Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to explore truck drivers’ views toward diet, physical activity, and health care access to inform the development of a weight loss intervention.
...Design/methodology/approach
– The authors conducted four focus groups via teleconference (one) or in person (three). Each focus group included eight to ten truck drivers. Sessions were digitally recorded and transcribed. The authors used thematic analysis of the participant responses to develop themes and subthemes.
Findings
– Truck drivers desired good health, however, many knowledge gaps were identified. Drivers were aware of some healthy foods, but lacked knowledge of appropriate energy intake and healthy weight. Drivers expressed many barriers to eating healthy food and engaging in physical activity on the road. Participants suggested strategies and resources to improve their diet and increase physical activity.
Research limitations/implications
– This qualitative study included a convenience sample of 30 long-haul truck drivers. Consensus of themes and subthemes was achieved by four sessions. Issues facing long-haul truck drivers may be different than other truck drivers. Additional qualitative research should be conducted along with interventions focussed on healthy behaviors that can be implemented in the mobile working environment.
Originality/value
– This is the first focus group study of truck drivers that targets eating and physical activity. Future weight loss intervention designs should address the lack of knowledge and skills. To succeed, interventions should implement strategies to address perceived barriers: access, time limitations, and high cost of healthy lifestyle habits.
Tollefson et al quantify the spatiotemporal overlap of Alaskan brown bears and people. Such interactions between bears and people occur at Wolverine Creek and Cove, and managers were concerned about ...humans displacing bears and whether bears had sufficient access to salmon to continue concurrent sport fishing and bear viewing in a safe environment.
Echocardiographic examinations require a well-trained and competent sonographer to obtain proper anatomic and physiologic data to establish an accurate diagnosis for clinical decision-making and ...patient management. Although the formal education and training of cardiovascular sonographers are evolving, many entry-level and staff sonographers may not have sufficient practical or clinical knowledge of the necessary components of the echocardiographic study for the individual patient's clinical presentation. In many clinical settings, echocardiograms are read after the patient has left the laboratory. Thus, there is a role for a sonographer who can practice at an advanced level in a cardiovascular ultrasound laboratory to ensure a proper echocardiographic examination is performed on every patient. In this setting, an Advanced Cardiovascular Sonographer (ACS) would be able to review the indication for and quality of the examination. If additional images were needed, the ACS would assist the sonographer in obtaining these images, which would lead to the performance of a complete and fully diagnostic examination before the patient had left the echocardiography laboratory. In clinical practice, the quality of the examinations performed would improve, advancements in echocardiographic methods could be taught and incorporated into daily practice, and patients would be better served. The present report is a proposal from the American Society of Echocardiography Advanced Practice Task Force that identifies the potential of cardiac sonographers to achieve the ACS level.
Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to explore truck drivers’ views toward diet, physical activity, and health care access to inform the development of a weight loss intervention.
...Design/methodology/approach
– The authors conducted four focus groups via teleconference (one) or in person (three). Each focus group included eight to ten truck drivers. Sessions were digitally recorded and transcribed. The authors used thematic analysis of the participant responses to develop themes and subthemes.
Findings
– Truck drivers desired good health, however, many knowledge gaps were identified. Drivers were aware of some healthy foods, but lacked knowledge of appropriate energy intake and healthy weight. Drivers expressed many barriers to eating healthy food and engaging in physical activity on the road. Participants suggested strategies and resources to improve their diet and increase physical activity.
Research limitations/implications
– This qualitative study included a convenience sample of 30 long-haul truck drivers. Consensus of themes and subthemes was achieved by four sessions. Issues facing long-haul truck drivers may be different than other truck drivers. Additional qualitative research should be conducted along with interventions focussed on healthy behaviors that can be implemented in the mobile working environment.
Originality/value
– This is the first focus group study of truck drivers that targets eating and physical activity. Future weight loss intervention designs should address the lack of knowledge and skills. To succeed, interventions should implement strategies to address perceived barriers: access, time limitations, and high cost of healthy lifestyle habits.
Elsewhere in Iraq, looting appeared to be on the wane, and Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit was under U.S. control. Troops continued ferreting out pockets of resistance -- especially foreign ...fighters who entered Iraq to support the old regime -- and searching for chemical and biological weapons and Mr. Hussein, his two sons, and other regime leaders. In Washington, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the U.S. was restocking hospitals and beginning the process of rebuilding ministries. About 100 Iraqis attended the meeting, with Zalmay Khalilzad, the White House envoy to Iraq, serving as moderator. U.S. general Jay Garner, who has been designated as head of an interim administration, also attended, along with other U.S. and British officials, and promised that the U.S. had no intention of ruling Iraq. Syria has denied having chemical weapons or cooperating with the Hussein regime and has visibly bristled at the public challenge from the Bush administration. Its relationship with the U.S. is complicated. While for years the country has been designated by the U.S. as a state sponsor of terrorism, it has provided intelligence help in the war on terror, and U.S. administrations have wooed Damascus to make peace with Israel by exempting it from many of the stringent economic sanctions imposed on Libya, Iran and other countries that are part of the U.S. terrorism list.
As at Nasiriyah, much of the fighting occurred in places through which elements of the U.S. military had already passed in recent days. That raised the question of whether Iraqi military leaders had ...initially lost communications links to the field and had now regained them. Another possibility is that Iraqi forces, knowing they would be slaughtered in a head-on fight with a far-more-powerful foe, hid in the cities, waiting to ambush more-vulnerable U.S. support troops following behind. Besides endangering troops, the fighting in the south has so far deprived the U.S. of an important psychological weapon. Going into the war, U.S. planners hoped that American troops would be greeted by joyous civilians in the southern city of Basra and elsewhere that would be broadcast around the globe. U.S. officials expected to use the resulting pictures to help persuade Iraqi troops and civilians elsewhere to abandon Mr. Saddam Hussein and his regime. The division near Karbala already was responding to the U.S. assault with artillery fire aimed at advancing U.S. troops from the Army's Third Infantry Division. U.S. warplanes hammered guard divisions Monday with 2,000-pound satellite-guided bombs. The planes also hit two other Republican Guard units on the immediate southern outskirts of Baghdad.
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