The purpose of this paper is to describe the development of a simple tool that enables inpatient psychiatric adolescent units to relate patient dependency to the number of nursing…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to describe the development of a simple tool that enables inpatient psychiatric adolescent units to relate patient dependency to the number of nursing staff needed to give a defined level of care. Recorded at the same time was the number of nurses on each shift, and if they felt there were enough of them. A simple measure of what the ward felt like and if the nurses felt they had been therapeutic was also made for each shift. Some results are presented and an attempt made to relate the number of staff needed to give a certain quality of care in the context of rising dependency levels.
Design/methodology/approach
An observational study collecting quantitative data including patient dependency, staffing and staff satisfaction. These were recorded daily for three years.
Findings
Results show that when there is high dependency in the ward, if there are not enough nurses, then quality of care suffers. For our ward, a minimum of 11 nurses are needed to cover each 24 hours and more if the dependency levels go up. If there are less than 11 nurses then the quality of care suffers.
Originality/value
Makes a strong connection between workload, staffing and care quality in a specific care group.
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The QUALCAT project at the University of Bradford attempted to apply automated quality control to databases of bibliographic records. Sets of records, putative duplicates, that…
Abstract
The QUALCAT project at the University of Bradford attempted to apply automated quality control to databases of bibliographic records. Sets of records, putative duplicates, that appeared to be for the same monograph were grouped together and an expert system used to determine whether they were in fact duplicates, and if so which were the best records. This paper outlines the expert system used and discusses problems and further developments in automated examination of bibliographic records.
Examines the way the public sector and public management evolved in the UK over the last two decades of the twentieth century. Concentrates on the period between 1979 to 1997 when…
Abstract
Examines the way the public sector and public management evolved in the UK over the last two decades of the twentieth century. Concentrates on the period between 1979 to 1997 when the UK had a succession of Conservative governments, when there was a kind of “arms race” of escalating rhetoric between the right and the left. Attempts to present a balanced account of what actually happened to the UK’s public sector in general. Concludes that public services are still a very large proportion of national life, and that they have not qualitatively altered the share of national resources they consume, the numbers of people they employ or the range of services they offer.
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The division between town and country in most areas of the world is marked and shows little evidence of any closer association, but in this country recent history with its wide…
Abstract
The division between town and country in most areas of the world is marked and shows little evidence of any closer association, but in this country recent history with its wide economic changes has made the division less deep than in times past, but still within living memory. Time was when country folk were almost a distinct breed, living under conditions for the most part primitive.
Diego Ravenda, Maika M. Valencia-Silva, Josep Maria Argiles-Bosch and Josep Garcia-Blandon
The purpose of this paper is to investigate how accounting is used to disguise and carry out money laundering activities in specific socio-economic and political contexts and…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate how accounting is used to disguise and carry out money laundering activities in specific socio-economic and political contexts and whether discretionary accruals can provide evidence of such illicit practices performed through legally registered Mafia firms (LMFs).
Design/methodology/approach
The study is based on a sample of 224 Italian firms identified as LMFs, due to having been confiscated by judicial authorities because of their owners being accused of Mafia-type association. Using a multivariate regression model, specifically developed discretionary accrual proxies for LMFs are compared with those of a population of lawful firms (LWFs).
Findings
The results reveal that in the pre-confiscation years, LMFs manage aggregate, revenue and expense accruals more than LWFs do, in order to smooth earnings and disguise/carry out money laundering. In contrast, in the post-confiscation years, there is no significant difference in the level of accrual management between LMFs and LWFs, as a consequence of the effective intervention of legal administrators.
Originality/value
This study adopts discretionary revenue and expense accrual proxies that provide additional insight into the simultaneous manipulation of revenues and expenses, linked to money laundering, which may not be fully detected by traditional aggregate accrual models. Furthermore, it suggests that the incentive for LMFs to manage accruals may be fostered by the irrelevance of their financial statements to trades with stakeholders. Finally, this paper may provide regulators with financial accounting signals which could be included in risk assessment models aiming to detect money laundering activities within firms.
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Not many weeks back, according to newspaper reports, three members of the library staff of the School of Slavonic and East European Studies in London were dismissed. All had…
Abstract
Not many weeks back, according to newspaper reports, three members of the library staff of the School of Slavonic and East European Studies in London were dismissed. All had refused to carry out issue desk duty. All, according to the newspaper account, were members of ASTMS. None, according to the Library Association yearbook, was a member of the appropriate professional organisation for librarians in Great Britain.
The initial purpose of this paper is to review the explanatory power that memetics promised for socio‐cultural evolutionary theory, for organisational adaptation, and emergent…
Abstract
Purpose
The initial purpose of this paper is to review the explanatory power that memetics promised for socio‐cultural evolutionary theory, for organisational adaptation, and emergent patterns of traits. Second, to argue that philosophical accusations and premature demands have retarded a science of memetics; regardless, isolated demonstrations of empirical research feasibility suggest a pragmatic resolution. Third, to speculate about practical applications, future advances, and prompt consideration about resuming methodological research initiatives that draw extensively from biology into organisational and managements science.
Design/methodology/approach
Owing to present methodological immaturity of cultural science then a high conceptual level of meta‐methodology is required. This scope necessarily overlooks specific technical details. Life‐science principles are well known in comparison to the embryonic memetic and cultural sciences. The meme‐gene analogy builds a bridge across which we can draw candidate hypotheses and established methods. However, memetics has inherited the expectations of genetics but without its developmental history. Memetics therefore would benefit from recapitulating the ontogenesis of the more senior science by drawing upon foundational methods.
Findings
Linnæan Systematics was elemental to evolutionary theory and genetics; a cultural analogue is proposed. Retreating to description would support emerging objective organisational taxonomies that are laying the methodological foundations for a potential synthesis between organisational replicator and evolutionary theories.
Research limitations/implications
At the moment, the number of organisational examples are few, which further suggests the fundamental nature of this area of research. They serve to illustrate that a large array of hypotheses and methods can be adapted from the biological domain, opening up a bloom of research implications for the organisational domain.
Originality/value
Discourse about memetics is commonplace, but empirical research has been undermined. Originality stems from reapplying established biological methods to the new organisational domain. The value is in conferring the rigour of natural science to socio‐cultural study.
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Yvonne Warburton, Mike Cornford and Sandra Vogel
Last month there was an unexpected complete absence of anything I felt like shouting about. This month there's more than enough.