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Introduction Methods Results Conclusion Dialysis adequacy is traditionally calculated from pre‐ and post‐hemodialysis session serum urea concentrations and expressed as the urea reduction ratio, or Kt/Vurea. However, with increasing hemodiafiltration usage, we wished to determine whether there were any differences between standard Kt/Vurea equations and directly measured spent dialysate urea clearance.Urea clearance was measured from collected effluent dialysate and compared with various other methods of Kt/Vurea calculation, including change in total body urea from measuring pre‐ and post‐total body water with bioimpedance and the Watson equation, by standard Kt/V equations, and online clearance measurements using effective ionic dialysance (OLC).We compared urea clearance in 41 patients, 56.1% male, mean age 69.3 ± 12.6 years with 87.8% treated by hemodiafiltration. Reduction in total body urea was greater when estimating changes in total body urea, compared to measured dialysate losses of 58.4% (48.5–67.6) vs 71.6% (62.1–78), p < 0.01. Sessional urea clearance (Kt/Vurea) was greater using the online Solute‐Solver program compared to OLC, median 1.45(1.13–1.75) vs 1.2 (0.93–1.4), and 2nd generation Kt/V equations 1.3 (1.02–1.66), p < 0.01, but not different from estimated total body urea clearance 1.36 (1.15–1.73) and dialysate clearance 1.36 (1.07–1.76). The mean bias compared to the Solute‐Solver program was greatest with OLC (−0.25), compared to second‐generation equations (−0.02), estimated total body clearance (−0.02) and measured dialysate clearance (−0.01).This study demonstrated that the result from equations estimating urea clearance indirectly from pre‐ and postblood samples from hemo‐ and hemodiafiltration treatments was highly correlated with direct measurements of dialysate urea clearance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To negotiate quality in early childhood education and care, we must ask from different perspectives what constitutes a good centre for children. The children themselves have only recently been identified as a resource to contribute to that discussion. Several studies have described profound methodologies to obtain children's perspectives by observing, interviewing and conducting group discussions. This article introduces research that combines exploring children's perspectives with sustained shared thinking (SST). Focussing on the dialogue following the rules of SST, we conducted and analysed group discussions with children about their lives within a children's centre in Berlin, Germany. The children were asked to think about aspects of quality. They expressed their ideas, wishes, likes and dislikes within the centre explicitly and profoundly. Following the lead of these children, a dialogue developed in which children and researchers contributed equally and led the way. This showed how well children could act out their agency and were capable of expressing rational and reasonable opinions. Here, we argue that SST helps to see the pedagogical side of exploring children's perspectives and acknowledges this as a pedagogical and political act. Children experience being heard and having a say in shaping situations. This is in itself a pedagogical situation a researcher should be aware of. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Resource quality is an important concept in ecology and evolution that attempts to capture the fitness benefits a resource affords to an organism. Yet "quality" is a multivariate concept, potentially affected by many variables pertaining to the resource, its surroundings, and the resource chooser. Researchers often use a small number of proxy variables to simplify their estimation of resource quality, but without vetting their proxies against a wider set of potential quality estimators this approach risks overlooking potentially important characteristics that can explain patterns of resource use in their study systems. Here we used Neolamprologus multifasciatus, a group‐living cichlid fish that utilizes empty snail shells as shelter resources, to examine how shells were used by, and partitioned among, group members in relation to a range of attributes, including shell size, intactness, texture, spatial position, and usage by heterospecifics. This approach generated a comprehensive picture of what characteristics contribute to the attractiveness and quality of each shell resource, confirming the importance of two previously proposed shell characteristics, size and intactness, but highlighting the influences of other unexplored variables, including shell spatial position and usage by heterospecifics. We also present a generally applicable "resource attractiveness index" as a means to estimate resource quality based on resource choice data. This index incorporates information from any number of resource characteristics and is of particular use when researchers wish to quantify resource value, but many characteristics jointly contribute to the value and attractiveness of the resource. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phenomenology questions the centrality that Kant attributes to the “I think.” It claims that on the pre‐reflective level experience is selfless as unity is given. I call this the “unity argument.” The paper explores the significance of this claim by focusing on the work of Edmund Husserl. What interests me is that although the unity argument claims that we can account for the unity of experience without appealing to the an “I think,” Husserl agrees with Kant that experience must be owned. Moreover, he endorses Kant's dictum that ‘the “I think” must be capable of accompanying all my presentations’. The aim of the paper is to explore how Husserl can consistently appeal to Kant's account of the “I think” and at the same time contend that on the pre‐reflective level experience is selfless. The thesis I wish to advance is that although the unity argument acknowledges that experience is necessarily mine, it reveals that it is a necessary feature of self‐reference that I have never taken absolute ownership over my experience. This may explain why our sense of self can often be out of tune with the way we live our lives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Universals in the Platonic tradition were intended to play both metaphysical and epistemological roles. The contemporary debate around universals has focused overwhelmingly on the former, with even ‘platonists’ typically holding that our knowledge of universals is derived from our knowledge of particulars. In contrast, I wish to argue for the epistemological primacy of the universal: specifically, I defend the thesis that we perceive particulars as a result of knowing universals, and not the other way around. My argument draws from the work of Malebranche, who notoriously contended that we see ordinary objects through the immutable ‘ideas’. I conclude with the suggestion that the resulting account of the relationship between our knowledge of universals and our perception of particulars may be thought of as a kind of Platonic indirect realism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In his remarkable new book, Emotion and Virtue, Sreenivasan defends the view that, in the case of many virtues, in order for an exemplar of each of these virtues to be a reliable judge of what that virtue requires in specific circumstances, she must possess a particular, morally rectified, emotional trait. In this article, I raise two challenges to “the argument from salience” that Sreenivasan offers in favor of this view. First, I argue that, although Sreenivasan wishes to remain neutral about different philosophical theories of emotions, the success of his argument depends, in fact, on the outcome of the debate about the nature of emotions. Second, I challenge the central claim of Sreenivasan's argument from salience, namely, that the possession of a morally rectified emotional trait, cleverness, and supplementary moral knowledge is sufficient to explain an agent's ability to reliably judge what a given virtue requires in specific circumstances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In Austria, due to its history, only relatively little research on the topic of intellectual disabilities and dementia has been conducted to date. The present study thus aims to explore the challenges and tasks currently facing formal caregivers, together with assessing their wishes for further development. Methods: Ten semi‐structured interviews were held with formal caregivers. Interviews were transcribed and analysed by means of structured qualitative content analysis. Results: Caregivers must deal with conflicts between residents, and with increasing demands for care and emotional support. Education and training on dementia and intellectual disability are mostly of high quality, but still remain insufficient. Caregivers would like to see suitable adaptation of care premises, smaller groups, more staff and better training on dementia and intellectual disability. Conclusion: To ensure quality care and 'ageing in place', caregivers and providers need to pay greater attention to dementia‐related changes when planning and adapting services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Environmetrics wishes to thank all those individuals who served the journal as anonymous referees during 2023. Without their diligent efforts, the journal could not continue to maintain the high standards to which it aspires. In previous years, we published actual names of these editorial collaborators; however, new GDPR guidelines prevent us from doing so as we move forward. We nonetheless thank the tireless efforts of those kind scholars who provided their guidance to us—some more than once—during the year. [Extracted from the article]