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This article explores an area of Europeanization literature not studied before, namely the impact of EU language status on a state language. Using Maltese, the Union’s only Semitic language, as a c...

To ensure practices are set up to return to a ‘new normal’, thorough planning and forecasting are essential. Using short- and long-term forecasting helps to predict what impact the coming months may have on a practice’s finances. Likewise, taking action now and creating an action plan ensures that you are positioning your practice to be in good stead for whatever comes next.

Unlike other South European member-states of the EU, Malta did not experience any negative ramifications from the 2008 financial crisis and its eurozone membership has been stable, with the country...

Although the past year has been a tricky one for many, let's start with a big positive - there remains plenty of great tax-saving opportunities for the veterinary profession as we move through the Covid-19 pandemic. In this article, I give a flavour of some of the tax changes that have been announced so far in 2021, and what they mean for the profession going forward.

In an attempt to decentre the debate of democracy promotion in the Mediterranean, this article applies social constructivism to an analysis of the work undertaken by two International Parliamentary Bodies in the Mediterranean. With a focus on the European Parliament and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Mediterranean, we analyse how effective their role can be without coercion and move on to discuss whether newly formed democratic parliaments, as in Tunisia, may represent a more legitimate and viable source of parliamentary-driven democracy promotion., peer-reviewed

Malta has followed a unique trajectory in terms of Euroscepticism, being the only country of the 2004 accession states where a major party and nearly 50 percent of voters were opposed to EU (European Union) membership pre-2004. Fifteen years later and the country’s party system is now overwhelmingly Euro-enthusiastic. The Maltese show some of the highest approval ratings for the EU and Malta’s place in the Union. As in all European Parliament (EP) elections held since 2004, in 2019 Malta again registered the highest turnout for a country where voting is not obligatory and distributed its 6 seats amongst the S&D (Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats) (4 seats) and the EPP (European People’s Party) (2 seats). Malta is now one of the few EU countries with no Eurosceptic parties in Parliament.

The government, in light of the pressures being placed on businesses across the country, has put together a package of assistance for employers and employees, in an effort to keep as many people in employment as possible during the current Covid-19 emergency.

Before joining the EU in 2004 Malta registered the starkest level of Euroscepticism amongst applicant states with a major party opposed to EU membership and a marked antipathy amongst half ...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse why Malta continues to show the highest level of turnout for European Parliament (EP) elections in a country where voting is not obligatory. By analysing the Maltese EP elections from 2004 to 2019, the paper seeks to understand why the Maltese engage with a second order election to the degree that they do. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, first assessing the context of the 2019 elections, the historical trends and then the factors that help explain why the Maltese continue to engage with EP elections. Findings – The paper finds that the Maltese political system, highly polarised and dominated by two parties, primarily galvanises people to engage with elections, that it is more about party leadership than actual engagement with Europe and that second order elections in Malta are often run as first order elections. Originality/value – This paper is the only systematic evaluation of the 2019 EP elections in Malta, discusses categorically that EP elections are rarely about Europe while also showing clearly that political parties can make second-order elections appear as first-order elections should the stakes be high enough., peer-reviewed

Malta is the smallest EU member state in terms of territory, population, and economy. Malta, in the centre of the Mediterranean, was a British colony until 1964, and its political and economic system bear a link to the British period. In the post-WWII drive to free the economy from its dependency on British military spending, successive governments cultivated tourism as well as manufacturing, in particular electronics and pharmaceuticals, as economic industries to bolster the country. In 1990, the Christian Democrats applied to join the EC with the issue of membership becoming divisive in this two-party state as the Socialists opposed. The issue was resolved in the 2003 EU referendum with a vote in favour, and Malta joined in 2004.

The amount of time that vets allocate to consultations can have a significant impact on client satisfaction and practice profits, as well as dramatically affecting the day-to-day running of the business. With such potentially important outcomes, Mark Harwood considers how to decide what consultation times are best for a practice.

In 2013 the Maltese Labour Party returned to power after 15 years in opposition, securing the single largest majority in the island's post-independence history and on a platform promising civil unions for same-sex couples. Asking how LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) rights became mainstream in a country synonymous with Catholicism, the article examines whether the adoption of the Civil Union Act is the culmination of ten years of European Union membership. Employing concepts of policy and institutional fit as well as social constructivist theories of elite socialisation and epistemic communities, it concludes that while policy fit accounts for the introduction of equality laws, the Civil Union Act depended on the social democrats' need to retake the progressive agenda. Elite socialisation – particularly among Members of the European Parliament – helped reframe the issue, encouraging the party to adopt this policy while the Europeanisation of the LGBT lobby reminded the social democrats that t...

This paper discusses the issue of how size impacts a country’s experience of EU membership, in particular its ability to control the implementation of EU policy. Small countries share several characteristics at an EU level, in that they avoid isolation in the Council and depend on partnership with larger member states. In terms of Malta, this was shown to be the case but other factors appear to have brought this about, in particular the country’s political history. In terms of Europeanization, small states adopt flexible arrangements to manage membership with public servants empowered in the process. This was not the case for Malta where membership saw greater involvement for public servants in policy making but no increase in actual power due to a heavy centralisation of decision-making which empowered the political class. Where size appears to have played a role in the country’s Europeanization experience was in terms of how that centralisation process has allowed the government to control the monitoring of its implementation of EU policy by third parties, including the Commission. Key words: Europeanization, small states, public administration, Malta.

Summary Detailed investigations utilizing borehole drilling, geophysical techniques and revision mapping have elucidated the geological evolution of southern Charnwood Forest. This study confirms that the South Charnwood Diorite was emplaced in latest Neoproterozoic times and has a broadly concordant intrusive contact with underlying volcaniclastic strata of the Charnian Supergroup. Following erosion that unroofed the diorite, an Early Cambrian marine transgression deposited an unconformable covering of Brand Group strata. In end-Silurian times, the region experienced orogenic compression and folding along a dominant NW–WNW tectonic grain. ‘Phase 1’ structures with these orientations include the Charnwood Anticline and a transecting, penetrative cleavage that is mainly developed in the stratiform Charnian rocks. Further manifestations of this deformation were systems of NW-trending faults, the most important of which is the Groby Reverse Fault. This complex structure is described here for the first time; it features a narrow tectonic slice of Brand Group rocks, which was thrown down into the South Charnwood Diorite. The courses of younger, ‘Phase 2’ faults are also revealed by the present study; they are orthogonal to, and thus offset the earlier NW structures. During Permian times, the area was stripped of its Carboniferous cover, resulting in a rugged pre-Triassic topography. This study has shown that the South Charnwood Diorite was eroded into low-lying, NW-elongated, steep-sided domes (bornhardts). It has also revealed the configuration of an associated palaeo-valley system, which suggests that regional tilting associated with development of the syn-Triassic Hinckley Basin to the south-west of Charnwood Forest may have influenced drainage directions before burial of the hill-range beneath desert sediments of the Mercia Mudstone Group.

The right accountant will go far beyond just preparing your accounts and tax returns, says Mark Harwood, and that work can ultimately have a significant impact on your practice9s bottom line. Here, he suggests 10 questions to ask potential accountants to help identify the one that will best look after your practice9s interests.

The fit of patient coping style and psychotherapy focus has been suggested as improving treatment outcome. This article reviews the definitions, measures, and previous research surrounding this hypothesis. An original meta-analysis of 12 carefully selected studies (N = 1,291 patients) resulted in a weighted, mean effect size (d) of .55 in favor of a fit between externalizing patients and symptom-focused treatment or, alternatively, internalizing patients and insight-focused treatment. This medium-size effect indicates that nondiagnostic patient factors, like coping style, are important considerations in the selection of effective therapies. Clinical examples and clinical recommendations are provided.

Psychotherapists from all professions and perspectives periodically struggle to effectively manage a patient's resistance to change. This article provides definitions and examples of patient-treatment matching applied to patient resistance or reactance. We report the results from an original meta-analysis of 12 select studies (N = 1,102) on matching therapist directiveness to patient reactance. Our findings support the hypothesis that patients exhibiting low levels of trait-like resistance respond better to directive types of treatment, while patients with high levels of resistance respond best to nondirective treatments (d = .82). Limitations of the research reviewed are noted, and practice recommendations are advanced.

Describes pilot findings from a treatment development study aimed at improving treatment for comorbid depressed and chemically-dependent patients. A comparison of standard RCT analyses with Hierarchical Multiple Regression (HLM) procedures revealed the latter to be more sensitive to the relative effects of patient, treatment, and patient–treatment matching variables among a small sample of (N = 40) depressed, stimulant-abusing patients. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three treatments, a standard Cognitive Therapy for Drug Abuse (CT), a contrasting Cognitive-Narrative Therapy (NT), and a Prescriptive Therapy (PT), the latter of which selectively applied procedures from both of the other two treatments following an Aptitude × Treatment Interaction (ATI) model. The results supported a multiple factor view of psychotherapy effects, including the hypothesis that patient, treatment, relationship, and patient-therapy matching variables add independent power to the prediction of treatment outcome, especially during follow-up. ATI effect sizes were stronger than those associated with specific treatments. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

As the ‘Arab Spring’ turns into winter, the literature on the causes of the revolts and their aftermath has grown steadily. The general thrust of most books is that the 2011 Arab uprisings exposed the corrupt relations between state and economic elites and other underlying social dislocations in many of the affected states. After the initial hopes that these uprisings would generate a fourth wave of democratization, analysts such as Adeed Dawisha, in The Second Arab Awakening (2013), concluded wisely that the jury is still out on whether the upheavals will lead to democracy or not. It is, however, certain that the Arab uprisings have stimulated a revival in interest in the political-economic foundations of the region’s authoritarian regimes even though lately the interest has understandably shifted to the security threats posed by Islamic State (IS) and other extremist organizations. One approach that differs from the mainstream focuses on the role that capitalism plays in setting internal conditions for the distribution of economic and political power, and how it affects the external conditions that impinge on the sovereignty of the nation-state. This review comprises three books that, from very different perspectives, emphasize the impact of capital on the current state of (some) Arab countries and the Muslim world in general., peer-reviewed

This study examined interactions between patient attributes and therapist interventions on alcoholism treatment outcome. Process analyses of an early psychotherapy session from either cognitive-behavioral (CBT) or family systems (FST) therapy and baseline patient information (N=47) were used to measure theory-based therapy and patient variables. Hierarchical linear regression was used to test the effect of each patient-therapy interaction on changes in drinking behavior. Two disordinal interactions were predictors of alcohol use during the maintenance phase of treatment. Patients high in emotional distress did best when their therapy addressed emotional experiences, and the converse was observed for patients low in distress. Patients high in reactance had better drinking outcomes when their therapy was nondirective, and patients low in reactance improved more with directive therapy. In contrast to the interactions between patient attributes and the therapy process, the interactions between patient attributes and treatment model (CBT versus FST) were not reliable predictors of alcohol use.

This paper reviews findings from two studies that support the contentions of the Generic Model of Psychotherapy that therapeutic outcome must be viewed as arising from a complex interaction of common and specific factors. Patient, therapy, and relationship factors are shown to selectively add to the variance predicted in psychotherapy outcome studies. Moreover, an inspection of procedures that are common to two different therapies, and those that are unique to these approaches reveal that both contribute to outcome and do so in ways that suggest the presence of both synergistic and inhibiting effects.

To quantitate neuroanatomic parameters in healthy volunteers and to compare the values with normative values from postmortem studies.Magnetic resonance (MR) images of 116 volunteers aged 19 months to 80 years were analyzed with semiautomated procedures validated by means of comparison with manual tracings. Volumes measured included intracranial space, whole brain, gray matter (GM), white matter (WM), and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). Results were compared with values from previous postmortem studies.Whole brain and intracranial space grew by 25%-27% between early childhood (mean age, 26 months; age range, 19-33 months) and adolescence (mean age, 14 years; age range, 12-15 years); thereafter, whole-brain volume decreased such that volunteers (age range, 71-80 years) had volumes similar to those of young children. GM increased 13% from early to later (6-9 years) childhood. Thereafter, GM increased more slowly and reached a plateau in the 4th decade; it decreased by 13% in the oldest volunteers. The GM-WM ratio decreased exponentially from early childhood through the 4th decade; thereafter, it gradually declined. In vivo patterns of change in the intracranial space, whole brain, and GM-WM ratio agreed with published postmortem data.MR images accurately depict normal patterns of age-related change in intracranial space, whole brain, GM, WM, and CSF. These quantitative MR imaging data can be used in research studies and clinical settings for the detection of abnormalities in fundamental neuroanatomic parameters.

The major risks of pacemaker and implantable cardioverter defibrillator extraction are attributable to the fibrotic tissue that encases them in situ, yet little is known about the cellular and functional properties of this response. In the present research, we performed a histological and mechanical analysis of human tissue collected from the lead-tissue interface to better understand this process and provide insights for the improvement of lead design and extraction. The lead-tissue interface consisted of a thin cellular layer underlying a smooth, acellular surface, followed by a circumferentially organized collagen-rich matrix. 51.8±4.9% of cells were myofibroblasts via immunohistochemistry, with these cells displaying a similar circumferential organization. Upon mechanical testing, samples exhibited a triphasic force-displacement response consisting of a toe region during initial tensioning, a linear elastic region and a yield and failure region. Mean fracture load was 5.6±2.1N, and mean circumferential stress at failure was 9.5±4.1MPa. While the low cellularity and fibrotic composition of tissue observed herein is consistent with a foreign body reaction to an implanted material, the significant myofibroblast response provides a mechanical explanation for the contractile forces complicating extractions. Moreover, the tensile properties of this tissue suggest the feasibility of circumferential mechanical tissue disruption, similar to balloon angioplasty devices, as a novel approach to assist with lead extraction.

Pretreatment planning is an essential element in psychotherapy. Constraints imposed by managed care, efficiency-of-treatment/cost-effectiveness issues, and increased likelihood of change and increased magnitude of change are obvious justifications for the provision of individualized and comprehensive pretreatment assessment. Relatedly, quality pretreatment assessment is essential for accurate patient–treatment matching. In this vein, systematic treatment selection, prescriptive psychotherapy, systematic treatment, and Innerlife are variants of an overriding empirically supported model of patient–treatment matching. More specifically, they employ accurate, comprehensive pretreatment assessment to help guide the clinician in the selection and matching of specific psychotherapeutic strategies and principles. Questions regarding diagnosis, prognosis, current level of functioning, most effective treatment, and causation/maintenance are answerable through an evaluation of relevant patient predisposing variables. While there are many qualities of problems that vary as a function of specific situations and circumstances, three appear to be of major importance to the differential assignment of treatment: patient expectations, subjective distress, and functional impairment.

Transvenous Lead Extraction. Introduction: As the population ages, the number of elderly patients with implantable cardiac devices referred for transvenous lead extraction will dramatically increase in Western countries. The safety and effectiveness of lead extraction in elderly patients has not been well evaluated. We report the safety and effectiveness of transvenous lead extraction in octogenarians. Methods and Results: From January 2005 to January 2011, we reviewed data from consecutive patients ≥ 80 years referred to our institutions for transvenous lead extraction because of cardiac device infection or lead malfunction. Clinical characteristics, procedural features, and periprocedural major and minor complications were compared between octogenarians and younger patients. Out of 849 patients undergoing lead extraction in the participating institutions during the study period, 150 (18%) patients were octogenarians (mean age 84 years; range 80–96; 64% males). A significantly higher percentage of octogenarians presented with chronic renal failure (55% vs 26%; P < 0.001), history of malignancy (22% vs 6%; P < 0.001), and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (46% vs 19%; P < 0.001). Complete lead extraction rates were similar in the 2 age groups (97% in octogenarians vs 96% in patients

Self-help in mental health , Self-help in mental health , کتابخانه دیجیتال جندی شاپور اهواز

Eating disorders are often times included among addictive behaviors (Klingemann & Sobell, 2007; L’Abate, Farrar, & Settitella, 1992) where they rightly belong because of their single-minded concentration on unique patterns of behavior, exclusion of other alternatives, and their repetitive and compulsive nature. On the other hand, the SH and SC literature on these disorders is so vast that they deserve separate coverage (Buchanan, 1992; Buchanan and Buchanan, 1992; Williams, 2003). There is a high rate of mortality for anorexia nervosa (AN) with less than one-half of those who survive recovering fully from the disorder. There may be a natural progression from anorexia nervosa to bulimia nervosa (BN) (Polivy, 2007, p. 119; DSM-IV-TR, 2000).

A large segment of the population does not receive needed psychiatric services. The reasons for this unfortunate situation are manifold and include (1) restricted access to psychiatric services for rural communities or prison populations, (2) an over-burdened mental health care system, (3) social stigma, (4) financial constraints, (5) time constraints, (6) educational deficits with respect to treatment options and pathological symptoms, and (7) a general tendency to resist entering therapy inherent in some diagnostic categories (e.g., social phobia).