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A royal birth? Lucky Kate

PG research

With the Queen’s Jubilee, the Olympics and Andy Murray winning at SW1 Wimbledon (again) it seems Britain is still riding a wave of optimism with the birth of a male heir to the throne; the Prince of Cambridge. The baby was delivered on 22 July 2013 at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, west London, weighing 8lb 6oz. The document said: “Her Royal Highness, the Duchess of Cambridge was safely delivered of a son at 4.24pm today. He and the duchess will remain in the hospital overnight. A bulletin signed by the Queen’s gynaecologist Marcus Setchell, who led the medical team that delivered the baby – was taken by a royal aide from St Mary’s to the palace under police escort.

The implications are wide -reaching, in multi-cultural Britain the royal baby is unusual for London in having a mother originally from the UK and most babies delivered in the capital these days (57%) are to mothers born overseas and nearly half of all babies (48%) are born outwith marriage. With midwifery cuts and the further medicalisation of birth where the “cascade of interventions” often occurs when birth is induced.  For instance, in the USA which spends more money on healthcare than any country in the world and yet the maternal mortality rate is among the highest of any industrialised country.

And on July 19, 2013, the USA the House State-Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittee today approved a steep cutback in international family planning assistance for fiscal year 2014. Rejecting President’s Obama’s 2014 budget request of $635.4 million, the Subcommittee capped appropriations for international family planning and reproductive health programs at $461 million, $174 million less than the President’s request, and $137 million (23% below the current funding level).  The cuts, if approved by the full Congress, would have a devastating impact: Several million women in the developing world would lose access to contraceptives services, resulting in more unplanned pregnancies and deaths from unsafe abortions. Each pregnancy multiplies a woman’s chance of dying from complications of pregnancy or childbirth. Maternal mortality rates are particularly high for young and poor women, those who have least access to contraceptive services. It is estimated that one in three deaths related to pregnancy and childbirth could be avoided if all women had access to contraceptive services.

Not so lucky, therefore, are Kate’s counterparts in the South – Frightening statistics include that daily, approximately 800 women die from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth. In our study site, Nepal every year, 4,500 Nepali women die in childbirth due to lack of medical care. In low-income countries, most maternal deaths are avoidable, as the health-care solutions to prevent or manage complications are well known. All women need is access to antenatal care in pregnancy, skilled care during childbirth, and care and support in the weeks after childbirth.

To make every birth worldwide as joyful an event as the royal birth in London we need is: a) more and better midwifery services; and b) improved access to care for pregnant women globally.

Sheetal Sharma is a HSC PhD student and currently a visiting researcher in Barcelona, supervised by Dr. Elisa Sicuri at CRESIB on an evaluation of a health promotion programme in rural Nepal aiming to improve access to care; in which socio-economic and cultural barriers exist.

Thanks to Edwin & Elisa for their input in this piece.

References:

http://www.populationinstitute.org/newsroom/press/view/57/

http://midwifeinternational.org/how-to-become-midwife/business-of-baby/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23408377

http://www.unfpa.org/public/home/mothers/pid/4382

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23403391

I’ll bet you it’s a baby!

 

 

The new royal baby has been born.  Good news for Kate and William and also for the betting shops.  Apparently a large number of people bet on a girl being born on the estimated due date July 13th, and the punters seem to believe the gender would be female.  As a consequence, a large amount of money was made by UK betting shops.   The next bet is, of course, on his name.  Some websites seem to suggest the bookmakers favoured the name James, such as a website in the Netherlands (http://wereldnieuws.blog.nl/politiek/2013/07/19/britse-baby-kan-nu-ieder-moment-komen).  A Canadian website suggested a few days before the birth that “James or George were the favourites” for a boy (http://o.canada.com/2013/07/17/escape-from-royal-baby-media-circus-leads-to-londons-betting-shops/.  On the webpages of one of the UK’s larger betting shops today’s  (22nd July) top 13 boys’ names were: George, James, Alexander, Louis, Arthur, Henry, Phillip, Albert, Spencer, David, Thomas, Richard & Edward.

 

Betting on aspects of the royal birth and baby is a way of being involved in the same way that betting on your football team to win its first away-game of the season is part of being a supporter for some.  Luckily, there are many more options to waste your money, punters can also put money on the colour of his hair, baby’s first word, and if you want to wait a little longer for your money:  the name of his first love, age of first nightclub visit photograph, first official visit overseas, whether the prince will ever compete in the Olympics, and the university where he will study.

 

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health

School of Health & Social Care

Bournemouth University, UK

 

 

 

 

 

Innovation-Business-Research Event for Horizon 2020 open for bookings

The Industry and Parliament Trust is hosting a unique two day programme of EU training, orientation and network building in Brussels for Academics involved in Horizon 2020 projects (18-19th September, Brussels).

 Over the course of the two days attendees will gain a comprehensive overview of engaging with the EU and the Horizon 2020 programme. Sessions will be held at institutions across Brussels, from the European Parliament to the offices of the UK Representation to the European Union.  You will also have the opportunity to spend time with speakers and delegates informally over dinners and lunch. Guest speakers include:

  • Richard Corbett – Member of the Cabinet of the President of European Council,
  • David Wilkinson – Director of Scientific Policy and Stakeholder Relations Joint Research Centre, European Commission
  • Christina Miller – Director, UK Research office (UKRO)
  • Jonathan Hill – Deputy Head of Cabinet of Commissioner Vassiliou

For full details on of the programme please email NaomiAlderson@ipt.org.uk

 

Data.ac.uk has launched!

colouredData.ac.uk  is intended to provide access to lots of open data but also tools and somewhere to share ideas and approaches.

This is a landmark site for academia providing a single point of contact for linked open data development. It not only provides access to the know-how and tools to discuss and create linked data and data aggregation sites, but also enables access to, and the creation of, large aggregated data sets providing powerful and flexible collections of information.

Data.ac.uk is working to inform national standards and assist in the development of national data aggregation subdomains.

We are all part of the constantly evolving open data agenda and its emerging culture. Data.ac.uk aims to bring together the higher education community and the wealth of data it has access to, and encourage that community to share, utilise, update, grow and generate demand for open data.

The data being aggregated via this site can be used in all sorts of ways including:

  • Improving transparency
  • Increasing participation
  • Increased knowledge
  • Identifying trends
  • Improving products and services
  • Innovating
  • Improving efficiency

PGRs and the Health, Wellbeing & Ageing Theme!

PG research

The first PGR Health, Wellbeing and Ageing Community meeting took place on Wednesday 10th July at Royal London House. The purpose of the event was to bring together post graduate researchers from across schools to present and discuss their research under the Health, Wellbeing and Ageing theme.

Jo Hawkes (ST) began the meeting by presenting her research on the impact of premenopausal osteoporosis on physically active females. This was followed by the impact that children’s hospices have on parental relationships by Ashley Mitchell (HSC). Phillip James (ST) discussed his work on how active seniors engage with the internet when choosing holidays. We were also joined by Alister du Rose (DEC) from the AECC, who is using quantitative fluoroscopy and electromyography to determine normal mechanics of the lumbar spine.

Mevalyn Cross (HSC) discussed how her research was going to evaluate the effectiveness of a humanising framework to improve patient care in Poole Hospital. Becca Elisa (DEC) is who is due to start in September proposed plans and theory for her research into norepinephrine activity in ADHD. The meeting finished with Jib Acharya (HSC) presenting the results from his comparative study into nutritional problems in the preschool children of the Kaski district in Nepal.

All presentations were extremely interesting and the event was positively received by all those who attended. The event was also attended by Dr Heather Hartwell, Professor Edwin van Teijlingen, Professor Les Todres and Julia Hastings Taylor who were on hand to give advice and feedback to those who presented. It also gave PGRs the opportunity to meet each other and network across schools.

It is hoped that community events like this will be a regular occurrence with even more PGRs presenting their research. If anyone is interested in presenting or attending the next event please email Ashley Mitchell (ashmitchell@bournemouth.ac.uk).

A Women’s Academic Network at BU

This September marks the launch of a Women’s Academic Network here at BU. The launch event will be hosted by Professor John Vinney  and Sue Sutherland, OBE and is open to all BU academic staff.

 Why do we need a women’s academic network?

 Bespoke networks for women are common across business and within the media, both in the UK and across Europe and the USA.  Within the profession, there are networks for women in science and philosophy (for example). These bespoke networks exist in recognition that professional women regularly face gender related challenges in the workplace. Thus women’s networks also function to support women  and  to raise their profile within organisations and beyond, as well as to lobby on gender inequality issues. Despite decades of lobbying and the notable achievements gained by women in the workplace, women in academia have not managed to make significant gains across the sector.  This extraordinary situation has recently been highlighted in Nature and most recently, in the Times Higher Education through a series of features highlighting the seriousness of multiple career obstacles impacting on female academic staff in particular.

  How did we create WAN?

The network we are developing here is informed by work I undertook at UEA, as co-Chair of a Research Network for Women. I began by approaching a number of women across the University, and our initial meeting began with a discussion as to how we would envisage such a network and what its purpose would be We then ran a University wide survey, again to establish demand for such a group. We relied on the survey being passed forward and while we recognise that not everyone may have been able to participate, there was sufficient response from colleagues to identify a demand and need for such a forum to be established (see here for results). 

 What are our aims?

The aims of WAN are to support women and women’s interests, in all their diversity, across BU. 
As a distinct and separate entity we will also work alongside and support, Athena Swan, DDE and the Equalities Office.

 How will we do this?

Through a programme of events we will be seeking to:
Raise the profile of women across the University
Create a regular networking forum
Identify important career issues for women academics with a view to further consultation

 

What does WAN look like?

Our current committee (based on attendance at the last committee meeting) is as follows:

Co-Convenors (elected for one year in the first instance)

Amber Burton
Sara Crabtree
Heather Savigny

Committee Members

Carrie Hodges
Vanora Hundley
Julie Robson
Elizabeth Rosser
Chris Shiel
Gail Thomas
Shelley Thompson
Kate Welham
Amanda Wilding
Huiping Xian
Tiantian Zhang

 

How can you get involved?

Come to the launch event and learn more about WAN and how you can contribute to the network.

 

When is the launch?

September 26th
Where: venue tbc
What time: 5-7pm. Children and other dependents are welcome
To help us with catering and room bookings, please register by contacting Jo Downey (jdowney@bournemouth.ac.uk)

Further details including room and speaker information will be provided nearer the time

 If you would like to offer an event, please contact Sara Crabtree, Amber Burton or Heather Savigny (scrabtree@bournemouth.ac.uk; aburton@bournemouth.ac.uk; hsavigny@bournemouth.ac.uk )

 

BU Research wins Best Competitive Paper at CCT13 (Tucson, Arizona)

PG research

Blog Post by Rebecca Watkins, Postgraduate Researcher – Media School

Consumer Culture Theory (CCT) is an interdisciplinary field that comprises macro, interpretive, and critical perspectives of consumer behaviour, and the CCT conference has become the premier international venue for consumer culture researchers spanning a broad spectrum of academic disciplines to come together to share their ideas, empirical insights, and theoretical interests in an engaging, cutting edge, collegial forum. The conference invites original contributions in the form of full papers that undergo a rigorous peer review process with three double blind reviewers, and as a result research presented at the conference is consistently of an exceptionally high standard.  At this year’s conference in Tucson, Arizona, Bournemouth University PhD student Rebecca Watkins and senior lecturer Dr. Mike Molesworth were awarded Best Competitive Paper for their contribution entitled ‘The Biographies of Digital Virtual Goods’. The paper communicated empirical findings from Rebecca’s PhD research which explores ownership and possession in the context of digital goods, from magical swords, luxury cars and avatars within virtual worlds, to mp3s, ebooks, and social networking profiles. Building on award winning research by Dr Denegri-Knott and Dr Molesworth from Bournemouth University’s Media School, Rebecca and Mike highlight the ways in which the nature of digital goods encourages the delaying of classification decisions, resulting in vast digital hoards, and in doing so contribute to existing understanding of digital goods as possessions by providing insight into their biographies, including the significant ways in which they diverge from the typical biographies of material goods. Thus a key contribution of the paper, and of Rebecca’s research more broadly, is to illustrate that our understanding of material culture and consumption, so understandably rooted in the materiality of goods, is problematised by the emergence of digital possessions, often leading to tense and turbulent relationships between consumers and the providers of these digital goods that are yet to be adequately addressed by policy makers.

*Rebecca’s attendance at the conference was partially funded by the Graduate School’s PGR Development Fund

 

EC and Research Data Open Access Consultation – see one of the responses

Earlier this month, the EC held a public consultation on open access to research data in Brussels inviting statements from a range of stakeholders, who will play some role in revising the ECs policy and will help shape Horizon 2020. Five questions formed the basis of the discussion:

  1. How we can define research data and what types of research data should be open?
  2. When and how does openness need to be limited?
  3. How should the issue of data re-use be addressed?
  4. Where should research data be stored and made accessible?
  5. How can we enhance “data awareness” and a “culture of sharing”?

These are key questions every researcher should have an interest in. You can see the responses of the Open Knowledge Foundation here and learn more about the EC debates around research data open access mandates.

Have your Say! What should the new online research degree monitoring system be called?

Calling all postgraduate researchers, supervisors and research administrators!

You should by now have heard that we are working hard to have our new postgraduate monitoring system online for the beginning of the new academic year.  The system will enhance the experience of all those involved in research degrees:

  • Postgraduate Researchers
  • Supervisors
  • Research Administrators

The main aim is to move away from paper-based forms and to a more streamlined on-line system.  The system will guide you through the process and monitoring of PGR progression.

We’re now at the exciting stage of naming the system.  The steering group has come up with a list of possible names for you to vote on.  Cast your votes here – http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/L8H9VHF for:

  • myResearch Degree
  • ResearchPAD (Progression, Administration, Development)
  • BURD (Bournemouth University Research Degrees)

The poll will be open until 22 July.  Happy voting!

Dr Fiona Knight
Academic Manager

 

 

 

 

 

eBU in final stages before launch – please submit now!

Publishing, Research themes

eBU is going through the final IT phases before the anticipated launch at the end of July.

I have been delighted with the interest that eBU has generated from all sections of the BU community. Academics, students and professional and support staff have all shown an interest in submitting to and signposting others to eBU, and it is clear that eBU will play a significant role in developing academic output.

eBU has champions in each school (I’m happy to put people in contact), and section editors across all of the research themes under which submissions will sit.

Authors will be encouraged to submit by logging in to the eBU site. However, if you’re interested in submitting to eBU before the live date, please get in touch and email submissions to me at eBU@bournemouth.ac.uk or aharding@bournemouth.ac.uk

We already have some submissions, and submissions sent to me before the launch date will be among the first to be published by eBU and undergo immediate publication and open peer review.

Author guidelines can be found here – eBU guidelines.

Journal Citation Reports® (JCR) 2013 now available

The 2013 Edition of Journal Citation Reports® (JCR) provides a combination of impact and influence metrics, and millions of cited and citing journal data points that comprise the complete journal citation network of Web of ScienceSM.

The 2013 Edition of JCR includes:

  • More than 10,800 of the world’s most highly cited, peer reviewed journals in 232 disciplines
  • Nearly 2,500 publishers and 83 countries represented
  • 379 journals receiving their first Journal Impact Factor

Data from the JCR can be used to provide a quantitative, systematic review of the world’s leading journals.

You can access  the JCR and Scopus’s corresponding Journal Analyzer tool via the Library A-Z List of Databases.

If you need any help researching and finding information, using library researcher tools, navigating reference management software or advice on depositing your open access materials in BURO via BRIAN please get in touch with your School Library Team.

British Society of Criminology Annual Conference 2013

Last week the University of Wolverhampton hosted the annual conference of the British Society of Criminology. The Parellel sessions covered a wide range of topics including policing, prisons, diversity, media and culture and gender. Highlights for me were papers on cyberstalking by Italian teenagers and the development of websites that sell illicit drugs with a specific focus on the techonology behind one site Silk Road.

For anyone with a specific interest in prisons and offender welfare some interesting prelimary findings from the largest UK survey of prisoners were presented and this research will be published over the next few months with the first pblication due out at the end of July.

There was also a fascinating paper on research into the experience of prisoners that was conducted by a group of prisoner officers who undertook training in ethnographic research  and were assigned to research prisons where their status as a prison officer was unknown. The paper focused on the impact that undertaking the research had upon the prison officer researchers.

My paper , Exploring female drug-taking during the First World War generated a lively discussion on the female role in drug dealing and law-breaking.

It was an excellent conference and I would like to thank Rosie Read for supporting my application to the Society and Social Welfare Community Budget which enabled me to attend.

Inventions and Intellectual Property Law comes alive at the Festival of Design and Innovation 2013

Fusion

The annual Festival of Design and Innovation (FoDI) opened on Thursday 20 June 2013.  It was an opportunity for students from the School of Design, Engineering and Computing (DEC) to exhibit their innovations and creations. “A cake icing pen, a computer game controlled by brain power and a glamping pod were just some of the ground-breaking ideas and inventions on display at this year’s FoDI.”

During the academic year, final year students from DEC are paired off with final year students from the Law Department studying Intellectual Property (IP) Law.  The law students are tasked with advising their DEC clients on the protection and exploitation of their innovative creations.  The DEC clients then incorporate the advice which they have received from the ‘lawyers’ into their final year projects.

The IP-DEC Project brings Intellectual Property law to life.  It gives an opportunity for law students to apply IP Law to real-life inventions and in turn it helps the DEC client to understand the importance of strong IP protection when preparing to protect, market and exploit their various creations.

The IP-DEC Project culminates with Awards for the Best DEC Student; Best IP Student and Best IP-DEC Group sponsored by Paul Turner, a retired Patent Attorney.

The Paul Turner Prize for the best IP-DEC Group was awarded at the opening night of the Festival.  The prize was awarded to Law Students Danielle Foster and Luke Trim and DEC Students Benjamen Armstrong, George Burge, Joseph Carter, Markko Reinberg, Nicholas Cron, Thomas Clements and Thomas Reynolds.

Paul Turner with two of the winning DEC students and law students Luke Trim and Danielle Foster.

The Paul Turner Individual Prize for the Best IP Student went to Gemma Jefferies whilst the Paul Turner Prize for the Best DEC Student was awarded to Coco Canessa.  The Individual Prize winners will officially receive their awards at the Graduation Ceremony in November 2013.

The opportunity to apply Intellectual Property Law to real-life scenarios and to real-life innovations together with helping the DEC clients to grasp the importance of IP law, makes this project truly unique.

The IP-DEC Project is co-ordinated by Dr. Dinusha Mendis (Law); Dr. Tania Humphries (DEC); and Dr. Reza Sahandi (DEC).