Wellness and Stress Management Practices Among Healthcare Professionals and Health Professional Students.

PURPOSE: Healthcare professionals experience stressors that begin during training and persist into their careers that adversely impact their well-being. This study aims to identify students' and professionals' stress levels, satisfaction with wellness domains, barriers to wellness, and stress management practices. DESIGN: This study was a cross-sectional self-reported survey study. SETTINGS AND SAMPLE: The study included students (N = 242) and professionals (N = 237) from medicine, nursing, pharmacy, physical therapy, social work, and counseling/psychology. MEASURES: The Managing Health & Wellness in Health Professions Training and Practice survey was used to capture wellness practices and barriers among participants. Results: Students reported significantly higher perceived stress compared to professionals (P < 0.001). Total wellness is significantly higher among professionals compared to students (P < 0.001). A higher stress rate is significantly related to being female, having a lower wellness score, and facing more barriers (P < 0.001). Intellectual health is the most valuable wellness domain for providers (M = 3.71, SD = 0.9) and students (M = 3.43, SD = 0.85), followed by spiritual health for providers (M = 3.4, SD = 1.1), and work/learning environment for students (M = 3.33, SD = 0.93). Professionals and students are least satisfied with their physical and financial health. Barriers include fatigue, workload/productivity in clinical practice, work hours, and burnout. CONCLUSIONS: Healthcare professionals exhibit a variety of stress management practices, encounter barriers, and prioritize different wellness domains. Healthcare systems should incorporate self-care education into their curricula and implement systemic changes to foster a thriving healthcare workforce.

A Pilot Study Comparing Cued Versus Recognition Recall Question Design on Medical Student Utilization, Effectiveness, and Perceptions of Pharmacology Educational Games.

Although games are used for active learning, research is lacking on how design impacts learning, engagement, and utilization in medical students. This pilot study compared pharmacology educational games designed with cued recall questions with a recognition-recall trivia multiple choice format. Learning was determined by comparing quiz performance pre- and post-game, and perceptions were measured by post-game survey. Pharmacology performance improved regardless of game design, although the trivia game produced greater post-game performance improvement. Medical students positively perceived both pharmacology games to be interesting, effective, and engaging tools, supporting that they are a feasible method to promote engagement and active pharmacology learning.

A low-power integrated humidity CMOS sensor by printing-on-chip technology.

A low-power, wide-dynamic-range integrated humidity sensing chip is implemented using a printable polymer sensing material with an on-chip pulse-width-modulation interface circuit. By using the inkjet printing technique, poly(3,4-ethylene-dioxythiophene)/polystyrene sulfonate that has humidity sensing features can be printed onto the top metal layer of a 0.35 µm CMOS IC. The developed printing-on-chip humidity sensor achieves a heterogeneous three dimensional sensor system-on-chip architecture. The humidity sensing of the implemented printing-on-chip sensor system is experimentally tested. The sensor shows a sensitivity of 0.98% to humidity in the atmosphere. The maximum dynamic range of the readout circuit is 9.8 MΩ, which can be further tuned by the frequency of input signal to fit the requirement of the resistance of printed sensor. The power consumption keeps only 154 µW. This printing-on-chip sensor provides a practical solution to fulfill an ultra-small integrated sensor for the applications in miniaturized sensing systems.

A contact lens with embedded sensor for monitoring tear glucose level.

We report the design, construction, and testing of a contact lens with an integrated amperometric glucose sensor, proposing the possibility of in situ human health monitoring simply by wearing a contact lens. The glucose sensor was constructed by creating microstructures on a polymer substrate, which was subsequently shaped into a contact lens. Titania sol-gel film was applied to immobilize glucose oxidase, and Nafion® was used to decrease several potential interferences (ascorbic acid, lactate, and urea) present in the tear film. The sensor exhibits a fast response (20s), a high sensitivity (240 µA cm(-2) mM(-1)) and a good reproducibility after testing a number of sensors. It shows good linearity for the typical range of glucose concentrations in the tear film (0.1-0.6 mM), and acceptable accuracy in the presence of interfering agents. The sensor can attain a minimum detection of less than 0.01 mM glucose.