Financial groups Essay

Today, Barclays is one of the most powerful financial groups in the world. But its origins can be traced back to a much more modest business, founded more than 300 years ago in premises close to the Group’s global headquarters in the heart of London’s financial district. In the late 17th century, the streets of the City of London were filled with goldsmith-bankers, who provided monarchs and merchants with the money they needed to fund their ventures around the world. One such business was founded by John Freame and his partner Thomas Gould in Lombard Street, London, in 1690. The name Barclay became associated with the company in 1736, when James Barclay – who had married John Freame’s daughter – became a partner. Private banking was common in the 18th century, bankers would keep their clients’ gold deposits secure and lend to credit-worthy merchants. By the 1890s there were some 100 private banks. In 1896, 20 of these companies came together to form a new joint-stock bank. The leading partners of the new bank, which was named Barclay and Company, were already connected by a web of family and business relationships. The new bank had 182 branches, mainly in the East and South East, and deposits of i 26 million – a substantial sum of money in those days. It expanded its branch network rapidly by taking over other banks, including Bolithos in Cornwall and the South West in 1905 and United Counties Bank in the Midlands in 1916. In 1918 the company – now Barclays Bank Limited – amalgamated with the London, Provincial and South Western Bank to become one of the UK’s ‘big five’ banks. By 1926 the bank had 1,837 outlets in its own name. The development of today’s global business began in 1925, with the merger of three banks in which Barclays held shares, the Colonial Bank, the Anglo Egyptian Bank and the National Bank of South Africa. The new Barclays Bank had businesses in much of Africa, the Middle East and the West Indies. Its name changed to Barclays Bank DCO in 1954, in response to changed economic and political conditions. It became Barclays policy to decentralise, away form London setting up locally-established banks, and 1985 called Barclays Bank. Today’s Barclays has tremendous global strength and a reputation for being first with innovative products and services. As of 30 June 2000, staff worldwide consisted of 70,300, of which 52,300 were in the UK. Today, Barclays has five business groupings that are managed as international businesses, reflecting changing customer needs and the developments taking place in global financial services. Barclays Barclays makes a direct and significant contribution to the well-being of the UK economy. The banking sector accounts for approximately 4. 2 per cent of the UK’s national output. In 1998, the financial industry contributed i 4. 6 billion to government revenues in mainstream corporation tax. Barclays alone paid a total of i 533 million in taxes in 1998. Around 30 million transactions are processed every day through UK clearing systems. The number of ways it is possible to access financial services is dramatically increasing for the benefit of customers. Telephone banking, increased accessibility to cash machines, means that millions of customers can use banking services 24 hours a day. Demand for these services is rising as an alternative to branch-based banking and, as a consequence of this the number of traditional branched will continue to decline. Due to the closure of branches there has been a decline in the number of jobs across the banking sector. Reasons for Change and Actions Taken The main reason for the change is the changing needs of the consumers. More people are working know, leading busier lives with longer days and travelling more and needing instant access to money without having to queue and wait. Customer tastes are becoming increasingly diverse, whilst some people want the immediacy of 24 hour electronic access to their money whilst others still prefer personal, face to face service from cashiers. Having seen that people want more instant access to their money Barclays have set up over 25,000 ATM’s, expanded their telephone banking service and offer the worlds leading internet banking service. They boast statistic of: â€Å"One million customers have signed up for our telephone banking service. Our call centres receive 25 calls every minute. † â€Å"The number of cash machined available to customers had more than trebled in the past five years. † â€Å"Barclays online banking has attracted more than 450,000 customers since it was launched in1996† Barclays has to keep its services in the public interest as they face serious competition from multinational banking corporation, supermarkets offering cash back, and even car manufactures can offer banking services. In the last six years the total number of credit card issuers has more than doubled. The recent advances in technology, particularly digital information, mean that many of the new competitors in the financial market do not need to maintain a nationwide chain of branches. It is possible, and much cheaper, to provide financial services over the telephone, PC or internet. Due to the increase of competition it has been important for Barclays to aim to lead the way for banking in the future, and also for them to be careful that they handle their customers needs and expectations. One of the biggest challenges for all financial services providers is to develop a new generation of more sophisticated, flexible products and services. Customers want and require straight forward easy access to their cash, whether it be through a cash machine, over that phone or the cash desk. At Barclays it is possible for customers to chose what kind of accounts they want, for example all in one accounts, such as those offered by Virgin One and Mortgage Trust or they can opt for savings accounts from building societies and insurance companies. Traditional banking providers are offering more advanced current accounts. The number of customers choosing Barclays more advanced current account is increasing. Services such as internet banking unheard of ten years ago, are now offered as standard by most banks. Barclays has a long history of innovation. They were the first bank in the world to install the cash dispenser, this was located at their Enfield branch in 1967 having previously launched the first credit card in Europe in 1966. In the 1980’s they introduced the UK’s first debit card. In October 1998, Barclays became the first bank to introduce instant banking, and to allow the credit card to offer customer access to their current account and credit card details over the phone. Barclays realises that to keep up with competition that they will have to continue their long history of investment in production and service innovation, increase the use of the technology available to them, ie the internet, e-commerce and telebanking. They also propose to provide business customers with full euro capabilities and offering their personal banking customers an even broader range of flexible savings, mortgage and loan plans. Barclays has spent over i 10 million on customer research programmes in 1999 to ensure that they have an in depth understanding of the needs of their customers and their expectations. In total they surveyed more than 1. 7 million personal customers during 1999. They found that customers were generally satisfied with their financial service provider. Customers said that they regarded Barclays as solid, safe and reliable in terms of the funds and business they entrusted in them. However it was noticed that customers wanted an improvement in the one to one service and for individual circumstances to be well received. Having heard this Barclays responded by launching a series of initiatives, many of these involved better use of customer data allowing them to anticipate customers needs and allowing them to pre-approve loans, overdrafts and mortgage arrangements. Barclays aims to make a contribution to the community, in September 1999 they announced proposals to contribute i 100 million to a new regional Venture Capital Fund, offering loans to growing businesses that are unable to gain conventional bank funding, this was part of Barclays aim to promote economic regeneration. Barclays has also developed three national sponsorship programmes, these include, Barclays New Futures, this is the largest educational sponsorship scheme worth i 8 million over eight years, run in conjunction with Community Service Volunteers. Barclays Sitesavers, this is the largest environmental regeneration sponsorship worth i 3 million over six years, this is a partnership scheme with Groundwork, they are aiming to turn derelict land into in to parks, gardens, play areas and sports grounds. Barclays Stage Partner aims to allow people who otherwise could not afford to go to the theatre, it will cost Barclays a total of i 4. 5 million over six years. However for Barclays to keep up with competition in the millennium it was necessary for them to widen their market and a merger with the Woolwich was proposed. Both the chief executive of Woolwich and Barclays realised that they had a shared philosophy, strategy and vision, as well as their views on the future of banking being similar. A deal between Woolwich and Barclays would double Barclays’ share of both the mortgage and savings market, provide access to the country’s second largest team of independent financial advisers and give it Open Plan, Woolwich’s all-in-one bank account, which was adding a further 8,000 customers a week. However, due to the merger taking place over 100 Woolwich branches were located within 100 metres of a Barclays, as these were now unnecessary these 100 Woolwich branches were closed, leaving the group with a combined total of 2,000 branches. Barclays said that the Woolwich name would be kept and would become the mortgage brand for Barclays products. The newly merged group now had more than 16 million customers, with both sets being able to attain the advantages from both Barclays and Woolwich. However Barclays continued closing banks, closing a further 171 branches across Britain. It was argued that to keep up with their plan and to advance in this world with new improved technology it was no longer necessary to have so many branches. If the bank was not to realise this and change its methods of banking it would go out of business. However as Britain’s second biggest bank it was still difficult for them to justify the closing of so many branches with little pre warning leaving 7,500 people with no job and over 40,000 customers, most from rural communities without there local banking service. Barclays said that even after the closure of the rural branches people living in those areas would still have a local branch within three miles. This however was not true as now many customers face round trips of twenty miles to alternative branches and fears have been raised for the safety of people carrying cash to be cashed into their accounts. In one case a 79 year old woman staged a sit in at their local Barclays Bank to protest against plans to close it. The locals were said to be ‘devastated and worried to be losing their local bank and the effect it would have on businesses. ‘ Protest groups across the country are planning sit ins and other forms of disruption to try to deter Barclays from closing their local branches. Barclays quickly picked up on the negative atmosphere towards them in the areas they had closed the branches and announced that they had agreed a deal allowing customers to pay cash and cheques and withdraw cash from their local post office. The bank arranged this in 155 of the 171 areas were they had closed the banks. Barclays said that they hoped that the deal with the post offices would help to keep them open in areas they were they too were under threat. However locals complained that the new service was no substitute for full time banking facilities. It is not just Barclays facing these problems, most banks have been closing their local branches and been changing to more modern methods of financial services and issuing money. With more people working, with less time to go to the banks it is necessary for them to be able to withdraw cash at any time of day of night. In the past, when less woman worked it was possible for the woman to go to the bank and to cash in cheques and withdraw money, however now, often with both members of the family working it leaves little time to get to the bank, thus the need for instant services, ie. Telephone, Internet banking and twenty- four hour cash dispensers. Though many jobs have been lost through the closure of all the branches a vast number of jobs have been opened up through telephone banking, with Barclays alone boasting more than twenty- five calls minute. It is often the people who are scared of change who resist to it, though it may inconvenience them at first, in the long run it will benefit them allowing them easier access to their money.

Cost of Capital

We've regarded how cyber crimes impact the performance and how we can measure the impact of cyber crimes. Case study of Amazon Inc. epresents the main and general information about the ompany, identifies its mission and objectives. We've evaluated the current situation in company's business and performance. Our case also determined and found exposures of Amazon Inc. to cyber threats. We've reviewed the strategy and performance of the company from four perspectives: financial, customer, internal, innovation learning &growth perspective. On the basis of our findings we've given specific recommendations to the company that would help to achieve its goals and maintain leadership in the market of online retail.Recommendations correspond to four perspectives we've used to review performance of the company. We are onvinced that cyber defense is an integral part of company's performance and hence the performance management. 2. Introduction 2. 1 Cybercrimes in information age Cybercrimes appe ared at the same time as the Internet. And the ways and technologies of crimes were, are and would be improving along the development of machines and technologies in the whole and in particular the Internet. Cybercrimes became the part of our world and in order to protect us from that, governments of all countries provide the laws to prevent from such things.Also there are companies, which provide the security services against cybercrimes: Cyberpath, ESET, TDI and any others. But, unfortunately, they cannot solve all the problems. The existing criminal laws in most countries should cover computer-related crimes or electronically perpetrated crimes. 2. 2 Use of informational technology in fraud The biggest cyber threat is that it may happen at any given time, it is simply impossible to find out when the new wave will hit and more importantly what type of wave will it be. Cyber threat may take different forms.Here are the most common especially for our company. The first and the least dangerous is the threat, which has not material impact on the company. As an example can be the defacing of the company's website by hackers. Second, more serious is the threat, which is haling for the financial gain. Not only have the businesses entered the digital world. The criminals have done the same as well. And nowadays it functions Just like any other business. They have their strategies, management structures, quality control and so on.For example, hackers may obtain company's earnings reports before its official release. Having that knowledge, they may use it in making the decision of buying or selling stocks of that particular company. Keeping pace with new technologies also eeds certain portion of attention. Companies' risk exposure is constantly growing as the companies invest more and more in technologies (social, mobile, cloud, etc. ). All ot those can be a threat at the end ot the day. Mobile, tor instance, put the business in danger as the organization's corporate data suddenly may be assessed from the outside.Furthermore, the employees do not always fully realize the threat they are undertaking by sending, sharing or receiving the information on their personal devices. The same goes for social media, where the personal and professional line is often erased. One way that a hacker can gain illicit access toa system is through â€Å"social engineering†. Social engineering is a term used to describe deception against other humansl . A hacker may devise a scheme to trick another person into providing a username and password.Social engineering is as simple and effective as pretending to leave the room while another is signing onto a computer, all the while peaking around the corner to get a glimpse of logon keystrokes. Social engineering does not always take place face-to-face. Clever hackers have been known to place phone calls pretending to be a corporate help desk person or other legitimate artner asking for information that could compro mise access to computing resources. Imagine how many workstations are left wide open in a building when a fire alarm goes off.How long would it take for the alarm puller to drop a floppy into your desktop computer, initiate a process and be gone? Another category of intrusion tool is known as the scanner, or sniffer. Many operating systems come with vulnerability scanners that assist administrators in finding weaknesses. Public domain and commercial products are readily available, including SARA, Nessus, O SANS Institute 2002, Author retains full rights2. These scanners can reveal service ports that are open for attack and even details about the operating system itself.We should not be naive enough to think that these are out of the reach of the bad guys. Then, password cracking entails creating plain text passwords from their cryptographic hashes. Once the plain text password is garnered, access can be had. Password cracking tools are made available to system administrators for aud iting and recovery reasons. IP3 spoofing is a technique used by hackers as a means to gain hidden, unauthorized access to a target resource. They do this by impersonating a trusted resource.Specifically, a DDoS4 attack may change address information in the IP header of a message to make the target resource think the message is coming from a recognized, friendly port. When this technique is deployed in high volume, the attack can effectively dominate the target machine's resources, causing the target machine to perform sluggishly, or stop processing altogether. In addition to password cracking, social engineering, IP spoofing techniques, hackers have many other ways to perform destructive acts in the cyber realm.They have ways to hijack legitimate sessions, intercept and re-assemble IP fragments, take advantage of buffer overflows or flood a target machine with SYN requests. It is the wide and diverse nature of vulnerability today that argues for a strong cyber security management sy stem, one that begins with comprehensive policy and applies many technologies to achieve defense in depth. 3. Is business performance management relevant today? Business performance management is scientific approach to reaching the set of relevant and time limited goals by applying the definite set of metrics to assess the ffectiveness of resource usage.An evaluation of performance management regards indicators that numerically show the outcome of business activities. There are metrics for evaluating the success of a business: financial, internal, customer, strategic and compliance. Financial metric Financial metric includes sales, profits and costs. This metric shows us if our sales decreased or increased and if decreased, we should investigate why. But more important metric is how our profits behave. If our sales go down, our profits could still increase because we decreased the rate of cost.Internal metric Internal metric provides an evaluation management working at the company. As usual, this metric is better in small companies, because managers are closely connected with the employees rather than in big corporations. Customer metric Businesses exist to serve the needs of their customers. This means that behviour and loyalty of customers, and their level of satisfaction, provide us with a good measure for business long-term health and performance. Strategic metric Companies create strategies to reach short and long-term targets.An evaluation of the strategic performance management includes the quality of execution the trategies that management tried to implement. Strategies specify actions that management expects to achieve the desired result. An evaluation considers implementation of the strategies, successful execution of the planned actions by the company and whether results comply with the goals. Compliance metric Compliance metric measures effectiveness of compliance within the organization. Management should demonstrate ability to comply with financi al reporting standards, regulations and environmental legislation.Ideally, business should not have any imposed sanctions from the authorities. As we mentioned all these metrics are important for successful existence of the company. Without business performance management the company will collapse because, for example, if the company does not know what is its profit or its customer rate, what is inside in the company and so on and so forth. Measuring and keeping track on business's performance is essential for every company. If you don't evaluate your past performance you can't make realistic sustainable plans for the future. Cost of Capital We've regarded how cyber crimes impact the performance and how we can measure the impact of cyber crimes. Case study of Amazon Inc. epresents the main and general information about the ompany, identifies its mission and objectives. We've evaluated the current situation in company's business and performance. Our case also determined and found exposures of Amazon Inc. to cyber threats. We've reviewed the strategy and performance of the company from four perspectives: financial, customer, internal, innovation learning &growth perspective. On the basis of our findings we've given specific recommendations to the company that would help to achieve its goals and maintain leadership in the market of online retail.Recommendations correspond to four perspectives we've used to review performance of the company. We are onvinced that cyber defense is an integral part of company's performance and hence the performance management. 2. Introduction 2. 1 Cybercrimes in information age Cybercrimes appe ared at the same time as the Internet. And the ways and technologies of crimes were, are and would be improving along the development of machines and technologies in the whole and in particular the Internet. Cybercrimes became the part of our world and in order to protect us from that, governments of all countries provide the laws to prevent from such things.Also there are companies, which provide the security services against cybercrimes: Cyberpath, ESET, TDI and any others. But, unfortunately, they cannot solve all the problems. The existing criminal laws in most countries should cover computer-related crimes or electronically perpetrated crimes. 2. 2 Use of informational technology in fraud The biggest cyber threat is that it may happen at any given time, it is simply impossible to find out when the new wave will hit and more importantly what type of wave will it be. Cyber threat may take different forms.Here are the most common especially for our company. The first and the least dangerous is the threat, which has not material impact on the company. As an example can be the defacing of the company's website by hackers. Second, more serious is the threat, which is haling for the financial gain. Not only have the businesses entered the digital world. The criminals have done the same as well. And nowadays it functions Just like any other business. They have their strategies, management structures, quality control and so on.For example, hackers may obtain company's earnings reports before its official release. Having that knowledge, they may use it in making the decision of buying or selling stocks of that particular company. Keeping pace with new technologies also eeds certain portion of attention. Companies' risk exposure is constantly growing as the companies invest more and more in technologies (social, mobile, cloud, etc. ). All ot those can be a threat at the end ot the day. Mobile, tor instance, put the business in danger as the organization's corporate data suddenly may be assessed from the outside.Furthermore, the employees do not always fully realize the threat they are undertaking by sending, sharing or receiving the information on their personal devices. The same goes for social media, where the personal and professional line is often erased. One way that a hacker can gain illicit access toa system is through â€Å"social engineering†. Social engineering is a term used to describe deception against other humansl . A hacker may devise a scheme to trick another person into providing a username and password.Social engineering is as simple and effective as pretending to leave the room while another is signing onto a computer, all the while peaking around the corner to get a glimpse of logon keystrokes. Social engineering does not always take place face-to-face. Clever hackers have been known to place phone calls pretending to be a corporate help desk person or other legitimate artner asking for information that could compro mise access to computing resources. Imagine how many workstations are left wide open in a building when a fire alarm goes off.How long would it take for the alarm puller to drop a floppy into your desktop computer, initiate a process and be gone? Another category of intrusion tool is known as the scanner, or sniffer. Many operating systems come with vulnerability scanners that assist administrators in finding weaknesses. Public domain and commercial products are readily available, including SARA, Nessus, O SANS Institute 2002, Author retains full rights2. These scanners can reveal service ports that are open for attack and even details about the operating system itself.We should not be naive enough to think that these are out of the reach of the bad guys. Then, password cracking entails creating plain text passwords from their cryptographic hashes. Once the plain text password is garnered, access can be had. Password cracking tools are made available to system administrators for aud iting and recovery reasons. IP3 spoofing is a technique used by hackers as a means to gain hidden, unauthorized access to a target resource. They do this by impersonating a trusted resource.Specifically, a DDoS4 attack may change address information in the IP header of a message to make the target resource think the message is coming from a recognized, friendly port. When this technique is deployed in high volume, the attack can effectively dominate the target machine's resources, causing the target machine to perform sluggishly, or stop processing altogether. In addition to password cracking, social engineering, IP spoofing techniques, hackers have many other ways to perform destructive acts in the cyber realm.They have ways to hijack legitimate sessions, intercept and re-assemble IP fragments, take advantage of buffer overflows or flood a target machine with SYN requests. It is the wide and diverse nature of vulnerability today that argues for a strong cyber security management sy stem, one that begins with comprehensive policy and applies many technologies to achieve defense in depth. 3. Is business performance management relevant today? Business performance management is scientific approach to reaching the set of relevant and time limited goals by applying the definite set of metrics to assess the ffectiveness of resource usage.An evaluation of performance management regards indicators that numerically show the outcome of business activities. There are metrics for evaluating the success of a business: financial, internal, customer, strategic and compliance. Financial metric Financial metric includes sales, profits and costs. This metric shows us if our sales decreased or increased and if decreased, we should investigate why. But more important metric is how our profits behave. If our sales go down, our profits could still increase because we decreased the rate of cost.Internal metric Internal metric provides an evaluation management working at the company. As usual, this metric is better in small companies, because managers are closely connected with the employees rather than in big corporations. Customer metric Businesses exist to serve the needs of their customers. This means that behviour and loyalty of customers, and their level of satisfaction, provide us with a good measure for business long-term health and performance. Strategic metric Companies create strategies to reach short and long-term targets.An evaluation of the strategic performance management includes the quality of execution the trategies that management tried to implement. Strategies specify actions that management expects to achieve the desired result. An evaluation considers implementation of the strategies, successful execution of the planned actions by the company and whether results comply with the goals. Compliance metric Compliance metric measures effectiveness of compliance within the organization. Management should demonstrate ability to comply with financi al reporting standards, regulations and environmental legislation.Ideally, business should not have any imposed sanctions from the authorities. As we mentioned all these metrics are important for successful existence of the company. Without business performance management the company will collapse because, for example, if the company does not know what is its profit or its customer rate, what is inside in the company and so on and so forth. Measuring and keeping track on business's performance is essential for every company. If you don't evaluate your past performance you can't make realistic sustainable plans for the future.

RELIGION IN A MONTH IN THE COUNTRY AND THE LIFE OF PI Essay

RELIGION IN A MONTH IN THE COUNTRY AND THE LIFE OF PI - Essay Example In Life of Pi, Pi is an extremely religious character who relies on this faith to get him through a very difficult situation. While religion is explored different in these two texts, the inclusion of these faiths in central to both the literal and symbolic messages that each of them explore. In A Month in the Country, both good and evil can be seen throughout and are represented through religion, or lack thereof. This novel is set just after World War One had inflicted a great deal of damage on Europe and the world as a whole. This is symbolic of the evil in the world, as many people lost their lives as a result of this conflict and many more are left traumatized because of their experiences. This story centers around Tom Birkin, who is a veteran of the war and is also the victim of a broken marriage. Tom is contracted to restore a medieval mural located in a church in the Yorkshire village of Oxgodby, but he finds much more than a job in this village. When Tom arrives, this village has nearly lost its faith in religion, which is symbolized by the painting that has been covered up numerous times and by the cold-hearted nature of Reverend Keach. The lack of religion in this village is a stark contrast to the time period when the mural was originally painted, as the churc h and Christianity held a great deal of importance during that time period since â€Å"theirs was a different hell from oursâ€Å" (Carr 98). This is shown by the fact that the mural on the church is a depiction of God taking the good to heaven while sending the evil to hell. Another way in which good and evil are represented during this novel comes through the work of Charles Moon. He has been contracted in the same village to uncover the remains of a medieval man who was excommunicated from the church and also to find out why this happened to the man. Over time, Moon is able to figure out that this man was forced to convert to Islam and sword

Reflections on The Ideological Genesis of Needs Essay

Reflections on The Ideological Genesis of Needs - Essay Example Secondly it is considered as an object with an influential brand name in which case the function is forgotten and can be replaced by any other branded object and to be used as a possession of prestige to generate the same feeling status. The further discussions are on the exchange value, the symbolic and the sign value that are derived out of non-utilitarian objectives and gives a symbolic meaning to the object least taking it for the function it is meant for. The author thus considers the four logics of the object regarding (1) its utility, (2) the market price, (3) the symbolic value as a gift and (4) of a sign value as a status. The 'object of consumption' assumes its position when it disassociates its position as a utilitarian object, a symbol or as a commodity. Its sign value makes it as the object of consumption. The utilitarian object is irreplaceable barring the objects having the same function. Here the object has a relation with its function.

Constructivism Theory of International Relations Essay

Constructivism Theory of International Relations - Essay Example Based on these articles, I would like to point out that these scholars conducted a well organized and extensive research. They had to choose to carry out a research on this theory in order to create more awareness and inform their respective audiences on all the contributions, controversies and the gaps in this theory which need more researchers to study. In the choice of their methodology, I would like to recommend that it was properly done. It seems that they knew about the main objective of their research. Thus, they identified and used the most appropriate variables which would help them in answering their research questions and the hypotheses. Both of these scholars knew about the predictions that would determine their findings. This explains why there was no failure in the whole of their research. After identifying the research topic/issue, they settled on literature review in which they conducted several documentary analyses in order to get more information about this theory. They did this by choosing the most appropriate and relevant set of documents to use. Thus, their work became more credible and authoritative to be relied upon by other scholars for carrying out their future researches (Rodney, B.H., 2009). This area or f research is quite important for these scholars. Although several scholars have researched on it, because, as Richard and Christian suggest, a lot still need to be done in order to fill up the missing links. Based on their findings that this theory is valuable for the contemporary society.

Comparing Iodine Based Contrast Drugs for Acute and Late Allergic Article

Comparing Iodine Based Contrast Drugs for Acute and Late Allergic Reactions - Article Example After reading this article, both the patients and the technologist will understand risk of contrast reactions, the frequency of occurrence of such risks, the associated side effects, and through this they will understand ways of minimizing the occurrence of ICM. This will ultimately help them to come up with an appropriate plan to manage and treat the ICM reactions effectively. Introduction Iodinated contrast media are one of the most injectable drugs radiology. Reactions from intravenous injections are either mild or self-treated. Most modern iodinated contrast media are used almost in any part of the body. It is because they are often used intravenously although they can be administered intraabdominally, intrathecally and intraarterially. They are reported to be safe and with mild and self-limiting adverse effects. Nonetheless life-threatening or severe reactions can occur. Radiologist who get involved in using iodinated contrast drugs should be aware of the associated risk factors for contrast media reactions. They need to be aware of the strategies to help minimize adverse events and must be prepared to promptly manage and recognize them. Iodinated contrast media can be categorized into four groups namely (1) ionic dimers (lower carboxyl group toxicity; lower osmotoxity: ration 3),include ioxaglate, (2) Ionic monomers (highest carboxyl group toxicity; highest osmotoxicity ration 1.5), Diatrizoate, ioxythalamate, metrizoate, iothalamate, and iodamide, (3) Nonionic monomers (no carboxyl group toxicity; same osmotoxicity as the ionic dimers), include hydroxyl groups: metrizamide iopromide, hydroxyl groups: iomeprol, iopetnol, ioxitol, and iopamidol), hydroxyl group: ioversol, iohexol), (4) Non ionic dimers (no carboxyl group toxicity; lowest osmotoxicity: hydroxyl group (iodixanol), and hydroxyl group: iotrolan. This literature review of scientific articles aims at evaluating whether there were variations in iodine based contrast drugs for acute and late aller gic reactions, other side effects and their frequency. Materials and methods Selection of Random Controlled Trails (RCTs) investigating immediate or non-immediate allergic reactions, other side effects and frequency of iodine based contrast (Iodinated contrast media (ICM)) were considered for inclusion. Iodine based contrast was defined as intravenous contrast (radiocontrast) agents based on iodine. Comparing Iodine Based Contrast Drugs for Acute and Late Allergic Reactions, and other side effects and their Frequency Results and Discussion Iodinated-based Contrast Drugs/Media (ICMs) for Acute and Allergic Reactions. Iodinated contrast media (ICMs) are one of the injectable drugs that are most commonly used. Recent studies have shown that each year more than 70 million iodinated contrast media are administered worldwide. ICMs are derivatives of tri-iodinated benzene. Due to the tri-iodinated benzene derivative, ICMs are characterized by non-ionic or ionic side chains and the dimeric or monomeric ring structure. Non-ionic monomers seem to be less complicated than the non-ionic dimaers in NHR, although some studies indicate that there is no difference between non-ionic dimers and non-ionic monomers. According to the iodine

The Life and Influence of Jimi Hendrix Research Paper

The Life and Influence of Jimi Hendrix - Research Paper Example Hendrix was primarily a self-taught musician. He was also left-handed which created a problem with his father because he wanted him to play right handed for superstitious reasons. Hendrix was also an introvert and he was very shy. At one point in his life, his mother died and this sent him into more seclusion and a more focused concentration on his music. Hendrix had many challenges in school and eventually dropped out. He wanted to focus more on his music than on his school work and all he wanted to do was play music (Willett, 23). In 1956, he received his first real guitar from his father; it was an electric guitar without an amplifier. From that point on, Hendrix played music with any musician he could find to play with and listened very carefully to the music. The first time he played professional was with an amateur band of older boys. They were auditioning him to see if he could be a part of the group. The challenge was that Hendrix wanted to be a star even then and he played o ut. Hendrix first played with a group called "The Velvetones" where he played backup and he learned to play a mixture of blues, rhythm and blues, jazz and R&B; they also did a lot of dancing on the stage (Willett, 26). Later he played with a group called "The Rocking Kings." After they broke up Jimi next played with a group called "The Tomcats". After a short time working for his father in a landscaping business, Jimi went into the Army to escape his father and to get out of some legal problems.

Microeconomic Aspects of Music Event Realization in Radisson Blu Hotel Essay

Microeconomic Aspects of Music Event Realization in Radisson Blu Hotel of Dubai - Essay Example This essay presents a brief thorough microeconomic analysis of the ticket pricing policy for the music event, that was carried out by the management of Radisson Blu Hotel. One time experience in this hotel during July 2012 music extravaganza posed one of the most technical economic challenges to the management of the hotel and the prospective customers. The problem arose from the unprecedented demand for entry tickets. Dubai is a multicultural metro which hosts many people and musicians are one of the best entertainment sources that attract people from different walks of life. This means that the tickets which were released commensurate to the hall capacity were very few. It is important to note that the concept that was art play in this case was price elasticity. This was a luxurious event which in most cases is price inelastic and increasing ticket and drinks prices did not bring any significant change. This hotel employs a good number of the local people and therefore the benefits derived are reflected in their improved living standard. Such an economic policy like raising the price in such circumstances where the demand is high has economic benefit to the community through the hotel due to increased revenue. It is also important to note that there are some cases where the elasticity concept influences the general response of people when the cost of services or goods is altered. The scenario above did not yield better results as expected due to the price inelastic aspect of the service on offer. In some instances increasing prices will initiate increase in income due to price inelasticity especially in case of luxurious commodities and services. It is also imperative that other control measures are applied towards taming the excess demand rather than pricing policy option. It is important to note that high prices charged by the hotel must be reflected in marginal increase in costs. It is therefore imperative to note that if such actions are not well calculated with regard to economic consequences then outcome of the overall initiative can bring the firm down. Increasing the prices of the tickets that was done in this music extravaganza was used in expansionary production of various dishes as some of the products in this case and acquisition of additional furniture in the hotel. This has the effect of increasing the sitting capacity of the hotel with a multiplier effect which contributes to recruitment of more labor. This means that more members of the community are likely to get employed and extra uptake of input factors like foodstuff raw materials which will translate to increased income to the community. Such events attracts many people especially with consideration of the nature of Dubai and this means that raising the price of tickets is another way of simply boosting the revenue of the hotel due price inelasticity of the event. This high charge also means that the quality of the services and products offered must met some standard that equally has cost effects. The decision to increase

Christian vocation coursework Essay Example for Free

Christian vocation coursework Essay Describe how a Christian may follow the call to discipleship through daily life and work Vocation is the idea that people get a call from god to do a certain job this can also be said about being called into Christianity by god, it may not be an actual call or a big flash of light but just s feeling that you have created by god. ‘Vocation’ comes from the Latin word meaning ‘to be called’. Some Christians may say that they were called to Christianity and so were all Christians. For example Jesus was called by god, he heard his voice when he was baptised by John. Discipleship is another term used my Christians used to mean following Jesus like his disciples did, living a Christian lifestyle and helping others also apply to discipleship. Christians follow Jesus by following his examples like his love, service and compassion towards others. Someone who has chosen to follow Jesus should be living a caring helpful life, possibly in a caring profession such as a doctor, nurse or teacher. Any job can be a vocation, some Christians say god has a plan for everyone and he may call you to a job that isn’t related to Christianity at all. St. Paul said in Colossians 3:23 â€Å"whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the lord, not for men.† Possibly meaning that god has called everyone to their jobs because he knows its right for them so work for him and do the job well. A Christian may choose his or her job just simply because they want to do the job although this want or urge to do a job could be put down to god. I don’t think there are any jobs unsuitable for Christians, Jesus loved everyone anyway even if they were a sinner he did not commend what they did but he still loved them. I do not think your religion should constrain your job opportunities. A Christian may serve god in an ordinary job by obeying the 10 commandments in their job and generally being caring and helpful. Christians can put Christian teachings into their family lives by following Paul’s teachings and the 10 commandments. Paul’s teachings say, â€Å"A wife, must put her husband first. This is her duty as a follower of the lord. A husband must love his wife and not abuse her. Children must always obey their parents. This pleases the lord. Parents, don’t be hard on your children. If you are, they might give up. (a)(ii) Explain why some Christians join communities and take vows or poverty, chastity and obedience. Christian communities are a group of Christians who live together. A convent is where a group of female Christians would live also known as nuns and male Christians or monks would live in a monastery. A contemplative order is focusing your life on god, in prayer and everyday life. An example of a contemplative community is the poor clares. The normal day in the poor clares community may consist of many things, gardening, housework, cooking, cleaning, helping the elderly and sick, praying or working in the shop; making candles, encaustic wax cards, as well as cards created and printed on a computer, turning wood and knitting garment on their knitting machine. The nuns do this type of work involving their hands because it leaves their minds free to focus on god and pray. Jesus says in Matthew 6:24 how â€Å"no one can serve two masters†, â€Å"you cannot serve both god any money† so the nuns in the poor clare community decide to â€Å"serve god† and his people and help them rather than work for money. An active order is doing something about what you believe in, for example if you want to be one of Jesus’ disciples you would follow in his footsteps and his examples and help people maybe by helping out at a hospital or a school. People or monasteries and convents today are living like the first Christians as recorded in the book of acts because the first Christians lived out alone in the desert, Christians live in s slightly similar way today. They have no possessions, they cannot have sex and they dedicate their time to thinking if they are contemplative, as you would alone in a desert, or doing things to help others. Living in a Christian community would help a Christian to follow their call to discipleship because of the vows they take when they join, they have to do things in a similar way to Jesus therefore helping to follow their call to discipleship. Some Christians may say joining a Christian community is a vocation because whatever they do as a job or joining a community is a vocation. God has a plan for them and they follow it via vocation. Some Christians believe that god want them to live in a religious community rather than an ordinary one because its better for them and other who they would be helping. A vow is an oath or promise you make. Nuns and monks take vows when they join a religious community; they take a vow of poverty so they are not tied down by possessions and money and can focus on god. Christ was poor to make us rich so they follow in his footsteps and enforce discipleship. They also take a vow of chastity, which means they must remain celibate so they can devote themselves to god as Jesus did. Also a relationship with someone from the opposite sex will get in the way of god and praying; St. Paul advises Christians to be celibate so they can â€Å"be devoted to the lord†. Obedience is the third vow they take, by this vow they give to God their freewill. They must be obedient to their abbot or abbess. Again showing their discipleship, because Jesus was obedient until the point of death on the cross for god. It is important for Christians to make these vows in front of a community because then there is witnesses so you cant get out of the commitment and also if you are doubtful they can remind you about them. (a)(iii) Explain the purpose and practice of one particular religious community. The poor Clares are a religious community for women who want to dedicate their lives to god. They originated in 1212 by St Francis and St Clare in Assisi in Italy. The poor clares are a contemplative community. The contemplative community of nuns started as a way of being united with god and to follow Jesus. The aims of the poor Clare community are mostly â€Å"to pray for the world and the Church†, to live a life through their prayers, dedicated to god and â€Å"to live out the Gospel command of love† which means to live their lives as god wanted helping others and loving them. The normal day in the poor clares community may consist of many things, gardening, housework, cooking, cleaning, helping the elderly and sick, praying or working in the shop; making candles, encaustic wax cards, as well as cards created and printed on a computer, turning wood and knitting garment on their knitting machine. The nuns do this type of work involving their hands because it leaves their minds free to focus on god and pray. Jesus says in Matthew 6:24 how â€Å"no one can serve two masters†, â€Å"you cannot serve both god any money† so the nuns in the poor clare community decide to â€Å"serve god† and his people and help them rather than work for money. Their timetable is shown below 5.00 Rise 5.45 Readings – a morning invitation to prayer composed of some psalms and two readings, one from Scripture and one from a Christian teacher or saint. These nourish our spirits for the day ahead. A quick breakfast followed by time for personal prayer, reading, study until 7.30 7.30 Morning Prayer, the Prayer of Praise to God followed by Spiritual reading 8.30 Holy Mass followed by a short Office and then work until 11.50 11.50 A short Prayer written by Francis of Assisi and Scripture reading 12.30 Dinner; some free time until 2.15 2.15 back to work with a tea break at 3.30 and a short prayer together in the refectory at 4.00 to sanctify our work 5.50 Evening prayer 6.30 Supper followed by an hour of personal prayer time until 8.15 8.15 Compline or Night Prayer, which closes the day. The poor clares take three vows as a sign of their commitment and consecration to God. The vow of chastity allows the nuns to focus their love on god, they give god their bodies and souls and their right to marry. They also take the vow of poverty so they are not tied down by possessions and money and can focus on god. Christ was poor to make us rich so they follow in his footsteps and enforce discipleship. Obedience is the third vow they take, by this vow they give to God their freewill. Again showing their discipleship, because Jesus was obedient until the point of death on the cross for god. (b) â€Å"Christians should lead active rather than contemplative lives.† Contemplative means to life your life dedicated to god through prayer, to live a contemplative life. An example of a contemplative community is the poor clares. a day in the poor clares community may consist of things such as , gardening, housework, cooking, cleaning, helping the elderly and sick, praying or working in the shop; making candles, encaustic wax cards, as well as cards created and printed on a computer, turning wood and knitting garment on their knitting machine. The nuns do this type of work involving their hands because it leaves their minds free to focus on god and pray. Jesus says in Matthew 6:24 how â€Å"no one can serve two masters†, â€Å"you cannot serve both god any money† so the nuns in the poor clare community decide to â€Å"serve god† and his people and help them rather than work for money. Thomas Merton was a Trappist monk; he took a vow of silence amongst other vows his writings have had a big influence on many Christians. He took part in many social protests even though he had to be silent; he took part in such protests as the struggle for racial equality in the USA and the struggle against nuclear weapons in the Vietnam War. An active life for a Christian is doing something about what you believe in, for example a Christian can help follow their path to discipleship by following Jesus and helping others by helping people at hospitals, nursing homes, schools etc. ‘ordinary’ Christians can lead active lives by living in a Christian lifestyle and helping others also apply to discipleship. Christians follow Jesus by following his examples like his love, service and compassion towards others so do this in your everyday life and work and you will be living an active life. ‘Extra-ordinary’ Christian could do many great things for example Martin Luther King, Jr. (January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was one of the main leaders of the American civil rights movement he was a Baptist minister, and had a huge impact on the people of America. his most influential and well-known speech is the I Have A Dream speech. In 1964, he became the youngest man to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. he spoke out against injustices against black people of america, they were not allowed to vote, not allowed in the same places as white people and got half the pay. Martin luther king changed this Another example of a ‘extra-ordinary’ active christian was Mother Teresa (August 26, 1910 – September 5, 1997), she was born a roman catholic nun, she won the nobel peace prize in 1979. she was fascinated by stories of the lives of missionaries and their service. By the early 1970s, Mother Teresa had become an international celebrity. Her fame can be partly attributed to the 1969 documentary ‘Something Beautiful for God’. In 1982, at the height of the siege in Beirut, Mother Teresa rescued 37 children trapped in a front line hospital by negotioating a temporary cease-fire between the Israeli army and Palestinian guerillas. Mother Teresa inspired a wide variety of commemorations. Besides receiving numerous honors during her lifetime, she has also been memorialized through museums, been named patroness of various churches, and had various structures and roads named after her. In conclusion living an active life is far more beneficial to others and is more noticeable, living a contemplative life is good if you believe prayers work and they really were helping. Christians serve god in many different ways some more subtle than others. However it is to be taken into consideration that active Christians do pray and contemplate and contemplative Christians do work and help others. In my opinion active Christians are making a more valuable contribution to the world because I do not believe that prayers do anything and even if god doesn’t exist active Christians are still doing something good for the world

The Myth Of Fat Free

The Myth Of Fat Free Food Essay Meat products, junk foods and dairy products often advertise that the product that they are distributing are products that are either â€Å"fat free† or with lesser fat content than the usual item sold to the public. This is a claim that could only be repudiated by thoroughly examining the product as well as knowing the proper way of computing for calories per food serving and calories per fat content mass of the food in question. An example of such computation is outlined below to prove that the computation of calories sourced from fat is erroneous in most packed food containing the â€Å"fat free† or â€Å"lesser fat claim†. Based from the computations   performed above,   it appears that Food Manufacturing Companies   have been getting away with misleading facts concerning their   products. It could never be denied that these companies   have found a way to give â€Å"healthier† food to the health conscious public. The minimal calories associated to the food they manufacture   is indeed,   Ã‚  a   testament to their unwavering   dedication in promoting a healthier lifestyle for their   consumers. However, it should also be pointed out that   it is wrong to knowingly alter the Nutritional facts   stated on the product label to deceive their consumers.   Food Manufacturing Companies should refrain from putting   false information to the product packaging caption with unsubstantiated claims concerning the product’s nutritional values.   Instead, what they should do is to put in a   claim that their product has lesser   fat ,   lesser protein , lesser sodium   or  Ã‚  Ã‚   lesser cholesterol   based calories than most of the projects being sold in the market.   This would be more accurate and factual rather   than making claims   that their   food product is 97%, 98%, 0r 96%   fat free, especially when contains   18, 19 or 22.5% fat per serving. These THE   MYTH OF FAT FREE FOOD manufacturers need to correct   these   misleading statements  Ã‚   concerning their food product   in order to be   credible in the eyes of the public. REFERENCES: Calories in Cooked Corned Beef 97% Fat Free, Extra Lean, California Style.   Retrieved   May 22, 2010, from World wide web: http:// http://caloriecount.about.com/calories-dietz-watson-cooked-corned-beef-i89411 The 98% Fat Free Turkey.   Retrieved May 22, 2010, from World wide web: http://www.fatsecret. com/. /oscar-mayer/98%25 -fat-free-turkey- lunch-meat 97% Fat Free   Hebrew National   Hotdogs and Products.   Retrieved May 22, 2010, from World wide web: http:// www.hebrewnational.com/products/hot-dog-beef-franks.jsp Fitness Truth Behind Fat-Free Labeled Foods   by   Phil Kaplan.  Ã‚   Retrieved May 22, 2010, from World wide web: http:// www.philkaplan.com/thefitnesstruth/fat-free.htm

Prostate Cancer and Nutrition

Prostate Cancer and Nutrition Anand Somasundaram Contents (Jump to) Plant Based Diets: Fish Oil Vitamins and Minerals Dangers of Meats, high fat diets and Nitrites Conclusion Works Cited Introduction: Prostate cancer is the most common cancer of men and the third most common cause of death from cancer. Prostate cancer usually occurs in men above the age of 50. Many men who have prostate cancer, do not show any symptoms. Screening for this cancer is usually done by a Digital rectum exam (DRE) and/or Prostate specific antigen test (PSA). Digital rectum exam is the palpation of the prostate through the anus to check the size of the prostate. Prostate specific antigen test is a blood test to check if the prostate is releasing this specific antigen in the blood stream which can be a strong indication of prostate cancer. Research has been done on preventing and reducing the risk of obtaining this cancer. In these studies, nutrition can play a vital role in reducing the chances of getting this cancer. Diets that high in fruits and vegetables, low in fat especially fat from meats are shown to decrease the risk and development of prostate cancer. Plant Based Diets: Specific food groups have shown in several studies to be a crucial tool in preventing and slowing the progression of this disease. One group of foods that have shown a significant reduction in avoiding prostate cancer is plant based foods. Plant- based foods are shown to contain high amounts of vitamins and elements known to reduce cancer cell. For example, plant- based food contains vitamins and phytochemicals such as carotenoids, flavonoids, phytoestrogens and isothiocyanates (Ma Chapman, 2009). These phytochemicals have shown to regress cancer cell development and stop tumor promotion. Furthermore plant based diets are high in antioxidant. Antioxidants are molecules that prevent the oxidation of other molecules. Oxidation is the reason behind the production of free radicals. In addition, antioxidants reduce the damage to DNA by binding to these free radicals and eliminating them from the body. Free radicals damage the structure of DNA which can lead to tumor growth. An important carotenoid and phytochemical is lycopene. Lycopene is found in fruits such as tomatoes. Lycopene is known to reduce insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) signing. IGF-1 is protein that has found to promote prostatic cancer cells and allow the prostate to be susceptible to cancer. Cruciferous vegetables such cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts and bok choy all contain a compound call glucosinolate. Glucosinolate have shown in studies to reduce DNA damage, induce apoptosis and inhibit prostate cancer cell (Ma Chapman, 2009).They also possess phenethyl isothiocyanate, sulfophorane and indole-3-carbinol, which are compounds that have potential anti-cancer properties. Their mechanism of action involves the inhibition of  cytochrome P450  enzymes, which oxidize compounds such as  benzo[a]pyrene  and  polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons  (PAHs) into more polar  epoxy-diols. Cytochrome P450 enzyme is a known agent to cause mutation and cancer growth Another vegetable that constitutes an impact on tumor cells is soy bean. Soy beans contain isoflavones*. Isoflavones are organic 3-phenylchromen-4-one structure substances that natural occur in different types of foods. They inhibit enzymes associated with transmission of signals for tumor cell growth. `Tea especially green has been found to have similar effects to consuming vegetables and fruits. Polyphenol compounds in green tea have also been found to have the same effects as the cruciferous vegetables. They prevent metastases of the cancer, induce apoptosis and inhibit cell growth. Studies have shown that green tea inhibits tumor growth, therefore, leading to lower prostate-specific antigen levels and lower IGF-1 levels (Ma Chapman, 2009). One of these polyphenolic compounds is epigallocathechin-3 gallate (EGCG). EGCG is known to attach to urokinase, Urokinase is an enzyme that helps tumor cells grow. In the current market, there is a drug called amiloride and is used Amiloride can only have a maximum dose of 20 mg EGCG while normal cup of green can have upwards of 150mg EGCG. Another benefit is that green tea can be consumed at much higher rate than amiloride and not have physiological effect on the body (Jankun ,1997, p561) . Fish Oil The next groups of food that have shown to inhibit tumor cell growth are fish oils. Fish oil contains n3 polyunsaturated fatty acids. n3 polyunsaturated fatty acids are known to reduce serum prostate-specific antigen (PSA) protein expression (Ma Chapman, 2009). PSA is produced by the prostate gland and is used by the body to liquefy semen. The body uses excretes PSA in semen but sometimes in the presence of cancer, the PSA escapes to the blood stream. There two main groups of fatty acids, omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids. , Omega 3 fatty acids protect from cancer, while omega 6 fatty acids have been found to promote cancer when consumed in excessive amounts. One reason why omega 6 promotes cancer is because of its ability to promotion inflammation. (Tandon et al., 2008). Vitamins and Minerals Another antioxidant that has shown significant effect on prostate cancer cell growth is vitamin E. Vitamin E is considered as an intracellular antioxidant and an antiprostaglandin. * Antiprostaglandins are a group of molecules that reduce the production of mediators of the inflammatory process. As with any fat soluble vitamins, too much can have harmful effect. Intake of over 400 IU can be harmful to the body (Ma Chapman, 2009). In addition another vitamin that is important in inhibiting tumor cell growth is vitamin D. In studies, vitamin d has shown in both regular cells and cancerous to convert vitamin d into an active hormonal state. In this state, vitamin D has shown to inhibit tumor grow especially prostatic epithelial cells. (Tandon et al., 2008). Another substance besides vitamins that can help in the fight against is minerals. Minerals differ from vitamins in that vitamins are organic and contain carbon while minerals do not and are consider inorganic. A particular mineral, selenium, has been proven to be a protective agent. It reduces cellular proliferation, causes apoptosis and inhibits angiogenesis. (Ma Chapman, 2009). Angiogenesis is the growth of new capillary blood vessels in the body. In preventing blood vessel formation; the tumor cannot grow or spread (Li, Smith Li, 2011). Dangers of Meats, high fat diets and Nitrites All the foods discussed above have shown to decrease the instance of prostatic cancer cells. On the other hand, there are groups of food that are now known to promote prostate cancer cells. For example, meats especially cooked at high temperatures contribute to the production of cancer cells. When a meat is cook at high temperature, it releases carcinogens. Carcinogens are known to alter DNA which can lead to two results, apoptosis or promotes uninhibited cell growth. The two carcinogens that are produced during this process are Heterocyclic amines (HCAs) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). (â€Å"Why Carcinogens Cause Cancer†, n.d.). A way to reduce HCA and PAH formation in cooked meats is to reduce the amount of time the meat is cooked on an open flame. This can be done by continuously flipping the meat or using a microwave to shorten the cooking time on the stove. Another carcinogen that is found in meat is N-nitrosocompound. This carcinogen is found in bacon, hot dogs and anything containing sodium nitrate. Sodium nitrate is preservative added to food to not only preserve but also to add flavor to. N-nitroso is formed when the sodium nitrate combines with the amines in the meat to form this carcinogen. These N-nitroso compound attacks cells and can cause mutation to the molecule’s DNA (Mehdad, 2010). In another study, there was evidence that a high fat diet contribute to prostate cancer. In this study, men consumer high types of monosaturated and polyunsaturated fats significantly increase their chances of getting prostate cancer (Crowe et al., 2008). Men who were consuming 45 grams of total fat in a day have 10-20 percent increased risk of getting cancer (Park, Murphy, Wilkens, Henderson, Kolonel, 2007). In another study, there was a strong correlation between obesity and prostate cancer. In a study of eighty-seven men with prostate cancer, 89 percent of these men were overweight or obese. Ninety- seven percent of them had a body fat of twenty five percent or higher (Mehdad, McBride, Grillo, Camilo, Ravasco, 2010). Obesity increases the body’s production of IGF-1 which discussed early leads to cancer cell proliferation. Conclusion As with anything, specific groups of foods need to be taken in moderation. Daily activity and a balanced meal can contribute greatly to not only prevent cancer growth but living a healthy happy life. Prostate cancer is the most common cancer for men and the second leading cause of cancer death in men. Eating foods high in antioxidants, phytochemicals such as vegetables and fruits can lead to the reduction of prostatic cancer cell forming. In addition, avoiding diets high in preserved meats, diary and cooking at high temperature all can additionally reduce men’s chances of getting prostate cancer. Works Cited Crowe, F.L., Key, T.J., Appleby, P.N., Travis, R.C., Overvad, K., Jakobsen, M.U., Riboli, E. (2008). Dietary fat intake and risk of prostate cancer in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 87: 1405-1413. Jankun, J. (1997, June 5). Why drinking green tea could prevent cancer. Nature, 381, 561. Li, W., Hutnik, M., Smith, R., Li, V. (2011). Understanding Angiogenesis. Retrieved from http://www.angio.org/ua.php. April 4, 2014. Ma, R.W.-L. Chapman, K. (2009). A systematic review of the effect of diet in prostate cancer prevention and treatment. Journal of Human Nutrition and Dietetics, 22:187-199. Mehdad, A., McBride, E., Grillo, I.M., Camilo, M., Ravasco, P. (2010).Nutritional status and eating pattern in prostate cancer patients. Nutricion Hospitalaria,2 (3): 422-427. Park, S., Murphy, S.P., Wilkens, L.R., Henderson, B.E., Kolonel, L.N. (2007). Fat and meat intake and prostate cancer risk: the multiethnic cohort study. International Journal of Cancer, 121: 1339-1345. â€Å"Prostate Specific Antigen†. Retrieved from http://www.medicinenet.com/ prostate_specific_antigen/article.htm . April 4, 2014. Tandon, M., Siddique, R.A., Avrind, R., Singh, N.K., Ambwani, T., Rai, S.N. (2008). Anti-cancer diet: reviewing the role of nutrition in cancer prevention. Current Topics in Nutraceutical Research, 6(2): 67-82. â€Å"Why Carcinogens Cause Cancer†. Retrieved from http:// www.edinformatics.com/interactive_molecules/dna.htm. July 10, 2010. World Cancer Research Fund / American Institute for Cancer Research. Food, Nutrition, Physical Activity, and the Prevention of Cancer: a Global Perspective. Washington, DC: AICR, 2007 Jankun, J. (1997, June 5). Why drinking green tea could prevent cancer. Nature, 381, 561.

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee Essay -- To Kill a Mockingbird Essa

To Kill A Mockingbird Courage, the mental or morale strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty, is displayed in many different ways throughout Harper Lee ¹s only published novel, To Kill A Mockingbird. To some, the courage manifested by the characters in this book is either offensive, or frivolous, but to those who realize the true meaning of this word, the fortitude and bravery exhibited by certain individuals is considered uncustomary. In fact, To Kill A Mockingbird revolves around courage, as the author of this book describes Jem and Scout ¹s (the two main character ¹s in the story) childhoods living in Maycomb County, and how, as they grow older , they learn to realistically define heroism. To distinct courage in this book however, is not an easy task to accomplish, for typically, courage is displayed in the smallest or most unnoticeable fashions.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In To Kill A Mockingbird, Atticus, a man who provides the morale guidelines in the story, and also Scout and Jem ¹s father, demonstrates courage in a variation of different ways, but the biggest of all the tasks that he had to overcome was when he was given the opportunity to defend Tom Robinson in court. Atticus did not treat this litigation such as any other case that he had ever dealt with before, for he new that this one would most likely change his life. The reason: Tom Robinson was a Negro. At the time, segregation was very common among the citizens of his town, and therefore he knew that he stood no chance in winning this indictment, especially based upon the fact that Robinson was charged with a transgression such as rape. Atticus was courageous in this situation for many different reasons, but mainly because he stood up for what he believed in; in this case it was that blacks should have equal rights as whites in a court of law. A quote that fascinated me while reading this book was:  ³Simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try to win. ²(p76) Atticus was the one to have said this, showing his acknowledgment of the fact that he was going to be on the losing end of the lawsuit. Still, he prepared for this case, willingly putting his heart into it, disregarding the insults and attacks thrown in his direction by white supremacists. Although he lost, he came out victorious in the end, as he receiv... ...asing the amount of time that she was spending without taking the drug. Eventually, by the time that Jem was no longer obligated to read, she had accomplished her goal; she was going to be free when she died, as she did kick her habit. A suffering and feeble woman going a month without consuming a drug that she has been addicted to for over five years is undeniably courageous. Mrs. Dubose could easily have died taking morphine to soothe her pain, but instead she did what in her mind was right, suffering for a month on earth, permitting her to be untroubled for eternity in heaven.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Defending a Negro, resisting the temptation of fighting, and kicking a morphine addiction. All three of these acts of courage can somehow relate to the quote:  ³Real courage is when you know you ¹re licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. ²(p112) This quotes continues, implying that you rarely win, but sometimes you do, such as in Mrs. Dubose ¹s case. In both Atticus and Scout ¹s cases though, they lost, but neither winning nor losing is important, as long as inside you know you have done the right thing.

The Character of Iago in Shakespeares Othello Essay -- Othello essays

The Character of Iago in Othello      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   No one has ever failed to appreciate the skilled art with which Shakespeare has defined the characters of his plays; great and small alike, their distinctiveness, their dignity, their misery, and their integrity are captured and displayed.   In particular the depiction of certain characters in Othello have been universally acclaimed.   Identified by many scholars as one of Shakespeare "great" tragedies, along with Hamlet, Macbeth, and King Lear, Othello follows a traditional tragic pattern, tracing the central character's fall from greatness and bringing together qualities of nobility with choices that lead to inevitable suffering. Othello is also one of Shakespeare's most emotionally compelling plays. The drive, with which the devastating series of events disentangle, creates a breathless sense of muddled chaos that mesmerizes viewers almost as much as it propels the characters.   In the course of Othello, we are exposed to a dramatic concepti on of Iago.   The evil contained within Othello is by no means paranormal or mythical, yet is represented by the character Iago and his voracious desire for revenge and constant deception.   Iago is disloyal, shrewd, and egotistical.   He uses these traits to his advantage by slowly planning his own conquest while watching the demise of others.   Although Iago is a perfect example of evil, a "hellish villain" creating an internalized beastlike rage, he is in fact a human wrapped with passion suffering from a distorted image of himself and others.    Evil has nowhere else been portrayed with such mastery as in the character of Iago.  Ã‚  Ã‚   Iago is young, deceitful and a scoundrel from the start. He is keen and able to manipulat... ...ealed Through Dialogue." Readings on The Tragedies. Ed. Clarice Swisher. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1996. Reprint from Literature. N. p.: Random House, 1986.    Gardner, Helen. "Othello: A Tragedy of Beauty and Fortune." Readings on The Tragedies. Ed. Clarice Swisher. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1996. Reprint from "The Noble Moor." British Academy Lectures, no. 9, 1955.    Shakespeare, William. Othello. In The Electric Shakespeare. Princeton University. 1996. http://www.eiu.edu/~multilit/studyabroad/othello/othello_all.html No line nos.    Wright, Louis B. and Virginia A. LaMar. "The Engaging Qualities of Othello." Readings on The Tragedies. Ed. Clarice Swisher. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1996. Reprint from Introduction to The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice by William Shakespeare. N. p.: Simon and Schuster, Inc., 1957.   

Genetic Engineering on Humans Essay

Visualize a world where anyone can do anything, regardless of age or physical conditions. Nobody would age nor develop any illnesses or disorders. Essentially, this would be a society in which everyone is perfect. Such a thought would be the result of genetic engineering, which is the modification of an organism’s genome using biotechnology. Scientists alter the genetic makeup of an organism by using techniques that remove inherited material or inject DNA from outside the organism either directly into the host or into a cell that is then crossbred with the host (Clapper, 2013). The goal of genetically modifying organisms is to fix imperfections and improve their capabilities. In humans, genes that cause diseases and disorders can be identified and defenses can be put up to fight them. After hours of research and weeks of studying on the topic, I have reached a conclusion that humans should be able to be genetically engineered, but there needs to be a limit to how much they are modified. Some benefits of this include the absence of diseases, the ability for parents to choose the physical traits for their child, and increased human capabilities. One major benefit of the genetic engineering of humans is the termination of physical disorders. Life without diseases would mean that everyone, no matter the age, would be healthy and capable of doing whatever they please. The Human Genome Project is currently working on identifying all the genes in the human body and their purposes (Hanna, 2006). They will then be able to work on preventing diseases by removing or replacing the defective gene in a process known as gene therapy. In the movie GATTACA, Vincent, who was born without the aid of genetic selection, was tested to show that he had a high probability of developing mental disorders as well as a heart defect (GATTACA, 1997). However, the second son Anton, who was genetically modified, is perfectly healthy and is predicted to live forever. This shows that genetic engineering can indeed alter or even fully eliminate disorders or negative conditions. For example, scientists using gene therapy  were able to cure twenty two children with severe combined immunodeficiency, providing the first strong piece of evidence that this process was effective (Campbell, Reece, and Simon, 2007). In addition, another way in which genetic engineering could be a benefit is that parents would be able to choose how they want their child to turn out. According to the article Pros and Cons of Genetic Engineering in Humans, parents could alter their baby’s appearance however they want to (Bird, 2011). Genetic engineering can also be used to eliminate superficial traits parents may perceive as flaws, such as oversized ears for example. In GATTACA, the parents chose to use genetic selection to conceive their second child Anton (GATTACA, 1997). Julian Savulescu, a philosopher and bioethicist, believes that genetically engineering will soon have developed to affect an individual’s personality instead of just their physical appearance (Alleyn e, 2012). He argues that, â€Å"rational design would help lead to a better, more intelligent and less violent society in the future.† This means that future genetically modified children could not only be physically attractive but also better people in general, capable of making smarter decisions. Last but not least, genetic engineering could provide us with better capabilities. Humans could be modified to have superhuman strength and immeasurable intellect. Animals can be modified have human traits, so humans should theoretically also be able to be engineered with physical characteristics from different species. A National Human Genome Research Institute team reported a mutation in a gene that codes for a muscle protein known as myostatin which can increase muscle mass and enhance racing performance in a breed of dogs (Sato, 2009). Scientists wonder if human athletes could benefit from having a gene or two artificially mutated to give them a little extra strength and speed. GATTACA also shows how genetic engineering affected the bodies of the main characters. Anton was genetically altered to be far superior physically and mentally compared to his older brother Vincent (GATTACA, 1997). Based on the fact that the Department of Science and Technology states that crops will be able to grow on unfertile land and for newer functions, it is suggested that humans too can be genetically modified to perform higher level tasks (Haut, 2014). In every argument, there exists cons to balance out with the pros. People argue that having genetically engineered humans would decrease diversity. The world revolves around the differences between individuals and  their evolutionary process that occurs at some point. As mentioned early on, there should be limits placed on the modification. The physical traits of a person should be enhanced so that he/she can take upon newer and better functions, but the emotional character within them should be left untouched. Because each individual would still have their own personal thoughts, feelings, and opinions, genetic diversity would remain unchanged. In addition, genetically engineering humans would not necessarily be changing the process of evolution. Simply put, the progression would essentially be sped up to a point where it is easier for a species to develop their skills and abilities if they have been established early in their lives. Although there are some downsides to genetic engineering on humans, I believe that it is a necessary step that should be taken in the future. If our theories prove to be successful in experiments, we will be able to cure and possibly eradicate diseases. Parents would be satisfied with their child, knowing that they turned out exactly as pictured. And finally, people would have enhanced capabilities, allowing them to do much more with their physical fitness and knowledge. With proper research and experiments, we will be able to develop a stronger and highly-advanced species with limitless power and endless possibilities. Works Cited Hanna, K. (2006). Genetic Enhancement. Retrieved from http://www.genome.gov/10004767 Campbell, N., J. Reece, and E. Simon (2007). Treating Severe Combined Immunodeficiency. In Essentials of Biology with Physiology, 2nd ed., pp. 235. San Francisco. Pearson Benjamin Cummings. Bird, M. (2011). Pros and Cons of Genetic Engineering in Humans. Retrieved from http://www.sciences360.com/index.php/pros-and-cons-of-genetic-engineering-in-humans-6890/ Sato, R. (2009). Are We Close to Creating Super-humans? Retrieved from http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2009/01/are-we-close-to.html Haut, J. (2014). Biotechnology: Genetic Modification of Crops Handout. Clapper, R. (2013). Human Genetic Engineering: A Very Brief Intro. Retrieved from http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1112819269/human-genetic-engineering-a-very-brief-introduction/ Alleyne, R. (2012). Genetically Engineering â€Å"Ethical†

Short Story Sonny Blues

In James Baldwin’s, Sonny’s Blues, he uses many different symbols throughout his short story to present the overall theme of suffering to the reader. He uses symbols such as music, characters facial expressions and the presence of ice, light and darkness. In the very beginning of the story when the narrator is reading the paper and he comes across the news of his brother, Sonny, he says, â€Å"A great block of ice got settled in my belly and kept melting there slowly all day long†. (Baldwin 600) He also says â€Å"†¦it was a special kind of ice.It kept melting, sending trickles of ice water all up and down my veins, but it never got less. † (Baldwin 600) This is not the only time that the ice presents itself. It reappears when the narrator meets one of Sonny’s friends who is also a drug addict, and again later when Sonny is over for dinner with the narrator’s family. The ice that appears whenever the narrator feels an uncomfortable or pa inful situation represents how the narrator is incapable of dealing with his own emotions well. The ice also allows the reader to empathize with how the narrator feels about how his brother is leading his life.Another symbol Baldwin uses throughout Sonny’s Blues is light and darkness. Throughout the story there is a contrast of light and darkness. For example, in the first paragraph of the story, Sonny’s Blues Baldwin writes, â€Å"I stared at it in the swinging lights of the subway car, and in the faces and bodies of the people, and in my own face, trapped in the darkness which roared outside. † (Baldwin 599) This contrasts the lightness and the darkness. It demonstrates the contrast between his own suffering and the world around him and the suffering of the world.Another example of lightness and darkness Baldwin uses in the short story is when the narrator’s mother is recalling the story of the narrator’s father and his brother she says â€Å"th ere was a moon that night, it was bright like day. † (Baldwin 607) This is when the narrator’s father and his brother are having a good time and walking home. This brightness of the moon is used to represent the light, which represents all the hope and good things in life. The narrator’s mother later recalls, â€Å"he says he never in his life seen anything as dark as that road after the lights of that car had gone away. (Baldwin 608) Referring to after the narrator’s father’s brother had been hit and killed. The color of the men’s skin also represents the contrast between light and darkness. The men that killed the narrator’s father’s brother were all white and the other two men were dark skinned. This is also an example of the contrasting of light and dark. This shows how the difference of something in the same situation can both have two different results. Meaning that both the light men and the dark men were drunk. They wer e each also having fun. The situations were both similar, but the end results of each situation were very different.One of the dark men lost their life to the light men. The darkness is used to represent the tormenting and dark moments in the characters lives. The darkness however is always stabilized with lightness. Just like the dark road was stabilized with the lightness of the car lights. This light is used to signify safety and comfort, while the darkness represents the turmoil also looking to destroy that safety and comfort. Another way Baldwin symbolizes the overall theme of suffering is through the character’s facial expressions and interactions.Baldwin writes â€Å"And I watched her face as she laughingly responded to something someone said to her, still keeping time to the music. When she smiled one saw the little girl, one sensed the doomed, still struggling women beneath the battered face of the semi-whore. † (Baldwin 602) This shows that even under her â⠂¬Å"battered face† there was still a glimpse of when she was young. The narrator can see her as a young innocent little girl. This shows the reader that there is hope even in suffering. Baldwin is also trying to get his point across that even though one may suffer, the suffering will not change the past and whom you are or have become.Another example of how Baldwin incorporates the facial expressions of his characters to help promote the overall theme of suffering is when the narrator is on the subway in the first few sentences of the short story. He writes, â€Å"I stared at it in the swinging lights of the subway car, and in the faces of the bodies of the people, and in my own face, trapped in the darkness. † (Baldwin 600) This illustrates that not only does the narrator feel and see suffering inside himself and his own face, but he also sees it inside the faces of others and the surroundings around him.This also proves that the overall effect of suffering is visible to one who is suffering themselves, like that of the narrators. Baldwin also promotes the theme of Sonny’s Blues by using the presence of music. The entire short story is loaded with occasions of music. The overall title of the story even contains music. â€Å"Sonny’s Blues†, promotes the tone and theme of suffering throughout the entire story. It provides the reader with information that there will be suffering in the story. Giving them an idea of what is to come before even being read. Another example of music is Sonny’s growing love for playing the piano.The narrator states â€Å"†¦Sonny was so serious about his music and how, as soon as he came in from school, †¦he went straight to that piano and stayed there until suppertime. †, â€Å"He was at the piano all day Saturday and all day Sunday. † (Baldwin 612) This tells the reader of Sonny’s love for music. It illustrates how the music is Sonny’s safety and allows h im to not suffer. When Baldwin makes it clear to the reader that Isabel and her mother grow tired of the music, â€Å"it wasn’t like living with a person at all, it was like living with sound. And the sound didn’t make any sense to her, didn’t make any sense to any of them – naturally. (Baldwin 612) This proves that music can both heal suffering but also create it. The music for Sonny was a safety. To Sonny the music made him feel at ease and helped to subside his suffering. It wasn’t until after Sonny stopped playing the piano and his records that he began to truly feel the power of his suffering. Although the music was a medicine to Sonny’s suffering, it was the cause of suffering for Isabel and her mother. This suffering caused Isabel’s mother to snap and yell at Sonny. This caused Sonny to stop playing the piano and thus the true suffering began.Another example of suffering and music is when the narrator witnesses the meeting on the corner. He watches the battered people play their music and notices their suffering. He says, â€Å"As the singing filled the air the watching, listening faces underwent a change, the eyes focusing on something within; the music seemed to soothe a poison out of them; and time seemed, nearly, to fall away from the sullen, belligerent, battered faces, as though they were fleeing back to their first condition, while dreaming of their last. † (Baldwin 615) Showing again how music can be a safety and a rescuer to not only Sonny but others as well.By the narrator stating this it shows that it is noticeable of the change in expression music brings as it lessens the sufferings of those who play. â€Å"Sonny’s fingers filled the air with life, his life. † (Baldwin 620) Near the end of Baldwin’s story Sonny plays his music once again. To most, the music Sonny plays is merely for entertainment. But to some it is a story, Sonny’s story. As Sonny plays, the narrator notices the things his brother has been through and felt. While Sonny plays the narrator notices both his brother’s suffering as well as his own.

Hermaphrodites and Society Essay

Individuals are given the gift of life when they are born into this world. Many agree that everyone is blessed and should not take their lives for granted. To be truly alive, individuals must be overjoyed and pursue happiness. However, others would describe their lives as a joke. To be precise, many would be ashamed of who they are. A very strong example of an ashamed soul would be Calliope, the main protagonist of Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. In the story, Eugenides tells the tale of Callie, who is supposedly a monster because she is a hermaphrodite. Being a hermaphrodite indicates that someone has the sex organs associated with both genders. By definition, Callie is an abnormal freak. Eugenides employs literary devices, such as tone, imagery, and personification, to express Callie’s shame and humiliation of being herself. Eugenides employs imagery to transport readers into Callie’s shoes and understand her shame of being a hermaphrodite. Callie describes herself as â€Å"being surrounded by illuminating faces bent over books, her hair covering the definition of herself. Normal individuals surround Callie, and she abruptly conceals the word monster to prevent anyone from realizing her true identity. In Callie’s point of view, normal individuals surround her, and she is in the center covering a secret that could ultimately ruin her reputation as a human. Callie is so frightened of being exposed to the world as a true monster. Callie makes a past reference of how she had experienced monster before. Callie addresses that â€Å"she was not looking at it in her bathroom stall. † She has the affirmation that someone had already known her as a monster, but she was too afraid to agree. Now, however, Callie is reminded of her past, and sadly acquaints past and present to reach the conclusion the she is indeed a monster. Callie also refers to herself as a â€Å"lumbering, shaggy creature pausing at the edge of the woods, as a humped convolvulus rearing its dragon’s head from an icy lake. † Callie truly visualizes herself as an actual monster, a freak of nature that is shunned by the world and lives in absolute seclusion. In her eyes, she is a grotesque beast that cannot even stand to stare at herself out of humiliation and shame. Callie is absolutely alone and is surrounded by others who look at her with disgust and wide eyes. Eugenides utilizes tone in the story to help readers develop sympathy and pity towards Callie. All throughout the passage, the tone of the story is serious. Callie acknowledges that â€Å"her mother was crying in the next room, and the doctors were working on Callie’s disease in secret. † The statements convey that Callie’s parents are also disappointed and ashamed of what their daughter has become. Callie understands that her mother sheds tears thinking what she has done to deserve a defected daughter. Callie’s parents are so ashamed and overwhelmed that they took Callie to New York to try and heal in secret instead of in the open. Callie’s parents do not want others to see what has happened to her out of concern for their daughter’s social life as a normal individual. The thoughts and emotions expressed give readers pity towards Callie and her condition. Callie muses that â€Å"she longed to be held, caressed, which was impossible. † Callie wishes to be comforted and surrounded by others that loved and understood her. Unfortunately, Callie views herself so much like a monster rather than an individual that she is too far long to be comforted by anyone. Readers infer that Callie is a freak with no friends, family, or loved ones. Eugenides also uses personification to display how Callie views the inhumane objects around her as also excluding her from humanity and pushing her towards being a monster. Callie enunciates that â€Å"fear is stabbing me. † Callie feels horrible about her discovery of being a hermaphrodite; she actually visualizes fear around her. Callie feels frightened and vulnerable to the thought of others singling her out and chanting the monster. Callie cannot even comprehend what she feels, but can only implore she is engulfed by fear and incapable of accepting her secret getting out. This also expresses Callie’s extreme shame of being who she is, as well as how others will view her as a non –human. Callie comments on the chain within the dictionary as â€Å"speaking of poverty, mistrust, inequality, and decadence as she held onto it. † Callie establishes a connection between herself and the chain as both being bound to the worst parts of human lives. Callie strongly grasps the word monster in her hand, as if she is bound to it like the chain is. Callie cannot detach herself because deep in her heart, she understands that she is a monster, no matter how much she wishes not to be. As Callie leaves the Reading Room, Callie also cannot release the word monster from herself. Callie appeals that â€Å"the Webster’s dictionary kept calling after her, Monster, Monster! † Callie is so attached and strongly understands herself as a monster that she hears the word everywhere she goes. No matter where Callie goes, the word monster will always haunt and pursue her, always reminding her of what she is. Callie interprets the chants of inanimate objects calling her monster, and she cannot help but feel ashamed and humiliated to be reminded of what she is. Calliope, all throughout the passage, is a hermaphrodite and a monster. A world of normal individuals surrounds Callie and do not understand what she is. Eugenides uses literary devices, such as imagery, tone, and personification to express Callie’s shame and humiliation of being herself. To be alive is truly a blessing, but is being abnormal in the eyes of peers a curse? Everywhere, there are individuals who are terrified and alone, and sometimes, no one comes to help them. Regardless of who they are, or whether they may be different, everyone belongs. No one is a monster.

Healthy Emotional Transition for Mothers, First Week Post-Partum Essay

Emotional is an important aspect of life. We experience joy, anger, and sadness in everyday life. When we do not tend to our emotion needs, psychological complications may occur (Burger & Goddard, 2010). According to health Canada (2009), 16% of women in Canada will experience major depression in the course of their lives. Women experience increased risk for psychological disorders in postpartum period (Raines, Campbell, &Hall, 2010). The most common psychological disorders are postpartum blues, postpartum depression (PPD), and postpartum psychosis (Raines, Campbell, &Hall, 2010). 75% of women experience postpartum blues, but the symptom is usually mild and can usually improve without professional help (Raines, Campbell, &Hall, 2010). A more serious condition is called postpartum depression. Postpartum depression is a medical condition that affects about 10% of mothers (Raines, Campbell, &Hall, 2010). In this article, I will examine the postpartum depression in relation to the healthy emotional transition. This topic is important because the postpartum depression is more serious and can usually last for months (Raines, Campbell, &Hall, 2010), and because postpartum depression can usually be detected and prevented (Donaldson-Myles, 2011) (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011) (Garabedian et al. , 2011). The purpose of this paper is to provide the knowledge to prevent PPD. In order to meet the purpose of this paper, I will examine 3 articles that I have chosen from CINAHL and write critical review and relate the information from the article to my own nursing experience. Synthesis These articles offer great in-depth on how to prevent PPD. Wojcicki and Heyman (2011) have reviewed 10 articles and made conclusion that although more studies are needed, high dosage of omega-3 fatty acid can reduce the risk of PPD. Donaldson-Myles (2011) reviewed on the evidence of breastfeeding and PPD and has found a strong inverse link between the two. Garabedian et al. (2011) has found that women who are victim of violence in adulthood are more likely to suffer from PPD. These 3 articles have contributed to additional information on PPD to what is learned from the textbook. They provide insight on when PPD will likely happen and how to reduce the likelihood. Based on the information on these articles, prevention of PPD would be the top priority in my nursing practice. For example, although it is known from the class that 10% of women will suffer from PPD (Raines, Campbell, &Hall, 2010), it is further explained that women suffer multiple abuses should be expected to have higher risk of PPD (Garabedian et al. , 2011). In the future nursing practice, I will check for signs of injury and the mental state of the client as well as those of her partner’s to make sure that the client does not suffer from violence. I will include breastfeeding and high dosage of omega-3 fatty acid daily as part of my health teaching to reduce the risk of PPD (Donaldson-Myles, 2011) (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011). The questions that have emerged from this assignment are many. One question is that even though there are ways to reduce the risks of PPD, what is the sure way of preventing it? Another question is that Wojcicki & Heyman (2011) has found that high dosage of omega-3 fatty acid can reduce the risk of PPD, does taking too much omega-3 have any side effects? Thirdly, what should I do to reduce PPD if the client refuses to breastfeed? The first 4 weeks of this course has provided me with foundation of caring for postpartum mothers. I learned the basic cares and assessments for postpartum mothers. Those 3 literatures provide me with further knowledge of psychological aspect postpartum mother and made me look for signs of trouble. For example, Garabedian et al. (2011) has found that single mothers, smokers, and women of young age are more likely to experience violence, hence more likelihood of PPD. During my first week of practicum, the first mother that I examined was recently single, had to go out to smoke during my visit and was 26 years old. At that time, she looked perfectly fine and well composed and was reading her self-help book. I thought that she was going to be fine with her postpartum life. If I possessed this piece of knowledge back then, I would recognize her has high-risk for postpartum depression and offer her additional information on how to deal with psychological changes. During the week of my health teaching, I had the privilege of witnessing childbirth and caring for the mother and the child for the day. I used Watson’s caritas process 3, which is â€Å"developing and sustaining a helping trusting authentic caring relationship† (Jesse, 2010). From the moment I walked into the delivery room, I kept reminding myself that helping the patient was my first priority, and that anything that I could learn was just a bonus and should not interfere with the woman’s needs. Therefore, after I introduced myself, I used the technique of using silence and avoid looking at the woman’s exposed body parts because I thought it would create more tension for the woman (Burger & Goddard, 2010). I kept quiet till the family finally thought that I was trustworthy. During the teaching, I used Watson’s caritas process 7, which is â€Å"Engaging in genuine teaching-learning experience that attends to unity of being and meaning, attempting to stay within others’ frame of reference† (Jesse, 2010). Since the family looked very educated, I shared my observation on their knowledge to help communicate (Burger & Goddard, 2010). I used terms such as â€Å"you might already know this† to make myself less lecturing. My patient was very willing to listen to what I had to say because I was very helpful in their delivery and they knew that my teaching was an assignment for school. They asked me a few questions regarding to how to deal with postpartum blues and appeared genuinely interested in my presences. I thought my teaching was effective because firstly I was very nice and humble towards them. Secondly, I received feedback from them in term of questions (Burger & Goddard, 2010). Effective communication involves dialogues in both directions (Burger & Goddard, 2010). Conclusion Postpartum period is a difficult time for a woman (Evans, 2010). The body has to undergo physiological and psychological changes (Evans, 2010). Several factors influence the psychological changes. From my reading of the articles, it is learned that breastfeeding and high intake of omega-3 fatty acid reduces the risk of PPD (Donaldson-Myles, 2011) (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011), and that violence victim have higher risk of PPD (Garabedian et al. , 2011). As a nurse, one has to stay vigilant on client’s behavior, diet, and environment and reduce the likelihood of PPD by informing the patient the benefit of breastfeeding, the benefit of omega-3 fatty acid, and by assessing the patient’s living environment. Reviews The key points of this article is that women who breastfeed are less likely to suffer from postpartum depression notwithstanding the old researches proving otherwise and that breastfeeding provides protection that lasts up to 3 month (Donaldson-Myles, 2011).. The intended audiences of this article are midwives (Donaldson-Myles, 2011). The limitations of this study is the defining the postpartum depression and defining breastfeeding. In some of the study, some people are â€Å"mixed† feeding, which can confuse the result (Donaldson-Myles, 2011). There is also no clear, universally defined method on how to breastfeed in all the studies (Donaldson-Myles, 2011). The definition of postpartum depression is also unclear (Donaldson-Myles, 2011). Although most studies use the Edinburgh depression scale, some of the depression symptom may be just due to lack of sleep or religious factors (Donaldson-Myles, 2011). The cut-off point for depression is also not the same across all the studies, with some using the cut-off point of 13 for depression and some using 12 as cut-off point (Donaldson-Myles, 2011). This research is done in Britain (Donaldson-Myles, 2011). It applies to Canadian nursing because both countries share the same culture and customs. The implication of this article for nursing practice is that as nurses, we need to advocate on breastfeeding in our patient care. Since breastfeeding can offer protection from postpartum depression up to 3 month (Donaldson-Myles,2011), we need to make sure that the clients know the benefit of breastfeeding and make sure that they can breastfeed properly. The key points of this article are that taking high dose omega-3 fatty acid supplement reduce the risk for postpartum depression (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011) and that moderate amount shows no effect (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011) . The intended audience of the article is for the researchers who intend to do more research on the correlation omega-3 and postpartum health (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011). The limitation of this research is that it is a review of other journals. Thus the author does not have raw data from the research (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011). This research is done department of pediatrics, university of California, San Francisco, California, USA (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011). This research applies to Canadian content because of the proximity of two countries. One limitation of this research is that it is a review of other articles (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011). The author does not have the primary data from all the studies. Another limitation of this research is that the dosage of omega-3 fatty acid is not the same in all the studies. Some studies take 100mg daily, others take 500 mg daily and there are also recommendations for 2g/day (Wojcicki & Heyman 2011). The key points of this article is that women who are the victim of violence are more likely to self-report postpartum depression (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011) and that the more types of violence experience, the more likelihood of self-reported postpartum depression (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011), and that the likelihood of postpartum depression strongly correlates to the race, marital status, education, and the usage of drugs (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011). The intended audiences of the article are for the medical professionals who are screening depression for postpartum women. The limitation of this study is that this is composed of mostly online questionnaires (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011); therefore, false data can appear in the data collection. For example, postpartum blue can be mistaken as postpartum depression (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011). Secondly, this is survey has a difficult time distinguishing disciplinary action and child abuse (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011). For example, any hit from the guardian could be considered as child abuse in this survey (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011). This research is done in Kentucky, USA (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011). It applies to Canadian nursing practice because 5%-50% of women experience abuse in their lifetime (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011). The implication of this article for nursing practice is that as nurses, we need to check for evidence of abuse as part of nursing assessment. For example, suspicious bruises should be reported. Since violence is strongly correlated to postpartum depression, we need to make sure that the clients with history of abuse can get help in the postpartum period (Garabedian, Lain, Hansen, Garcia, Williams, & Crofford, 2011) .