Showing papers by "Mark David McGregor Davis published in 2015"

Beyond resistance: social factors in the general public response to pandemic influenza

Abstract: Influencing the general public response to pandemics is a public health priority. There is a prevailing view, however, that the general public is resistant to communications on pandemic influenza and that behavioural responses to the 2009/10 H1N1 pandemic were not sufficient. Using qualitative methods, this paper investigates how members of the general public respond to pandemic influenza and the hygiene, social isolation and other measures proposed by public health. Going beyond the commonly deployed notion that the general public is resistant to public health communications, this paper examines how health individualism, gender and real world constraints enable and limit individual action.

On Secrecy, Disclosure, the Public, and the Private in Anthropology: An introduction to Supplement 12

Abstract: Anthropology and cognate disciplines have long addressed the complex and troubled relations of public and private life, supplying insight into such matters as identity, politics, and civic life. In the multiple, interconnected settings of an intricately globalized and mediatized twenty-first century, how secrets are made, maintained, and broken remains vitally important to social science and its publics. The special issue we introduce here brings together anthropologists and social scientists working in health, museology, media, and cultural studies to interrogate secrets and secrecy, the private and the public, in diverse yet interrelated domains and national contexts. Our introduction explores ways to think critically of secrets and secrecy and related ramifications for private and public life by highlighting some key ethical, intellectual, and epistemological complexities. We consider the contemporary forms of life of the secret in social settings and public institutions and then consider how secrets d...

Use of whole-exome sequencing for diagnosis of Limb-Girdle muscular dystrophy

Abstract: Importance To our knowledge, the efficacy of transferring next-generation sequencing from a research setting to neuromuscular clinics has never been evaluated. Objective To translate whole-exome sequencing (WES) to clinical practice for the genetic diagnosis of a large cohort of patients with limb-girdle muscular dystrophy (LGMD) for whom protein-based analyses and targeted Sanger sequencing failed to identify the genetic cause of their disorder. Design, Setting, and Participants We performed WES on 60 families with LGMDs (100 exomes). Data analysis was performed between January 6 and December 19, 2014, using the xBrowse bioinformatics interface (Broad Institute). Patients with LGMD were ascertained retrospectively through the Institute for Neuroscience and Muscle Research Biospecimen Bank between 2006 and 2014. Enrolled patients had been extensively investigated via protein studies and candidate gene sequencing and remained undiagnosed. Patients presented with more than 2 years of muscle weakness and with dystrophic or myopathic changes present in muscle biopsy specimens. Main Outcomes and Measures The diagnostic rate of LGMD in Australia and the relative frequencies of the different LGMD subtypes. Our central goals were to improve the genetic diagnosis of LGMD, investigate whether the WES platform provides adequate coverage of known LGMD-related genes, and identify new LGMD-related genes. Results With WES, we identified likely pathogenic mutations in known myopathy genes for 27 of 60 families. Twelve families had mutations in known LGMD-related genes. However, 15 families had variants in disease-related genes not typically associated with LGMD, highlighting the clinical overlap between LGMD and other myopathies. Common causes of phenotypic overlap were due to mutations in congenital muscular dystrophy–related genes (4 families) and collagen myopathy–related genes (4 families). Less common myopathies included metabolic myopathy (2 families), congenital myasthenic syndrome (DOK7), congenital myopathy (ACTA1), tubular aggregate myopathy (STIM1), myofibrillar myopathy (FLNC), and mutation of CHD7, usually associated with the CHARGE syndrome. Inclusion of family members increased the diagnostic efficacy of WES, with a diagnostic rate of 60% for “trios” (an affected proband with both parents) vs 40% for single probands. A follow-up screening of patients whose conditions were undiagnosed on a targeted neuromuscular disease–related gene panel did not improve our diagnostic yield. Conclusions and Relevance With WES, we achieved a diagnostic success rate of 45.0% in our difficult-to-diagnose cohort of patients with LGMD. We expand the clinical phenotypes associated with known myopathy genes, and we stress the importance of accurate clinical examination and histopathological results for interpretation of WES, with many diagnoses requiring follow-up review and ancillary investigations of biopsy specimens or serum samples.

‘Fuzzy’ virus: indeterminate influenza biology, diagnosis and surveillance in the risk ontologies of the general public in time of pandemics

Abstract: Influenza viruses are radically uncertain, leading to scientific and procedural challenges for diagnosis and surveillance and lending influenza symptoms a high degree of indeterminacy. In time of pandemic influenza, however, members of the general public are asked to enact non-pharmaceutical infection control measures such as hygiene and social distancing. Drawing on the concepts of manufactured risk and ontological insecurity, we use data from interviews and focus groups we undertook in 2011 and 2012 in Melbourne, Sydney and Glasgow, to examine how members of the general public understood the ‘fuzzy’ nature of the influenza virus and reconciled this with infection control measures. We found that participants in our research acknowledged: the difficulty of avoiding infection from influenza; impediments to accurate diagnosis and that infection control measures proposed by public health messages were compromised by the ‘fuzzy’ nature of the virus. However, we found that participants valued prevention measur...

After the clinic? Researching sexual health technology in context

Abstract: There is great interest in what testing, pharmaceutical, information and social media technology can do for sexual health. Much programmatic and research activity is focused on assessing how these technologies can be used to best effect. Less obvious are analyses that place technology into historical, political and real-world settings. Developing an ‘in-context’ analysis of sexual health technology, this paper draws on interviews with leading community advocates, researchers and clinicians in Australia, Canada and the UK and looks across examples, including social media, rapid HIV testing, pre-Exposure Prophylaxis for HIV and polymerase chain reaction Chlamydia testing. The analysis is framed by studies of techno-society and the dialectics of sex-affirmative advocacy with biomedical authority and attends to: the rationalistic and affective dimensions of the imaginary associated with technology; the role of technology in the re-spatialisation and re-temporalisation of the sexual health clinic; and the re-i...

Between bushfire risk and love of environment: preparedness, precariousness and survival in the narratives of urban fringe dwellers in Australia

Abstract: Many Australians live in attractive urban-fringe and semi-rural environments which are said to be places that promote health and well-being. Yet, each summer, these residents are asked by authorities to prepare for episodic, intensely unpredictable bushfire emergency. In 2012/2013, we interviewed 17 people who lived on the rural fringe of Melbourne to gain insights into how people are able to feel secure whilst residing in bushfire risk environments. Our findings highlight the deep attachment that people have to place, the importance of learning from past experiences, recognition that any preparation has limitations, and the need to recognise one’s own limitations when confronted with fire. With reference to the bushfire preparedness narratives told in the interviews, we discuss the precariousness of living in a place that is seen as healthy and dangerous. The argument we develop furnishes insight into how individuals and families deal with the intensity and complexity of bushfire risk and more generally ...

Sex, Health and the Technological Imagination

Abstract: This themed symposium considerswhat technology does for sexual health, set in the context of critical social science perspectives on the sexuality-technology-health nexus. Through case studies on technological materialisations, watersheds and affordances in the domains of the prevention of HIV, reproductive health, sex work, sexual partnering and community, and in the practices of the sexual self, this special issue ofCulture, Health&Sexuality brings together leaders in their fields and offers new ways of framing how to understand and research sexual health and the technological imaginaries it depends upon and inspires. Technology is, of course, never outside of history and society nor is it singular and onedimensional. For the present purposes, technology can be conceptualised in at least three dimensions: as a material object, as discursive practice and as performative of self and social relations (Agamben 2009). For example, HIV self-testing technologies, which were licensed for use in the USA in 2012 (aidsmap.com/Home-sampling-and-home-testing/ page/1322467/) and the UK in 2014 (aidsmap.com/Legal-barrier-to-self-testing-for-HIVin-UK-to-be-lifted/page/2731557/), are material devices, purchased by willing consumers, administered by them in domestic or non-clinical environments and which produce the effect of revealing if one, and/or one’s partner, has been exposed to HIV (notwithstanding questions of window periods and the sensitivity of the test). But the HIV self-test apparatus is also discursive in the sense that it depends upon language in many ways: negotiating the purchase of the kit in a chemist or online; comprehending instructions on how to use it; translation of the results into knowledge of one’s health status; communication of the results to others, to name a few examples. The HIV self-test is therefore both material and discursive, and its social effects depend on the coordination of these two of its properties. The HIV self-test is also performative since it is invested with the capacity to alter knowledge of HIV serostatus, entering the self into HIV prevention and if need be into HIV treatment and, thereby, establishing identities pertaining to the biopolitics of HIV. TheHIV self-test can also be understood as performative of an imaginary of biomedical control of HIV. This is because one justification for licensing the self-test is that it is thought to reach more people more often and therefore reduce the numbers of people who do not know they have HIV. The HIV self-test is therefore in part a way of imagining a future where HIV is controlled, though there are arguments casting doubt on the idea that those least likely to know of their infection will be able to, or desire to, seek out and pay for these tests on a regular basis. Considering what it is imagined a technology like the HIV self-test can do is a vital way of deepening social science perspectives on contemporary turnings in technologising sexual healthcare.

A wlan controller

Abstract: The present application is related to wireless networks and presents a method by which capacity on a wireless network may be measured. The capacity measurement may be employed to tune the EDCA settings of the wireless network.

A Simple Procedure for Merging Expert Opinions to Achieve Superior Portfolio Performance

Abstract: In this paper, the authors describe a simple procedure for blending statistical estimates with expert opinions to produce a forward-looking view of the performance of assets. They discuss the impact of behavioural biases on the views and propose general modelling principles to biases. Standard linear filtering techniques play a leading role in our approach. Filtering blends statistical estimates and expert opinions seamlessly, while opening the way to the application of dynamic portfolio optimisation techniques.

Behaviouralizing Black-Litterman: Expert Opinions and Behavioural Biases in a Diffusion Setting

Abstract: This paper proposes a continuous time version of the Black-Litterman model that accounts for, and corrects, some of the main behavioural biases that analysts may exhibit. We formulate the model as a stochastic control problem under partial observations, and derive the optimal investment strategy and value function in closed form. We implement this model with three partially observable state variables corresponding to the three factors of the Fama-French model, and fourteen sources of observations: market data from eleven ETFs, views from two analysts, and one stress test scenario. With this example, we show concretely how to calibrate analyst views and mitigate the impact of behavioural biases. To explore the effect that views and biases have on the asset allocation, we compare the results of six dynamic investment models. We find that the views have a modest impact on the Kelly portfolio, but the confidence intervals around the views have a large impact on the intertemporal hedging portfolio.