Family planning is often regarded as the woman's responsibility, but there is growing recognition of the need to involve men in family planning programs. Since 2001, the fertility-awareness-based Standard Days Method® (SDM) has been introduced in more than 30 countries, providing a natural, effective birth control option. SDM requires the cooperation of the male partner, and its introduction cr...

Continuousand discrete-time switching audio power amplifiers are studied both with and without feedback. Pulse-width modulation (PWM) and sigma–delta modulation (SDM) amplifier configurations are simulated and their interrelationship is described using linear phase modulation (LPM) and linear frequency modulation (LFM). Distortion generation encountered when applying negative feedback to PWM is...

Graph Transformation (GraTra) provides a formal, declarative means of specifying model transformation. In practice, GraTra rule applications are often programmed via an additional language with which the order of rule applications can be suitably controlled. Story-Driven Modelling (SDM) is a dialect of programmed GraTra, originally developed as part of the Fujaba CASE tool suite. Using an intui...

BACKGROUND From many empirical and theoretical points of view, the implementation of shared decision making (SDM) in work rehabilitation for pain due to a musculoskeletal disorder (MSD) is justified but typically the SDM model applies to a one on one encounter between a healthcare provider and a patient and not to an interdisciplinary team. OBJECTIVES To adapt and implement an SDM program ada...

BACKGROUND Shared Decision Making (SDM) is a way to empower patients when decisions are made about treatment. In order to be effective agents in this process, patients need access to information of good quality. Routine Outcome Monitoring (ROM) may provide such information and therefore may be a key element in SDM. This trial tests the effectiveness of SDM using ROM, primarily aiming to diminis...

BACKGROUND Hypertension is one of the key factors causing cardiovascular diseases. A substantial proportion of treated hypertensive patients do not reach recommended target blood pressure values. Shared decision making (SDM) is to enhance the active role of patients. As until now there exists little information on the effects of SDM training in antihypertensive therapy, we tested the effect of ...

This paper addresses semantic data mining, a new data mining paradigm in which ontologies are exploited in the process of data mining and knowledge discovery. This paradigm is introduced together with new semantic subgroup discovery systems SDM-search for enriched gene sets (SEGS) and SDM-Aleph. These systems are made publicly available in the new SDM-Toolkit for semantic data mining. The toolk...

A continuous-time (CT) sigma-delta modulator (SDM) for condenser microphone readout interfaces is presented in this paper. The CT SDM can accommodate a single-ended input and has high input impedance, so that it can be directly driven by a single-ended condenser microphone. A current-sensing boosted OTA-C integrator with capacitive feedforward compensation is employed in the CT SDM to achieve h...

The workshop 'Species distribution models: applications, challenges and perspectives' held at Belo Horizonte (Brazil), 29-30 August 2011, aimed to review the state-of-the-art in species distribution modelling (SDM) in the neotropical realm. It brought together researchers in ecology, evolution, biogeography and conservation, with different backgrounds and research interests. The application of ...

Objective: The goal of this study was to test the degree to which client clinical characteristics and environmental context and social workers’ practice values and experience influenced support for client’s autonomy and willingness to engage in shared decision making (SDM), and whether willingness to engage in SDM was mediated by support for autonomy. Method: A randomized factorial survey of so...