Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Desiccation cracking in clayey soils occurs when they lose moisture, leading to an increase in th... more Desiccation cracking in clayey soils occurs when they lose moisture, leading to an increase in their compressibility and hydraulic conductivity and hence significant reduction of soil strength. The prediction of desiccation cracking in soils is challenging due to the lack of insights into the complex coupled hydro-mechanical process at the grain scale. In this paper, a new hybrid discrete-continuum numerical framework, capable of capturing hydro-mechanical behaviour of soil at both grain and macro scales, is proposed for predicting desiccation cracking in clayey soil. In this framework, a soil layer is represented by an assembly of DEM particles, each occupies an equivalent continuum space and carries physical properties governing unsaturated flow. These particles move freely in the computational space following the discrete element method (DEM), while their contact network and the continuum mixture theory are used to model the unsaturated flow. The dependence of particleto-particle contact behaviour on water content is represented by a cohesive-frictional contact model, whose material properties are governed by the water content. In parallel with the theoretical development is a series of experiments on 3D soil desiccation cracking to determine essential properties and provide data for the validation of mechanical and physical behaviour. Very good agreement in both physical behaviour (e.g. evolution of water content) and mechanical behaviour (e.g. occurrence and development of cracks, and distribution of compressive and tensile strains) demonstrates that the proposed framework is capable of capturing the hydro-mechanical behaviour of soil during desiccation. The capability of the proposed framework facilitates numerical experiments for insights into the hydro-mechanical behaviour of unsaturated soils that have not been possible before.
2021 International Symposium on Electrical and Electronics Engineering (ISEE)
This paper proposes a robust deep learning framework used for classifying anomaly of respiratory ... more This paper proposes a robust deep learning framework used for classifying anomaly of respiratory cycles. Initially, our framework starts with front-end feature extraction step. This step aims to transform the respiratory input sound into a two-dimensional spectrogram where both spectral and temporal features are well presented. Next, an ensemble of C-DNN and Autoencoder networks is then applied to classify into four categories of respiratory anomaly cycles. In this work, we conducted experiments over 2017 Internal Conference on Biomedical Health Informatics (ICBHI) benchmark dataset. As a result, we achieve competitive performances with ICBHI average score of 0.49, ICBHI harmonic score of 0.42.
Background There is very limited evidence on the existence of cancer-related perceived stigma and... more Background There is very limited evidence on the existence of cancer-related perceived stigma and self-blame among patients with advanced cancer in Asia, and how they are associated with psychosocial outcomes. This study aimed to address the gap in the current literature by (1) assessing perceived stigma, behavioural self-blame and characterological self-blame among Vietnamese patients with advanced cancer, and (2) investigating the associations of perceived stigma and self-blame (behavioural and characterological) with depression, emotional well-being and social well-being. Methods This cross-sectional study involved 200 Vietnamese patients with stage IV solid cancer. Depression was measured using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression (CES-D) Scale. Emotional well-being and social well-being were measured with the relevant domains of the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General (FACT-G) scale. Perceived stigma was assessed using the sense of stigma subscale of Kiss...
Raising environmental awareness and product development are two separate and costly investments t... more Raising environmental awareness and product development are two separate and costly investments that many small and medium-sized fashion businesses cannot afford to achieve sustainability. Therefore, there is a need to decide which factors more significantly impact consumer loyalty and purchase intention toward eco-friendly fashion. Thus, the study employs a mixed-methods approach to research how customers' perception about product-service quality and their environmental awareness and pro-environmental behavior impact purchase intention and customer loyalty toward eco-friendly fashion products among Vietnamese Gen Z's. Most interviewees acknowledged that their primary source of knowledge for eco-friendly fashion was social media. The qualitative results further show that the knowledge and attitude toward eco-friendly fashion practices are insufficient to convince young customers to afford eco-friendly fashion products. The quantitative results show that while customer-relate...
Raising environmental awareness and product development are two separate and costly investments t... more Raising environmental awareness and product development are two separate and costly investments that many small and medium-sized fashion businesses cannot afford to achieve sustainability. Therefore, there is a need to decide which factors more significantly impact consumer loyalty and purchase intention toward eco-friendly fashion. Thus, the study employs a mixed-methods approach to research how customers' perception about product-service quality and their environmental awareness and pro-environmental behavior impact purchase intention and customer loyalty toward eco-friendly fashion products among Vietnamese Gen Z's. Most interviewees acknowledged that their primary source of knowledge for eco-friendly fashion was social media. The qualitative results further show that the knowledge and attitude toward eco-friendly fashion practices are insufficient to convince young customers to afford eco-friendly fashion products. The quantitative results show that while customer-relate...
A variational integrator of arbitrarily high-order on the special orthogonal group \begin{documen... more A variational integrator of arbitrarily high-order on the special orthogonal group \begin{document}$ SO(n) $\end{document} is constructed using the polar decomposition and the constrained Galerkin method. It has the advantage of avoiding the second order derivative of the exponential map that arises in traditional Lie group variational methods. In addition, a reduced Lie–Poisson integrator is constructed and the resulting algorithms can naturally be implemented by fixed-point iteration. The proposed methods are validated by numerical simulations on \begin{document}$ SO(3) $\end{document} which demonstrate that they are comparable to variational Runge–Kutta–Munthe-Kaas methods in terms of computational efficiency. However, the methods we have proposed preserve the Lie group structure much more accurately and and exhibit better near energy preservation.
A new hybrid discrete–continuum numerical approach that explores the key advantages of both discr... more A new hybrid discrete–continuum numerical approach that explores the key advantages of both discrete and continuum approaches is proposed to model unsaturated seepage flows through porous media. In contrast to existing approaches where a porous medium is often represented by a continuum medium or required a background mesh, the proposed approach explicitly exploits the discrete contact network formed by an assembly of discrete solid particles. Each solid particle is assumed to occupy an equivalent-continuum space, over which the governing equations for unsaturated seepage flow are derived. These governing equations are then discretised and solved on the discrete contact network through a new numerical procedure that links micro-diffusivity to the macro-one. Thanks to this concept, the proposed approach is capable of describing the nature of flow in unsaturated porous media at the microscale level. This unique feature also enables the proposed approach to naturally simulate the water flow through the heterogeneous porous media without any ad hoc treatments. In this paper, the mathematical concept of the proposed approach together with its implementation features and performances for a rigid porous media is presented and discussed. The focus is placed on its application to the discrete element method (DEM), although the proposed concept, in general, can be applied to any other methods possessing similar features.
Background: Vietnam's economy and intellectual standards have witnessed significant development, ... more Background: Vietnam's economy and intellectual standards have witnessed significant development, improving conditions for residents to acquire novel mHealth applications. Additionally, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has influenced Vietnamese awareness of healthcare; however, previous studies have only been clinician-centered rather than customer-centered. Methods: This study addresses this literature gap by interviewing 50 Vietnamese participants grouped by age, namely Generation X, Generation Y, and Generation Z, and health conditions, namely whether participants or family members have chronic illness. The study utilized semi-structured and in-depth interviews to collect the data and used thematic analysis to analyze the data under the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology framework. Results: Most participants were willing to adopt this technology and demanded a convenient and user-friendly one-stop-shop solution, endorsements from credible and authoritative sources, and professional customer services. However, each group also had distinctive demands and behaviors. Conclusion: This study contributes theoretically by providing context-rich demand for Vietnamese customers across three generations and healthcare conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic and comparing their behavior with pre-COVID literature. While this research provides helpful information for potential app developers, this study also suggests that mHealth developers and policymakers should pay more attention to the differences in the demand of age groups and health conditions.
Chromatin dynamics are central to the regulation of gene expression and genome stability. In orde... more Chromatin dynamics are central to the regulation of gene expression and genome stability. In order to improve understanding of the factors regulating chromatin dynamics, the genes encoding these factors are deleted and the differential gene expression profiles are determined using approaches such as RNA sequencing. Here, we analyzed a gene expression dataset aimed at uncovering the function of the relatively uncharacterized chromatin regulator, Set4, in the model system Saccharomyces cerevisiae (budding yeast). The main theme of this paper focuses on identifying the highly differentially expressed genes in cells deleted for Set4 (referred to as Set4 Δ mutant dataset) compared to the wild‐type yeast cells. The Set4 Δ mutant data produce a spiky distribution on the log‐fold changes of their expressions, and it is reasonably assumed that genes which are not highly differentially expressed come from a mixture of two normal distributions. We propose an adaptive local false discovery rate (FDR) procedure, which estimates the null distribution of the log‐fold changes empirically. We numerically show that, unlike existing approaches, our proposed method controls FDR at the aimed level (0.05) and also has competitive power in finding differentially expressed genes. Finally, we apply our procedure to analyzing the Set4 Δ mutant dataset.
Artificial intelligence innovations, such as chatbots and specialized education suggestion tools,... more Artificial intelligence innovations, such as chatbots and specialized education suggestion tools, provide potential interactive and on-demand pedagogical engagement between non-Christians and Christians with Christianity. However, there is little empirical research on the readiness, acceptance, and adoption of religious education involvement of AI in a secular state such as Vietnam. This research addresses the literature gap by providing an entrepreneurial analysis and customer perspectives on the ideas of AI involvement in religious education. Specifically, the study explores whether the Vietnamese across different ages accept and have enough skills to adopt AI in Christian education innovation. The interview sample is 32 participants, selected based on their religious orientation (Christians and non-Christians) and age (Generation X, Generation Y, and Generation Z). Most respondents are open to AI application in religious education except for Church personnel. However, only Genera...
This study evaluated the effectiveness of evidence-based intervention to reduce methamphetamine (... more This study evaluated the effectiveness of evidence-based intervention to reduce methamphetamine (MET) use among HIV-positive users in Ho Chi Minh. A total of 236 HIV-positive patients were screened, 71 (30.1%) met the inclusion criteria and 51 (71.8%) were enrolled. Of those enrolled, 49 completed 12 weeks of the intervention, most (?%) of whom used amphetamine-type substances at moderate or higher risk of dependence. The intervention reduced the rate of positive urine MET tests from 54.9% to 12.5%. Participants at intermediate risk for MET (93.1%) were significantly more likely to respond to positive behavior management during the first 6 weeks than participants at high-risk (6.9%, p=0.01). The responder group with positive behavioral management (n=29, 56.8%) received phone/SMS intervention during the latter six weeks of the study and were able to maintain negative urine drug tests. In the non-responder group (n=20), there was no significant difference between the group receiving t...
scar assessment scale (PSAS) and observer scar assessment scale (OSAS). RESULTS: Mean operative t... more scar assessment scale (PSAS) and observer scar assessment scale (OSAS). RESULTS: Mean operative time was 142.7AE16.3 and 97.60AE25.6 minutes in LESS and ML groups, respectively (P< 0.05). Mean estimated blood loss was 70.67AE43.67 and 56AE23.54 mL in both groups, respectively (P > 0.05). Mean VAS was 2.07AE0.26 and 2.27AE0.46 in both groups, respectively (P[ 0.07). Mean PSAS and OSAS was 6.53AE6.53 and 7.00AE0.93 vs 9.8AE2 and 9.73AE1.67 in both groups, respectively (P< 0.05). There were no intraoperative complications, conversions to open surgery, or to conventional laparoscopy in both groups. No additional port was used in LESS RN. There was no significant difference in the postoperative complications according to the Clavien-Dindo system nor in hospital stay in both groups. CONCLUSIONS: Both LESS RN and ML RN are valid options for treatment of renal neoplasms. They have comparable results in terms of blood loss, complication rate, VAS and hospital stay. However, LESS is associated with longer operative time and better cosmesis
The emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic has created both negative and positive changes, including ... more The emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic has created both negative and positive changes, including implementing the circular economy across the globe. This Systematic Review follows the PRISMA statement and employs the Text Mining (Voyant Tools) technique to visualize and analyze the impacts of the Covid-19 on three aspects of the circular economy: economic, social, and environmental. The research employs Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) to identify five major topics: (1) Shortage of medical equipment but high medical waste during Covid-19 due to the high demand in healthcare; (2) The long term negative impacts of lockdown on economic and social activities because of Covid-19 pandemic; (3) The reports on impacts of Covid-19 pandemic on the manufacturing globally, and their coping strategies and new opportunities; (4) The impacts of international restriction on the tourism, trade, shipping, and aviation industry, causing billion-dollar losses; (5) The reduction of pollution with healt...
Critical care and resuscitation : journal of the Australasian Academy of Critical Care Medicine, 2019
OBJECTIVE Lack of management guidelines for lifethreatening asthma (LTA) risks practice variation... more OBJECTIVE Lack of management guidelines for lifethreatening asthma (LTA) risks practice variation. This study aims to elucidate management practices of LTA in the intensive care unit (ICU). DESIGN A retrospective cohort study. SETTING Thirteen participating ICUs in Australia between July 2010 and June 2013. PARTICIPANTS Patients with the principal diagnosis of LTA. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Clinical history, ICU management, patient outcomes, ward education and discharge plans. RESULTS Of the 270 (267 patients) ICU admissions, 69% were female, with a median age of 39 years (interquartile range [IQR], 26-53 years); 119 (44%) were current smokers; 89 patients (33%) previously required ICU admission, of whom 23 (25%) were intubated. The median ICU stay was 2 days (IQR, 2-4 days). Three patients (1%) died. Seventy-nine patients (29%) received non-invasive ventilation, with 11 (14%) needing subsequent invasive ventilation. Sixty-eight patients (25%) were intubated, with the majority of patien...
Purpose: Recent literature on healthcare quality demands more contextualized and patientperspecti... more Purpose: Recent literature on healthcare quality demands more contextualized and patientperspective research, as models from developed countries are not suitable for developing countries. Moreover, research on private healthcare services in Vietnam has long been underestimated by academia, but it has significant economic and commercial value. Hence, this study explores the dimensions of service quality in private healthcare and how they impact in-patient satisfaction, perceived value, and customer loyalty in Vietnam. Methods: This mixed-method study had a sample size of five inpatients for the qualitative phase and 368 inpatients for the quantitative phase from hospitals in Vietnam. The qualitative analysis explores service quality dimensions in private healthcare and incorporates them with the literature to develop a conceptual model. The quantitative phase tests the relationship between each construct in the conceptual model via structural equation modeling. Results: The four dimensions of service quality were emotion, function, social influence, and trust. Most of these dimensions have a significant impact on customer perceived value and satisfaction. However, emotion does not significantly influence customer perceived value, and function does not considerably impact customer satisfaction. In addition, social influence is an underrepresented variable in the service quality literature, but it has the most substantial impact on customer perceived value and customer satisfaction. The quantitative results also confirm that customer satisfaction and customer perceived value significantly impact customer loyalty (word-of-mouth and revisit intention); however, customer perceived value does not significantly impact customer satisfaction. Conclusion: The study suggests that private healthcare providers and the government in Vietnam should allocate resources to improve service quality. Practitioners should invest in social branding and e-services to reach out to their customers. Future research should focus on a cost-benefit analysis and compare the effectiveness of service quality dimensions on customer behavioral intention.
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Desiccation cracking in clayey soils occurs when they lose moisture, leading to an increase in th... more Desiccation cracking in clayey soils occurs when they lose moisture, leading to an increase in their compressibility and hydraulic conductivity and hence significant reduction of soil strength. The prediction of desiccation cracking in soils is challenging due to the lack of insights into the complex coupled hydro-mechanical process at the grain scale. In this paper, a new hybrid discrete-continuum numerical framework, capable of capturing hydro-mechanical behaviour of soil at both grain and macro scales, is proposed for predicting desiccation cracking in clayey soil. In this framework, a soil layer is represented by an assembly of DEM particles, each occupies an equivalent continuum space and carries physical properties governing unsaturated flow. These particles move freely in the computational space following the discrete element method (DEM), while their contact network and the continuum mixture theory are used to model the unsaturated flow. The dependence of particleto-particle contact behaviour on water content is represented by a cohesive-frictional contact model, whose material properties are governed by the water content. In parallel with the theoretical development is a series of experiments on 3D soil desiccation cracking to determine essential properties and provide data for the validation of mechanical and physical behaviour. Very good agreement in both physical behaviour (e.g. evolution of water content) and mechanical behaviour (e.g. occurrence and development of cracks, and distribution of compressive and tensile strains) demonstrates that the proposed framework is capable of capturing the hydro-mechanical behaviour of soil during desiccation. The capability of the proposed framework facilitates numerical experiments for insights into the hydro-mechanical behaviour of unsaturated soils that have not been possible before.
2021 International Symposium on Electrical and Electronics Engineering (ISEE)
This paper proposes a robust deep learning framework used for classifying anomaly of respiratory ... more This paper proposes a robust deep learning framework used for classifying anomaly of respiratory cycles. Initially, our framework starts with front-end feature extraction step. This step aims to transform the respiratory input sound into a two-dimensional spectrogram where both spectral and temporal features are well presented. Next, an ensemble of C-DNN and Autoencoder networks is then applied to classify into four categories of respiratory anomaly cycles. In this work, we conducted experiments over 2017 Internal Conference on Biomedical Health Informatics (ICBHI) benchmark dataset. As a result, we achieve competitive performances with ICBHI average score of 0.49, ICBHI harmonic score of 0.42.
Background There is very limited evidence on the existence of cancer-related perceived stigma and... more Background There is very limited evidence on the existence of cancer-related perceived stigma and self-blame among patients with advanced cancer in Asia, and how they are associated with psychosocial outcomes. This study aimed to address the gap in the current literature by (1) assessing perceived stigma, behavioural self-blame and characterological self-blame among Vietnamese patients with advanced cancer, and (2) investigating the associations of perceived stigma and self-blame (behavioural and characterological) with depression, emotional well-being and social well-being. Methods This cross-sectional study involved 200 Vietnamese patients with stage IV solid cancer. Depression was measured using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression (CES-D) Scale. Emotional well-being and social well-being were measured with the relevant domains of the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General (FACT-G) scale. Perceived stigma was assessed using the sense of stigma subscale of Kiss...
Raising environmental awareness and product development are two separate and costly investments t... more Raising environmental awareness and product development are two separate and costly investments that many small and medium-sized fashion businesses cannot afford to achieve sustainability. Therefore, there is a need to decide which factors more significantly impact consumer loyalty and purchase intention toward eco-friendly fashion. Thus, the study employs a mixed-methods approach to research how customers' perception about product-service quality and their environmental awareness and pro-environmental behavior impact purchase intention and customer loyalty toward eco-friendly fashion products among Vietnamese Gen Z's. Most interviewees acknowledged that their primary source of knowledge for eco-friendly fashion was social media. The qualitative results further show that the knowledge and attitude toward eco-friendly fashion practices are insufficient to convince young customers to afford eco-friendly fashion products. The quantitative results show that while customer-relate...
Raising environmental awareness and product development are two separate and costly investments t... more Raising environmental awareness and product development are two separate and costly investments that many small and medium-sized fashion businesses cannot afford to achieve sustainability. Therefore, there is a need to decide which factors more significantly impact consumer loyalty and purchase intention toward eco-friendly fashion. Thus, the study employs a mixed-methods approach to research how customers' perception about product-service quality and their environmental awareness and pro-environmental behavior impact purchase intention and customer loyalty toward eco-friendly fashion products among Vietnamese Gen Z's. Most interviewees acknowledged that their primary source of knowledge for eco-friendly fashion was social media. The qualitative results further show that the knowledge and attitude toward eco-friendly fashion practices are insufficient to convince young customers to afford eco-friendly fashion products. The quantitative results show that while customer-relate...
A variational integrator of arbitrarily high-order on the special orthogonal group \begin{documen... more A variational integrator of arbitrarily high-order on the special orthogonal group \begin{document}$ SO(n) $\end{document} is constructed using the polar decomposition and the constrained Galerkin method. It has the advantage of avoiding the second order derivative of the exponential map that arises in traditional Lie group variational methods. In addition, a reduced Lie–Poisson integrator is constructed and the resulting algorithms can naturally be implemented by fixed-point iteration. The proposed methods are validated by numerical simulations on \begin{document}$ SO(3) $\end{document} which demonstrate that they are comparable to variational Runge–Kutta–Munthe-Kaas methods in terms of computational efficiency. However, the methods we have proposed preserve the Lie group structure much more accurately and and exhibit better near energy preservation.
A new hybrid discrete–continuum numerical approach that explores the key advantages of both discr... more A new hybrid discrete–continuum numerical approach that explores the key advantages of both discrete and continuum approaches is proposed to model unsaturated seepage flows through porous media. In contrast to existing approaches where a porous medium is often represented by a continuum medium or required a background mesh, the proposed approach explicitly exploits the discrete contact network formed by an assembly of discrete solid particles. Each solid particle is assumed to occupy an equivalent-continuum space, over which the governing equations for unsaturated seepage flow are derived. These governing equations are then discretised and solved on the discrete contact network through a new numerical procedure that links micro-diffusivity to the macro-one. Thanks to this concept, the proposed approach is capable of describing the nature of flow in unsaturated porous media at the microscale level. This unique feature also enables the proposed approach to naturally simulate the water flow through the heterogeneous porous media without any ad hoc treatments. In this paper, the mathematical concept of the proposed approach together with its implementation features and performances for a rigid porous media is presented and discussed. The focus is placed on its application to the discrete element method (DEM), although the proposed concept, in general, can be applied to any other methods possessing similar features.
Background: Vietnam's economy and intellectual standards have witnessed significant development, ... more Background: Vietnam's economy and intellectual standards have witnessed significant development, improving conditions for residents to acquire novel mHealth applications. Additionally, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has influenced Vietnamese awareness of healthcare; however, previous studies have only been clinician-centered rather than customer-centered. Methods: This study addresses this literature gap by interviewing 50 Vietnamese participants grouped by age, namely Generation X, Generation Y, and Generation Z, and health conditions, namely whether participants or family members have chronic illness. The study utilized semi-structured and in-depth interviews to collect the data and used thematic analysis to analyze the data under the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology framework. Results: Most participants were willing to adopt this technology and demanded a convenient and user-friendly one-stop-shop solution, endorsements from credible and authoritative sources, and professional customer services. However, each group also had distinctive demands and behaviors. Conclusion: This study contributes theoretically by providing context-rich demand for Vietnamese customers across three generations and healthcare conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic and comparing their behavior with pre-COVID literature. While this research provides helpful information for potential app developers, this study also suggests that mHealth developers and policymakers should pay more attention to the differences in the demand of age groups and health conditions.
Chromatin dynamics are central to the regulation of gene expression and genome stability. In orde... more Chromatin dynamics are central to the regulation of gene expression and genome stability. In order to improve understanding of the factors regulating chromatin dynamics, the genes encoding these factors are deleted and the differential gene expression profiles are determined using approaches such as RNA sequencing. Here, we analyzed a gene expression dataset aimed at uncovering the function of the relatively uncharacterized chromatin regulator, Set4, in the model system Saccharomyces cerevisiae (budding yeast). The main theme of this paper focuses on identifying the highly differentially expressed genes in cells deleted for Set4 (referred to as Set4 Δ mutant dataset) compared to the wild‐type yeast cells. The Set4 Δ mutant data produce a spiky distribution on the log‐fold changes of their expressions, and it is reasonably assumed that genes which are not highly differentially expressed come from a mixture of two normal distributions. We propose an adaptive local false discovery rate (FDR) procedure, which estimates the null distribution of the log‐fold changes empirically. We numerically show that, unlike existing approaches, our proposed method controls FDR at the aimed level (0.05) and also has competitive power in finding differentially expressed genes. Finally, we apply our procedure to analyzing the Set4 Δ mutant dataset.
Artificial intelligence innovations, such as chatbots and specialized education suggestion tools,... more Artificial intelligence innovations, such as chatbots and specialized education suggestion tools, provide potential interactive and on-demand pedagogical engagement between non-Christians and Christians with Christianity. However, there is little empirical research on the readiness, acceptance, and adoption of religious education involvement of AI in a secular state such as Vietnam. This research addresses the literature gap by providing an entrepreneurial analysis and customer perspectives on the ideas of AI involvement in religious education. Specifically, the study explores whether the Vietnamese across different ages accept and have enough skills to adopt AI in Christian education innovation. The interview sample is 32 participants, selected based on their religious orientation (Christians and non-Christians) and age (Generation X, Generation Y, and Generation Z). Most respondents are open to AI application in religious education except for Church personnel. However, only Genera...
This study evaluated the effectiveness of evidence-based intervention to reduce methamphetamine (... more This study evaluated the effectiveness of evidence-based intervention to reduce methamphetamine (MET) use among HIV-positive users in Ho Chi Minh. A total of 236 HIV-positive patients were screened, 71 (30.1%) met the inclusion criteria and 51 (71.8%) were enrolled. Of those enrolled, 49 completed 12 weeks of the intervention, most (?%) of whom used amphetamine-type substances at moderate or higher risk of dependence. The intervention reduced the rate of positive urine MET tests from 54.9% to 12.5%. Participants at intermediate risk for MET (93.1%) were significantly more likely to respond to positive behavior management during the first 6 weeks than participants at high-risk (6.9%, p=0.01). The responder group with positive behavioral management (n=29, 56.8%) received phone/SMS intervention during the latter six weeks of the study and were able to maintain negative urine drug tests. In the non-responder group (n=20), there was no significant difference between the group receiving t...
scar assessment scale (PSAS) and observer scar assessment scale (OSAS). RESULTS: Mean operative t... more scar assessment scale (PSAS) and observer scar assessment scale (OSAS). RESULTS: Mean operative time was 142.7AE16.3 and 97.60AE25.6 minutes in LESS and ML groups, respectively (P< 0.05). Mean estimated blood loss was 70.67AE43.67 and 56AE23.54 mL in both groups, respectively (P > 0.05). Mean VAS was 2.07AE0.26 and 2.27AE0.46 in both groups, respectively (P[ 0.07). Mean PSAS and OSAS was 6.53AE6.53 and 7.00AE0.93 vs 9.8AE2 and 9.73AE1.67 in both groups, respectively (P< 0.05). There were no intraoperative complications, conversions to open surgery, or to conventional laparoscopy in both groups. No additional port was used in LESS RN. There was no significant difference in the postoperative complications according to the Clavien-Dindo system nor in hospital stay in both groups. CONCLUSIONS: Both LESS RN and ML RN are valid options for treatment of renal neoplasms. They have comparable results in terms of blood loss, complication rate, VAS and hospital stay. However, LESS is associated with longer operative time and better cosmesis
The emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic has created both negative and positive changes, including ... more The emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic has created both negative and positive changes, including implementing the circular economy across the globe. This Systematic Review follows the PRISMA statement and employs the Text Mining (Voyant Tools) technique to visualize and analyze the impacts of the Covid-19 on three aspects of the circular economy: economic, social, and environmental. The research employs Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) to identify five major topics: (1) Shortage of medical equipment but high medical waste during Covid-19 due to the high demand in healthcare; (2) The long term negative impacts of lockdown on economic and social activities because of Covid-19 pandemic; (3) The reports on impacts of Covid-19 pandemic on the manufacturing globally, and their coping strategies and new opportunities; (4) The impacts of international restriction on the tourism, trade, shipping, and aviation industry, causing billion-dollar losses; (5) The reduction of pollution with healt...
Critical care and resuscitation : journal of the Australasian Academy of Critical Care Medicine, 2019
OBJECTIVE Lack of management guidelines for lifethreatening asthma (LTA) risks practice variation... more OBJECTIVE Lack of management guidelines for lifethreatening asthma (LTA) risks practice variation. This study aims to elucidate management practices of LTA in the intensive care unit (ICU). DESIGN A retrospective cohort study. SETTING Thirteen participating ICUs in Australia between July 2010 and June 2013. PARTICIPANTS Patients with the principal diagnosis of LTA. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Clinical history, ICU management, patient outcomes, ward education and discharge plans. RESULTS Of the 270 (267 patients) ICU admissions, 69% were female, with a median age of 39 years (interquartile range [IQR], 26-53 years); 119 (44%) were current smokers; 89 patients (33%) previously required ICU admission, of whom 23 (25%) were intubated. The median ICU stay was 2 days (IQR, 2-4 days). Three patients (1%) died. Seventy-nine patients (29%) received non-invasive ventilation, with 11 (14%) needing subsequent invasive ventilation. Sixty-eight patients (25%) were intubated, with the majority of patien...
Purpose: Recent literature on healthcare quality demands more contextualized and patientperspecti... more Purpose: Recent literature on healthcare quality demands more contextualized and patientperspective research, as models from developed countries are not suitable for developing countries. Moreover, research on private healthcare services in Vietnam has long been underestimated by academia, but it has significant economic and commercial value. Hence, this study explores the dimensions of service quality in private healthcare and how they impact in-patient satisfaction, perceived value, and customer loyalty in Vietnam. Methods: This mixed-method study had a sample size of five inpatients for the qualitative phase and 368 inpatients for the quantitative phase from hospitals in Vietnam. The qualitative analysis explores service quality dimensions in private healthcare and incorporates them with the literature to develop a conceptual model. The quantitative phase tests the relationship between each construct in the conceptual model via structural equation modeling. Results: The four dimensions of service quality were emotion, function, social influence, and trust. Most of these dimensions have a significant impact on customer perceived value and satisfaction. However, emotion does not significantly influence customer perceived value, and function does not considerably impact customer satisfaction. In addition, social influence is an underrepresented variable in the service quality literature, but it has the most substantial impact on customer perceived value and customer satisfaction. The quantitative results also confirm that customer satisfaction and customer perceived value significantly impact customer loyalty (word-of-mouth and revisit intention); however, customer perceived value does not significantly impact customer satisfaction. Conclusion: The study suggests that private healthcare providers and the government in Vietnam should allocate resources to improve service quality. Practitioners should invest in social branding and e-services to reach out to their customers. Future research should focus on a cost-benefit analysis and compare the effectiveness of service quality dimensions on customer behavioral intention.
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Papers by Khoa Tran