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Acupuncture can be conveniently used for pain control in patients with a variety of conditions, and it has obvious effects on various acute pains. In 2018, we implemented a program for emergency treatment with Chinese medicine to promote the integration of Chinese and Western medicine at the Emergency Department (ED). Ileus is a common cause of abdominal pain among patients in the ED, and it is an indication for emergency treatment with Chinese medicine. This study investigated the efficacy of acupuncture as a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM)-based treatment method for the treatment of patients with ileus in the ED. We analyzed data of patients with ileus, who visited ED between January and December 2019, and compared the length of ED stay between the Western medicine group and the Western medicine plus acupuncture group. Furthermore, pain intensity was measured by a visual analogue scale before and after acupuncture. We found that the length of ED stay was 10.8 hours lesser in the Western medicine plus acupuncture group than in the Western medicine group (P = .04), and the visual analogue scale score decreased by 2.0 on average from before to after acupuncture treatment (P = .02). Acupuncture treatment was effective and rapid in relieving the symptoms and discomfort in patients with ileus and in reducing their length of stay in the ED.

This paper attempts to find the factors that affect the number of cases and deaths of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients a year after the first outbreak in Wuhan, China. There were 141 countries affected with COVID-19 involved in the study. Countries were grouped based on population. Using ordinary least squares regression, it was found that the total number of cases and deaths were significantly related with the levels of population of the different countries. On the overall, median age of the country, and average temperature are positively related with the number of deaths from the virus. On the other hand, population density is positively related with the deaths due to COVID for low populated countries. The result of this preliminary study can be used as a benchmark for authorities in the formulation of policies with regards to treating COVID-19 related issues.

This study examines how experience of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) influences the impact of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) on international tourism demand for four Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) economies, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, and New Zealand, over the 1 January&ndash, 30 April 2020 period. To proceed, panel regression models are first applied with a time-lag effect to estimate the general effects of COVID-19 on daily tourist arrivals. In turn, the data set is decomposed into two nation groups and fixed effects models are employed for addressing the comparison of the pandemic-tourism relationship between economies with and without experiences of the SARS epidemic. Specifically, Taiwan and Hong Kong are grouped as economies with SARS experiences, while Thailand and New Zealand are grouped as countries without experiences of SARS. The estimation result indicates that the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases has a significant negative impact on tourism demand, in which a 1% COVID-19 case increase causes a 0.075% decline in tourist arrivals, which is a decline of approximately 110 arrivals for every additional person infected by the coronavirus. The negative impact of COVID-19 on tourist arrivals for Thailand and New Zealand is found much stronger than for Taiwan and Hong Kong. In particular, the number of tourist arrivals to Taiwan and Hong Kong decreased by 0.034% in response to a 1% increase in COVID-19 confirmed cases, while in Thailand and New Zealand, a 1% national confirmed cases increase caused a 0.103% reduction in tourism demand. Moreover, the effect of the number of domestic cases on international tourism is found lower than the effect caused by global COVID-19 mortality for the economies with SARS experiences. In contrast, tourist arrivals are majorly affected by the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Thailand and New Zealand. Finally, travel restriction in all cases is found to be the most influencing factor for the number of tourist arrivals. Besides contributing to the existing literature focusing on the knowledge regarding the nexus between tourism and COVID-19, the paper&rsquo, s findings also highlight the importance of risk perception and the need of transmission prevention and control of the epidemic for the tourism sector.

Climate change is regarded as one of the major factors enhancing the transmission intensity of dengue fever. In this study, we estimated the threshold effects of temperature on Aedes mosquito larval index as an early warning tool for dengue prevention. We also investigated the relationship between dengue vector index and dengue epidemics in Taiwan using weekly panel data for 17 counties from January 2012 to May 2019. To achieve our goals, we first applied the panel threshold regression technique to test for threshold effects and determine critical temperature values. Data were then further decomposed into different sets corresponding to different temperature regimes. Finally, negative binomial regression models were applied to assess the non-linear relationship between meteorological factors and Breteau index (BI). At the national level, we found that a 1&deg, C temperature increase caused the expected value of BI to increase by 0.09 units when the temperature is less than 27.21 &deg, C, and by 0.26 units when the temperature is greater than 27.21 &deg, C. At the regional level, the dengue vector index was more sensitive to temperature changes because double threshold effects were found in the southern Taiwan model. For southern Taiwan, as the temperature increased by 1&deg, C, the expected value of BI increased by 0.29, 0.63, and 1.49 units when the average temperature was less than 27.27 &deg, C, between 27.27 and 30.17 &deg, C, and higher than 30.17 &deg, C, respectively. In addition, the effects of precipitation and relative humidity on BI became stronger when the average temperature exceeded the thresholds. Regarding the impacts of climate change on BI, our results showed that the potential effects on BI range from 3.5 to 54.42% under alternative temperature scenarios. By combining threshold regression techniques with count data regression models, this study provides evidence of threshold effects between climate factors and the dengue vector index. The proposed threshold of temperature could be incorporated into the implementation of public health measures and risk prediction to prevent and control dengue fever in the future.

Pangolins are currently the most smuggled mammals in the world. Meanwhile, Taiwan has demonstrated the world’s first case of the use of artificial feeding to raise pangolins to adulthood. The government has also begun to cooperate with farmers in pangolin-spotted areas. Agricultural products can earn the green label once they have passed the evaluation. The challenge is that very few farms have obtained the pangolin-friendly label so far. Our hypothesis is that farmers lack the knowledge that consumers would pay additional money for products that are labeled pangolin-friendly compared to regular ones. Thus, farmers have an insufficient incentive to apply for this label. This research aims to fill this gap by providing people with the necessary knowledge. Contingent valuation with the single-bounded dichotomous choice format was used, which involved investigating 417 valid observations. We found the following: (1) customers are willing to pay about 8.06 USD for pangolin-friendly rice (an increase of 397% in relation to the mean price of rice), (2) customers are willing to pay for about 11.46 USD for pangolin-friendly tea (an increase of 179% in relation to the mean price of tea), and (3) customers are willing to pay about 25.81 USD for pangolin-friendly coffee (an increase of 509% in relation to the mean price of coffee). Our findings give farmers more incentive to conduct eco-friendly production. Consequently, the quality of agricultural products as well as the habitats of endangered pangolins improve. Thus, consumers’ health, the environment, and the future of pangolin conservation can benefit in this attempt to achieve sustainability.

Ambient air pollution from energy use and other sources is a major environmental risk factor in the incidence and progression of serious diseases, such as cardiovascular and respiratory diseases. This study elucidates the health effects of energy consumption from air pollution in China based on multiple threshold effects of the population-weighted exposure to PM2.5 (fine particles less than 2.5 microns in diameter) on particle-related mortality rate. We firstly estimate the causal relationship between coal consumption and PM2.5 in China for 2004&ndash, 2010 using a panel regression model. Panel threshold models are applied to access the non-linear relationships between PM2.5 and cause-specific mortality rates that indicate the health effects are dependent on the PM2.5 ranges. By combining these steps, we calculate the health impacts of coal consumption based on threshold effects of PM2.5. We find that a 1% coal consumption increase induces a 0.23% increase in PM2.5. A triple threshold effect is found between PM2.5 and cardiovascular mortality, for example, increasing PM2.5 exposure causes cardiovascular mortality rate to increase when PM2.5 lies in 17.7&ndash, 21.6 &mu, g/m3 and 21.6&ndash, 34.3 &mu, g/m3, with the estimated increments being 0.81% and 0.26%, respectively, corresponding to 1% PM2.5 increase. A single threshold effect of SO2 on respiratory mortality rate is identified and allows the estimation of the mortality effects of PM2.5 regarding the two regimes of SO2. Finally, we access the health impacts of coal consumption under specific estimated thresholds. This study provides a better understanding of sources contributing to related-air pollution mortality. The multi-threshold effect of PM2.5 could be considered for further applications in harmonizing emission standards in China and other developing countries.

Much energy-related construction causes environmental concern. Sometimes the environmental issue is so huge that it is difficult to make a policy decision even with the assistance of traditional valuation techniques. The third natural gas receiving station at Datan, Taiwan, is one example of this. The construction would be beneficial to energy security, economic development, and particulate matter (PM) 2.5 reduction. However, it would destroy a precious algal reef, which is a habitat for endangered species, biodiversity, and a unique ecological system. Thus, we used willingness-to-pay to show the strength of both pro-energy and pro-ecology opinions specifically to help with decision-making. First, respondents were asked to choose between the gas station and the reef. Then they were asked about their willingness to pay for that choice. We then estimated parametric/nonparametric models—traditional probit, structured probit, and Turnbull—to obtain reliable estimates. We found that the per-person value for pro-gas-station respondents was higher than that for pro-reef respondents, while the percentage of pro-reef respondents was higher than the percentage of pro-gas-station respondents. These results together form a clear policy implication for this case.

School enrollments are sometimes decided by lottery. However, students may wish to enter the same school or different schools for their social relationship needs so as to maintain good friendships, or avoid continuously being victims of bullying. While recent developments in non-traditional rationing lotteries (Chen et al., 2010; Tseng & Ngamsomsuke, 2012) can meet such social relationship needs, these kinds of lotteries apply to situations where the number of slots is less than the number of applicants. However, in other situations, the number of slots may be identical to the number of applicants when there are several schools available but each school has different qualities. In this paper, we develop a new lottery that works in both situations, satisfying such social relationship needs, while maintaining the equal opportunity that supports educational equality, a point emphasized by Allen et al. (2013). The new lottery may also work under demand and supply uncertainties. Korean elementary school graduates entering the next stage of their education are used as an example to show that this new lottery indeed works and improves well-being.

We develop a generalized lottery mechanism in this article that allows people to choose to succeed separately while retaining both merits (fairness and options to succeed jointly) of the collective lottery developed by Chen et al. (2010). We use the rationing of hunting permits in the US and Canada as examples to show the applicability of this generalized lottery mechanism.

In traumatic brain injury (TBI), computed tomography (CT) provides a good assessment of anatomic pathologic findings and the prognostic value of CT characteristics has been well discussed. However, few studies have focused on skull bone fracture and its clinical prognostic importance. Hence, this study aims to evaluate the effects of skull bone fracture on patients with severe TBI admitted to the emergency unit.We reviewed the medical records of patients with isolated severe TBI admitted to the emergency unit of a university hospital from July 2003 to June 2008. Patients were divided into two groups based on the presence of skull bone fracture identified by the CT scan while in the emergency unit. Mann-Whitney U test and a Student's t test were used to identify the differences between the two groups, whereas logistic regression was applied to determine any significant differences found in the statistical analysis.A total of 197 patients were signed up in our study. Based on the presence of skull bone fracture on CT scan at emergency department, 92 patients (46.7%) comprised the skull bone fracture group and 59 patients (64.1%) of these died. One hundred five patients (53.3%) comprised the nonskull bone fracture group, of which 33 patients (31.4%) died. There is significant difference between the two groups (p = 0.004).This study shows that skull bone fracture is a mortality risk factor for patients with isolated severe blunt TBI.

The main purpose of this study was to investigate how climate change affects blood vessel-related heart disease and hypertension and to estimate the associated economic damage. In this paper, both the panel data model and the contingent valuation method (CVM) approaches are applied. The empirical results indicate that the number of death from cardiovascular diseases would be increased by 0.226% as the variation in temperature increases by 1%. More importantly, the number of death from cardiovascular diseases would be increased by 1.2% to 4.1% under alternative IPCC climate change scenarios. The results from the CVM approach show that each person would be willing to pay US$51 to US$97 per year in order to avoid the increase in the mortality rate of cardiovascular diseases caused by climate change.

For many countries, the best way to counter an influenza pandemic is to provide citizens with a pandemic vaccine. However, since the global supply of the vaccines is far smaller than the quantity demanded, how to allocate the limited vaccines can be a very challenging task for them. In this study, we introduce a collective lottery mechanism that allocates vaccines as fairly as the traditional lottery, while also offering more options for family members or those who are close so that they can choose the joint probability of successes that can maximize their welfare. This mechanism thus gives rise to a Pareto improvement over the traditional lottery. Our empirical study uses the US and the UK as examples in sequential collective lotteries that are simulated to prove that such an improvement while maintaining fairness, in fact, exists.

Researchers of climate change have suggested that climate change and variability has a significant influence on the epidemiology of infectious diseases, particularly vector-borne diseases. The purpose of this study is to explore how climate conditions and the dengue fever epidemic in Taiwan are related and to estimate the economic impact of climate change on infectious diseases. To achieve these objectives, two different methods, one involving the Panel data model and the other the Contingent Valuation Method (CVM), are applied in this study. At first, we use the Panel data model to assess the relationship between climate conditions and the number of people infected by dengue fever during the period from January 2000 to February 2006 in 308 cities and townships in the Taiwan. The results of the empirical estimation indicate that climate conditions have an increasingly significant impact on the probability of people being infected by dengue fever. The probability of being infected by dengue fever due to climate change is then calculated and is found to range from 12% to 43% to 87% which represent low, mid, and high probabilities of infection caused by climate change when the temperature is increased by 1.8°C. The respondent’s willingness to pay (WTP) is also investigated in the survey using the single-bounded dichotomous choice (SBDC) approach, and the results show that people would pay NT$724, NT$3,223 and NT$5,114 per year in order to avoid the increased probabilities of 12%, 43%, and 87%, respectively, of their being infected with dengue fever.

Article history:Received 6 January 2007Received in revised form30 May 2007Accepted 7 June 2007Available online 3 August 2007The purpose of this study is to estimate the value of the potential economic impact ofclimate change on the Taiwan trout (also referred to as Oncorhynchus masou formosanus), anendangered species that only lives in high mountain stream sections in which the watertemperature is lower. A two-stage approach is adopted to estimate the value of the changeintheTaiwantroutstockduetoachangeinclimate.Thefirststageinvolvesestablishingtherelationship between the Taiwan trout stock and climate change, while the second stageinvolves estimating the non-market value of the change in the Taiwan trout populationusing the double bound model associated with the contingent valuation method (CVM). OurresultsindicatethatthetotalTaiwantroutpopulationwilldeclinefrom1612to974,560,and146 if precipitation in Taiwan increases by 0.6 mm/day, while the temperature increases by0.9 °C, 1.8 °C, and 2.7 °C, respectively. The mean willingness to pay per person per year toavoid a change in the trout stock caused by climate change is found to be US$16.22, US$25.72, and US$33.60, respectively.© 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.Keywords:Climate changeContingent valuation methodDouble bound modelTaiwan troutJEL classification:Q25; Q26

Coral reefs constitute the most biologically productive and diverse ecosystem, and provide various goods and services including those related to fisheries, marine tourism, coastal protection, and medicine. However, they are sensitive to climate change and rising temperatures. Taiwan is located in the central part of the world's distribution of coral reefs and has about one third of the coral species in the world. This study estimates the welfare losses associated with the potential damage to coral reefs in Taiwan caused by climate change. The contingent valuation method adopted includes a pre-survey, a face-to-face formal survey, and photo illustrations used to obtain reliable data. Average annual personal willingness to pay is found to be around US$35.75 resulting in a total annual willingness to pay of around US$0.43 billion. These high values demonstrate that coral reefs in Taiwan deserve to be well preserved, which would require a dedicated agency and ocean reserves.

Non-alloyed Cr/Au Ohmic contacts on N-face and Ga-face n-GaN were studied. The specific contact resistances (ρc) of Cr/Au contacts onto the N-face and Ga-face n-GaN were as low as 2.4 × 10−4 Ω cm2 and 2.4 × 10−5 Ω cm2, respectively. Native oxide formed on the n-GaN surface was believed to be the key factor for higher ρc. The results of X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy confirmed that n-GaN samples with different surface polarities or treated by different chemical solutions exhibited significant differences in gallium oxide content on the surface, which led to a marked difference in the ρc of non-alloyed Cr/Au Ohmic contacts to GaN films.

Random utility models rely on the properties of the logistic distribution for ease of estimation, but this distribution implies the independence of irrelevant alternatives (IIA). The random parameters logit model offers a means of avoiding the IIA assumption as well as greater heterogeneity among agents, recreational anglers or beachgoers in the current application. A problem often encountered in the estimation of random utility models with many alternatives is the necessity of sampling alternatives or otherwise reducing the number of choices. Research has shown that in the random utility model, such changes in choice set still lead to consistent parameter estimates. However, with the random parameters logit, there is greater need to sample but no theoretical evidence that sampling is justified. In this paper we show the impact of sampling in a random parameters logit model. We find that sampling does not appear to change the parameter estimates substantially. We investigate two data sets: a study of beac...

This report summarizes the analysis results of 0.13µm technology 256Mbits NBit HTOL (High Temperature Operational Life) induced standby current failures caused by STI (Shallow Trench Isolation) punch through induced leakage degradation. Electrical analysis, EMMI and stress experiment on test devices are employed to identify the failure mechanisms, root causes, and corrective solutions. From this study, improvements could be achieved by circuit layout modification.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impacts of infectious diseases including Avian Flu and severe acute respiratory syndrome (hereafter SARS) on international tourist arrivals in Asian countries using both single datasets and panel data procedures. An autoregressive moving average model together with an exogenous variables (ARMAX) model are used to estimate the effects of these diseases in each SARS- and Avian Flu-infected country, while a dynamic panel model is adopted to estimate the overall impact on the region of these two diseases. The empirical results from both approaches are consistent and indicate that the numbers of affected cases have a significant impact on SARS-affected countries but not on Avian Flu-affected countries. However, since the potential damage arising from the Avian Flu and subsequent pandemic influenza is much greater than that resulting from the SARS, the need to take the necessary precautions in the event of an outbreak of Avian Flu and pandemic influenza warrants further attention and action. Therefore, the empirical findings of this study could add to the knowledge regarding the relationship between tourism and crisis management, especially in so far as the management of transmissible diseases is concerned.

We present a novel solution to the problem of best matching prefix (BMP) which is required in the IP routing lookup. Our approach is based on the trie-based algorithm. The idea is to prune the trie so that the main-searchable portion of the trie can be fitted into the small on-chip SRAM. The algorithm consists of two parts: level smart-compression trie and trie pruning. In the first part, we present the new trie-based algorithm which can provide flexibility, storage efficiency and incremental update. Moreover, the fixed-size data structure eliminates the complexity of the memory management. Secondly, we define the "core" and present how to apply the concept "trie pruning" to achieve fast IP routing lookup. With the currently popular platform, the proposed scheme can provide 40 MPPS without any assumption. While considering route flaps, the performance degrades by only 0.01% with 4000 BGP updates per 30 seconds.

Hashing is a widely used method to perform fast lookup. Several schemes have been proposed to support Internet lookup that includes IP lookup and packet classification. Rectangular search is a well-known packet classification scheme based on multiple hash accesses for different filter length. It shows good scalability with respect to the number of filters; however, the lookup performance is not satisfactory. For example, through experiments, each packet classification takes about 40 hash accesses in a 100,000-filter database and each hash access may take more than one memory access. Obviously, this is insufficient to provide gigabits throughput. We proposed a novel "lookahead caching" which can significantly improve the performance of the hash-based algorithm. The basic idea is to find out the unmatched case for each incoming packet, thus it is different from the traditional caching mechanism. The experimental results indicate that the proposed scheme can improve the performance by a factor of two. The scheme can be further enhanced using parallel processing.

Packet classification is a technique that classifies the flows into different classes. Nowadays the packet classification plays an important role for many new Internet services. Rectangle search is a well-known packet classification scheme which is based on multiple hash accesses for different filter length. It shows good scalability with respect to the number of filters; however, the lookup performance is not fast enough. For example, through experiments, each packet classification takes about 40 hash accesses in a 100,000-filter database and each hash access may take more than one memory access. Obviously, this is not capable to provide gigabits throughput. We propose an efficient scheme to improve the rectangle search. The scheme consists of two parts. In the first part, the "tuple reduction algorithm" based on filter duplication is proposed. In spite of the increased number of filters, the pre-computation information is dramatically reduced. The performance has increased two times while only about one quarter storage is required. Secondly, we propose a novel "lookahead caching" which can further improve the lookup performance. The basic idea is to find out the "un-matched" case for each incoming packet, thus it is different from the traditional caching mechanism. The experimental results indicate that the proposed scheme can fulfill OC-192 throughput.

Adult intussusception is rare with variable clinical presentation. We reported a case of adult intussusception presenting with symptoms mimicking acute appendicitis. The patient presented as an abdominal pain from epigastric area with shifting gradually to RLQ. The atypical presentation of adult intussusception remains a diagnostic challenge to the emergency physician.

In the packet classification, the route and resources allocated to a packet are determined by the destination address as well as other header fields of the packet such as source/destination address, TCP and UDP port numbers. It has been demonstrated that performing packet classification on a potentially large number of fields is difficult and has poor worst-case performance. In this work, we proposed an enhanced tuple pruning search algorithm called "Tuple Pruning +" that provides fast two-dimension packet classification. With reasonable extra filters added for Information Marker, only one hash access to the tuples is required. Through experiments, about 8 MB memory is required for 100K-filter database and 20 million packet per second (MPPS) is achievable. The results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm is suitable for high-speed packet classification.