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The purpose of this research is to increase consumers' use of food thermometers to test the endpoint temperature of small cuts of meats.

The project integrates research, classroom and non‐formal education.

Instant‐read food thermometers were available in >73 percent of USA supermarkets and most were accurate within 1.1°C. Lethality findings include that ground beef patties should either be cooked in a two‐sided grill or turned frequently during cooking. Focus group participants said the primary motivator to food thermometer use was avoidance of foodborne illness. Educational materials positively affected thermometer use among consumers.

Behavior change will be facilitated by widespread availability of thermometers, inclusion of endpoint temperatures in recipes, and seeing others use food thermometers.

This project develops and delivers information to encourage use of food thermometers to assess endpoint temperature when cooking small meat items.

The purpose of this paper is to explain current processes which are part of the eGovernment agenda in Dutch governmental organizations: these processes are part of a transformation of government organizations and municipalities towards networked organizations (“infocracies”). The paper also aims to show which difficulties municipalities are faced with, and how an instrument for measuring information quality and management can help municipalities cope with these developments that come with the transformation.

The paper analyses current developments and the challenges that government organizations are confronted with, and shows how a measurement instrument can contribute in helping government organizations cope with these developments.

The findings show that IT is an enabler for government organizations to transform towards networked organizations. In a municipal setting, this has led to the creation of authentic registrations as a crucial element of the networked organization. The main challenges for municipalities with regard to the implementation of authentic registrations are not technical but organizational of nature: there is a need for information sharing and cooperation, process and chain orientation and an awareness of the interdependencies which are inherent to authentic registrations. The EGEM Thermometer makes the challenges and obstacles, which obstruct the successful implementation of authentic registrations visible, and provides municipalities with a base to start the implementation thereof.

The Thermometer is currently based on a pilot project and a project that was the start of the Thermometer, which is made up of six municipalities.

The use of the EGEM Thermometer helps municipalities by creating insight, awareness, sense‐of‐urgency and a basis for organizational development.

The paper illustrates how measurement and feedback sessions can help organizations cope with IT challenges in relation to cooperation, service delivery, enforcement and information management.

CONVENTIONAL aircraft thermometers are of the platinum‐resistance type, comprising one arm of a Wheatstone bridge network. The meter connected to the network is graduated on a temperature scale and different values are due to changes in the resistance of the platinum element. These arise from variations in the temperature of the air immediately in contact with the element or its protective casing. Any indicated temperature is a measure of the temperature of the air in contact with the thermometer. It is also the temperature of those parts of the aircraft over which the air is moving at the same speed as it is flowing past the thermometer. Since the air does not flow at the same speed over all parts of the aircraft it is clear that by mounting thermometers in different positions on an aircraft, different temperatures will be obtained. Due mainly to kinetic heating none of these will be the true temperature of the air in the free stream—i.e. away from the influence of the aircraft—and to obtain the free stream air temperature it is necessary to apply corrections. For many purposes, particularly meteorological research, it is important to be able to obtain true air temperatures from indicated air temperatures quickly and accurately and it is with this purpose in mind that the diagram to be described was devised and constructed.

IT has become increasingly obvious that however good the thermometers may be in an aeroplane, they are liable to errors—sometimes quite large ones—as a result of vibration, fatigue or plain accidental damage. It seems quite likely that on operational machines an error, as long as it is constant, is of no great importance; as most pilots look for variations in their normal readings, rather than judge by the readings themselves, and, therefore, it is probably sufficient if any instrument that is obviously suspect is tested, and the others are‐taken as satisfactory.

BOEING are using IRCON ULTIMAX™ portable infra‐red thermometers to check heated pitot tubes mounted eight metres high on 747 aircraft fuselages by measuring the surface temperatures, remotely, from the ground.

The purpose of this paper is to present the performance of an 8-bit hybrid DAC which is suitable for wireless application or part of a built-in test block for ADC. The hybrid architecture used is the combination of thermometer coding and binary-weighted resistor architectures.

The conventional DAC topology performance tends to degrade at high-resolution applications. A hybrid topology, which combines an equal number of bits of thermometer coding and binary-weighted resistor architectures operating at higher sampling frequency, was proposed in this work. The die was fabricated in 180 nm CMOS process technology with a supplied voltage of 1.8 V.

Measured results showed that the DNL and INL errors are within −1 to +1 LSB and −0.9 to +0.9 LSB, respectively for the input range of 0.9 V at the clock rate of 200 MHz, and this DAC was proven monotonic. This 0.068 mm² DAC consumed 12.6 mW for the data conversion.

This paper is of value in showing the equal division of bits from thermometer coding and binary-weighted resistor architectures provides smaller die size and enhances the performance of hybrid DAC, in terms of linearity, which are DNL and INL errors and guarantees monotonicity at higher sampling frequency.

The psycho-oncology and social work services recognised that a cancer diagnosis and treatment can result in considerable emotional consequences for patients, yet the referral rate to both services was extremely low. Only very visibly distressed patients were being referred to the service. The “Distress Thermometer” (DT), a distress screening tool, was introduced as a pilot project with day care and inpatient oncology patients of St Vincent ' s University Hospital, Dublin, in an effort to improve the identification, management and treatment of psychological distress in oncology patients. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effectiveness of this new intervention.

The Psycho-oncology service in conjunction with the Medical Social Work Department and Nursing Management at St Vincent ' s University Hospital, Dublin, initiated a Distress Education Management and Training Programme (DEMP). The initiative involved providing a training programme for oncology nursing staff and the introduction of a distress-screening tool for patients. In 1998, the DT was developed and validated for evaluation of distress (and depression) in cancer. It was adopted into recommendations made by the US National Comprehensive Cancer Network. The DT is a simple, self-report, pencil and paper measure consisting of a line with a 0-10 scale anchored at the zero point with “No distress” and at scale point ten with “Extreme distress”. Patients are given the instruction, “How distressed have you been during the past week on a scale of 0-10”? Patients indicated their level of distress with a mark on the scale. Patients scoring 4 or above were regarded as requiring intervention. The DT includes a problem checklist. The patient is asked to identify those problems from the checklist which are contributing to their score. The use of the DT was evaluated through interviews with patients and professionals.

Patients who scored four or above (38 per cent of patients), were seen by the Oncology Social Worker for psychosocial assessment and mental health triage. Patients who scored above a certain level (usually above 12/20) in the clinical range on the Hospital Anxiety and Depression scale (3 per cent) were referred to Psycho-oncology. That 38 per cent of oncology patients required intervention from a specialist service accurately reflects international findings on the rate of distress among cancer patients.

Assessment of cancer patients ' distress levels in a structured and planned manner with a Distress Thermometer, as recommended by best international practice, works very effectively and should be considered for all cancer out-patients This will have implications in terms of staff that will be required to manage such a service.

This was the first time that this internationally recognised tool was used to such an extent and to positive effect in an Irish context.

This paper describes an experimental study into the validity and reliability of international qualitative market research through the Internet. Is it possible to generate valuable and valid qualitative market information from several countries, on the basis of on‐line research organised from one country? The results of face‐to‐face research and on‐line research in Singapore, the United Kingdom and Sweden are compared. The study clarifies the opportunities and limitations in using this type of market research in an international context.