ABSTRACT
VirtualWorx™ began as a 2015 Raytheon Six Sigma process improvement project to solve challenges faced by customers who were being asked to "do more with less"such that Operations Sustainment (OS) costs became a significant aspect in the planning and awarding of new systems, as well as for upgrades to existing systems. This raised the need to investigate opportunities that reduced OS costs, which spanned the spectrum from technology-enabled maintenance operations to autonomy and analytics. VirtualWorx™ focused on the former and in particular, the process of flying technicians to international field sites to solve challenging troubleshooting and repair issues that were beyond the capabilities of the local maintainers but would have broader implications affecting product maintainability.The opportunity focused on business process improvement through the insertion of technology to better leverage global human resources and extend the significant breadth and depth of engineering expertise from Raytheon Centers of Excellence. This would allow support of deployed systems anywhere in the world through secure two-way audiovideo communication up to and including augmented reality-based interactive remote collaboration. Figure 1 depicts the brainstorming session that resulted in a "back-of-The-napkin"design.The vision was to provide a secure enterprise, technical collaboration solution by implementing augmented reality-based communication capability to improve operational availability (Ao) of a system to perform its mission, reduce overall sustainment costs (including significant reduction in program travel), and provide effective troubleshooting of systems under repair.The proposed strategy prioritized customer driven use cases and network architecture development to:•Establish scalable Outside Contiguous United State (OCONUS) reach-back connectivity for technical support between a remote user and subject matter expert over a secure infrastructure worldwide•Facilitate technical support via a common environment using Augmented Reality (AR) capabilities over existing company network infrastructure•Enable the spectrum of collaboration across the enterprise to reduce staffing costs, leverage technical expertise, and provide improved Efficiency, Effectiveness, Capacity, and Capability (E2C2).With a strong business case, a successful proof-of-concept phase gained support from senior leadership in engineering and digital technology and earned further investment through Raytheon Independent Research and Development (IRAD) funding to move the project forward into a pilot phase for the first use case-remotely supported maintenance.To date, VirtualWorx™ has been successfully piloted and deployed on various internal and customer programs handling a variety of data and communication-rich exchanges that span the entire development life cycle.Underneath the system's hardware and Raytheon Technologies' global network infrastructure, VirtualWorx™ is powered by Librestream's Onsite software platform that provides responsive technical support throughout the product life cycle allowing the emerging workforce to respond in a way employees feel most comfortable-via video.VirtualWorx™ has become a Raytheon Technologies Enterprise solution for end-To-end augmented reality collaboration specifically tailored to support remote maintenance of aerospace and defense repairable assets. The on-premises solution carries export controlled technical data and delivers live reach-back support over an increasing variety of use cases since the initial proof-of-concept-to support maintenance and repair of deployed systems around the world. It streams AR-enhanced live audiovideo between field service engineers, subject matter experts, domestic and international business partners and is accessible anywhere on the company's global network and through virtual private networking (VPN) access from off-site locations.Return on investment (ROI) has been realized from the initial remote maintenance use case to broader applications of the technology to reso ve both internal and external challenges. Many of these recent challenges were especially brought on by recent COVID pandemic conditions that restricted global travel, limited face-To-face communication, and prevented movement of personnel as sites were locked-down due to COVID exposure concerns. © 2023 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
Prognostic markers are the biomarkers used to measure the disease progression and patient outcome regardless of treatment in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). This study aimed to analyze laboratory parameters as prognostic markers for the early identification of disease severity. In this study, 165 patients attending Sukraraj Tropical and Infectious Disease Hospital with COVID-19 were enrolled and divided into severe and non-severe groups. The demographic data, underlying co-morbidities, and laboratory findings were analyzed and compared between severe and non-severe cases. The correlation between the disease criticality and laboratory parameters was analyzed. Cut-off values of parameters for severe patients were speculated through the receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curve, and regression analysis was performed to determine the risk factors. Patients with severe COVID-19 infection had significantly higher absolute neutrophil count, neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), platelet-lymphocyte ratio (PLR), ferritin, positive carbohydrate reactive protein (CRP), glucose, urea, creatinine, and aspartate aminotransferase, while lower absolute lymphocyte count, absolute eosinophil count (AEC), and red blood cell count in comparison to non-severe infection. ROC analysis gave a cut-off value (sensitivity, specificity) of age, AEC, NLR, PLR, and ferritin as 47.5 years (70.2, 64.7%), 335 cells/mm(3) (74, 67%) 3.3 (68.4, 63.7%), 129 (77.2, 51%), and 241 ng/mL (74.0%, 65.0%) respectively. Risk factor analysis showed higher age, low AEC, high ferritin, and positive CRP as independent risk factors associated with severe COVID-19 infection. Hematological and inflammatory markers, including novel NLR and PLR, should be assessed to aid clinicians in the early identification of severe cases, prioritization of cases, and effective management to decrease the mortality of COVID-19 patients.
ABSTRACT
Objectives: Prognostic markers used to measure the disease progression and patient outcome regardless of treatment in COVID-19. We aim to analyze and evaluate the prognostic markers for early identification of severe patients. Materials and Methods: During a 3-month period (November 2020 to January 2021), a total of 165 patients attending Sukraraj Tropical and Infectious Disease Hospital with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 were enrolled and divided into non-severe and severe groups. The demographic data, underlying co-morbidities and laboratory findings were analyzed. Correlation, Regression analysis and ROC curve was performed to determine the risk factors and cut-off values for critically ill patients were speculated. Results: Disease severity was significantly associated with age (r = 0.359, p<0.001), RBC (r = -0.163, p = 0.037), AEC (r = -0.300, p<0.001), ALC (r = -0.239, p<0.001), ANC (r = 0.228, p<0.001), NLR (r = 0.336, p<0.001), PLR (r = 0.286, p<0.001), glucose (r = 0.155, p = 0.046), urea (r = 0.282, p<0.001), creatinine (r = 0.194, p = 0.012), AST (r = 0.169, p = 0.030), ferritin (r = 0.359, p<0.001) and CRP. Whereas Increasing age (AOR = 3.611), positive CRP (AOR = 2.930), high ferritin (AOR = 2.754), decreased AEC (AOR = 3.415) was found to be independent risk factors for COVID-19 severity. Similarly, ROC (Receiver Operating Characteristics) curve analysis showed age (AUC = 0.724), NLR (AUC = 0.710), PLR (AUC = 0.678), ferritin (AUC = 0.735), AEC (AUC = 0.661) can be used to monitor the disease severity. Conclusion: Our study revealed severe COVID-19 is associated with increased markers of innate immune response such as neutrophil count, NLR, CRP and serum ferritin;decreased markers of adaptive immune response such as lymphocyte and increased markers of major organ damage including AST, urea, and creatinine compared to COVID-19.
ABSTRACT
This is the first study to use discrete choice experiment in exploring the stated choice preference of blended learning preference among the university students in the context of Bangladesh. As a prerequisite in developing student engagement learning strategies, we investigate the choice preference of university students towards different types of blended learning to explore relevant concerns and challenges in order to plan for successful implementation of this option. Around 306 responses from the students belonging to Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP) and North South University (NSU) are considered representing both public and private universities in Bangladesh. Conditional logit model is used to explore the choice preference of the respondents based on the attributes. We find that university students explicitly dislike recorded videos as the primary mode of instruction as there is minimum human interaction using this method. Students with mobile internet also prefer offline classes to online classes, whereas students with broadband internet prefer the opposite choices. The policy implications of these findings hold global relevance in devising student engagement strategies towards blended learning such as for other developing economies in South Asia which were forced to transition to online learning as an adaptation response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Practitioner Notes 1. This is the first study to use discrete choice experiment in exploring the stated choice preference of blended learning preference of the university students in the context of Bangladesh. 2. We apply Conditional logit model is used to explore the choice preference of the respondents based on the attributes. 3. Our sample includes 306 responses belonging to Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP) and North South University (NSU). 4. We find that university students explicitly dislike recorded videos as the primary mode of instruction as there is minimum human interaction using this method. 5. Students with mobile internet also prefer offline classes to online classes, whereas students with broadband internet prefer the opposite choices.
ABSTRACT
Social media is a common platform that enables its users to share opinions, personal experiences, perspectives with one another instantaneously, globally. It has played a paramount role during pandemics such as COVID-19 and unveiled itself as a crucial means to communicate between the sources and the individuals. However, it also has become a place to disseminate misinformation and fake news rapidly. Infodemic, a plethora of information, some authentic some not makes it even harder to general people to receive factual and trustworthy information when required, has grown to be a major risk to public health and social media is developing as a trendy platform for this infodemic. This commentary aims to explore how social media has affected the current situation. We also aim to share our insight to control this misinformation. This commentary contributes to evolving knowledge to counter fake news or health-related information shared over various social media platforms.