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The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of packaging design on purchasing decisions in hospitals and to identify inefficiencies in the US hospital supply chain. Recognition of inefficiencies helped to directly relate to the effects on critical factors of operation such as environment, traceability, and logistical ease which significantly add to the cost of health care.

A survey instrument was designed to be completed by purchasing agents in US hospitals and clinics. Statistical analysis was then applied to the survey data to draw inferences. In addition, existing studies of best practices of supply chain and packaging design were considered to determine what may be applied to the US hospital supply chains.

Analysis showed very little correlation between packaging requirements and hospital supply chain design. The data from the survey also supports the supply chain literature that the healthcare industry in the USA has been slow to adopt inventory efficient systems like just in time and lean development, including product tracking through bar coding and radio frequency identification devices; though most US hospitals have the capability to migrate to such a supply chain system.

A small number of respondents were involved in the survey. Such efforts were limited by the availability of participants which were primarily supply chain procurement staff in various large community hospitals in major metropolitan areas across the USA.

There is a substantial opportunity for management of hospitals to educate their purchasing agents on the benefits of collaborating with their suppliers in order to take their relationships to the next level to lower costs of the US hospital supply chain. This has been shown by the responses in support of critical factors of the supply chain. Case studies have shown some hospitals are leading the way towards efficient use of their supply chain strategies.

Analysis of survey data revealed that packaging and environmental friendly suppliers/medical products do not currently play a role in hospital purchasing decisions. Nearly, all of the community hospitals in the USA that participated in the survey do not value packaging as providing a means to a more efficient inventory management program.

This study explored whether women could “have it all,” both at home and in the workplace. Using neoliberal feminism, mental load theory and intergenerational perspective as theoretical frameworks, this study explored how neoliberal ideologies which emphasized individual agency, economic empowerment and self-responsibility interact with persistent gendered expectations/norms to influence women’s experiences in navigating familial commitments and career aspirations.

Around 140 (N = 140) women living in Australia were recruited to participate in a qualitative, open-ended questionnaire that aimed to explore their: (1) perceptions and (2) expectations about (a) how gender roles evolved for them from youth to adulthood in various contexts, (b) how their family structures and dynamics, such as attitudes toward marriage, caregiving and/or household responsibilities, have changed and (c) what has/have influenced their career aspirations and family choices.

Results revealed a trend of women who worked hard at home and professionally. Unlike women who in the past lived more traditional lives, women in our cohort focused on their career as an important part of their identity and self-fulfillment. However, many women did report heightened mental load, stress and a lack of physical exercise in their daily lives.

This study revealed complex interplay between societal norms, intergenerational influences and the cognitive burdens associated with managing multiple roles. By examining these dynamics and using an integrated theoretical framework, the article aimed to holistically explain the challenges women in Australia encounter as they try to balance familial obligations with career ambitions within changing socioeconomic contexts.

The ALS is a theoretically driven approach to the design of integrated-embedded training systems that is highly flexible and offers ease of implementation. It operates by exerting leverage on foci of the self-regulation system, which recent research has demonstrated to be central to learning and performance for difficult, complex, and dynamic tasks. The training strategy incorporated in the ALS constructs instructional interventions by combining specific training components that affect different aspects of the SRS. By designing synergistic combinations, instructional interventions can be tailored to the developmental progress of trainees and can enhance learning, performance, and adaptability.Our research will target those training components that offer the greatest practical and theoretical potential for improving complex skill acquisition, and the enhancement of adaptive capabilities. By building on existing principles of training design (e.g. mastery goals, sequencing), and examining promising new ideas (e.g. information, interpretation) that are likely to be key capabilities of the next generation of advanced technology systems, the research is expected to yield new principles of training design uniquely suited for the design of integrated-embedded training systems.