Online Examination System with Measures for Prevention of Cheating along with Rapid Assessment and Automatic Grading

The requirement for remote examination had emerged along with remote learning during the COVID-19 pandemic as the unprecedented situation had brought the world to halt. The pandemic had forced many educational institutions to move towards the online mode of assessment to assess the caliber of the students. This paper focuses on the ways that an online examination system can be prepared and can be used for conducting exams remotely in a secure way. It also emphasizes on various test cases that are essential for an efficient and useful examination system that can benefit both students and faculty by saving them time and effort. Due to the challenges in the existing mode of online assessment such as the use of digital forms that are usually used for conducting surveys, scanning and uploading answer sheets using phone with poor camera quality, the problem of engaging in the different kinds of misconduct, it was important to understand the user requirements at an examiner and examinee level and prepare a web application that addresses them and makes it convenient to conduct and attempt. We propose different methodologies that can be implemented in a Python based web application with the help of JavaScript such as switching the browser window to full-screen in order to restrict access to other applications, limited exits from full-screen, easy management of examiner and candidate data along with visualization of exam data that help to better understand and draw quick conclusions at the time of exam. It is also focused on the continuously evolving distance education system and finding the best software solution possible for online examinations. Additionally, an automated grading system may help to reduce human error and declare results easily reducing fatigue. © 2022 IEEE.

Traveling with pets: designing hospitality services for pet owners/parents and hotel guests

Purpose: Pet-friendly hotels are growing rapidly. The prevalence of pet adoption has largely resulted from the loneliness due to social distancing that happened during the Coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. Many hotels around the world aim to become pet-friendly to satisfy the growing demand. Hoteliers believe that the popularity of pet-friendly hotels will continue, as pet owners often treat pets as their kids. This study aims to investigate how pet-friendly hotels need to design and manage pet-friendly services and policies. Design/methodology/approach: Using grounded theory methodology, this research conducts interviews with 25 pet-friendly hotel managers from Hong Kong (HK). The study includes hotels from different hotel categories and classifications. It examines the conceptualization of pet-friendly service design, drawing on a service blueprint. Findings: Building on the service marketing and service blueprint literature, this research provides a synthesis that reflects how pet-friendly hotels can serve both guests with and without pets. The findings reveal that pet-owner's service expectations are formed on anthropomorphism, that is, an inclination of attributing human features to nonhuman entity. Hotel managers, and particular those who have pets personally understand better how pet-friendly service can be adapted to meet the expectations and requirements of pet owners while accommodating guests without pets. The market of pet-friendly hospitality is growing, with high profit potential from pet owners who are willing to spend generously. Research limitations/implications: Data were collected from selected pet-friendly hotels in HK through interviews with pet-friendly service providers. The research is qualitative and exploratory in nature. It aims to explore and examine the multilevel pet-friendly hospitality service design from a managerial perspective. This research enriches the literature on anthropomorphism theory, the design of pet-friendly services and the application of service blueprint. Practical implications: The research offers explicit suggestions for the design of pet-friendly hospitality services. A pet-friendly hotel service blueprint is developed. This can help managers to develop essential pet-friendly policies and service collaborations between internal departments and with external specialist organizations, maximizing the value for all stakeholders. Originality/value: The study explores a rapidly emerging market and scrutinizes its specific design requirements. It extends theoretical insights by enriching the anthropomorphism theory and broadening the conceptualizations of service blueprint based on anthropomorphism theory. © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.

Using Service Blueprint to Optimize the Process Management of Group Package Tour in Kinmen

The COVID-19 led to a global border blockade, and domestic group package tours have become Taiwan tourism industry's main economic source. This study takes 30 group package tours in Kinmen by non-participatory observation method and in-depth interviews with eight tour guides, and four components based on the service design optimization are categorized as follows: (1) accommodation;(2) restaurant;(3) attractions visit;and (4) shopping. The research data indicates that: (1) Tourism operators should consider both the input of service manpower and the supervision of the quality of service delivery. (2) Tour guides are the most important key in multiple delivery services. Practical implications and future research directions are also proposed for application and management. © 2022, Chinese Society for Quality. All rights reserved.

Service design touch point failure model and effect analysis based on the triangular fuzzy number evaluation method

How to improve employees' satisfaction in the remote office mode while working together has become a challenge for enterprises to deal with the new office management mode. The concept of service design touch point is introduced into the remote office management system to improve employees' office experience and help enterprises complete the remote office service design. From the perspective of virtuous circle, the cost of failure analysis and preventive measures for service design touch point in the process of service design is lower than that of dealing with failure after service failure. Therefore, this paper made a risk assessment on the failure mode of service design touch point loss analysis method based on the triangular fuzzy number evaluation method. In the failure risk assessment, the fuzzy failure mode and effect analysis theory and the failure mode of service design touch point are analyzed first, and the expert scoring method is used to evaluate and determine the fuzzy level of severity, occurrence and detection of each failure mode;Then, aiming at the ability difference of different experts in evaluating different objects, the expert importance matrix, which is based on attribute difference, is determined;On this basis, the risk priority value of each failure mode is analyzed and determined by fuzzy calculation method. The risk evaluation ranking results of touch point failure modes are obtained according to the risk priority value. Finally, taking the failure analysis of Y company's remote collaborative office service as an example, the feasibility of the method is verified by the case of protection during COVID-19.

High concordance of 70-gene recurrence risk signature and 80-gene molecular subtyping signature between core needle biopsy and surgical resection specimens in early-stage breast cancer.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: With increased neoadjuvant therapy recommendations for early-stage breast cancer patients due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is imperative that molecular diagnostic assays provide reliable results from preoperative core needle biopsies (CNB). The study objective was to determine the concordance of MammaPrint and BluePrint results between matched CNB and surgical resection (SR) specimens. METHODS: Matched tumor specimens (n = 121) were prospectively collected from women enrolled in the FLEX trial (NCT03053193). Concordance is reported using overall percentage agreement and Cohen's kappa coefficient. Correlation is reported using Pearson correlation coefficient. RESULTS: We found good concordance for MammaPrint results between matched tumor samples (90.9%, κ = 0.817), and a very strong correlation of MammaPrint indices (r = 0.94). The concordance of BluePrint subtyping in matched samples was also excellent (98.3%). CONCLUSIONS: CNB samples demonstrated high concordance with paired SR samples for MammaPrint risk classification and BluePrint molecular subtyping, suggesting that physicians are provided with accurate prognostic information that can be used to guide therapy decisions.

Best practices for covid-19 test process in a hospital emergency department

Detection tests for COVID-19 are important to mitigate its spread. However, it is not yet clear what are the best practices for its realization. This paper aims to propose best practices to avoid possible failures in the points of contact of the samples collection for Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) process in an emergency department of a hospital for the care of patients who are suspected or diagnosed with the new coronavirus. For this purpose, we performed a process mapping of the RT-PCR collection process using the Service Blueprint tool to identify the points of contact between the patients and the hospital staff. Thus, we identified the possible failures in these points, with the process actors, and we prioritized them according to their perception about Gravity, Urgency, and Tendency matrix. Our results show that the most critical failures are related to the information and communication between the process actors and the patients. In this way, improvements were proposed related to the standardization, information material, continued training, development of specialized teams, creation of protocols, and use of information technology. © IEOM Society International.

Low-Carbon Tourism Approach as an Alternative Form for Tourism Development: A Review for Model Development

The tourism industry is a major contributor to the gross domestic product of several countries, including Malaysia. However, recent tourism growth has led to increase the industry's carbon dioxide (CO2). Low-carbon tourism, therefore, needs to be introduced to the sector to help curb global climate change. A comprehensive understanding of lowcarbon tourism needs to be developed to achieve this goal. This article looks at the relevant studies in the literature using content analysis. By adopting a qualitative methodology, the article collected and assessed measurements of tourism's carbon emissions and examined the effects of implementing a low-carbon tourism programme. Some of the low-carbon strategies were listed by going through the entire implementation process of lowcarbon tourism as an alternative form of tourism development. The discussion also focuses on how Covid-19 can influence lowcarbon tourism development. A blueprint for a low-carbon recovery proposed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is also presented at the end of the paper. The results of this study can be used as a basis for policy development and further research on low-carbon tourism in industry sub- sectors worldwide.

A Review on Emerging Infectious Diseases Prioritized Under the 2018 WHO Research and Development Blueprint: Lessons from the Indian Context.

Objective: This review describes the current scenario of a priority group of emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) listed by World Health Organization (WHO), and their main determinants and drivers for the emergence/spread of the diseases. The gaps and strategies developed by India to meet the WHO guidelines on the effective control of epidemic-prone diseases and outbreaks are also presented in the review. Methods: Epidemiologic information of EIDs, namely Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever (CCHF), Ebola and Marburg viruses (EboV and MarV), Zika virus (ZIKAV), Rift Valley fever (RVF), Middle East respiratory syndrome, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Nipah and Hendra virus (NiV and HeV), and Lassa fever virus (LASV), was drawn from international and national electronic databases to assess the situation. A brief view on the novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in India is also included. Results: There are no reports for human infection of EboV, MarV, RVF, and LASV in India. CCHF, SARS, ZIKAV, and NiV have been involved in outbreaks in eight states of India, while COVID-19 is currently reported from majority of states. India has deeply strengthened its surveillance and response system of outbreaks and epidemic-prone diseases. Conclusions: Despite its enormous improvements made in the anticipation of such threats, still more efforts are needed in sensitization of populations as well as hospital management in the context to EIDs, as addressed in the review. Furthermore, there is still a need for more research and development activities to efficiently control EIDs.

ABC of Surgical Teaching: Time to Consider a Global Blueprint for Holistic Education.

BACKGROUND: Educating and equipping students and trainees into clinicians capable of meeting healthcare demands and service provision needs is essential. Unprecedented events like COVID-19 pandemic, highlight urgent need for reformation of training to ensure high quality education is maintained. To this end, we describe an innovative and globally adaptable blueprint for establishing a surgical curriculum, aiming to optimize preparation of future surgeons. METHODS: We used a structured protocol to synthesize evidence from previous systematic reviews focused on surgical education alongside a series of focused original educational studies. This approach allowed incorporation of prospectively applied novel ideas into the existing landscape of published evidence. All material used for this proof of concept derives from the outputs of a dedicated research network for surgical education (eMERG). RESULTS: We propose the foundation blueprint framework called "Omnigon iG4" as a globally applicable model. It allows adaptation to individual local educational environments for designing, appraising and/or refining surgical curricula. We also describe the "Omnigon iG4 Hexagon Pragmatic Model," a novel perspective model which assesses the performance of our blueprint in a multi-layer fashion. This "Hexagon" model is the first to introduce pragmatic outcomes in curricula performance assessment. CONCLUSIONS: This proof of concept, "Omnigon iG4," proposes an adaptable version of a curriculum blueprint. The framework allows educators to establish a surgical curriculum with the ability to map out competencies, permitting full control over their intended learning outcomes. This can form the basis for developing globally adaptable multifaceted Simulation-Based learning (SBL) courses or even surgical curricula for undergraduates.

Planning for COVID-19 vaccines safety surveillance.

COVID-19 vaccines are the most important tool to stem the pandemic. They are being developed with unprecedented global collaboration and accelerated timelines to achieve WHO Emergency Use Listing, while using regulatory pathways through national regulatory authorities. Alongside preparations to ensure equitable access to the vaccines among people globally, preparations must be made within countries for COVID-19 vaccines safety surveillance on an urgent basis. Safety surveillance must be capable of investigating adverse events of special interest (AESI) and adverse events following immunization to determine a change in the benefit-risk profile of the vaccine, and to be able to anticipate coincidental events that might be attributed to the vaccine. Active surveillance systems should calculate the incidence of background rates of AESI prior to vaccine roll out. These background rates vary tremendously across regions, populations and case ascertainment methods. Active surveillance systems must be established or strengthened now, (including in LMIC), to calculate the background rates. Utilizing standardized case definitions and global standards for AESI will help in harmonization. Vaccine safety communication plans should be developed. Expanding the global vaccine safety system to meet the needs of COVID-19 and other emergency and routine use vaccines is a priority currently.

The Role of Family Physicians in a Pandemic: A Blueprint.

Pandemics are a significant stress test for a country's economic, political and health systems. An effective pandemic response demands a multi-pronged and multi-layered approach, comprising surveillance, containment, border control, as well as various social and community measures. In the wake of the novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, which has now infected more than 7 million people worldwide, strict quarantine measures are a commonplace, and a third of the world's population have now gone into some form of lockdown. With the exception of border control, all these response measures involve the contributions of family physicians and general practitioners (GPs) in one way or another. Primary care physicians form and lead the primary care network, which in turn forms the backbone of any healthcare system. Being the first point of contact for a significant proportion of patients, primary care physicians play an essential strategic function in the fight against disease, both during peacetime and in the event of a public health crisis. In this commentary, we examine and propose some of the key roles that they play in a pandemic, drawing examples from the current COVID-19 pandemic and past experiences. COVID-19 has showed us that the world is grossly unprepared for a pandemic, both in terms of our global management and the structure of our current primary health care systems, and this should provide the impetus for us to improve.