burrows, the rats snuggle up together and are perfectly friendly. But once they are above ground, the gloves come off.
No hibernation
African ice rats are found only in areas at least 2 kilometres above sea level, where the air is chilly and there is often snow on the ground. The creatures seem to have been driven into the mountains fairly recently by the closely related vlei rat.
At first glance the rats don't seem particularly well adapted to their upland habitat. For starters they don't hibernate in winter, unlike many alpine rodents. Worse, their bodily functions work best at ambient temperatures of between 26 and 28 ?C.
"They retain the physiology for lower altitudes," says Neville Pillay of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa.
On the plus side, their small intestines are unusually large, allowing them to absorb more energy from their food and thus keep warm. Their fur is also rather dense, allowing them to retain heat more easily than their lowland relatives.
These adaptations help, but they're not enough. So instead of changing their bodies, the ice rats have changed how they behave. Whereas lowland species live solitary lives, the ice rats work together to dig burrows, where they huddle up together to keep warm.
It sounds harmonious, but it's not. Pillay and his colleagues discovered this by monitoring 10 colonies of wild rats for four years. Each one had up to 17 adults, but in 612 hours of observations, once above ground the rats only interacted 31 times, and 26 of those were aggressive.
Boxing rats
They run up to each other, says Pillay, and start boxing with their front paws. At least in Pillay's experience, the rats never seriously hurt one another. Instead, one would give up and run, and the other would chase it off.
The researchers also ran experiments in which they caged an ice rat ? for its own protection ? before placing it near another rat, either from its own colony or another. The ice rats were almost always aggressive towards each other, regardless of which colony they belonged to. "We wouldn't have predicted that," says Pillay. Once they're above ground, it seems, the ice rats exhibit no allegiance to their colony-mates.
Pillay says food is scarce in the mountains, so the rats must compete furiously to get enough. When he dropped pieces of apple ? which the ice rats love ? the number of fights increased significantly.
"I think this is a compromise," Pillay says. The ice rats are social when they need each other to stay warm, but ferocious loners when looking for food. "It works for them."
Population explosion
It's not clear if ice rat society will change. Heavy snowfalls are the sole brake on their population ? Pillay says they have no natural predators ? but these are becoming rarer. "In the last few decades the ice rats have exploded in numbers, because of climate change," he says. Whereas many alpine species are expected to suffer as the climate warms, the ice rats are thriving.
That could change if lowland predators start moving uphill. Jackal buzzards have started moving in, and on one occasion a buzzard was seen hunting and killing an ice rat. "The ice rats were not prepared for that," Pillay says. Although more social animals like meerkats have alarm calls to warn each other of predators, the ice rats do not.
So while they don't like each other much now, Pillay says that might have to change. If more predators enter their home range, the ice rats could evolve to become more social.
Journal reference: Journal of Zoology, doi.org/mb3
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Google has a longhistory of dolingouteastereggs to amuse and delight the public, so naturally it decided to sneak one in the Explorer Edition of Glass as well. New Glass Explorer Jay Lee discovered that when you select View Licenses under Settings and Device Info, then tap the touchpad nine times (an audible beep increasing in pitch will follow each tap), you'll be able to see the entire Project Glass team in a panoramic shot. Mike LeBeau from the Glass team confirmed that he snuck that easter egg in to pay tribute to his colleagues. Naturally, now we can't help but wonder if shaking your head in tune to the Konami Code (sans A and B button-pushing) will uncover more hidden gems.
By Tara Fowler This weekend, Michael Bay will try to erase the sting of "Armageddon" with the true-crime feature "Pain & Gain." Personally, I've never met a Bay film I haven't liked (well, maybe Pearl Harbor), so I couldn't be more psyched for this movie, which centers on three Florida bodybuilders—Daniel Lugo, Adrian Doorbal, and [...]
The downfall of WebOS left more than a few canceleddevices in its wake, but the most illusive of the bunch tends to be the WindsorNot: a touch-only smartphone. We've seen hints of it here and there, but the shy little device has largely been kept under wraps -- until now. The dedicated folks at WebOS Nation have managed to get their hands on a functional prototype. The 4-inch devices seems to lie somewhere between a Pre3 and HP Touchpad, aping the hardware specifications of the former while adopting the latter's software version: WebOS 3.0. The tweaked software does feature a smartphone-sized keyboard, but WebOS Nation says some of the OS' trappings are difficult to read, and were clearly meant to be refined for the smaller screen before release. The phone's form, on the other hand, seems to be top notch, indicating that the project was canned before the software team had a chance to catch up. Check out the source link for a full walkthrough of the device and a brief history lesson of WebOS' last days.
The Beef Jerky Outlet Franchise, Inc. has announced a discount franchise fee for veterans. The 50% discount is a special feature of the Vet-Express business ownership program that fast-tracks veterans of the US Armed Services who want to own a retail franchise business.
April 23, 2013 // Franchising.com // The Beef Jerky Outlet Franchise, Inc. now offers a 50% discount on the franchise fee for veterans of the US Armed Forces. The special discount is a feature of the Vet-Express business ownership program that fast-tracks veterans who want to own a retail franchise business. Program advantages include priority site selection, an accelerated approval process and a personalized financial consultation. The Beef Jerky Outlet Franchise is a unique national retail franchise specializing in premium beef jerky and gourmet snack food.
Beef Jerky Outlet Franchise President Scott Parker said, "We want to help the dedicated men and women who have served their country. This program takes the Vet by the hand and guides them to a successful start toward a prosperous future. We think they deserve it." Scott adds that there are many potential sites available in prime retail locations. "Interested vets should check out our website at www.beefjerkyoutlet.com. Download the Franchise Kit and give us a call."
Paul Lyons, company vice president, said the franchise has assigned the highest priority to recruiting former military into the company. "Business ownership requires discipline, execution and perseverance. We know that veterans possess these qualities and that they contribute to success in business.? Lyons adds, "We believe so strongly in our veterans that we are proud to offer this exciting new program. We can help folks who have done so much for us to get started on the next phase."
Beef Jerky Outlet stores feature an authentic, inviting atmosphere that brings customers into the store and encourages them to stay longer. The friendly retail environment is enhanced by free product sampling and the low key approach of sales associates. Beef Jerky Outlet stores feature the world?s largest selection of beef, turkey and wild game jerky available under one roof.
The bulk jerky is set out in authentic covered barrels for sale by the pound. Jerky in packs and select gourmet snack foods line the shelves. The authentic atmosphere of the stores is in line with the marketing philosophy of the franchise to keep it simple. This uncomplicated approach makes a Beef Jerky Outlet store easy to operate for the owner and a pleasure to shop for the customer.
The Beef Jerky Outlet Franchise is ready for business in most states in the continental USA, as well as Alaska and Puerto Rico. The stores offer an excellent opportunity for investors seeking a franchise business with high margin returns on moderate start-up costs. The Beef Jerky Outlet Franchise, Inc. will be an exhibitor at the International Franchise Expo in New York June 20-23 at the Javits Center.
About The Beef Jerky Outlet
The Beef Jerky Outlet is a Tennessee-based company focusing on elevating jerky of all kinds to culinary status. It offers a large selection of jerky in various flavors made from beef, turkey and wild game. The Beef Jerky Outlet stores present excellent retail franchise opportunities for investors seeking a business with high margin returns on moderate start-up costs. To find out more, visit our website at http://www.thebeefjerkyoutlet.com
Contact: John Ascenzi ascenzi@email.chop.edu 267-426-6055 Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
Teaching tool could improve emergency training worldwide
New, low-tech teaching techniques used by novice instructors may improve training for healthcare providers in performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) on children who suffer cardiac arrest. Researchers in a large multicenter study say their findings hold the potential to standardize and upgrade life support training by hundreds of thousands of instructors around the world.
"In the U.S. alone, over 8,000 children a year have a cardiac arrest, but providers may encounter such a catastrophic event only once or twice in their careers," said the study's senior author, Vinay M. Nadkarni, M.D., a critical care and resuscitation science specialist at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. "So it's crucial to keep those front-line providers trained and ready to respond. This new approach will assist with that."
The research team carried out the EXPRESS study in 14 research centers in North America, publishing their results online April 22 in JAMA Pediatrics. The EXPRESS (Examining Pediatric Resuscitation Education Using Simulation and Scripted Debriefing) researchers found that trainees in simulation exercises using a child-sized mannequin retained more knowledge if the crisis simulation leaders used scripted debriefings.
"A debriefing is the most important part of a simulation experience, and gives participants an opportunity to reflect on what they did right and what needs improvement," said Adam Cheng, M.D., of Alberta Children's Hospital and the University of Calgary. Cheng, the study's principal investigator, added that, "In a scripted debriefing, the words and sentences are phrased in a very deliberate way that helps learners reflect and think analytically about their performance and about handling emergency situations."
Nadkarni noted that the teaching method, called "advocacy inquiry," is designed to pull out a rationale from students to explain their decisions. "This avoids the common teaching technique of 'guess what I'm thinking.' We've taken a sophisticated interactive teaching method and distilled it into a script that can be readily used by novice instructors."
Many of the instructorsphysicians, nurses, emergency medical technicians and paramedicsare not highly experienced teachers. But they have a broad reach: some 280,000 instructors teach these programs around the world, typically to a group of 10 trainees each. In North America, about half a million health care workers take the Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) course per year, featuring emergency simulations on lifelike mannequins.
In the current study, the largest ever conducted involved pediatric simulation, 387 participants in 90 teams followed a 12-minute long scenario in which a 12-month-old infant suffers cardiac arrest. After the teams responded to the simulated emergency, half the instructors debriefed their group with an assigned script, and the other led unscripted debriefings. The debriefing session lasts 20 minutes. As assessed in tests and quizzes, participants in the scripted groups had improved medical knowledge and rated their instructors more highly, compared to unscripted groups.
In addition to comparing scripted to nonscripted debriefing, the researchers also compared "high-realism" to "low-realism" simulation. In the high-realism groups, the instructors used SimBaby, a computerized infant mannequin, with all the functions active, such as heart sounds, blood pressure, and breath sounds; in the low-realism groups, most of SimBaby's functions were turned off.
Using the high-realism simulation didn't provide educational advantages over the low-realism simulation. This may have important practical implications, said Nadkarni, because the high-realism simulators cost roughly $30,000 each as opposed to $300 to $400 for the simplest model. "If these results are generalizable, they imply that we can improve resuscitation training with less investment in expensive simulators," he added.
One limitation of the current study, concluded Nadkarni, is that it measured educational outcomes, not clinical outcomes in patients. Further research will determine how well the improvements in education translate into better care and better outcomes for children.
###
The American Heart Association funded this study. Co-authors with Nadkarni from The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia were Aaron Donoghue, M.D., an emergency medicine physician, and Akira Nishisaki, M.D., a critical care physician.
Cheng et al., "Examining Pediatric Resuscitation Education Using Simulation and Scripted Debriefing," JAMA Pediatrics, published online April 22, 2013.
doi: 10.1001/jamapediatrics.2013.1389
About The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia: The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia was founded in 1855 as the nation's first pediatric hospital. Through its long-standing commitment to providing exceptional patient care, training new generations of pediatric healthcare professionals and pioneering major research initiatives, Children's Hospital has fostered many discoveries that have benefited children worldwide. Its pediatric research program is among the largest in the country, ranking third in National Institutes of Health funding. In addition, its unique family-centered care and public service programs have brought the 516-bed hospital recognition as a leading advocate for children and adolescents. For more information, visit http://www.chop.edu.
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Contact: John Ascenzi ascenzi@email.chop.edu 267-426-6055 Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
Teaching tool could improve emergency training worldwide
New, low-tech teaching techniques used by novice instructors may improve training for healthcare providers in performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) on children who suffer cardiac arrest. Researchers in a large multicenter study say their findings hold the potential to standardize and upgrade life support training by hundreds of thousands of instructors around the world.
"In the U.S. alone, over 8,000 children a year have a cardiac arrest, but providers may encounter such a catastrophic event only once or twice in their careers," said the study's senior author, Vinay M. Nadkarni, M.D., a critical care and resuscitation science specialist at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. "So it's crucial to keep those front-line providers trained and ready to respond. This new approach will assist with that."
The research team carried out the EXPRESS study in 14 research centers in North America, publishing their results online April 22 in JAMA Pediatrics. The EXPRESS (Examining Pediatric Resuscitation Education Using Simulation and Scripted Debriefing) researchers found that trainees in simulation exercises using a child-sized mannequin retained more knowledge if the crisis simulation leaders used scripted debriefings.
"A debriefing is the most important part of a simulation experience, and gives participants an opportunity to reflect on what they did right and what needs improvement," said Adam Cheng, M.D., of Alberta Children's Hospital and the University of Calgary. Cheng, the study's principal investigator, added that, "In a scripted debriefing, the words and sentences are phrased in a very deliberate way that helps learners reflect and think analytically about their performance and about handling emergency situations."
Nadkarni noted that the teaching method, called "advocacy inquiry," is designed to pull out a rationale from students to explain their decisions. "This avoids the common teaching technique of 'guess what I'm thinking.' We've taken a sophisticated interactive teaching method and distilled it into a script that can be readily used by novice instructors."
Many of the instructorsphysicians, nurses, emergency medical technicians and paramedicsare not highly experienced teachers. But they have a broad reach: some 280,000 instructors teach these programs around the world, typically to a group of 10 trainees each. In North America, about half a million health care workers take the Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) course per year, featuring emergency simulations on lifelike mannequins.
In the current study, the largest ever conducted involved pediatric simulation, 387 participants in 90 teams followed a 12-minute long scenario in which a 12-month-old infant suffers cardiac arrest. After the teams responded to the simulated emergency, half the instructors debriefed their group with an assigned script, and the other led unscripted debriefings. The debriefing session lasts 20 minutes. As assessed in tests and quizzes, participants in the scripted groups had improved medical knowledge and rated their instructors more highly, compared to unscripted groups.
In addition to comparing scripted to nonscripted debriefing, the researchers also compared "high-realism" to "low-realism" simulation. In the high-realism groups, the instructors used SimBaby, a computerized infant mannequin, with all the functions active, such as heart sounds, blood pressure, and breath sounds; in the low-realism groups, most of SimBaby's functions were turned off.
Using the high-realism simulation didn't provide educational advantages over the low-realism simulation. This may have important practical implications, said Nadkarni, because the high-realism simulators cost roughly $30,000 each as opposed to $300 to $400 for the simplest model. "If these results are generalizable, they imply that we can improve resuscitation training with less investment in expensive simulators," he added.
One limitation of the current study, concluded Nadkarni, is that it measured educational outcomes, not clinical outcomes in patients. Further research will determine how well the improvements in education translate into better care and better outcomes for children.
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The American Heart Association funded this study. Co-authors with Nadkarni from The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia were Aaron Donoghue, M.D., an emergency medicine physician, and Akira Nishisaki, M.D., a critical care physician.
Cheng et al., "Examining Pediatric Resuscitation Education Using Simulation and Scripted Debriefing," JAMA Pediatrics, published online April 22, 2013.
doi: 10.1001/jamapediatrics.2013.1389
About The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia: The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia was founded in 1855 as the nation's first pediatric hospital. Through its long-standing commitment to providing exceptional patient care, training new generations of pediatric healthcare professionals and pioneering major research initiatives, Children's Hospital has fostered many discoveries that have benefited children worldwide. Its pediatric research program is among the largest in the country, ranking third in National Institutes of Health funding. In addition, its unique family-centered care and public service programs have brought the 516-bed hospital recognition as a leading advocate for children and adolescents. For more information, visit http://www.chop.edu.
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ROME (Reuters) - Italy's president launched urgent talks on Tuesday that could lead to a prime minister quickly being named after two months of post-electoral stalemate that has weighed on a stagnant economy and alarmed Rome's partners in the euro zone.
After an angry and emotional blast of impatience on Monday at the very parliament which handed him an unprecedented - and heartily unwanted - second term as head of state at the weekend, 87-year-old Giorgio Napolitano announced a rapid round of consultations on Tuesday.
The meetings were beginning at 10.30 a.m. (0830 GMT) with a series of brief discussions of no more than 30 minutes with all of the house and senate leaders until a final meeting at 6.30 p.m.. The party leaders will not take part.
Having threatened to resign if the parties continue with what he called their "irresponsibility" after the inconclusive parliamentary election of February 24 and 25, Napolitano seems determined to force the pace, and could even designate a prime minister to form a grand coalition government within the day.
One leading name is Giuliano Amato, a 75-year-old from the center-left who has twice before been prime minister but no longer sits in parliament. Whoever is named is likely to forge a multi-party cabinet to take over from the technocrat government of outgoing Prime Minister Mario Monti, who was appointed in late 2011.
Though few in leadership show any appetite for holding a new election, any new administration may struggle for stability or the parliamentary backing needed for economic and political reforms seen as vital to revive Italy's competitiveness.
The center-left narrowly won a majority in the lower house but failed to win control of the Senate and its inability since February to cut a deal with either Silvio Berlusconi's center-right or the shock new third force of Beppe Grillo's anti-establishment 5-Star Movement has left the country in limbo.
The otherwise largely ceremonial presidency plays a key role in the process of forming coalitions and the coincidence of Napolitano reaching the end of his seven-year term while that deadlock was unresolved led to a series of failed attempts by parliament to elect a new head of state last week.
In the process, the main center-left party fractured and its leader, Pier Luigi Bersani, resigned, adding to the complex political geometry Napolitano must now navigate, having reluctantly agreed to be re-elected on Saturday.
PRESIDENT'S FRANKNESS
In his inaugural address to parliament on Monday, he made clear that he expected the parties to compromise and cooperate:
"I have a duty to be frank. If I find myself once again facing the kind of deafness I ran into in the past, I will not hesitate to draw the consequences," he said - a clear warning that he will resign if the party leaders fail to take heed.
He berated the parties for failing to reform a dysfunctional electoral law and accused them of a "long series of omissions and failures, obstruction and irresponsibility".
Financial markets welcomed his re-election and the prospect of a government with the power to take steps to revive the euro zone's third biggest economy, which is mired in recession.
Media tycoon Berlusconi was obliged to step down as prime minister in 2011 in favor of the technocrat Monti in the midst of scandal and fears of financial meltdown. But he and his People of Freedom (PDL) have emerged strengthened by the turmoil in Bersani's Democratic Party (PD).
The PDL is expected to be part of the coalition, but 5-Star, which won a quarter of the vote and speaks for millions of Italians utterly disillusioned with an entire political class, says it will sit in opposition in parliament.
Its founder Grillo, a stand-up comedian by profession, said any new government to emerge from negotiations would only protect the vested interests of a discredited elite.
Berlusconi's PDL has insisted it would only accept a coalition government giving it a share of power with the PD.
WASHINGTON (AP) ? The richest Americans got richer during the first two years of the economic recovery while average net worth declined for the other 93 percent of U.S. households, says a report released Tuesday.
The upper 7 percent of households owned 63 percent of the nation's total household wealth in 2011, up from 56 percent in 2009, said the report from the Pew Research Center, which analyzed new Census Bureau data released last month.
The main reason for the widening wealth gap is that affluent households typically own stocks and other financial holdings that increased in value, while the less wealthy tend to have more of their assets in their homes, which haven't rebounded from the plunge in home values, the report said.
Tuesday's report is the latest to point up financial inequality that has been growing among Americans for decades, a development that helped fuel the Occupy Wall Street protests.
A September Census Bureau report on income found that the highest-earning 20 percent of households earned more than half of all income the previous year, the biggest share in records kept since 1967. A 2011 Congressional Budget Office report said incomes for the richest 1 percent soared 275 percent between 1979 and 2007 while increasing just under 40 percent for the middle 60 percent of Americans.
Other details of Tuesday's new report:
?Overall, the wealth of American households rose by $5 trillion, or 14 percent, during the period to $40.2 trillion in 2011 from $35.2 trillion in 2009. Household wealth is the sum of all assets such as a home, car and stocks, minus the sum of all debts.
?The average net worth of households in the upper 7 percent of the wealth distribution rose by an estimated 28 percent, while that of households in the lower 93 percent dropped by 4 percent. That is, the mean wealth of the 8 million households in the more affluent group rose to an estimated $3.2 million from an estimated $2.5 million while that of the 111 million households in the less affluent group fell to roughly $134,000 from $140,000.
?The upper 7 percent were the households with a net worth above $836,033 and the 93 percent represented households whose worth was at or below that. Not all households among the 93 percent saw a decline in net worth, but the average amount declined for that group.
?On an individual household basis, the average wealth of households in the more affluent group was almost 24 times that of those in the less affluent group in 2011. At the start of the recovery in 2009, that ratio was less than 18 to 1.
?During the study period, Standard & Poor's 500 stock index rose by 34 percent, while the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller index for home prices fell by 5 percent.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - As if Suffolk County, home of the Hamptons and playground of the rich and famous on New York's Long Island, didn't have enough financial problems already.
A regulatory filing on behalf of the county dated April 16 shows it accidentally missed an interest payment on some of its debt, including $76.1 million of public improvement bonds, putting the county technically in default. Oops.
The county is wealthy with income per capita well above the national average but it has run into difficulty recently, declaring a fiscal emergency last year after an independent task force predicted a three-year deficit of $530 million.
The county could have a budget shortfall of as much as $250 million by the end of next year, local officials said last month.
The error is more of an embarrassing glitch than anything else. The missed payment - just $722.65 - would be small change for many of the county's residents.
That will buy you fewer than 20 butter-poached lobster rolls (not the most expensive thing on the menu) at Dave's Grill in Montauk, a quaint fishing village on the island's northern tip, or just 10 bottles of Merry Edwards Sauvignon Blanc Russian River 2009 at La Plage in Wading River. A mere picnic.
The mistake was pointed out by the Depository Trust Company, a clearing firm, the day after it was missed and the filing says the error was the fault of the county's escrow agent, M&T Bank.
"The county informed M&T of its error and the escrow agent immediately wired the $722.65 payment to DTC," the regulatory filing said.
So what went wrong? The county was making the first payment in a complicated arrangement that uses $17 million in state HEAL grants for medical costs, primarily related to the Foley Nursing home, said Richard Tortora, president of Capital Markets Advisors, the county's financial adviser.
The $722.65, part of a debt payment of over $1 million, was the portion of the payment from the HEAL grants. The $17 million is being held in an escrow account at M&T.
"M&T for reasons we can't fathom just blew it: 'Oops it wasn't in our system, we missed it'", said Tortora, president of Capital Markets Advisors. Tortora said missing the payment and having to make a regulatory filing with the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board was frustrating after months spent putting the arrangement together for the county.
M&T Bank was not immediately available for comment.
Fitch Ratings, the credit ratings agency, downgraded Suffolk County's general obligation bond rating to A from A-plus last month, affecting about $1.4 billion of debt. General obligation bonds have the full faith and credit of the issuer and are the best gauge of how risky investors think the county is.
Fitch said it had concerns about the county's ability to become financially stable, let alone reduce its big deficit.
(This story was corrected to fix name of Suffolk County's financial advisers)
(Reporting by Edward Krudy, additional reporting by Pam Niimi; Editing by Kenneth Barry)
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, the world's No.2 telecoms equipment maker, expects its networking equipment sales targeted at enterprises to rise to $2.7 billion this year, up from $1.9 billion in 2012, a senior executive said on Tuesday.
William Xu, CEO of Huawei's enterprise business group, gave the forecast during a media briefing in Shenzhen, China, where the company is headquartered.
Earlier in the day, another Huawei executive said sales from the unit would rise to $10 billion by 2017, toning down the company's long-term target and saying a prior figure was too optimistic.
(Reporting by Yimou Lee and Lee Chyen Yee; Editing by Edmund Klamann)
A few things before you look at this map and say "So I'm here exactly"
I did my best to shape the map how I have it... I didn't have to add colors/detail but i did anyways... but don't go entirely off that either... If I could I'd much rather scan my hand-drawn map because i prefer those so much better. Alas I do not have a scanner so I did what i could for you guys...
This is currently the map of the continent of Celnaria... Not perfect but It gives the shape...
As you see North west is Garrom, East of that is "Cleyridia's territory (No longer). Down in the lightest plains is Ahn'veria and the dark area represents the forest of Vidaria.
If you look closely you'll see a badly drawn tree which is where Vidaria stands.. I was too far into it to go back to it ... The area that is kinda divided with the forest should be plains but again - too far to go back and fix it.
Ahn'veria is surrounded mostly by hills and plains as I hope you can see... North among the borders should be mountains...
Garrom is snowy mountains, forest and a small area of a plains... Overall mountains as shown...
To describe the borders
Green = Ahn'Veria light blue = Vidaria Red = Garrom Purple = Alexander Pink = Uncontrolled Territory
Down on the lower left corner - Is the canyon and the small desert areas...
Anyways sorry If i suck at map making but I hope it was helpful.
BAGHDAD (AP) ? Iraqi election monitors on Sunday reported multiple irregularities in the country's first provincial vote since U.S. troops left, but were unclear as to whether results would be affected.
In an initial report, two non-governmental organizations, Shams and Tamoz, said over 300 irregularities had been recorded by the seven thousand monitors they had sent across Iraq to cover Saturday's polls.
The vote was a key test of Iraq's short experience with democratic elections because it was the first one run since the U.S. withdrawal in December 2011. Allegations of vote fixing are not uncommon following elections in the country.
In one instance, Hoger Jato of Shams said some security force members had helped specific campaigns while on duty, with some advising voters at polling centers on who to support. Elsewhere, electoral commission employees reportedly failed to check the identities of voters, allowing them to cast ballots on behalf others.
The groups did not say whether the irregularities were widespread enough to significantly affect the election's outcome.
On Sunday evening, a bomb went off in a popular kebab shop in Fallujah, 65 kilometers (40 miles) west of Baghdad, killing eight and wounding 25, according to police and hospital officials. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information to reporters.
Violence has ebbed sharply since the peak of Sunni-Shiite fighting that pushed the country to the brink of civil war in 2006 and 2007. But insurgents are still able to stage frequent high-profile attacks.
Earlier in the day, Iraqis began counting votes, unloading hundreds of ballot boxes from trucks and tallying the figures in the heavily guarded counting centers. Employees of the country's independent electoral commission went through the ballots under supervision of political party representatives.
Votes are first manually sorted before being entered into a computerized system. Final results are expected in several days.
Despite widespread violence in the run-up to the election that left at least 14 candidates dead, Saturday's voting was mostly peaceful. A few mortar shells and small bombs struck near polling centers, wounding at least six people.
The turnout stood at 51 percent, the same as at the last provincial elections in 2009. When some eligible voters complained they did not find their names on the voting rolls, the election commission blamed them for not updating their information.
Hours after closing the polls, the U.N. Special Representative, Martin Kobler, praised the vote as well-organized and peaceful.
"Credible elections are critical to the country's stability," Kobler said in a statement.
The voting took place in 12 of Iraq's 18 provinces. Voting was not scheduled in the ethnically-mixed province of Tamim, where ethnic groups have not reached a power-sharing deal. The last election for local officials there was in 2005. Elections were also delayed in two provinces because of unstable security conditions, and the country's autonomous three-province northern region was not included.
Thousands of candidates from 50 electoral blocs are vying for 378 seats on provincial councils. The Iraqi constitution does not give wide powers to provincial councils, but they have some say on security matters. They also negotiate local business deals and allocate funds.
Jim Miller is 5-foot-8, fights at 155 lbs., and has a bushy red beard. Pat Healy is 5-foot-9, fights at 155 lbs., and sported a trimmed red beard at UFC 159. Can you blame UFC announcer Bruce Buffer for mixing them up?
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Public release date: 24-Apr-2013
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