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Project Development (project + development)
Selected AbstractsProject Development in Complex Environments: Assessing Safety in Design and Decision-MakingJOURNAL OF CONTINGENCIES AND CRISIS MANAGEMENT, Issue 3 2001Joop F. M. Koppenjan How can we be sure that safety risks are adequately dealt with in the design of complex, innovative projects? In The Netherlands, a number of recent innovative project initiatives have made this a relevant question. These initiatives include projects such as the construction of tunnels using new technologies, the construction of underground facilities that combine several functions, i.e. shopping, parking and transport, and the development of a transport corridor in which rail, road and waterway have been or will be combined. These projects combine several functions and have been, or will be, realised in densely built and populated areas. Although safety regulations for products and systems have been institutionalised through legislation and professional design practices, recent project proposals link systems and their environment in new and complex ways. The risks evolving from these links are unknown and the extent to which they are covered by existing safety approaches is uncertain. In this contribution, we examine how the attention paid to safety can be increased and maintained in the design process of infrastructural projects. First, we discuss the need to reorganise the safety focus in the design process. Then we describe the role of the design process in decision-making for major projects with regard to utility building, town planning and the construction of infrastructures. Third, we elaborate how the focus on safety can be organised within this context, given developments in the field of interactive decision-making and the design and management of interaction processes. We then outline a safety risk management method that can be used to achieve this and, finally, address the conditions that influence the use of this method. [source] An Approach to Fulfilling the Systems-based Practice Competency RequirementACADEMIC EMERGENCY MEDICINE, Issue 11 2002David Doezema MD The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME)-identified core competency of systems-based practice requires the demonstration of an awareness of the larger context and system of health care, and the ability to call on system resources to provide optimum care. This article describes an approach to teaching and fulfilling the requirement of this core competency in an emergency medicine residency. Beginning residents are oriented to community resources that are important to the larger context of care outside the emergency department. Each resident completes a community project during his or her residency. Readings and discussions concerning community-oriented medical care and the literature of research and injury prevention in emergency medicine precede the project development. Several projects are described in detail. Such projects help to teach not only awareness of the community resources of the greater context of medical practice outside the emergency department, but also how to use those resources. Projects could be a main component of a resident portfolio. This approach to teaching the core competency of systems-based practice is proposed as an innovative and substantial contribution toward satisfying the requirement of the core competency. [source] Implementation of oral health recommendations into two residential aged care facilities in a regional Australian cityINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EVIDENCE BASED HEALTHCARE, Issue 3 2006Tony Fallon BAppSc(Hons) PhD Abstract Background, Residents of aged care facilities usually have a large number of oral health problems. Residents who suffer from dementia are at particular risk. A systematic review of the best available evidence with regard to maintaining the oral health of older people with dementia in residential aged care facilities provided a number of recommendations. Objectives, The aim of the implementation project was to introduce evidence-based oral hygiene practices for patients with dementia in two publicly funded residential aged care facilities and monitor for changes in nursing awareness, knowledge, documentation and practice to improve patient outcomes and ensure appropriate accreditation standards were met. An additional aim was to identify barriers and strategies to overcome barriers to implementation of evidence-based recommendations. Methods, Two facilities, a 40-bed facility and a 71-bed facility in the health service district of the regional Australian city of Toowoomba, provided the setting. A quality improvement approach was taken, using a number of strategies from the National Health and Medical Research Council guidelines for implementation studies. The implementation involved a number of stages, including project development, interactive oral health education, oral audits of residents, changes to oral hygiene practice via care plans and critical reflection. Results, The multidisciplinary approach to improving oral healthcare appeared to improve knowledge and awareness and move oral health practices in facilities closer to best practice. Specialised training in oral health was provided to a Clinical Nurse Consultant. Regular oral audits were introduced and facility staff were trained in the use of the oral audit tool. Care plans at one facility were of better quality and more comprehensive than before the intervention. Comments made during critical reflection suggested improvements in the oral health of residents, increased use of oral swabs and saliva substitutes, improved care of dentures and mention of the use of mouth props in resident care plans. There was also some evidence that changes brought about by the implementation are sustainable. Conclusion, The majority of recommendations provided in the systematic review of oral healthcare for dementia patients were applicable to the applied context. The importance of day-to-day leaders was highlighted by the apparently varied outcomes across target facilities. The quality improvement approach would appear to have considerable advantages when applied to improving practice in residential aged care. [source] Assessing the efficacy of user and developer activities in facilitating the development of OSS projectsJOURNAL OF SOFTWARE MAINTENANCE AND EVOLUTION: RESEARCH AND PRACTICE, Issue 5 2009Hewijin Christine Jiau Abstract Although the development of open source software (OSS) projects is known to be critically dependent on many key factors, the precise contribution of the various user and developer activities toward the development of an OSS project is unknown. Therefore, an empirical study is performed to examine the correlation between the user/developer activities and the state of development of an OSS project. It is shown that certain user/developer activities have a particular efficacy in facilitating OSS project development. The results presented in this study provide an effective approach useful in observing and evaluating the development of OSS projects. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Governance frameworks for public project development and estimationPROJECT MANAGEMENT JOURNAL, Issue 1 2010Kenneth H. Rose No abstract is available for this article. [source] How effective is geophysical survey?ARCHAEOLOGICAL PROSPECTION, Issue 2 2009A regional review Abstract Geophysics is such an accepted part of British archaeology that its effectiveness seems obvious. Yet if there is no reason to doubt the benefits of geophysics why do some experienced archaeologists use it so rarely and why is it little used in some countries which, in other ways, have highly developed professional archaeology services? There are, often cheaper, alternatives for archaeological survey. Yet since the performance of different survey methods has rarely been studied systematically there is no objective basis on which to test which choices best meet archaeologists' needs. Moreover the geophysicists' understandable desire to present successful rather than unsuccessful surveys, and to discuss results in geophysical rather than archaeological terms, makes such assessment more difficult. Thus although geophysical surveyors have strong grounds to claim that their work benefits archaeology, those who pay for survey can reasonably ask that these benefits be clarified, quantified where possible, and compared with alternatives, such as aerial photography or surface artefact survey, so that they can make the best choices about its use. This paper summarizes a study of all the geophysical surveys carried out in the northwest of England before 2006. The study assessed the performance of geophysical surveys in archaeological terms and was centred on a detailed analysis of 35 sites for which there is good comparative excavation data or which have particularly illustrative case histories. The study concludes that, despite the doubts in this area, geophysics serves archaeologists well and provides greater certainty in both identifying where sites exist and where they do not exist than has been generally assumed. It therefore deserves more extensive and more rational use. Geophysics is, however, being underused because, although abundant, surveys are formulaic and commercial surveyors are rarely able to fit methodologies to sites by a programme of reflective project development. Thus, although currently effective, geophysics might be even more so if surveyors had the time and resources to do this and to answer more complex and specific questions. The paper considers how these findings relate to the use of geophysical survey in other countries. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] | |||||||||||||