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This paper analyses the Department of Digital, Culture, Media & Sport committee's inquiry into the economics of music streaming. The scrutiny of the committee's oral and written evidence, and final report is placed within the context of the music industry's significance to UK cultural policy since the late 1990s. The perspectives of the UK's musicians and song-writers are a focal point of the analysis of the inquiry's published documentation, as they are when discussing the committee's recommendations released in July 2021. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Camden and Islington Personality Disorder Service (PDS) increasingly provides clinical consultation to external services. There is a dearth of research on the experience of clinicians delivering such consultation. Interviews were conducted with clinicians from the PDS, and a semantic Thematic Analysis was conducted on transcripts to answer the question, 'What is the experience of Personality Disorder Service staff providing input to staff in external services?' 13 sub-themes under four overarching themes were identified (these latter were: Anxiety, Fragmented Co-working, Task Difficulty, and Positive Outcome). These themes provide an overview of the experience of consulting clinicians. Themes are explored through Kleinian psychoanalytic theory, with reference to Bion's work on containment and groups. Findings suggest that staff need to retain thinking space to work effectively, to feel safe and recover a sense of competence when it is attacked, highlighting the need for access to structures such as supervision. The responsibility for trying to reduce distress, risk (to self, to and from others) and functional disability of people with a diagnosis of personality disorder cannot belong to one person or service but services need to be able to think together to gain a better understanding and have an agreed cross-service response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To identify the rates of potentially inappropriate antibiotic choice when prescribing for common infections in UK general practices. To examine the predictors of such prescribing and the clustering effects at the practice level.Methods: The rates of potentially inappropriate antibiotic choice were estimated using 1 151 105 consultations for sinusitis, otitis media and externa, upper respiratory tract infection (URTI) and lower respiratory tract infection (LRTI) and urinary tract infection (UTI), using the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD). Multilevel logistic regression was used to identify the predictors of inappropriate prescribing and to quantify the clustering effect at practice level.Results: The rates of potentially inappropriate prescriptions were highest for otitis externa (67.3%) and URTI (38.7%) and relatively low for otitis media (3.4%), sinusitis (2.2%), LRTI (1.5%) and UTI in adults (2.3%) and children (0.7%). Amoxicillin was the most commonly prescribed antibiotic for all respiratory tract infections, except URTI. Amoxicillin accounted for 62.3% of prescriptions for otitis externa and 34.5% of prescriptions for URTI, despite not being recommended for these conditions. A small proportion of the variation in the probability of an inappropriate choice was attributed to the clustering effect at practice level (8% for otitis externa and 23% for sinusitis). Patients with comorbidities were more likely to receive a potentially inappropriate antibiotic for URTI, LRTI and UTI in adults. Patients who received any antibiotic in the 12 months before consultation were more likely to receive a potentially inappropriate antibiotic for all conditions except otitis externa.Conclusions: Antibiotic prescribing did not always align with prescribing guidelines, especially for URTIs and otitis externa. Future interventions might target optimizing amoxicillin use in primary care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To examine variations across general practices and factors associated with antibiotic prescribing for common infections in UK primary care to identify potential targets for improvement and optimization of prescribing.Methods: Oral antibiotic prescribing for common infections was analysed using anonymized UK primary care electronic health records between 2000 and 2015 using the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD). The rate of prescribing for each condition was observed over time and mean change points were compared with national guideline updates. Any correlation between the rate of prescribing for each infectious condition was estimated within a practice. Predictors of prescribing were estimated using logistic regression in a matched patient cohort (1:1 by age, sex and calendar time).Results: Over 8 million patient records were examined in 587 UK general practices. Practices varied considerably in their propensity to prescribe antibiotics and this variance increased over time. Change points in prescribing did not reflect updates to national guidelines. Prescribing levels within practices were not consistent for different infectious conditions. A history of antibiotic use significantly increased the risk of receiving a subsequent antibiotic (by 22%-48% for patients with three or more antibiotic prescriptions in the past 12 months), as did higher BMI, history of smoking and flu vaccinations. Other drivers for receiving an antibiotic varied considerably for each condition.Conclusions: Large variability in antibiotic prescribing between practices and within practices was observed. Prescribing guidelines alone do not positively influence a change in prescribing, suggesting more targeted interventions are required to optimize antibiotic prescribing in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The electroencephalogram (EEG) is an important but often over-relied upon investigation in evaluating paroxysmal events of childhood. The UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines for epilepsy help clinicians decide which children should/should not have an EEG. Would introduction of these guidelines in our hospital change the ordering practices of our hospital clinicians? Would introduction reduce unnecessary tests and improve rapidity of obtaining an EEG?Methods: Paediatric EEG requests, results and, where possible, the patient hospital chart were reviewed before and after introduction of an EEG request form (Appendix I) which provided ordering advice as per the NICE epilepsy guideline. Patient age, sex, distance from hospital and ethnicity were reviewed. Also evaluated was clinical indication and time from ordering to performing the EEG.Results: Prior to the new EEG form, 56% of the EEG requests fulfilled the NICE criteria; after its introduction, this increased to 83%. EEGs ordered within the NICE guidelines were abnormal on 61% of occasions, but when ordered outside of the guidelines they were abnormal only 4% of the time (P < 0.0001). After its introduction there was poor use of the new form in practice (only 29% of requests). However, the EEGs were more likely to meet ordering criteria and fewer tests were required, leading to more rapid turn-around times.Conclusion: This study demonstrates the value of using guidelines to improve timeliness and reduce over-utilisation of EEGs in general paediatric practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper charts the turn in the UK New Labour government’s (1997–2010) creative industries policy from an early focus on encouraging wider access to the arts to an increasingly instrumentalist emphasis on self-funding and the generation of wealth from intellectual property. The paper demonstrates the effect of this policy primarily through the case of the teaching of media and communications in UK universities. Focusing on the Skillset Media Academy Network, the authors ask whether this is both the best approach to teaching media and communications in UK universities and appropriate that many of these courses appear to be solely geared towards preparing graduates for jobs in the creative industries. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper analyses the UK's approach to the digitisation of its cultural heritage during the New Labour administration from 1997 to 2010, with a specific emphasis on academic texts and archival documents. Focusing on the identification of common areas of concern across a range of programmes, the paper asks whether a national digitisation strategy is needed and, if so, what form it should take. It concludes with three recommendations for improving the coordination and practice of the digitisation of the UK's cultural heritage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a review of the DCMS's annual estimates of the size, scope and activities of the UK's creative industries, with a particular focus on the latest publication in January 2009. Running parallel to these estimates is a research programme, latterly codified as the Creative Economy Programme (CEP), which constantly assesses and periodically modifies the methodologies used for collating statistics. This programme is also reviewed, primarily through two 2007 documents: a report commissioned from Frontier Economics and a DCMS overview of all the CEP's work in 2006-2007. The review also draws on primary sources in the form of national and international reports on methodologies for classifying and measuring the creative industries, as well as appropriate academic literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

1. Recent studies of rodent populations have demonstrated that certain parasites can cause juveniles to delay maturation until the next reproductive season. Furthermore, a variety of parasites may share the same host, and evidence is beginning to accumulate showing nonindependent effects of different infections. 2. We investigated the consequences for host population dynamics of a disease-induced period of no reproduction, and a chronic reduction in fecundity following recovery from infection (such as may be induced by secondary infections) using a modified SIR (susceptible, infected, recovered) model. We also included a seasonally varying birth rate as recent studies have demonstrated that seasonally varying parameters can have important effects on long-term host–parasite dynamics. We investigated the model predictions using parameters derived from five different cyclic rodent populations. 3. Delayed and reduced fecundity following recovery from infection have no effect on the ability of the disease to regulate the host population in the model as they have no effect on the basic reproductive rate. However, these factors can influence the long-term dynamics including whether or not they exhibit multiyear cycles. 4. The model predicts disease-induced multiyear cycles for a wide range of realistic parameter values. Host populations that recover relatively slowly following a disease-induced population crash are more likely to show multiyear cycles. Diseases for which the period of infection is brief, but full recovery of reproductive function is relatively slow, could generate large amplitude multiyear cycles of several years in length. Chronically reduced fecundity following recovery can also induce multiyear cycles, in support of previous theoretical studies. 5. When parameterized for cowpox virus in the cyclic field vole populations ( Microtus agrestis) of Kielder Forest (northern England), the model predicts that the disease must chronically reduce host fecundity by more than 70%, following recovery from infection, for it to induce multiyear cycles. When the model predicts quasi-periodic multiyear cycles it also predicts that seroprevalence and the effective date of onset of the reproductive season are delayed density-dependent, two phenomena that have been recorded in the field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]