Mary Catherine Daly

• RGN, RM, MSc
• Medical Professional at Cork University Hospital

Background Previous studies showed that the combination of Cystic Fibrosis Transmembrane Conductance Regulator (CFTR) corrector and potentiator, lumacaftor–ivacaftor (LUMA–IVA) provides meaningful clinical benefits in patients with cystic fibrosis who are homozygous for the Phe508del CFTR mutation. However, little is known about the effect of LUMA–...

Purpose Clostridium difficile has been reported to occur in the gastrointestinal tract of 50% of Cystic Fibrosis (CF) subjects, however, clinical C. difficile infection (CDI) is a rare occurrence in this cohort despite the presence of toxigenic and hypervirulent ribotypes. Here, we present the first longitudinal, multicentre analysis of C. difficil...

Cystic Fibrosis (CF) and its treatment result in an altered gut microbiota composition compared to non-CF controls. However, the impact of this on gut microbiota functionality has not been extensively characterised. Our aim was to conduct a proof-of-principle study to investigate if measurable changes in gut microbiota functionality occur in adult...

Gaining an understanding of factors contributing to bone quality is key to the development of effective preventative treatments for osteoporosis and reduction in osteoporotic fractures. Oestrogen is a strong regulator of bone remodelling which maintains skeletal structural integrity. The growth regulation by oestrogen in breast cancer 1 (GREB1) gen...

This article focuses on the meanings and repertoires of action associated with money in low-income and poverty circumstances. Based on interviews with 51 people, the analysis reveals how people on a low income actively engage with money as a way of situating themselves in their complex worlds. Money is investigated at two levels: praxis and orienta...

This themed section focuses on parenting support as a social policy phenomenon within and across five European countries. The provisions involved include: information to parents about parenting and child-rearing (through helplines and websites as well as face-to-face services), organised parenting classes or programmes, one-to-one counselling and i...

This themed section focuses on parenting support as a social policy phenomenon within and across five European countries. The provisions involved include: information to parents about parenting and child-rearing (through helplines and websites as well as face-to-face services), organised parenting classes or programmes, one-to-one counselling and i...

Teppo Kröger and Sue Yeandle (eds.) (2014), Combining Paid Work and Family Care: Policies and Experiences in International Perspective. Bristol: Policy Press. £24.99, 264 pp., pbk. - Volume 44 Issue 4 - MARY DALY

This article develops an analytic framework for parenting support, treating it as both a form of social policy and a measure that intervenes more broadly in politics and society. It is suggested that, as a form of social policy, parenting support can be examined through analytical categories that are classic to social policy, such as: the nature of...

This article enquires into how parenting support, as concept, policy and provision, has penetrated the English social policy landscape, and critically considers why it has proved so popular with policy makers. It first outlines the existing policy configuration. The second section identifies some key factors precipitating the roll-out of parenting...

Under its new economic reform strategy, Europe 2020, the EU has committed itself to reducing poverty and social exclusion by 20 million by 2020. Despite several decades of the EU engaging in the policy area of poverty and social exclusion, this is the first time it has set itself a quantitative target. A further encouraging aspect of this recent de...

This article examines the latest iteration of EU social policy – the target to reduce poverty and social exclusion by 20 million. The application of a three-part conceptual matrix – focused on ideas, politics and governance – indicates key weaknesses. The target is ungovernable because it melds different approaches to poverty and social exclusion a...

Background Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic, autoimmune disease characterized by hyperplasia and inflammatory changes within the synovium. The recruitment and accumulation of monocytes in the synovium contribute to inflammatory response and bone destruction. Fractalkine (FKN) is a chemotactic cytokine that promotes monocyte transmigration and...

The provision of decision support tools for highly uncertain and unstructured decision situations has occupied researchers in the Decision Support Systems (DSS) area since the term was coined by Gorry and Scott Morton in 1971. We propose an empirical evaluation of Silver's [20] concept of decisional guidance in a case study of Big Bank, a large fin...

Since the beginning of the 20th century and the emergence of modern business, organisations large and small have increasingly struggled to get to grips with the rising tide of their critical data. This led to a period during the 1970s and 1980s where much focus was directed towards managing information as a specific activity, increasingly carried o...

It is considered that up to 50% of the excess mortality in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is attributable to cardiovascular disease (CVD). Diastolic dysfunction in RA patients without clinically–evident cardiac disease is recognised. Transthoracic echocardiography is a sensitive and non-invasive method of assessing diastolic function. Ankle brachial pre...

Forty years after Gorry and Scott Morton’s seminal paper on DSS, supporting decisions in organisation is still a critical objective. Given the elapsed time since DSSs were first introduced, it is important to gauge the scope and quality of decision support provided to managers. Using Executive MBA students as informants about decision making in the...

This article offers a critical account of the ‘social’ in the Europe 2020 strategy, focusing on the new poverty target and the European Platform against Poverty and Social Exclusion. The article reaches three main conclusions. First, while poverty is given a prominent place in the strategy and the recourse to targets is intended to harden up Member...

The aim of this article is to analyse the nature and significance of the recent European Union (EU) poverty and social exclusion target, which has become part of the EU’s new 10-year strategy, known as ‘Europe 2020’. It situates this analysis in the politics of social policy, at both transnational and national levels. The agreement on the target pr...

Despite a severe recession and modest recovery, real wage growth has stayed relatively solid. A key reason seems to be downward nominal wage rigidities, that is, the tendency of employers to avoid cutting the dollar value of wages. This phenomenon means that, in nominal terms, wages tend not to adjust downward when economic conditions are poor. Wit...

Embedding business intelligence systems within organisations requires a seamless integration of technology, business processes and routines into the fabric of the organisation. In this paper, we propose a set of five dimensions for embeddedness of business intelligence systems within organisations. We argue that these dimensions can be related to d...

TNF blockers have rarely been associated with haematological complications; however, there are scattered case reports of marked neutropenia with their use and necessitating in their withdrawal. We would like to report a series of five patients who developed neutropenia with etanercept use; however, all these patients were re-challenged with etanerc...

Forty years after Gorry and Scott Morton’s seminal paper on DSS, supporting decisions in organisation is still a critical objective. Given the elapsed time since DSSs were first introduced, it is important to gauge the scope and quality of decision support provided to managers. Using Executive MBA students as informants about decision making in t...

Analyses regularly feature claims that European welfare states are in the process of creating an adult worker model. The theoretical and empirical basis of this argument is examined here by looking first at the conceptual foundations of the adult worker model formulation and then at the extent to which social policy reform in western Europe fits wi...

The U.S. unemployment rate has remained stubbornly high since the 2007-2009 recession

In the years since it came to power in 1997, New Labour has set about reforming key elements of the British welfare state. In its wide-ranging vision, project even, the family has had a central place. This article probes the meaning and significance of New Labour’s focus on the family and considers whether it represents a change compared with past...

In 2009, strong growth in productivity allowed firms to lay off large numbers of workers while holding output relatively steady. This behavior threw a wrench into the long-standing relationship between changes in GDP and changes in the unemployment rate, known as Okun’s law. If Okun’s law had held in 2009, the unemployment rate would have risen by...

This article examines recent reform in law and social policy in Germany and the UK, identifying and comparing developments from a family and gender perspective. The utility of the concept of individualisation to understand the reforms is put under the spotlight by an analysis that explores the relationship between individualisation and institutions...

Although the pace of layoffs appears to be subsiding and the overall economy is showing hints of stabilization, most forecasters expect unemployment to continue to increase in coming months and to recede only gradually as recovery takes hold. In this Economic Letter, we evaluate this projection using data on three labor market indicators: worker fl...

This Letter examines how changes in wealth and credit may be affecting household and aggregate labor supply.

Since Congress overhauled the U.S. welfare system in 1996, single mothers between 18 and 24 have reduced welfare dependency, increased workforce participation, and registered gains in household income. The group's growing attachment to the labor force means they may be better positioned to take advantage of unemployment insurance during the current...

There is abundant evidence that the current business environment is pushing firms to invest increasing amounts of resources in sourcing state of the art IT capability. Some of this investment is directed towards developing the decision support capability of the firm and it is important to measure the extent to which this deployment of decision supp...

One goal of osteoporosis research is to identify the genes and environmental factors that contribute to low bone mineral density (BMD) and fracture. Linkage analyses have identified quantitative trait loci (QTLs), however, the genes contributing to low BMD are largely unknown. We examined the potential association of an intronic polymorphism in CD3...

Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium isolates of phage types DT104 and DT104b are frequently associated with multiple antimicrobial resistance. We describe the characterization of a class 1 integron containing dfrA1 and aadA1, genes from two Salmonella serovar Typhimurium DT104b isolates. Genetic mapping located the integron to the bacterial chr...

Antimicrobial resistance determinants may be transferred among bacteria via mobile genetic elements including plasmids, transposons, and the more recently explored integrons (1). Integrons are naturally occurring genetic elements found as part of the Tn21 transposon family or located on various broad host-range plasmids (2). The fundamental integro...

In conclusion, these preliminary results suggest that the TNF-gene polymorphism at position À308 might have an impact on susceptibility to renal manifestations of pSS, but the influence of HLA-DR3 cannot be ruled out owing to the limited number of patients. A power analysis showed that to reach a 30% difference in the presence of dRTA would necessi...

Celiac disease (CD) is a relatively common gastrointestinal disorder that can be asymptomatic. An increased prevalence of subclinical CD has been reported in many populations. Even among asymptomatic patients a reduction in bone mineral density (BMD) has been observed. The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of silent CD in a cohort of...

To employ a combination of phenotypic and genotypic subspecies typing methods to aid in an epidemiological investigation of an outbreak of Salmonella bredeney involving ten persons. Isolates were characterised by employing antibiogram typing, in addition to two genotyping techniques, including pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE), random amplifi...

Osteoporosis is a disease characterized by low bone mineral density (BMD) and poor bone quality. Peak bone density is achieved by the third decade of life, after which bone is maintained by a balanced cycle of bone resorption and synthesis. Age-related bone loss occurs as the bone resorption phase outweighs the bone synthesis phase of bone metaboli...

Low bone mineral density (BMD) is a major risk factor for the development of osteoporosis and there is strong evidence to suggest that the procurement and preservation of peak BMD is genetically determined. In an effort to identify factors responsible for susceptibility to low BMD in the Irish population, we investigated its possible association wi...

Aims: Burkholderia cepacia is a Gram-negative bacterium associated with increasing morbidity and mortality and is readily transmitted among infected cystic fibrosis (CF) patients. The B. cepacia complex consists of five distinct subgroups, termed genomovars. A collection of 17 presumptive B. cepacia isolates, obtained from three national CF referr...

Salmonella enterica serotype Bredeney has emerged as the third most commonly identified serotype among human clinical isolates referred to the Irish National Salmonella Reference Laboratory in the years 1998 to 2000. A collection of 112 isolates of S. enterica serotype Bredeney collected during the period 1995 to 1999 from animal, food, and human s...

Osteoporosis is a disease characterised by a low bone mineral density (BMD) and microarchitectural deterioration of bone tissue leading to fractures, especially of the hip and spine. It is a major public health problem of western societies that affects the elderly population. Both environmental and genetic factors have been evoked as determinants o...

Two hundred and twenty-six Salmonella enterica serotype Typhimurium isolates were examined for the presence of integron-associated gene cassettes. All but two of the non-DT104 isolates, together with DT104 isolates, contained gene cassettes. Amplicons of 1.5 kbp each were found in two non-DT104 isolates, encoding a dhfrI gene (trimethoprim resistan...

Contemporary Irish data on the prevalence of major coronary heart disease (CHD) risk factors are sparse. There is confusion regarding the targeting of interventions such as statin therapy for primary prevention Clinicians are faced with a plethora of risk scoring systems. The Sheffield Risk Table is widely used in the UK: (i) To estimate the preva...

Two hundred and twenty-six randomly collected Irish Salmonella enterica serotype Typhimurium were analysed for antimicrobial agent-encoding resistance genes by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Most of these isolates were phage typed as DT104 and were resistant (R) to five (or more) antibiotics including ampicillin, chloramphenicol, streptomycin, su...

Salmonella enterica is among the principal etiological agents of food-borne illness in humans. Increasing antimicrobial resistance in S. enterica is a cause for worldwide concern. There is concern at present in relation to the increasing incidence of human infection with antimicrobial agent-resistant strains of S. enterica serotype Typhimurium, in...

Resistance to antimicrobial agents used to treat severe Campylobacter spp. gastroenteritis is increasing worldwide. We assessed the antimicrobial resistance patterns of Campylobacter spp. isolates of human and animal origin. More than half (n = 32) were resistant to sulphonamide, a feature known to be associated with the presence of integrons. Anal...

Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a pathogen in both humans and animals. This bacterium, most often associated with respiratory infections in cystic fibrosis patients, was found to be the causative agent in bovine mastitis outbreaks among 11 Irish dairy herds. Epidemiological findings suggested that the infection was spread to all herds by teat wipes that...

An outbreak of Salmonella tel-el-kebir occurring over a 6-month period is described in this report. This is the first outbreak of S. tel-el-kebir in the reported literature. S. tel-el-kebir was isolated from human faecal samples using conventional laboratory methods. Eight patients had S. tel-el-kebir isolated from faeces. All patients were owners...

On May 8, 2000 this sequence version replaced gi:6513856.

On Dec 20, 1999 this sequence version replaced gi:5257500.

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has become a major nosocomial pathogen in recent years. Once introduced into the hospital environment, MRSA can spread rapidly, and its subsequent treatment is often difficult as it may be simultaneously resistant to several antibiotics. A useful strategy both to identify the source of infection an...

Although the labor market has slowly begun to recover, unemployment remains stubbornly high. The pace at which unemployment comes down over the next two years depends in part on the cyclical recovery of labor force participation and the extent to which that offsets or adds to ongoing structural changes in labor force behavior related to increased s...