Project description:BackgroundThe Millennium Development Goals have guided development co-operation in the 15 years up to 2015, achieving some significant progress in the priorities on which they focused. As the framework for the post-2015 development agenda is negotiated, this article reviews the evidence for the place of mental health in broader development issues that have already been outlined in the run-up to 2015.DiscussionIf mental health is going to be recognised as having an essential role in development, there needs to be a consensus on priorities for advocacy. Various key issues emerged from a survey of stakeholders in the Movement for Global Mental Health (MGMH), leading to a Position Statement, which is now available for use by advocates. The priorities that emerged were increasing access to mental health services, and addressing human rights abuse, stigma, and exclusion.SummaryMental health is a cross-cutting issue, and including it in frameworks for action will increase the likelihood of achieving global priorities for development such as poverty reduction, economic development, improved health, and ensuring the most vulnerable in society are not left behind.
Project description:A diverse, cross-sectorial group of partners, stakeholders and researchers, collaborated to develop an evidence-informed Position Statement on active outdoor play for children aged 3-12 years. The Position Statement was created in response to practitioner, academic, legal, insurance and public debate, dialogue and disagreement on the relative benefits and harms of active (including risky) outdoor play. The Position Statement development process was informed by two systematic reviews, a critical appraisal of the current literature and existing position statements, engagement of research experts (N=9) and cross-sectorial individuals/organizations (N=17), and an extensive stakeholder consultation process (N=1908). More than 95% of the stakeholders consulted strongly agreed or somewhat agreed with the Position Statement; 14/17 participating individuals/organizations endorsed it; and over 1000 additional individuals and organizations requested their name be listed as a supporter. The final Position Statement on Active Outdoor Play states: "Access to active play in nature and outdoors--with its risks--is essential for healthy child development. We recommend increasing children's opportunities for self-directed play outdoors in all settings--at home, at school, in child care, the community and nature." The full Position Statement provides context for the statement, evidence supporting it, and a series of recommendations to increase active outdoor play opportunities to promote healthy child development.
Project description:It is the position of Dietitians Australia that clients can receive high-quality and effective dietetic services such as Medical Nutrition Therapy (MNT) delivered via telehealth. Outcomes of telehealth-delivered dietetic consultations are comparable to those delivered in-person, without requiring higher levels of additional training nor compromising quality of service provision. Dietitians Australia recommends that policy makers and healthcare funders broaden the recognition for telehealth-delivered dietetic consultations as a responsive and cost-effective alternative or complement to traditional in-person delivery of dietetic services. The successful implementation of telehealth can help to address health and service inequalities, improve access to effective nutrition services, and support people with chronic disease to optimise their diet-related health and well-being, regardless of their location, income or literacy level, thereby addressing current inequities.
Project description:In view of the increasing complexity of both cardiovascular implantable electronic devices (CIEDs) and patients in the current era, practice guidelines, by necessity, have become increasingly specific. This document is an expert consensus statement that has been developed to update and further delineate indications and management of CIEDs in pediatric patients, defined as ≤21 years of age, and is intended to focus primarily on the indications for CIEDs in the setting of specific disease categories. The document also highlights variations between previously published adult and pediatric CIED recommendations and provides rationale for underlying important differences. The document addresses some of the deterrents to CIED access in low- and middle-income countries and strategies to circumvent them. The document sections were divided up and drafted by the writing committee members according to their expertise. The recommendations represent the consensus opinion of the entire writing committee, graded by class of recommendation and level of evidence. Several questions addressed in this document either do not lend themselves to clinical trials or are rare disease entities, and in these instances recommendations are based on consensus expert opinion. Furthermore, specific recommendations, even when supported by substantial data, do not replace the need for clinical judgment and patient-specific decision-making. The recommendations were opened for public comment to Pediatric and Congenital Electrophysiology Society (PACES) members and underwent external review by the scientific and clinical document committee of the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS), the science advisory and coordinating committee of the American Heart Association (AHA), the American College of Cardiology (ACC), and the Association for European Paediatric and Congenital Cardiology (AEPC). The document received endorsement by all the collaborators and the Asia Pacific Heart Rhythm Society (APHRS), the Indian Heart Rhythm Society (IHRS), and the Latin American Heart Rhythm Society (LAHRS). This document is expected to provide support for clinicians and patients to allow for appropriate CIED use, appropriate CIED management, and appropriate CIED follow-up in pediatric patients.
Project description:Machine learning offers great opportunities to streamline and improve clinical care from the perspective of cardiac imagers, patients, and the industry and is a very active scientific research field. In light of these advances, the European Society of Cardiovascular Radiology (ESCR), a non-profit medical society dedicated to advancing cardiovascular radiology, has assembled a position statement regarding the use of machine learning (ML) in cardiovascular imaging. The purpose of this statement is to provide guidance on requirements for successful development and implementation of ML applications in cardiovascular imaging. In particular, recommendations on how to adequately design ML studies and how to report and interpret their results are provided. Finally, we identify opportunities and challenges ahead. While the focus of this position statement is ML development in cardiovascular imaging, most considerations are relevant to ML in radiology in general. KEY POINTS: • Development and clinical implementation of machine learning in cardiovascular imaging is a multidisciplinary pursuit. • Based on existing study quality standard frameworks such as SPIRIT and STARD, we propose a list of quality criteria for ML studies in radiology. • The cardiovascular imaging research community should strive for the compilation of multicenter datasets for the development, evaluation, and benchmarking of ML algorithms.
Project description:It is the position of Dietitians Australia that to promote human and planetary health, a food system transformation is needed that enables the population to adopt healthy and sustainable diet-related practices. A healthy and sustainable diet must (i) be nutritionally adequate, healthy and safe, (ii) have low environmental impact and be protective of natural resources and biodiversity, (iii) be culturally acceptable and (iv) be accessible, economically fair and affordable. Dietitians Australia acknowledges that it is critical to prioritise Indigenous knowledges in consultation, policy-making and implementation processes to achieve these recommendations. In facilitating the uptake of healthy and sustainable diets, dietitians are contributing to the transformation of our current food system that is urgently required to nourish present and future generations within planetary boundaries. In developing this position statement, opportunities for future research have been identified including those to advance the professions' capacity to improve environmental sustainability outcomes across all areas of practice. To achieve a population-level shift towards this diet, Dietitians Australia recommends: (i) the development of a National Food and Nutrition Strategy which honours Indigenous knowledges on food systems, (ii) the integration of sustainability principles in Australia's dietary guidelines, (iii) the reorientation of our food environment to prioritise access to healthy and sustainable foods, and (iv) investment in capacity building activities to equip the current and future nutrition and dietetics workforce.
Project description:We sought to compare methods of nonsurgical treatment of lateral epicondylitis in men and women older than 18 years to develop a guideline intended for orthopedic surgeons and other health care providers who assess, counsel and care for these patients. We searched Medline, Embase and Cochrane through to Mar. 9, 2021, and included all English-language studies comparing nonsurgical approaches. We compared physiotherapy versus no active treatment, corticosteroids versus placebo, platelet-rich plasma (PRP) versus placebo, and autologous blood injection versus placebo. Outcomes of interest were pain outcomes (visual analogue scale scores) and functional outcomes. We rated the quality of the evidence and strength of recommendations using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) approach. This guideline will benefit patients seeking nonsurgical intervention for lateral epicondylitis by improving counselling on nonsurgical treatment options and possible outcomes. It will also benefit surgical providers by improving their knowledge of various nonsurgical approaches. Data presented could be used to develop frameworks and tools for shared decision-making.
Project description:Background:Patient-reported outcomes (pros) are essential to capture the patient's perspective and to influence care. Although pros and pro measures are known to have many important benefits, they are not consistently being used and there is there no Canadian pros oversight. The Position Statement presented here is the first step toward supporting the implementation of pros in the Canadian health care setting. Methods:The Canadian pros National Steering Committee drafted position statements, which were submitted for stakeholder feedback before, during, and after the first National Canadian Patient Reported Outcomes (canpros) scientific conference, 14-15 November 2019 in Calgary, Alberta. In addition to the stakeholder feedback cycle, a patient advocate group submitted a section to capture the patient voice. Results:The canpros Position Statement is an outcome of the 2019 canpros scientific conference, with an oncology focus. The Position Statement is categorized into 6 sections covering 4 theme areas: Patient and Families, Health Policy, Clinical Implementation, and Research. The patient voice perfectly mirrors the recommendations that the experts reached by consensus and provides an overriding impetus for the use of pros in health care. Conclusions:Although our vision of pros transforming the health care system to be more patient-centred is still aspirational, the Position Statement presented here takes a first step toward providing recommendations in key areas to align Canadian efforts. The Position Statement is directed toward a health policy audience; future iterations will target other audiences, including researchers, clinicians, and patients. Our intent is that future versions will broaden the focus to include chronic diseases beyond cancer.