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History Matter (history + matter)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Humanities and Social Sciences	33%

Selected Abstracts

Evaluation of Repatriation Parameters: Does Medical History Matter?

JOURNAL OF TRAVEL MEDICINE, Issue 1 2009
Sjoerd Greuters MD
Background Aeromedical repatriation of patients is an expanding service due to the growing number of travelers worldwide. Of these repatriated patients, a small number require specialized transportation due to severe medical complications. We evaluated the medical in-flight records of Dutch patients with severe disease or polytrauma who were repatriated by air from 1998 to 2002 via one of the largest Dutch alarm centers. We questioned how this Dutch population of repatriated patients is demographically distributed and whether this population is a priori at high risk for acute medical complications that need specialized medical attention. Results Seventy-seven of 115 repatriated patients were 50 years and older, of which most were male (73%). Fifty patients had no significant medical history, whereas the remaining 65 patients suffered from comorbidities such as cardiovascular disease or cancer. In patients aged 18 to 49 years, one third of all patients were repatriated due to traumatic fractures. In the older age category, the main reasons for repatriation were cardiopulmonary incidents. There was an equal distribution in the primary medical reason for repatriation as defined by need for trauma/neurological support and ventilation or circulatory support. Of note, 82% of the 65 patients who traveled with a chronic disease condition were repatriated due to worsening of this particular condition. Conclusions The present study shows that an aeromedical repatriation service is frequently employed by travelers with a history of chronic disease who develop medical complications. The growing number of repatriated elderly patients and/or patients with preexisting comorbidities requires development of secure pretravel risk assessment and adaptation of the medical service level in foreign countries. [source]

Does Voting History Matter?

AMERICAN JOURNAL OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, Issue 1 2009
Analysing Persistence in Turnout
Individuals who vote in one election are more likely to vote in the next. Yet modelling the causal relationship between past and current voting decisions is intrinsically difficult, as this positive association can exist due to habit formation or unobserved heterogeneity. This article overcomes this problem using longitudinal data from the British National Child Development Study (NCDS) to examine voter turnout across three elections. It distinguishes between unobserved heterogeneity caused by fixed individual characteristics and the initial conditions problem, which occurs when voting behavior in a previous, but unobserved, period influences current voting behavior. It finds that, controlling for fixed effects, unobserved heterogeneity has little impact on the estimated degree of habit in voter turnout; however, failing to control for initial conditions reduces the estimate by a half. The results imply that voting in one election increases the probability of voting in a subsequent election by 13%. [source]

Why Australian History Matters

HISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 1 2003
Carl Bridge
I have been teaching Australian history to students in the University of London on and off over the last fifteen years. Most of the class are young Britons, and there is a scattering of exchange students from other European universities, the Americas and Asia. It is a perennially popular subject and I often wonder why? One answer, better than it seems at first sight, is the mountaineer's: ,because it is there'. But there are certainly some things that attract students to Australian history more than others. There is a fascination with the exotic and the natural wonders. Students are particularly interested in the Aboriginal past and culture. And they are curious to explore what European and other immigrants and their descendants have achieved when they have a chance to invent a society de novo. There is also an interest in how a country of predominantly European traditions has negotiated its position permanently anchored as it is in Pacific Asia. As our London students all study Australian history along with courses on the histories of other countries and movements, there is also considerable opportunity for comparative work, and this offers perspectives that do not naturally occur to historians studying Australia from within. [source]

Does biogeographical history matter?

AUSTRAL ECOLOGY, Issue 1 2005
Diversity, distribution of lotic midges (Diptera: Chironomidae) in the Australian Wet Tropics
Abstract We examined broad scale patterns of diversity and distribution of lotic Chironomidae (Diptera) within the Wet Tropics bioregion of northern Queensland, Australia. Field surveys across broad latitudinal and altitudinal gradients within the Wet Tropics revealed a fauna of 87 species-level taxa in 49 genera comprising three main elements: a small genuinely tropical fraction, and larger cosmopolitan and Gondwanan components. The latter group originated when Australia, as part of the ancient Gondwana supercontinent, was situated over Antarctic latitudes with a cooler, wetter climate than today. In the Wet Tropics, cool Gondwanan taxa occurred predominantly in upland and shaded lowland sites, but no species appeared narrowly temperature restricted, and there was no faunal zonation with altitude. Most chironomid species occurred at all latitudes within the Wet Tropics, with no evidence for an enduring effect of the historical rainforest contractions on current-day distribution patterns. These findings contrast with those for aquatic faunas elsewhere in the world and for the terrestrial Wet Tropics fauna. We relate this to the generally broad environmental tolerances of Australian chironomids, and comment on why the latitudinal diversity gradient does not apply to the Australian chironomid fauna. [source]

Does biogeographical history matter?

THE ROLE OF SUNK COSTS IN THE DECISION TO INVEST IN R&D,

THE JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL ECONOMICS, Issue 4 2009
JUAN A. MÁÑEZ
We present a dynamic empirical model of a firm's R&D decisions that is consistent with the existence of sunk R&D costs, taking into account that these costs may differ between small and large firms, and among different technological regimes. We estimate a multivariate dynamic discrete choice model using firm-level data of Spanish manufacturing for 1990,2000. Conditional on firm heterogeneity and serially correlated unobservable factors, we find that R&D history matters. This true state dependence allows inferring the existence of sunk R&D costs associated with performing R&D. Sunk R&D costs are found to be higher for large, high-tech firms. [source]