Feasibility, Acceptability, and Preliminary Effectiveness of a Peer-Delivered and Technology Supported Self-Management Intervention for Older Adults with Serious Mental Illness.

To assess the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary effectiveness of a peer-delivered and technology supported integrated medical and psychiatric self-management intervention for older adults with serious mental illness. Ten older adults with serious mental illness (i.e., schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, bipolar disorder, or major depressive disorder) and medical comorbidity (i.e., cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, hypertension, and/or high cholesterol) aged 60 years and older received the PeerTECH intervention in their homes. Three certified peer specialists were trained to deliver PeerTECH. Data were collected at baseline, one-month, and three-month. The pilot study demonstrated that a three-month, peer-delivered and technology-supported integrated medical and psychiatric self-management intervention ("PeerTECH") was experienced by peer specialists and participants as feasible and acceptable. PeerTECH was associated with statistically significant improvements in psychiatric self-management. In addition, pre/post, non-statistically significant improvements were observed in self-efficacy for managing chronic health conditions, hope, quality of life, medical self-management skills, and empowerment. This pre/post pilot study demonstrated it is possible to train peers to use technology to deliver an integrated psychiatric and medical self-management intervention in a home-based setting to older adults with serious mental illness with fidelity. These findings provide preliminary evidence that a peer-delivered and technology-supported intervention designed to improve medical and psychiatric self-management is feasible, acceptable, and is potentially associated with improvements in psychiatric self-management, self-efficacy for managing chronic health conditions, hope, quality of life, medical self-management skills, and empowerment with older adults with serious mental illness and chronic health conditions.

Draft Genome Sequences of Two Janthinobacteriumlividum Strains, Isolated from Pristine Groundwater Collected from the Oak Ridge Field Research Center.

We present here the draft genome sequences of two Janthinobacterium lividum strains, GW456P and GW458P, isolated from groundwater samples collected from a background site at the Oak Ridge Field Research Center. Production of a purple pigment by these two strains was observed when grown on diluted (1/10) LB agar plates.

Should informed consent be required for laboratory testing for drugs of abuse in medical settings?

Laboratory testing for drugs of abuse is often conducted in medical settings, with little consideration of the technical limitations and the potential for legal and social harm to the patient. We consider several technical problems associated with such testing, including the lack of chain-of-custody procedures, the possibility of false-positive results with screening immunoassays, and the infrequency of confirmatory testing. Important ethical issues arise because of the sensitive nature of drug test results, the ramifications of false-positive results, the limitations of confidentiality protection, and the practice of testing without the patient's knowledge. Taken together, these technical and ethical concerns suggest that drug testing policies in medical settings should specify which conditions require explicit informed consent, as well as create procedures for protecting this sensitive information.

Samples of stars beyond the solar system: silicate grains in interplanetary dust.

We have identified six circumstellar silicate grains within interplanetary dust particles (IDPs). Their extrasolar origins are demonstrated by their extremely anomalous oxygen isotopic compositions. Three 17O-rich grains appear to originate from red giant or asymptotic giant branch stars. One 16O-rich grain may be from a metal-poor star. Two 16O-poor grains have unknown stellar sources. One of the grains is forsterite, and two are amorphous silicate "GEMS" (glass with embedded metal and sulfides), which is consistent with astronomical identifications of crystalline and amorphous silicates in the outflows of evolved stars. These observations suggest cometary origins of these IDPs and underscore the perplexing absence of silicates among circumstellar dust grains from meteorites.