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Across the world, the interest in point-of-care drug checking as a harm-reduction intervention is growing. This is an attempt to improve intelligence about current drug trends and reduce drug-related morbidity and mortality. In the UK, drug-related harm is increasing exponentially year after year. As such, specialist community treatment services are exploring new methods to improve engagement with people who use drugs (PWUD), who may require support for their problematic drug use. This need has driven the requirement to pilot an on-site, time-responsive, readily available drug-checking service at point-of-support centres. In this study, we piloted the UK’s first Home Office-licensed drug-checking service that was embedded into a community substance-misuse service and had all on-site analysis and harm-reduction interventions led and delivered by pharmacists. We report on the laboratory findings from the associated confirmatory analysis (UHPLC-MS, GC-MS, and 1H NMR) to assess the performance of the on-site hand-held Raman spectrometer and outline the challenges of providing real-time analysis of psychoactive substances in a clinical setting. Whilst acknowledging the limitation of the small sample size (n = 13), we demonstrate the potential suitability of using this technology for the purposes of screening substances in community-treatment services. Portability of equipment and timeliness of results are important and only very small samples may be provided by people who use the service. The challenges of accurately identifying substances from complex mixtures were equally found with both point-of-care Raman spectroscopy and laboratory confirmatory-analysis techniques. Further studies are required to confirm these findings.

Aggregates suitable for use in asphalt concrete (AC) pavement construction must meet durability criteria. Thus, it is critical to select appropriate tests to properly characterize aggregate durability. In Alaska, durability tests currently being used for aggregates in AC pavement include Los Angeles (LA) abrasion test, sulfate soundness test and Washington degradation test. However, there have long been concerns arising over Washington degradation test used as an acceptance tool, motivating pavement practitioners to seek more suitable alternatives. This paper presents a study to investigate the feasibility of using Micro-Deval test, commonly used in other states, to evaluate the durability of Alaskan aggregates in AC pavement as well as its potential to replaceWashington degradation test. Micro-Deval test,Washington degradation test and other tests currently specified in Alaska were conducted on aggregates from 16 batches representing statewide sources. Based on the testing results, it is found that using Micro-Deval test for durability assessment of Alaska aggregates was feasible and reproducible, and a high potential was revealed to use Micro-Deval test to replace Washington degradation test in Alaska. It is recommended that Micro-Deval test be considered as an additional test for a certain period, but in the long run should be used along with current LA abrasion and sulfate soundness tests to provide a more desirable durability assessment of Alaska aggregates used in AC pavement.

The Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOT&PF) wished to enhance its existing pavement preservation management program by using effective pavement preservation treatments for cold regions. This initiative would extend pavement life and defer the need for more costly rehabilitation. By collaborating with the California Pavement Preservation Center and the Alaska University Transportation Center, the Alaska DOT&PF recently completed a pavement preservation research project to improve its pavement preservation program for flexible pavements. Research tasks included conducting an international survey of pavement preservation in cold regions, reviewing literature on cold region pavement preservation treatments, monitoring existing preservation treatments that Alaska used, developing a pavement preservation database, and creating an online computer program for treatment selection. The database for pavement preservation treatment tracking is a web-based online program that includes standard types of pavement preservation strategies used in Alaska; pavement construction, traffic, weather, and other performance-related information; an integrated Google Map function to show the location of pavement preservation projects; and multiple pavement condition survey results with supporting documents. The strategy selection program is integrated within the pavement preservation database. The program sees results of the survey and other information on Alaska treatments to conduct treatment strategy selection and life-cycle cost analysis. Workshops have been given on preservation treatments used in cold regions and use of the database and strategy selection process. Tools developed for the Alaska DOT&PF should be helpful for long-term implementation of an effective pavement preservation program. Other agencies could learn from Alaska's experience.

Therapeutic hypothermia is a promising neuroprotective therapy with multiple mechanisms of action. We demonstrated the feasibility of thrombolysis combined with endovascular hypothermia, but not all patients achieved effective cooling. We sought to identify the factors that determined effective cooling. In 26 patients who underwent endovascular hypothermia, we computed four measures of effective cooling: time to reach target; Area-Under-the-Curve (AUC) 34 ratio; AUC-34; and AUC-35. By multivariate regression, we examined the effects of age, weight, starting temperature, body mass index, body surface area (BSA), gender, shivering, and total meperidine dose on the four outcome measures. In univariate analyses, all four outcome measures were significantly influenced by BSA (p

Pavement preservation is recognized as a means to a lower life cycle cost of a road asset; but, possibly not all surface distress data are documented and kept to further enhance a beneficial decision for the best treatment at the proper time. This paper presents a study to identify the types of treatments used in Alaska and how the treatments had performed. Forty-four road sections in Alaska that had received a pavement preservation treatment were surveyed in person along with data available from the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (AKDOT&PF). The PASER manual for asphalt roads was used to evaluate the distresses for the road sections. Different treatments provided varied improvement of pavement life, which is also consistent with the findings from parallel research efforts of literature and survey conducted by the research team. In addition, pavement failure modes in different regions of Alaska are different. The same pavement preservation treatments may be applied to different regions but to prevent or mitigate different failure modes. Use of some treatments (for example, chip seals) should be considered job-specifically. There is a need to create a pavement preservation database and keep good records of current and future pavement preservation projects for better evaluating and applying them.

It has long been suggested that a much more economical and sustainable approach be developed to address crack sealing effectiveness in Alaska. The development of a new method named special thermal crack evaluation (STCE) in a previous study served to directly and efficiently guide the crack sealing practices as opposed to the other nationally-used pavement surveying methods, including Long Term Pavement Performance (LTPP) and Pavement Surface and Evaluation Ratings (PASER) . However, no or little research has been found to compare and correlate STCE with the other two methods. This paper presents a study to fulfill this research need. Further data interpretation showed that STCE was capable of guiding the decision-making on crack sealing practices, while the other two methods provided quantitative measurements and general rating of the sealed or non-sealed cracks. In addition, the correlation between STCE and the other two methods recommended that STCE better be used along with the other two methods for a better and more complete guidance on current or potential crack sealing practices.

Pavement preservation is an emerging approach in road upkeep. The State of Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (AKDOT&PF) aim to spend wisely the funding for its road upkeep by integrating pavement preservation concept into its Pavement Management System. To do this, a literature review was conducted on the performance and cost effectiveness of pavement preservation treatments in cold regions. This paper presents the results of the literature review. The following include the main findings: Pavement preservation treatments, Crack Sealing, Patching, Fog Seals, Chip Seals, Slurry Seals, AST/BST, Microsurfacing, Thin Overlays, Bonded Wearing Courses, Interlayers and In-place Recycling, are all used widely in cold regions. Crack sealing and patching are the most extensively used pavement preservation treatments. Use of chip seals, fog seals, and slurry seals should be considered job specifically. The service life of the treatments varies from about 3 years to 12 years. Microsurfacing and thin overlays have the longest service life. The costs of treatments vary from a region to another as well as from project to another. Other issues despite the cost effectiveness include sustainability and traffic safety.