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BACKGROUND: Central and bridge nodes can drive significant overall improvements within their respective networks. We aimed to identify them in 16 prevalent chronic diseases during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic to guide effective intervention strategies and appropriate resource allocation for most significant holistic lifestyle and health improvements. METHODS: We surveyed 16 512 adults from July 2020 to August 2021 in 30 territories. Participants self-reported their medical histories and the perceived impact of COVID-19 on 18 lifestyle factors and 13 health outcomes. For each disease subgroup, we generated lifestyle, health outcome, and bridge networks. Variables with the highest centrality indices in each were identified central or bridge. We validated these networks using nonparametric and case-dropping subset bootstrapping and confirmed central and bridge variables' significantly higher indices through a centrality difference test. FINDINGS: Among the 48 networks, 44 were validated (all correlation-stability coefficients >0.25). Six central lifestyle factors were identified: less consumption of snacks (for the chronic disease: anxiety), less sugary drinks (cancer, gastric ulcer, hypertension, insomnia, and pre-diabetes), less smoking tobacco (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), frequency of exercise (depression and fatty liver disease), duration of exercise (irritable bowel syndrome), and overall amount of exercise (autoimmune disease, diabetes, eczema, heart attack, and high cholesterol). Two central health outcomes emerged: less emotional distress (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, eczema, fatty liver disease, gastric ulcer, heart attack, high cholesterol, hypertension, insomnia, and pre-diabetes) and quality of life (anxiety, autoimmune disease, cancer, depression, diabetes, and irritable bowel syndrome). Four bridge lifestyles were identified: consumption of fruits and vegetables (diabetes, high cholesterol, hypertension, and insom

Item does not contain fulltext, BACKGROUND: Clinical decision-making for patients with myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) is challenging, and both disease and treatment effects heavily impact health-related quality of life (HRQoL) of these patients. Therefore, disease-specific HRQoL measures can be critical to harness the patient voice in MDS research. METHODS: We report a prospective international validation study of the Quality of Life in Myelodysplasia Scale (QUALMS) with a main focus on providing information on the psychometric characteristics of its three subscales: physical burden (QUALMS-P), emotional burden (QUALMS-E), and benefit finding (QUALMS-BF). The analysis is based on patients enrolled from three European countries and Israel, participating to the MDS-RIGHT Project. The scale structure and psychometric properties of the QUALMS were assessed. RESULTS: Overall, 270 patients with a median age of 74 years were analyzed and the majority of them (60.3%) had a low MDS-Comorbidity Index score. Results of the confirmatory factor analysis supported the underlying scale structure of the QUALMS, which, in addition to a total score, includes three subscales: QUALMS-P, QUALMS-E, and the QUALMS-BF. The QUALMS-P exhibited the highest Cronbach's alpha coefficients. Discriminant validity analysis indicated good results with the QUALMS-P and QUALMS-E distinguishing between patients with different performance status, comorbidity, anemia, and transfusion dependency status. No floor and ceiling effects were observed. Responsiveness to change analysis supported the validity of the measure. Patients with a hemoglobin (Hb) level of <11 g/dL at study entry, who subsequently showed an improvement in their Hb levels, also reported a mean score change of 9 and 8 points (scales ranging between 0 and 100) in the expected direction of the QUALMS-E and QUALMS-P, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Our study provides additional validation data on the QUALMS from the international MDS-RIGHT Project. The use of this disease-spec

BACKGROUND: The health area being greatest impacted by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and residents' perspective to better prepare for future pandemic remain unknown. We aimed to assess and make cross-country and cross-region comparisons of the global impacts of COVID-19 and preparation preferences of pandemic. METHODS: We recruited adults in 30 countries covering all World Health Organization (WHO) regions from July 2020 to August 2021. 5 Likert-point scales were used to measure their perceived change in 32 aspects due to COVID-19 (-2 = substantially reduced to 2 = substantially increased) and perceived importance of 13 preparations (1 = not important to 5 = extremely important). Samples were stratified by age and gender in the corresponding countries. Multidimensional preference analysis displays disparities between 30 countries, WHO regions, economic development levels, and COVID-19 severity levels. RESULTS: 16 512 adults participated, with 10 351 females. Among 32 aspects of impact, the most affected were having a meal at home (mean (m) = 0.84, standard error (SE) = 0.01), cooking at home (m = 0.78, SE = 0.01), social activities (m = -0.68, SE = 0.01), duration of screen time (m = 0.67, SE = 0.01), and duration of sitting (m = 0.59, SE = 0.01). Alcohol (m = -0.36, SE = 0.01) and tobacco (m = -0.38, SE = 0.01) consumption declined moderately. Among 13 preparations, respondents rated medicine delivery (m = 3.50, SE = 0.01), getting prescribed medicine in a hospital visit / follow-up in a community pharmacy (m = 3.37, SE = 0.01), and online shopping (m = 3.33, SE = 0.02) as the most important. The multidimensional preference analysis showed the European Region, Region of the Americas, Western Pacific Region and countries with a high-income level or medium to high COVID-19 severity were more adversely impacted on sitting and screen time duration and social activities, whereas other regions and countries experienced more cooking and eating at home. Countries wit

BACKGROUND: The interconnected nature of lifestyles and interim health outcomes implies the presence of the central lifestyle, central interim health outcome and bridge lifestyle, which are yet to be determined. Modifying these factors holds immense potential for substantial positive changes across all aspects of health and lifestyles. We aimed to identify these factors from a pool of 18 lifestyle factors and 13 interim health outcomes while investigating potential gender and occupation differences. METHODS: An international cross-sectional study was conducted in 30 countries across six World Health Organization regions from July 2020 to August 2021, with 16 512 adults self-reporting changes in 18 lifestyle factors and 13 interim health outcomes since the pandemic. RESULTS: Three networks were computed and tested. The central variables decided by the expected influence centrality were consumption of fruits and vegetables (centrality = 0.98) jointly with less sugary drinks (centrality = 0.93) in the lifestyles network; and quality of life (centrality = 1.00) co-dominant (centrality = 1.00) with less emotional distress in the interim health outcomes network. The overall amount of exercise had the highest bridge expected influence centrality in the bridge network (centrality = 0.51). No significant differences were found in the network global strength or the centrality of the aforementioned key variables within each network between males and females or health workers and non-health workers (all P-values >0.05 after Holm-Bonferroni correction). CONCLUSIONS: Consumption of fruits and vegetables, sugary drinks, quality of life, emotional distress, and the overall amount of exercise are key intervention components for improving overall lifestyle, overall health and overall health via lifestyle in the general population, respectively. Although modifications are needed for all aspects of lifestyle and interim health outcomes, a larger allocation of resources and more intensi

Public diplomacy research in the realm of communication science has increased significantly since 2009, particularly in public relations and strategic organizational communication studies. Public diplomacy is generally conceived as a strategic communication instrument comprising different communication methods to inform and engage with foreign publics in order to advance the interests of nation-states. In this chapter, I focus on research on public diplomacy as the communication efforts of a nation (including those of the government itself and institutions that speak on behalf of the government) in advancing national interests and, ultimately, affecting the perception of a nation. In this regard, previous research has examined either subjects (communicators of public diplomacy messages) or objectives of public diplomacy communication.

When researchers analyze journalistic media, they usually select and categorize a sample of different sources. Usually this process includes defining the formats as well as genres of the content that is analyzed. This is normally done before the actual coding process. Both variables refer to manifest categories, provide important information about the analyzed content and are widely used: Especially for journalistic, non-fictional content of print, broadcast or online media, on which we focus in this chapter.

In the study of climate and environmental communication, content analysis—in all its many facets—has been used numerous times and in various ways. This chapter provides an overview of common research designs and (combinations of) methods, showing that a variety of approaches have been applied, ranging from qualitative, to quantitative, to automated content analyses. In addition, we identify the main constructs employed in media content analyses—with issue attention, actors and sources, framing, uncertainty, or visual representations being of primary concern. Finally, we outline research desiderata that should be considered in future studies

Science communication has been defined as encompassing “all forms of communication by and about the sciences, within science (professional audience) as well as in the [broader] public sphere (general audience)”. This broad understanding of science communication includes all kinds of communication focusing on scientific work or scientific results, within science or to non-scientists, in one-directional or dialogical form. It also includes communication about the natural sciences, the arts or the humanities, and it has considerable overlaps with research fields such as health communication and risk communication. Content analysis, especially of media content, is a common method in the research field and this article provides an overview of this research.

Die manuelle Inhaltsanalyse gilt nach wie vor als zentrale Methode kommunikationswissenschaftlicher Forschung. Die nachfolgenden Ausführungen sollen ein Grundverständnis über Merkmale, Schritte, Qualitätskriterien und Schwerpunkte der manuellen Inhaltsanalyse vermitteln, die für die Nachvollziehbarkeit von Konzept und Idee des Handbuchs behilflich sein können. So wird in diesem Kapitel deutlich, was unter standardisierter Inhaltsanalyse – auch in Abgrenzung zur qualitativen Inhaltsanalyse – verstanden wird. Zudem werden auch Qualitätskriterien der manuellen Inhaltsanalyse skizziert, die bei der Auswahl der berichteten Studien in diesem Handbuch und auch der Operationalisierungen für die dazugehörige Datenbank zentral waren.