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For small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) seeking to adhere to sustainable standards and gain a sustained competitive edge, green marketing and cleaner production are increasingly imperative. Green marketing has grown a lot in popularity in the present market, which makes it possible to rebrand and repackage existing products. This study looks at how green marketing in Algerian industrial SMEs might help achieve sustainability through cleaner production. Data analysis was performed using Smart PLS 4 softwareV.4.1.0.8 and structural equation modeling. With a mediation effect of 47.4%—higher than the direct impact of cleaner production on sustainability—the study's conclusion is that green marketing strongly mediates the relationship between cleaner production and sustainability. This suggests that by combining green marketing with cleaner production methods, SMEs can reap significant profits. In accordance with their financial and environmental goals, SMEs can effectively incorporate cleaner production methods and green marketing with the help of the research's practical recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Meat is an important source of high-value protein providing sustainable nutrition for human health. The discolouration of meat results in significant waste, which threatens the sustainability of meat production in terms of availability, affordability, and utilisation. Advancing the knowledge of factors and underlying mechanisms for meat discolouration supports the sustainability transformation of meat production practices. Previous studies found that colour stability may be associated with signature changes in certain metabolites, including NADH, glutamate, methionine, and testosterone. This study aimed to confirm the effect of these metabolites and sex, sire, and muscle type on lamb meat colour. NADH and glutamate improved colour stability as evidenced by the increased metmyoglobin reductase activity, while methionine and testosterone had detrimental effects. Overall, lamb meat was discoloured with retail display for up to 10 days at 4 °C. The semitendinosus muscle had higher L*, b*, and hue angle and lower a* (p < 0.05) than other muscles, especially in ewes. Lamb meat from rams had a higher L* and hue angle and lower a* than the ewes (p < 0.05), especially in the colour-labile group, suggesting an interaction between sex and sire. The outcomes of this study will help make the production of meat more sustainable by assisting the meat industry in improving the selection of animals for meat production and processing practices to reduce meat waste due to discolouration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Meat is an important source of high-value protein providing sustainable nutrition for human health. The discolouration of meat results in significant waste, which threatens the sustainability of meat production in terms of availability, affordability, and utilisation. Advancing the knowledge of factors and underlying mechanisms for meat discolouration supports the sustainability transformation of meat production practices. Previous studies found that colour stability may be associated with signature changes in certain metabolites, including NADH, glutamate, methionine, and testosterone. This study aimed to confirm the effect of these metabolites and sex, sire, and muscle type on lamb meat colour. NADH and glutamate improved colour stability as evidenced by the increased metmyoglobin reductase activity, while methionine and testosterone had detrimental effects. Overall, lamb meat was discoloured with retail display for up to 10 days at 4 °C. The semitendinosus muscle had higher L*, b*, and hue angle and lower a* (p < 0.05) than other muscles, especially in ewes. Lamb meat from rams had a higher L* and hue angle and lower a* than the ewes (p < 0.05), especially in the colour-labile group, suggesting an interaction between sex and sire. The outcomes of this study will help make the production of meat more sustainable by assisting the meat industry in improving the selection of animals for meat production and processing practices to reduce meat waste due to discolouration.

After natural resources are mined, they are stored in cities in the form of urban minerals through the construction of buildings. However, buildings have many negative impacts on nature from the time they are constructed and used to the end of their life cycles when they are demolished and discarded. At present, many researchers have conducted research on the recycling of buildings, including the whole life cycle of buildings, the value assessment of the construction waste, the recycling boundary of the construction waste, and the way building waste could be reused. These studies all need to discuss the types of construction waste and their total volume. Urban mining uses GIS data (top-down) and the same type of building material per unit area (bottom-up) to provide a broad calculation method for the construction waste, but it fails to accurately obtain the exact amount of each material of the building. From the perspective of architectural design, the same type of buildings tend to have different spaces and structures due to factors such as the site, orientation, and function. These all affect the way construction waste is reused. This paper aims to create a framework for the reuse of construction waste to improve the accuracy and diversity of the reuse of construction waste in the future. The main purpose of this article is to provide a more accurate assessment of the material which is contained in a building. Using a 48-year-old office building in the Taiwan Contemporary Culture Laboratory (TCCLab) as the research case study, the paper compares the data calculated by different methods and verifies the difference between the bottom-up and the disassembly classification method proposed in this study. According to the architectural design principles, the authors first carried out a 3D digital modeling of the office building (including the building structure) using a forward construction sequence and then they proposed the framework of the material classification and the reuse of the reinforced concrete (RC) of the office building using the method of reverse disassembly, hoping to provide a reference for the reuse of construction waste. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. Healthcare expenditure is growing at an unsustainable rate in developed countries. A recent scoping review identified several alternative healthcare delivery models with the potential to improve health system sustainability. Our objective was to obtain input and consensus from an expert Delphi panel about which alternative models they considered most promising for increasing value in healthcare delivery in Australia and to contribute to shaping a research agenda in the field. Methods. The panel first reviewed a list of 84 models obtained through the preceding scoping review and contributed additional ideas in an open round. In a subsequent scoring round, the panel rated the priority of each model in terms of its potential to improve health care sustainability in Australia. Consensus was assumed when -50% of the panel rated a model as (very) high priority (consensus on high priority) or as not a priority or low priority (consensus on low priority). Results. Eighty-two of 149 invited participants (55%) representing all Australian states/territories and wide expertise completed round one; 71 completed round two. Consensus on high priority was achieved for 59 alternative models; 14 were rated as (very) high priority by -70% of the panel. Top priorities included improving medical service provision in aged care facilities, providing single-point-access multidisciplinary care for people with chronic conditions and providing tailored early discharge and hospital at home instead of in-patient care. No consensus was reached on 47 models, but no model was deemed low priority. Conclusions. Input froman expert stakeholder panel identified healthcare deliverymodels not previously synthesised in systematic reviews that are a priority to investigate. Strong consensus exists among stakeholders regarding which models require the most urgent attention in terms of (cost-)effectiveness research. These findings contribute to shaping a research agenda on healthcare delivery models and where stakeholder engagement in Australia is likely to be high. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Background Maintained study-based registers (SBRs) have, at their core, study records linked to, potentially, multiple other records such as references, data sets, standard texts and full-text reports. Such registers can minimise and refine searching, de-duplicating, screening and acquisition of full texts. SBRs can facilitate new review titles/updates and, within seconds, inform the team about the potential workload of each task. Methods We discuss the advantages/disadvantages of SBRs and report a case of how such a register was used to develop a successful grant application and deliver results—reducing considerable redundancy of effort. Results SBRs saved time in question-setting and scoping and made rapid production of nine Cochrane systematic reviews possible. Conclusion Whilst helping prioritise and conduct systematic reviews, SBRs improve quality. Those funding information specialists for literature reviewing could reasonably stipulate the resulting SBR to be delivered for dissemination and use beyond the life of the project.

Abstract Wikipedia, the free-content online encyclopaedia, contains many heavily accessed pages relating to healthcare. Cochrane systematic reviews contain much high-grade evidence but dissemination into Wikipedia has been slow. New skills are needed to both translate and relocate data from Cochrane reviews to implant into Wikipedia pages. This letter introduces a programme to greatly simplify the process of disseminating the summary of findings of Cochrane reviews into Wikipedia pages.

Bio-oxidation technology for leaching sulfide mineral of refractory gold concentrate is cleaner than conventional methods. Although liquid agitation can maintain cells and particles in suspension, thereby improving the mass transfer efficiency of oxygen, carbon dioxide, and nutrients, it also generates shear stress, which can reduce bio-oxidation reaction efficiency by destroying shear sensitive cells. In this study, a multiphase Eulerian model with the standard k - ε equation and auxiliary models were evaluated based on previously conducted experiments investigating two and three phase flows of gas-liquid, solid-liquid and gas-liquid-solid. The predicted shear stress on bacteria, gas holdup, bubble diameter and turbulence energy dissipation rate were then calculated by these models to reveal the key factors influencing bio-leaching efficiency and to analyze the primary region in which cell death occurs. The results showed that shear stress on bacteria in the impeller region is higher than in other regions. Based on the results of the study, an optimal operation condition was applied to bio-oxidation technology investigations. Comparing with classic roasting technology, bio-oxidation technology completely eliminates toxic gas emissions, reduces 4.3tons of wastewater per ton of refractory gold concentrate and reduces the leaching toxicity of total arsenic in the solid waste from 0.57 mg/L to 0.36 mg/L. It is demonstrated that bio-oxidation technology is cleaner and more eco-friendly than classic roasting technology. This work provides guidance for further study and designation of the stirred bioreactor scale-up in both biochemical and environmental engineering applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Healthcare costs have been increasing worldwide mainly due to over utilization of resources. The savings potentially achievable from systematic, comprehensive, and cooperative reduction in waste are far higher than from more direct and blunter cuts in care and coverage. At King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Center inappropriate and over utilization of the glucose test strips used for whole blood glucose determination using glucometers was observed. The hospital implemented a project to improve its utilization. Using the Six Sigma DMAIC approach (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control), an efficient practice was put in place including updating the related internal policies and procedures and the proper implementation of an effective users’ training and competency check off program. That resulted in decreasing the unnecessary Quality Control (QC) runs from 13% to 4%, decreasing the failed QC runs from 14% to 7%, lowering the QC to patient testing ratio from 24/76 to 19/81. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Waste in the NHS is estimated to account for 20% of health expenditure. This article examines the literature on reducing waste, analyses some approaches to waste reduction, and identifies the role that nurses and other health professionals can play in developing a sustainable NHS. For the purposes of the article, and to inform nursing practice, the definition of, and discussion about, waste is broader than that outlined by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) controlled waste regulations, and the Royal College of Nursing classification. It includes clinical waste, waste arising out of clinical practice, service delivery and care, infrastructure, and carbon emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wikipedia, the free-content online encyclopaedia, contains many heavily accessed pages relating to healthcare. Cochrane systematic reviews contain much high-grade evidence but dissemination into Wikipedia has been slow. New skills are needed to both translate and relocate data from Cochrane reviews to implant into Wikipedia pages. This letter introduces a programme to greatly simplify the process of disseminating the summary of findings of Cochrane reviews into Wikipedia pages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data extraction is one of the most time-consuming tasks in performing a systematic review. Extraction is often onto some sort of form. Sharing completed forms can be used to check quality and accuracy of extraction or for re-cycling data to other researchers for updating. However, validating each piece of extracted data is time-consuming and linking to source problematic. In this methodology paper, we summarize three methods for reporting the location of data in original full-text reports, comparing their advantages and disadvantages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

R&D executives at-e Just beginning to consider implementing the principles of lean manufacturing. However, because R&D has different economics and different value creation mechanisms than manufacturing, lean R&D must differ substantially from lean manufacturing. Fortunately, many familiar lean concepts such as controlling queues, reducing batch size, and reducing waste can easily be transported into R&D organizations. Others, like variability reduction, must be approached very differently, because eliminating all variability in R&D also eliminates all value-added. Lean principles, used skillfully, offer the potential to simultaneously improve the cost, quality and speed of the R&D process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Health care service bundling experiments at the state and regional levels have showed reduced costs by providing a single lump-sum reimbursement for anesthesia services, surgery, and postoperative care. Potential for cost savings related to the provision of anesthesia care has the potential to significantly impact sustainability. This study defines and quantifies routine and preventable anesthetic drug waste and the patient, procedure, and anesthesia provider characteristics associated with increased waste., Methods: Over a 12-month period, the type and quantity of clean drugs prepared by the anesthesia team for the first case of the day were recorded. The amount of each drug administered was obtained from the computerized anesthesia record, and data were analyzed to determine the incidence and cost of routine and preventable drug waste. The monthly and yearly cost of preventable waste, including the cost of pharmacy tech labor and materials where applicable, was estimated based on surgical case volume at the study institution. All analyses were performed using SAS software v9.2., Results: Anesthetic drugs prepared for 543 separate surgical cases were observed. Less than 20% of cases generated routine waste. Preventable waste was generated most frequently for ephedrine (59.5% of cases), succinylcholine (33.7%), and lidocaine (25.1%), and least frequently for ondansetron (1.3%), phenylephrine (2.6%), and dexamethasone (2.8%). The estimated yearly cost of preventable anesthetic drug waste was $185,250., Conclusions: Significant potential savings with little impact on clinically significant availability may be achieved through the use of prefilled syringes for some commonly used anesthetic drugs. An intelligently implemented switch to prefilled syringes for select drugs is a potential cost saving measure, but savings might be diminished by disposal of prefilled syringes when they expire, hidden costs in the hospital pharmacy, and inability to supply some medications in prefilled syringes due to stability or manufacturing issues., (Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)