Clinicians' perspective on quality of life assessment in paediatric clinical practice.

AIM: This study was undertaken to investigate paediatric clinicians' views on and use of quality of life (QoL) assessment in clinical practice. METHODS: A survey was conducted among members of the Dutch Paediatric Association via e-mail. RESULTS: Over half of the 303 respondents (57%) believed that it was possible to use QoL questionnaires in clinical practice. The majority indicated that assessing QoL was beneficial and that it was especially necessary to assess QoL in children with a chronic disease (82%). Although only a minority (17%) currently used QoL questionnaires, most respondents would want to use QoL questionnaires in the future (76%). Obstacles that prevent the use of QoL questionnaires are the extra time needed for assessment, the unavailability of standardized questionnaires and insufficient knowledge about QoL. CONCLUSION: This survey shows that paediatric clinicians are positive towards QoL assessment, but that certain obstacles prevent the use of questionnaires. Thus, to facilitate future use, QoL questionnaires need to be developed from the perspective of the paediatrician. This means that they need to be developed for clinical use and brought to the attention of the paediatric health care community, demonstrating their validity to child health care.

Rangeland utilisation assessment and modelling for grazing and fire management.

To support grazing and fire management of communal semi-arid to sub-humid African rangelands, the assessment of grazing capacity is illustrated for cattle. The forage dry matter intake (DMI) was divided into four components: 1) the mature standing crop, 2) the green part of the standing crop, 3) the regrowth after range fires, and 4) browse. The relationship between the potential DMI and the crude protein (CP) concentration of the forage was modelled. The DMI ranged from 5 to 50% for forage with low to high CP concentrations, respectively. The DMI of browse was fixed at 0 and 10% of the DMI of unburnt vegetation for plain and woodland systems, respectively. The potential DMI of the four forage components combined, based on data of the early- to mid-dry season, was matched with livestock requirements to calculate grazing capacities. Possible combinations of and changes in the forage components, representing grazing capacities for different seasons of the year, were calculated and visualised. Lastly, it was demonstrated how to assess the proportion of the rangeland that should be burnt to make optimal use of the low quality forage available in abundance and the small amount of high quality regrowth.

Costs and returns of camels, cattle and small ruminants in pastoral herds in eastern Ethiopia.

Two questionnaire surveys (2 x 44) were conducted among pastoral households, using three grazing management systems. The average number of Tropical Livestock Units (250 kg) was 4.0 per member of the household. Milk production was the most important source of revenue (66% of the total) followed by sale of livestock (17%) and transport (16%). High mortality rates were recorded for all livestock. About 27% of the milk was sold fresh or as butter. Sedentary and transhumant grazing management systems showed similar levels of income, but nomads had a 2.6-fold higher overall net income. The average total gross income from the entire herd amounted to US$ 6382 per household per year. The calculated costs were 29% of the gross returns. The contribution to the total gross revenues of camels, cattle and small ruminants was 58%, 25% and 17%, respectively.

Nutrition management, nitrogen efficiency, and income over feed cost on dairy farms in Costa Rica.

Twenty-two dairy farms in two ecologically different zones were visited repeatedly during the dry and wet seasons of 1995 to evaluate nutrition and pasture management, N efficiency on the farm, and income over feed costs with the use of a management support program. Excessive amounts of concentrates were fed, and no differences in amounts were detected between seasons. Utilization of forage was consequently low and even negligible on some farms. The amount of crude protein in the diet was generally too high. The removal of N from the farms via milk and culling represented 27 and 31% of the total N input for the two regions, respectively. The income over feed costs per cow ($3.04 and $1.84/d, respectively) was considered reasonable despite the high amount of concentrates.