Search

Purpose: Incisional hernia (IH) is one of the most common complications after abdominal surgeries and may bring great suffering to patients. This study aims to evaluate the global trends in IH research from 2003 to 2023 and visualize the frontiers using bibliometric analysis., Methods: The literature search was conducted on the Web of Science for IH studies published from 2003 to 2023 and sorted by citation frequency. The top 100 most-cited articles were analyzed by the annual publication number, prolific countries and institutions, influential author and journal, and the number of citations through descriptive statistics and visualization., Results: The top paper was cited 1075 times and the median number of citations was 146. All studies were published between 2003 and 2019 and the most prolific year was 2003 with 14 articles. Jeekel J and Rosen M were regarded as the most productive authors with ten articles each and acquired 2738 and 2391 citations, respectively. The top three institutions with the most productive articles were Erasmus Mc, Carolinas Med Ctr, and Univ Utah, while the top three countries were the United States, Netherlands and Germany. The most frequent keyword was "incisional hernia" with 55 occurrences, followed by "mesh repair", "randomized controlled trial", and "polypropylene"., Conclusion: The 100 most-cited papers related to IH were published predominantly by USA and European countries, with randomized controlled trial (RCT) and observational study designs, addressing topics related to risk factors, complications, mesh repair, and mesh components., (© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag France SAS, part of Springer Nature.)

Copyright of European Journal of Social Work is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Purpose: The digital age requires people of all ages to communicate and organise their lives through digital technologies. The project EQualCare investigates how the growing population of older people living alone is managing this transition, how it shapes their (non-)digital social networks and what changes on a local level need to be brought about. This paper aims to give insight into the process of participatory action research (PAR) with older people in the community across four countries and reflects on experiences made by academic and co-researchers. Design/methodology/approach: Following the emancipatory underpinnings of PAR, which aims to reduce inequalities through collaboration and co-design, EQualCare involved nine teams of co-researchers across Finland, Germany, Latvia and Sweden making older people the centre of policy development. Co-researchers were involved in formulating research aims, collecting data, reflecting on data, formulating and disseminating recommendations for local policy stakeholders. Findings: Co-researchers' motivation to invest considerable time and effort was driven by a desire to create a more equal future for older people living alone. Moreover, they were keen to involve marginalised older people and became frustrated when this proved difficult. Power dynamics played a role throughout the process but became productive as roles and responsibilities were renegotiated. Doing PAR with older people can be emotionally challenging for co-researchers when negative feelings around ageing are encountered. Originality/value: The paper advances understanding on the process of PAR in ageing research by reflecting on the social, cultural and political contexts of doing PAR with diverse sets of older people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As humanity reaches the 5.0 industrial revolution, education plays a critical role in boosting the quality of human resources. This paper reports bibliometric research on emerging TiP during 1993-2022 in the educational field to analyse its development on any level of education during the last three decades. This study employed a Scopus database. The findings are that the trend of TiP publication in educational fields has tended to increase every year during the past three decades and conference paper became the most published document type, the USA is the country which produces the most publications; "Students" being the most occurrences keyword and total link strength. The publication of the TiP is ranked to the Quartile 1, which implies that a publication with the cited performance is a publication with credibility because the publisher has a good reputation. Researchers can find the topics most relevant to other metadata sources such as Web of Science, Publish, and Perish.

This paper explored the cultural and career transition experiences of two elite West African footballers in Germany using the approach of interpretive biography. By analysing data collected through semi--structured interviews, the players' narratives revealed a range of experiences emerging at different temporal points or life domains. The experiences included the psychosocial states of pre-transition, the challenges associated with language and weather, the increased demands of professionalism, the challenge of adapting to a new environment and routines of daily life, the superficiality of relationships and the attendant loneliness. It however, advanced literature by demonstrating how an African footballer in Europe may locate self and progress career within the European football economy and how a high-status African migrant athlete may use his social position to characterise self in a certain manner so as to exercise the right to belong. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper deals with the conflicts associated with the so-called 'Dieselgate' affair. It explains the interaction of civil society, law firms and political actors which reshapes the legal systems in Europe. Once the federal government in Germany had decided that European car owners should not get any kind of financial compensation, a transnational coalition of consumer organizations and law firms successfully initiated a legal mobilization campaign to counteract the political decision. As a consequence, collective litigation rights were strengthened in Germany and at the European level. Theoretically, the paper refers to the literature on adversarial legalism. Whether this judicialized style of conflict resolution is spreading to Europe ('Eurolegalism') has been a hotly debated topic in political science. Our main argument is that the Dieselgate case is a catalyst event to foster the transformation process towards 'Eurolegalism'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Marc Adelman's Stelen is a collection of 150 images of men posing at the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Germany. Understanding the photographs that compromise Stelen involves tracking a number of shifts that have taken place across different fields: a change in the understanding of the role of the public memorial which has seen the construction of 'anti-memorials' or 'counter-monuments' such as the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe; a turn towards participatory memory practices in museums and at memorial sites; digital photography and the impact of social media. In the first part of this paper, I explore how these trends intersect in order to give an account of the conditions of production of the photographs. Adelman has proposed that the photographs might be understood in relation to the role that the memory of the Holocaust plays in contemporary queer life. In the second part of this paper, I use Michael Rothberg's concept of Multidirectional Memory to consider Stelen as a counter-archive that offers a multidirectional articulation of grief. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Bodenkultur: Journal for Land Management, Food & Environment is the property of Sciendo and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Mosques in Europe have long been and are still at the centre of political debates, despite the decades-long presence of migrant Muslim communities in Europe. Scholars within geography and other disciplines have studied mosques extensively with a focus on urban space politics, and examined tensions and conflicts between migrant mosque communities and the broader segments of the local people. In this paper, I focus on DITIB, a Turkish umbrella mosque organization in Germany, and I carry these debates into a transnational terrain, re-theorizing mosques not only as political sites, but also everyday geopolitical spaces where national imaginaries and territorial struggles take place in the daily lives of mosque communities. Through this approach, I draw on the studies of feminist geographers who have provided a renewed perspective to classical geopolitics discussions by revealing how geopolitical relations, struggles, and interactions also operate in everyday spaces, relations, and bodies of ordinary people by reproducing the deep-seated exclusions, discriminations and contestations. This paper contributes to critical geopolitics and geographies of religion literatures as well as to broader discussions on the geopolitics of religion by analysing how a mosque organization is situated at the centre of geopolitical tensions, and how transnational and transregional controversies operate on the walls and properties of mosques and in everyday social/cultural activities of mosque communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Immigrant minority (IM) languages have a significant presence in certain European regions. Nonetheless, these languages are not usually included in the school curriculum. This paper aims to analyse the studies published between 2010 and 2020 considering IM languages in multilingual European education contexts. The method included a search of academic papers published in the databases ERIC, Web of Science and Scopus, which yielded 42 studies. The studies were analysed by considering: (1) the demographic characteristics of the countries where the studies were conducted, (2) the sociolinguistic or psycholinguistic focus of the papers in relation to the European country, and (3) the characteristics of the bi-multilingual education programme including IM languages. The results indicate that: (1) the demographic characteristics of the country are not strictly related to the number of studies published, (2) most studies have a sociolinguistic approach even though many studies analyse both sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic factors, and (3) only seven multilingual education programmes including IM languages were described in these papers. We conclude that there is a lack of research focusing on IM languages in educational settings and discuss how addressing these gaps could create opportunities for building equitable multilingual communities in Europe.

Aim: The goal of this paper is to analyze the COVID-19 policies of 10 European countries, including Sweden, Finland, Norway, Italy, France, Germany, Poland, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Hungary, with a time-series policy analysis tool. Subject and methods: The results of the COVID-19 policy analysis are based on a single time-series indicator, or daily population mortality rate: the number of COVID-19 daily cumulative deaths divided by the population in millions. The lower the score, the better the policy. Although many experts believe that the COVID-19 policy outcome analysis is premature, time series analysis is an excellent analysis that can provide information on the progress and transition of policy outcomes. In other words, the proposed time series analysis tool allows policymakers to identify and quantify when mistakes were made during the on-going COVID-19 pandemic. Results: The COVID-19 policy analysis discovered many useful facts. Sweden failed due to the herd immunity approach. Hungary made a fundamental mistake in COVID-19 tactics. Countries such as Sweden, Hungary, Belgium, and Poland showed time-series changes that differed from the others. Conclusion: Public health interventions can play a key role in mitigating the COVID-19 pandemic. The proposed policy analysis tool, hiscovid demonstrated the effectiveness of the time-series score behavior for discovering when policymakers made mistakes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whilst the link between young people's well‐being and the creative arts is strengthening, there is a lack of research which focuses on the roles that artists play to help teachers and parents engage young people in the creative arts. This paper explores the benefits of and barriers to artists working in education in six European countries (England, Iceland, Germany, Greece, Italy and Austria). Using the '5A's model of creativity' and a view of professional development taking place within 'landscapes of practice', the data were analysed in order to explain how creativity is operationalised in the different contexts. Our study highlights the need for policy at a national and transnational level to value the creative arts in order to help teachers cross boundaries and utilise the full potential of the creative arts in schools. Our study also highlights that further research is needed into how artists shape teaching and curriculum and how schools engage parents in the creative arts in order to build an evidence‐base relating to young people's positive mental health that can affect policy at these levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Organic farming systems have become widespread in recent decades due to their popularity with consumers and their beneficial effects on the environment and biodiversity. Through the increasing number of available studies from farm surveys and comparable results from long-term field trials, the various real existing forms and intensities of agricultural management were subjected to a closer examination in this review. In this paper, the mean characteristics and the range of variation in crop productivity, crop quality and soil fertility as well as the importance and the extent of environmental impacts are comparatively analyzed. From widespread cultivation systems and forms of nutrient management from Central Europe with a focus on Germany, the following fields of influence were investigated and conclusions for the future optimal design of organic cultivation methods were listed: site, soil conditions, climate, phases of conversion and consolidation, crop rotations and farm structures, application of organic and mineral fertilizer types. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Means-tested transfer schemes in Europe and elsewhere tend to include not only income tests but also asset tests of various sorts. The role of asset tests in minimum income protection provisions has been extensively researched in the Anglo-Saxon context. Far fewer authors have assessed the role of asset tests on social policy in a continental European context. Although asset tests may be useful in singling out the more deserving of the poor, we know relatively little of their actual impact on eligibility and social outcomes in European welfare states. This paper looks at the prevalence and design of asset tests in European minimum income protection schemes. We distinguish between two main types of asset tests: outright disqualification when assets reach a certain value, versus a more gradual tapering at a fictional rate of return. We then analyse in greater detail how asset tests in Belgium and Germany, as representatives of these two types, affect minimum income protection eligibility and poverty outcomes. We use the EUROMOD microsimulation model on the Household Finance and Consumption Survey data in order to assess the effects of asset tests. This survey was explicitly designed to more realistically reflect assets and capital incomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Medical data from family doctors are of great importance to health care researchers but seem to be locked in German practices and, thus, are underused in research. The RADAR project (Routine Anonymized Data for Advanced Health Services Research) aims at designing, implementing and piloting a generic research architecture, technical software solutions as well as procedures and workflows to unlock data from family doctor's practices. A long-term medical data repository for research taking legal requirements into account is established. Thereby, RADAR helps closing the gap between the European countries and to contribute data from primary care in Germany.Methods: The RADAR project comprises three phases: (1) analysis phase, (2) design phase, and (3) pilot. First, interdisciplinary workshops were held to list prerequisites and requirements. Second, an architecture diagram with building blocks and functions, and an ordered list of process steps (workflow) for data capture and storage were designed. Third, technical components and workflows were piloted. The pilot was extended by a data integration workflow using patient-reported outcomes (paper-based questionnaires).Results: The analysis phase resulted in listing 17 essential prerequisites and guiding requirements for data management compliant with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Based on this list existing approaches to fulfil the RADAR tasks were evaluated-for example, re-using BDT interface for data exchange and Trusted Third Party-approach for consent management and record linkage. Consented data sets of 100 patients were successfully exported, separated into person-identifying and medical data, pseudonymised and saved. Record linkage and data integration workflows for patient-reported outcomes in the RADAR research database were successfully piloted for 63 responders.Conclusion: The RADAR project successfully developed a generic architecture together with a technical framework of tools, interfaces, and workflows for a complete infrastructure for practicable and secure processing of patient data from family doctors. All technical components and workflows can be reused for further research projects. Additionally, a Trusted Third Party-approach can be used as core element to implement data privacy protection in such heterogeneous family doctor's settings. Optimisations identified comprise a fully-electronic consent recording using tablet computers, which is part of the project's extension phase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Germany and continental Europe, more broadly, race and ethnicity are concepts that are not widely used and are increasingly erased from the legislation. Nevertheless, race and ethnicity are still used as social markers and often merely replaced with other terms (e.g., cultural background). The goal of this paper is threefold. First, we point to the danger of treating race and ethnicity as essentialist categories, which is still common in developmental science research. Second, we want to outline specific problems that occur when doing research on ethnicity and race with children and adolescents in the European race‐mute context. Third, we suggest that future research ought to focus more on constructions of Whiteness and reproduction of power differences among ethnic majority populations. In doing so, we draw on examples from our own research on ethnic‐racial identity and ethnic‐racial socialization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Water & Land Development is the property of Polish Academy of Sciences and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

What explains regulators’ preferences concerning the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM)? The paper answers this question by providing an alternative account of the creation of the SSM using an institutionalist perspective. It is argued that the creation of the SSM does not simply reflect the material interests of governments and domestic financial firms, but that regulators’ positions were also significantly affected by the institutional environment in which they operated. Two characteristics of domestic supervisory governance are identified: the institutional responsibilities of banking regulators (microprudential and/or macroprudential) and the fragmentation of supervisory and monetary policies. The empirical analysis demonstrates the relevance of these factors for shaping regulators’ preferences both within and across countries. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: This paper explores practical and ethical dilemmas for professionals when securing the protection of children in the complex non‐clinical setting of individual families. It is based on a cross‐country study on cultural encounters in interventions against child physical abuse and neglect in four countries (England/Wales, Germany, Portugal, and Slovenia). Drawing on national reports of legal‐organizational frameworks and socio‐cultural backgrounds of European child protection systems, it also presents the results of a series of focus groups with professionals. Data were analysed to identify implicit and explicit discursive constructions as well as normative representations and from this deriving the key ethical issues and dilemmas. Despite a shared normative framework across Europe, intervention cultures vary across the four countries and between the different stakeholder groups. Although each child protection system faced widespread mistrust, policy approaches differ, some relying on strong and detailed guidance whereas others stress professional skill and judgement. We conclude that despite a shared commitment to the protection of children, deliberations and perceived ethical dilemmas suggest interdependency between differences in system cultures and policy approaches that inform the character of professional interventions in the four countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Sarcoma Policy Checklist was created by a multidisciplinary expert group to provide policymakers with priority areas to improve care for sarcoma patients.Main Body: This paper draws on this research, by looking more closely at how France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom are addressing each of these priority areas. It aims to highlight key gaps in research, policy and practice, as well as ongoing initiatives that may impact the future care of sarcoma patients in different European countries. A pragmatic review of the published and web-based literature was undertaken. Telephone interviews were conducted in each country with clinical and patient experts to substantiate findings. Research findings were discussed within the expert group and developed into five core policy recommendations. The five identified priority areas were: the development of designated and accredited centres of reference; more professional training; multidisciplinary care; greater incentives for research and innovation; and more rapid access to effective treatments. Most of the countries studied have ongoing initiatives addressing many of these priorities; however, many are in early stages of development, or require additional funding and resources.Conclusion: Gaps in access to quality care are particularly concerning in many of Europe's lower-resourced countries. Equitable access to information, clinical trials, innovative treatments and quality specialist care should be available to all sarcoma patients. Achieving this across Europe will require close collaboration between all stakeholders at both the national and European level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyse the health level and health dynamics of migrants from Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), broadly defined, in Germany. Population health in CEE compares badly to Germany. Lifestyle changes and access to better health care in Germany can lead to health improvement of migrants.Design/methodology/approach Longitudinal data from the German Socio-Economic Panel are used. First, the time trends of immigrant and native health are analysed graphically. Second, regression analysis is conducted, controlling for demographic and socio-economic factors when estimating the country of origin effects on health. Finally, regression models are estimated to investigate if social and economic integration significantly improves the subjective well-being of the immigrant groups.Findings Evidence is found for significantly better subjective health of migrants compared to the natives, even if demographic and socio-economic factors are controlled for. Only part of the health advantage is explained by selective migration. The health of the more advantaged migrants tend to decline slower than of the natives.Social implications If migrants are economically and socially integrated in the host country then their presence is unlikely to increase the health burdens of the host country.Originality/value The existing knowledge on the health developments of migrants from CEE in other European countries is limited. Based on richer statistical information, the results of this paper partly contradict earlier findings in the literature, in particular no evidence is seen for worse or quickly declining health of immigrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on research undertaken as part of the EU funded EPPIC project, this paper aims to update and elaborate on the relationship between drug use and offending behaviours by exploring variations within a cross-national sample of drug-experienced young people in touch with criminal justice systems. Adopting a trajectory-based approach, interviews were undertaken with 198 young people aged 15–25 in six European countries (Austria, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Poland, and UK). Data were analysed by applying the Bennett and Holloway categorization of the drugs-crime link, with a focus on the concept of social exclusion as developed by Seddon. Three main types of mechanisms (economic, pharmaceutical, and lifestyles) are used to interpret the data, showing how the relationship between drugs and offending can vary according to type of substances and over time. Furthermore, it can be associated with very different degrees of social exclusion and needs. The results suggest that while economic inequalities still play key roles in explaining drug use and offending, both behaviours can originate from a state of relative deprivation, resulting from the contradictions inherent in 'bulimic societies' that raise aspirations and desires while providing young people scarce opportunities for self-realisation and social recognition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Quartär is the property of Hugo Obermaier-Gesellschaft e.V. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper presents the initial results of an anonymous pilot quantitative survey on Muslims' conception of marriage and divorce, which was conducted in Germany between February and June 2018. The goal of the survey was to assess the attitudes held by Muslims towards these issues. Specifically, the questions aimed at identifying the potential role of the European context in the modification of German Muslims' understanding of marriage and divorce and gender roles, as well as interreligious marriage, mediation, and the role of the secular state in daily life. The results of this survey, although not representative of all Muslim perspectives on secular law, indicate dialogic exchange between Islamic and Western secular conceptions of family law. Contrary to some current assumptions concerning Islamic family law in Europe, the survey shows that there are many Muslims who are in favour of both conceptions (the religious and the secular) and wish to find a balance between them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Population aging is exacerbating the loss of competences in the workforce and simultaneously young people neither in employment nor in education and training (NEETs) are struggling to be reengaged in employment. These issues, which are deemed priorities for the European policy agenda, could be addressed by triggering active aging dimensions, valuing and exploiting older adult entrepreneurs' knowledge for enhancing youngsters' entrepreneurial attitudes, through mentoring. This paper reports the results of a study based on an intergenerational learning program, carried out in 2018 in Germany, Italy and Slovenia. The study was aimed at developing and testing one training on mentoring addressing 41 older adult entrepreneurs (55 and over), and two intergenerational learning trainings aiming at boosting entrepreneurial competences of 33 NEETs (aged 18–29). The impact of the program on older adult entrepreneurs and NEETs was assessed through a pre and post-evaluation using qualitative and quantitative tools. Findings at country level were treated as national case-studies and then the latter were compared by considering them as a multiple embedded case-study. Results indicated that, to different extent in the study countries, mentors learned and enhanced mentoring competences, e.g. active listening and the capability of orienting, improved well-being and self-esteem, social inclusion and active aging attitude. Moreover, NEETs acquired entrepreneurial and socio-relational competences by benefiting from the full exploitation of mentors' know-how and the trust relationship with them. Companies, trade unions, educational and voluntary organizations should cooperate to adopt intergenerational learning programs as good practices for older adults and NEETs' lifelong learning promotion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: The European Society of Cardiology (ESC) guidelines state that heart failure nurse specialists (heart-failure nurses) with specific competences are essential for a successful heart-failure-management programme. Thus, the Heart Failure Association (HFA) of the ESC developed the heart failure nurse curriculum (HFA curriculum). Several ESC member states developed cardiovascular education programmes to enable nurses to deliver high specialist care, but little is known of whether these curricula are in line with the HFA curriculum. Therefore, this paper describes the extent to which cardiovascular education programmes in Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany correspond to the HFA curriculum. Methods and results: A case study approach was adopted to obtain an in-depth understanding of the programme contents in relation to the HFA curriculum. For this purpose, representatives of the educational programmes and/or delegates of the national cardiovascular nursing organization shared their educational curricula. All of the studied cardiovascular education programmes aim to provide heart failure and/or cardiovascular nurses with essential competences for implementation of evidence based and guideline derived care. However, every cardiovascular education programme has a different focus/area of attention. Cardiovascular education in Belgium discusses aspects of all core-learning objectives of the HFA curriculum and emphasizes mostly knowledge aspects of these. Learning objectives in cardiovascular education in The Netherlands focus on chronic diseases in general and on learning objectives concerning patient education, support in self-care and management of device and pharmacological therapy. Cardiovascular education in Germany discusses most learning objectives; however, not all learning objectives receive equal attention. Conclusions: Although local cardiovascular education programmes adopt certain aspects of the HF curriculum, the curriculum as a whole is not adopted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the diversity in patients' experience of biomedicine and contrasts it with the normative view characteristic of health professionals. Ethnographic fieldwork among Polish migrant women in London, Barcelona and Berlin included interviews about their experiences with local healthcare and health professionals. Themes drawn from the narratives are differences between the cities in terms of communication between patients and health professionals, respect for patients' choices and dignity, attitudes to pregnancy and birth (different levels of medicalization), and paediatric care. It is argued that patients continuously negotiate among their own views and expectations based on previous experiences and knowledge from personal communication; internet forums and publications; and the offer of medical services in the countries of their settlement. Patients experience pluralism of therapeutic traditions within and outside bio-medicine. In turn, representatives of bio-medicine are rarely aware of other medical practices and beliefs and this leads to various misunderstandings. By highlighting the pluralism of medical practices in European countries and the increasing mobility of patients, this case study has useful implications for medical anthropologists and health professionals in a broader Western context, such as raising sensitivity to different communication strategies and a diversity of curing traditions and expectations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Millennial-scale climate variations during the last glacial period, such as Dansgaard–Oeschger (DO) cycles and Heinrich events, have been extensively studied using ice core and marine proxy records. However, there is a limited understanding of the magnitude of these temperature fluctuations in continental regions, and questions remain about the seasonal signal of these climate events. This study presents a 60 000-year-long temperature reconstruction based on branched glycerol dialkyl glycerol tetraethers (brGDGTs) extracted from lake sediments from the Eifel Volcanic Field, Germany. brGDGTs are bacterial membrane-spanning lipids that are known to have a strong relationship with temperature, making them suitable for temperature reconstructions. We test several temperature calibration models on modern samples taken from soils and multiple maar lakes. We find a negative bias in brGDGT-based temperature estimates associated with water depth and anoxic conditions that can be corrected for by accounting for a brGDGT isomer that is only produced in anoxic conditions. The corrected temperature reconstruction correlates with proxy and climate model estimates of temperature spanning the same time period, validating the calibration approach we selected. However, millennial-scale variability is significantly dampened in the brGDGT record, and in contrast to other Northern Hemisphere climate records, during several Heinrich stadials, temperatures actually increase. We demonstrate that these apparent discrepancies can be explained by the unique seasonal response of the brGDGT paleothermometer to temperatures of months above freezing (TMAF). Our data support the view that warm-season temperatures in Europe varied minimally during the last glacial period and that abrupt millennial-scale events were defined by colder, longer winters. Our continuous high-resolution temperature reconstruction provides important information about the magnitude of seasonal climate variability during the last glacial period that can be used to test climate models and inform studies of paleoecological change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Seven published and four new pollen records from well-dated sediment cores from six Pleistocene and Holocene maar structures located in the Eifel, Germany, are combined to a pollen stack that covers the entire last 132,000 years. This stack is complemented by new macroremain data from one additional sediment core. The pollen data included into the stack show consistently that the Eifel was covered by a dense forest during the Eemian, early Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 3, and the Holocene. While other European records indeed indicate a warming, the early MIS 3 fully developed forest remains a unique feature in central European pollen records. Comparison to orbital parameters and insolation hints to warm and humid, however, not fully interglacial conditions, which are also visible in speleothem growth throughout Europe. With the cooling trend towards the glacial maxima of MIS 4 and 2, tree pollen declined, with recovering phases during MIS 5c and 5a, as well as during all MIS 3 interglacials. During the colder stadials, steppe vegetation expanded. For MIS 5 and 4, we defined six new landscape evolution zones based on pollen and macroremains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper aims to understand the development track of skills mismatch research and discover the hidden internal connections between literature. Design/methodology/approach: The authors gathered data through scientometric quantitative analysis using CiteSpace. Specifically, this article applied basic analysis, journal cocitation analysis (JCA), author cocitation analysis (ACA) and document cocitation analysis (DCA), cluster analysis, citation burstness detection, scientific research cooperation analysis and coconcurrence analysis of keywords of 3,125 documents from Web of Science core collections for the period 2000-2020. Findings: Through the document cocitation analysis and the keywords' co-occurrence, this article identifies influential scholars, documents, research institutions, journals and research hotspots in research on the skills mismatch phenomenon. The results showed that the publications had ballooned, and the phenomenon has become an interdisciplinary research subject. The USA and Finland remain the main contributors, which is attributed to their high-yield institutions such as the University of Helsinki, the University of Witwatersrand, the University of Washington and so on. While the African continent lacks research on skills mismatch even with the continent's effort to overcome such a crucial issue. The paper presents an in-depth analysis of skills and educational mismatch issues to better understand the evolutionary trajectory of the collective knowledge over the past 20 years and highlight the areas of active pursuit. Research limitations/implications: The authors only used Web of Science core collection to collect data; however, they can added Scopus indexed database as well to extend the research trends and explore more new research hot topics to solve the skills mismatch phenomenon. Originality/value: The scientometric analysis is of great significance for identifying the potential relationship between the literature and investigating the knowledge evolution of skills mismatch research. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the International Labor Organization and the World Health Organization are the giants who are mostly concerned of the mismatch skills phenomenon. Researchers can refer to this study to understand the status quo, gaps and research trends to deal with the skills mismatch issue.

Cities are major drivers of environmental change at all scales and are especially at risk from the ensuing effects, which include poor air quality, flooding and heat waves. Typically, these issues are studied on a city-by-city basis owing to the spatial complexity of built landscapes, local topography and emission patterns. However, to ensure knowledge sharing and to integrate local-scale processes with regional and global scale modelling initiatives, there is a pressing need for a world-wide database on cities that is suited for environmental studies. In this paper we present a European database that has a particular focus on characterising urbanised landscapes. It has been derived using tools and techniques developed as part of the World Urban Database and Access Portal Tools (WUDAPT) project, which has the goal of acquiring and disseminating climate-relevant information on cities worldwide. The European map is the first major step toward creating a global database on cities that can be integrated with existing topographic and natural land-cover databases to support modelling initiatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last years, a demand for regionally produced biogas feedstocks was created by government subsidies to biogas production in Germany—contrary to the trend of specialization of agricultural production towards global commodity markets. The question arose whether this trend could contribute to an increased cultivation of uncommon crops and diversification of cropping patterns, owing to comparably different and less restricted feedstock requirements. In the cooperative research project "EVA," a multi-site experimental crop rotation field trial was conducted over 8 years at eight sites, representing the variety of soil-climatic conditions in Germany. The aim of the trial was to assess a variety of established and novel crops for anaerobic digestion. This paper presents the key findings of the trial. Special emphasis is given to biomass productivity and profitability. The chances for the approach "diversification of cropping patterns via energy cropping" are discussed. Results show that maize (average 4-year dry matter yield varied site-specific between 14.22 and 25.12 t ha−1) is clearly the most efficient crop for biogas production in Central Europe. Some cropping options for biogas feedstock production, such as winter triticale (whole crop, average yield of 6.71 to 15.17 t ha−1) or perennial fodder mixtures (average yield of 7.51 to 19.44 t ha−1) are feasible choices for farmers in some regions, which could contribute to diverse cropping systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In contrast to national elections, both parties and voters are assumed to think that ‘less is at stake’ in European elections: Campaigns are less intense, turnout is lower, and citizens are more inclined to ‘vote with their hearts’. The latter should be reflected in differing rationales of voting – party choice should not be based on identical determinants in national and European elections. However, this hypothesis has not been sufficiently tested and most of the research is based on the analysis of aggregated data while causal explanations are located on the micro level. This paper compares vote functions of individuals in regard to the 2009 European Parliament election as well as the 2009 German Federal election. Using data from the German Longitudinal Election Study (GLES), comparison of explanatory models shows that party choice on both levels is neither fundamentally different nor does it fit into the pattern of second-order electoral behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sebastian Kneipp (1821-1897) is seen as a vital link between the European nature cure movement of the 19th century and American naturopathy. He promoted a holistic treatment concept founded on five pillars: hydro- and phytotherapy, exercise, balanced nutrition, and regulative therapy. Kneipp attempted to bridge the gap with allopathic medicine, and many modern treatments that are based on his methods indeed blend wellness elements with naturopathic medicine and biomedicine. Because Kneipp's approach to health and healing today are mainly covered in German literature, this paper aims to provide a broader international audience with insights into his life and his treatment methods and to highlight the profound influence Kneipp has had to this day on natural and preventive medicine. The paper emphasizes in particular the continued popularity of Kneipp's holistic approach to health and well-being, which is evident in the many national and international Kneipp Associations, the globally operating Kneipp Werke, postgraduate qualifications in his treatment methods, and the existence of more than 60 accredited Kneipp spas and health resorts in Germany alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: There is a growing consensus worldwide that palliative care needs to be both more inclusive of conditions other than cancer and to improve. This paper explores some common challenges currently faced by professionals providing palliative care for patients with either cancer or dementia across five countries. Method: One focus group (n = 7) and 67 interviews were conducted in 2012 across five countries: England, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway, with professionals from dementia, cancer and palliative care settings. Results: The interviews revealed five common challenges faced across the five countries: communication difficulties (between services; and between professionals, and patients and their families); the variable extent of structural/functional integration of services; the difficulties in funding of palliative care services; problematic processes of care (boundaries, definitions, knowledge, skills and inclusiveness) and, finally, time constraints. Conclusion: These are not problems distinct to palliative care, but they may have different origins and explanations compared to other areas of health care. This paper explored deeper themes hidden behind a discourse about barriers and facilitators to improving care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study is to describe, in a historical and philosophical context, the foundations and developmental lines of a tradition defined as curriculum science or "didactic" in Continental Europe, particularly in Germany and Scandinavia. The principal aim here is introducing a theoretical approach based on a different philosophy, in addition to the techno-scientific Anglo-American theoretical approach. Didactic tradition has been of particular interest for curriculum researchers especially in the past two decades. With such an interactive focus, this paper is divided into four sections. Because this paper traces historical and philosophical pathways of inquiry, its research method is purely qualitative, based on document analysis. The findings of this analytical study are expected to contribute to the wider recognition of a philosophical-pedagogical tradition, which has not hitherto been paid much attention in Turkey.

Background: There is considerable public and political interest in the use of cannabis products for medical purposes.Methods: The task force of the European Pain Federation (EFIC) conducted a survey with its national chapters representatives on the status of approval of all types of cannabis-based medicines, the covering of costs and the availability of a position paper of a national medical association on the use of medical cannabis for chronic pain and for symptom control in palliative/supportive care.Results: Thirty-one out of 37 contacted councillors responded. Plant-derived tetrahydrocannabinol/cannabidiol (THC/CBD) oromucosal spray is approved for spasticity in multiple sclerosis refractory to conventional treatment in 21 EFIC chapters. Plant-derived THC (dronabinol) is approved for some palliative care conditions in four EFIC chapters. Synthetic THC analogue (nabilone) is approved for chemotherapy-associated nausea and vomiting refractory to conventional treatment in four EFIC chapters'. Eight EFIC chapters' countries have an exceptional and six chapters an expanded access programme for medical cannabis. German and Israeli pain societies recommend the use of cannabis-based medicines as third-line drug therapies for chronic pain within a multicomponent approach. Conversely, the German medical association and a team of finish experts and officials do not recommend the prescription of medical cannabis due to the lack of high-quality evidence of efficacy and the potential harms.Conclusions: There are marked differences between the countries represented in EFIC in the approval and availability of cannabis-based products for medical use. EFIC countries are encouraged to collaborate with the European Medicines Agency to publish a common document on cannabis-based medicines.Significance: There are striking differences between European countries in the availability of plant-derived and synthetic cannabinoids and of medical cannabis for pain management and for symptom control in palliative care and in the covering of costs by health insurance companies or state social security systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Bohemian Forest represents the most extensive continuous forest landscape in central Europe. Two neighbouring national parks (NP), the Bavarian Forest NP in Germany and the Šumava NP in Czechia, protecting the most valuable part of this area have been recognized as an important site for monitoring of effect of climate change on central European biodiversity and ecosystem structure. For long time, a hydrological monitoring program in the Große Ohe headwater catchment and complex monitoring of glacial lakes recently recovering from acidification were flagships of long-term transboundary research in the Bohemian Forest. Recently published results of biodiversity research in the Bavarian Forest NP and experiences with monitoring of mires in the Šumava NP supported a necessity of multidisciplinary and transboundary research. To improve the cooperation of both national parks, optimize methodologies, and coordinate research activities in the region a new Interreg project No. 26 "Silva Gabreta Monitoring - Implementation of transboundary monitoring of biodiversity and water regime" was jointly prepared. The aims and monitoring methodologies of three main project activities are presented in this paper: (i) monitoring of forest biodiversity, (ii) monitoring of mires, and (iii) monitoring of aquatic ecosystems. In addition, we briefly present several supplementary project activities and tasks, such as modelling of mesoclimatic conditions, monitoring of effect of deicing salt, project conference and common database. As well as sampling design, methods and strategies, and brief overview of the preliminary results are mentioned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research into educational inequalities has shown the importance of decomposing social origins into parental class, status and education, representing economic, socio-cultural and educational family resources, respectively. But we know little about how inequalities in educational attainment at the micro-level map onto institutional characteristics of educational systems at the macro-level, if we treat social origins in a multidimensional way. Drawing on the rich over-time variation in educational systems in four European countries – Britain, Sweden, Germany and Italy – this paper develops and tests a number of hypotheses regarding the effects of various components of social origins on individuals’ educational attainment in different institutional contexts. It is evident from our results that a great deal of similarity exists across nations with different educational systems in the persisting importance for individuals’ educational attainment of parental class, status and education. But our findings also indicate that changes in the institutional features of educational systems have, in some instances although not in others, served to reinforce or to offset the social processes generating educational inequalities at the micro level. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper analyses the determinants of people’s support for European institutions, mainly focusing on the impact of European identity, after the economic crisis and in a moment in which – after profound uncertainty for its immediate future – there is a new feeling toward European integration. Previous research on support for European institutions, before the economic and financial crisis which had hit Europe since 2008, found that people’s evaluations followed mainly an instrumental logic – support being contingent on a perception of personal or national benefit accruing for EU membership – with an additional role played by European identification. This contribution expands the analysis after the beginning of the economic crisis, so to assess whether the former has affected the structure of such support, and deepens the analysis of the impact of EU identity on European institutional confidence. Using a recent Eurobarometer survey (86.2, 2016) and combining both individual and contextual data, the paper shows that European identity plays a crucial role in explaining European support also after the crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the institutional setting for the Banking Union having been established and become fully operational, market participants, supervisory staff, and academics are gradually getting to terms with the reality of the new two-tier system of supervisory and resolution authorities within the Eurozone. Drawing from media coverage, input from practitioners and the on-going academic debate, the present article seeks to present an-inevitably provisional-assessment of the new regime from a German perspective. While regulatees and their advisers within the country appear to have got used to the new reality, the paper also identifies a number of residual concerns, some of which are attributable to the specific characteristics of the German financial sector, others indicative of broader problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]