Keynote Lectures
Cancer Patient Blogs: How Patients, Clinicians, and Researchers Learn from Rich Narratives of Illness
Lisa Gualtieri, Fiona Y. Akhtar
Abstract
Blogs written by cancer patients can offer deep insights to other patients about what to expect in the course of illness and treatment, can provide information to oncologists and other clinicians about patient experiences outside of appointments, and can increase researcher awareness of treatment effects and alternatives. While many forms of social media and online communities are used by patients, blogs are unique in that they provide a narrative of many aspects of disease and treatment, offering a comprehensive view of the disease experience delivered in installments, often from diagnosis through life as a survivor. However, the impact of patient blogs has been modest thus far because patient blogs are spread across the internet and, with no central repository of patient blogs, opportunities for analysis are limited. Given the life-altering and potentially devastating impact of cancer on people’s lives, we seek to develop a tool that will analyze tens of thousands of patient-authored blogs to improve cancer patient care.
Keywords
blogs, narratives, social media, patients, clinicians, reserachers
Full text is available at IEEE Xplore digital library.
Digitally Mediated Social Networking Practices: A Focus on Connectedness and Disconnectedness
Ben Light
Abstract
Research into digitally mediated networks is important as these are becoming increasingly intertwined with other aspects of our everyday lives as we invest as much effort in the relationships developed there as elsewhere. Over the past few years we have witnessed the rise of digital media usage (at least in the developed world) as exemplified by such Web 2.0 enabled networks as Facebook, YouTube and the like. It appears that Wittel’s (2001) hypothesis that ‘network sociality’ will become ever more important has come to fruition. Socialization for many has become deeply embedded in technology and is characterised by an assimilation of work and play (Wittel 2001). As Judith Donath states: “information that was once local is becoming global. The dramas of high school friends, blind date traumas, and mundane job irritations, once hot gossip only to be the immediate circle of the people involved, are now published for worldwide consumption on blogs and network sites.” (Donath 2007).
Keywords
digitally mediated networks, social networks
Full text is available at IEEE Xplore digital library.
The Impact of Packet Fragmentation on Internet-of-Things Enabled Systems
James Pope, Robert Simon
Abstract
The Internet of Things (IoT) refers to a collection of technologies designed to interconnect physical devices with the Internet. Due to device resource constraints IoT connectivity requires the redesign of several basic Internet protocols. This paper studies the impact of packet fragmentation at the data link level on the end-to-end performance of some of these redesigned protocols. Our results show that fragmentation can seriously degrade the performance of a typical IoT device to gateway communication modality. On the other hand, our results also show that with proper design of data broadcast mechanisms, gateway-to-device communication can be maintained at high performance levels. These results can be used as a guide for IoT network engineers.
Keywords
Internet of Things Communication, Internet Protocols over Embedded Systems, Low-power and Lossy Networks
Full text is available at IEEE Xplore digital library.
Business Analytics: Research and Teaching Perspectives
Ramesh Sharda, Daniel Adomako Asamoah, Natraj Ponna
Abstract
Business analytics and big data are being discussed everywhere right now. The objective of this paper is to provide a research and teaching introduction to business analytics. It begins by providing a quick overview of the three types of analytics. To assist the future analytics professionals, we identify various sectors of the analytics industry and provide a classification of different types of industry participants. Then it includes a brief description of some current research projects under way in our team. We also note some research opportunities in Big Data analytics. The paper also concludes with a discussion of teaching opportunities in analytics.
Keywords
Analytics Big Data, Research, Athletic Injuries, Healthcare
Full text is available at IEEE Xplore digital library.
Applications of Geographic Information Systems and Geo-spatial Modeling in Environmental Epidemiology
John E. Vena, Sara E. Wagner, Stephen L. Rathbun
Abstract
The ability of environmental epidemiology to determine the relationships between health and environmental insults has become exceedingly difficult. The multifactorial nature of disease and the diversity of the insults, which include biologic, physical, social and cultural factors, combined with genetic susceptibility, suggest the need to incorporate comprehensive perspectives of multidisciplinary epidemiologic investigation; utilize tools, such as geographic information systems (GIS) and other geospatial methods, which can integrate multi-level, spatial, and temporal factors and can help limit the potential for misclassification of exposure estimates; and to encourage collaborations and creativity in the field of environmental epidemiology. Examples of applications in cancer epidemiology will be presented. Statistical challenges to linking spatial pattern of cancer to radiation exposure will be discussed.
Keywords
environmental epidemiology, geographic information systems (GIS), geospatial modeling
Full text is available at IEEE Xplore digital library.