The Boolean 2022 Vol.6

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https://hdl.handle.net/10468/14644

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    Introduction
    (The Boolean, University College Cork, 2022) Ramsay, Ruth
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    Decisions decisions – A farmer's mitigation dilemma
    (The Boolean, University College Cork, 2022) Cantillon, Marion; O'Driscoll, Conor; Niemitz, Lorenzo; Murphy, Stephen; Cheemarla, Vinay Kumar Reddy; Meyer, Melissa Isabella; Taylor, David Emmet Austin; Cluzel, Gaston
    Livestock producers are under rising pressure to nourish a growing population while simultaneously reducing the impact of meat/milk production on the planets’ climate. Decision Support Tools (DST) provide a valuable evidence-based decision-making framework in agriculture to improve productivity and environmental outputs. Decision Support Tools are often developed and designed by local stakeholders and tend to represent their national system. While current DSTs may be used to examine the impact of management choices on farm emissions, there are relatively few tools available for Irish farms that take into account both the environmental and financial aspects of decision-making. This research will improve existing farm scale descision support systems designed to cost effectively mitigate Green House Gas emissions from livestock production systems.
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    Echoes from history: Women, drug-use, and cultural shame
    (The Boolean, University College Cork, 2022) Lynch, Arhonda; O'Driscoll, Conor; Niemitz, Lorenzo; Murphy, Stephen; Cheemarla, Vinay Kumar Reddy; Meyer, Melissa Isabella; Taylor, David Emmet Austin; Cluzel, Gaston
    Women who use drugs continue to be mostly overlooked in research or are depicted as promiscuous and licentious.31 The legacy of a patriarchal past and moralistic societal attitudes still features heavily on the pathways to recovery for women. This project will focus on the structural barriers faced by women in accessing supports for alcohol and/or drug use. The aim is to explore the potential harm caused to women due to the structural and often patriarchal barriers they experience in accessing supports. Historically, drug treatment and policies have emerged from knowledge produced by a ‘male-based society’, for what was perceived to be, predominantly a ‘male problem’.4, 34 Lorde17 asserts the ‘master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house’ thus male-based knowledge production will not serve women as well as it does men. The dominant culture has valued a punitive ideology of addiction that dismisses the needs of women who use drugs and fails to address the abuses perpetrated against them. Challenging this ideology, through viewing this as a feminist and human rights issue, will be the core argument within this project.
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    The impact of light based technologies in the future of healthcare
    (The Boolean, University College Cork, 2022) Saito Nogueira, Marcelo; O'Driscoll, Conor; Niemitz, Lorenzo; Murphy, Stephen; Cheemarla, Vinay Kumar Reddy; Meyer, Melissa Isabella; Taylor, David Emmet Austin; Cluzel, Gaston
    There has been an increasing interest in light-based technologies offering cheap, fast and noninvasive disease detection and treatment. In 2016, the market of light-based technologies represented >64% of the total medical imaging market ($90.7 billion in total) and more than twice the radiological imaging market that included X-Ray, ultrasound, magnetic resonant imaging and others. Light-based technologies have steadily increased with the mobile and home healthcare, as well as wearable devices dominating the market to monitor quality of sleep, sports performance, and blood oxygenation in general (including COVID-19 cases). Given the importance of light in the future of healthcare, this paper covers how light-based technologies are used to find diseases early (screening) and accurately (diagnostics) in both whole body (systemically with screening tests) or localized parts of the body (during surgery).
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    Who gets child protection and welfare services and why?
    (The Boolean, University College Cork, 2022) O'Leary, Donna; O'Driscoll, Conor; Niemitz, Lorenzo; Murphy, Stephen; Cheemarla, Vinay Kumar Reddy; Meyer, Melissa Isabella; Taylor, David Emmet Austin; Cluzel, Gaston
    When children are reported to Tusla Child and Family Agency, social workers may conduct Initial Assessments to determine their safety and welfare to decide if they need ongoing services. We know little about these impactful decisions. Equally, little is known about the nature of concerns investigated or about the children and families themselves. The research for my PhD addressed this evidence gap. I conducted two empirical studies in Tusla between 2015 and 2016. In the first, a case study, I used case file records and interviews to explore social workers’ rationales for their judgments and decisions. In the second, a cross-sectional study, I coded written case records to profile the population undergoing assessments and identify, through multivariable analysis, factors associated with the decision to provide ongoing service.The study developed new insights into the characteristics of children and families undergoing initial assessment and into decision making processes. Social workers’ judgments about service needs are informed by case factors, policies, resource constraints and their perception of their expertise and role. Almost 40% of children assessed received ongoing service. Multivariable analysis indicated decisions to provide ongoing services are multifactorial, influenced by a handful of current and historic case and organisation factors. This is the largest study of Initial Assessments conducted in Ireland to date. Implications of the findings for interventions, policy and further research are discussed.