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Bay Street no longer matters in Ottawa
Senator Irving Gerstein's ignored speech reveals the new reality in political fundraising
By Kenneth Whyte November 6, 2013
Todd Korol / Reuters
Irving Gerstein has a bald round head with a grey fringe at the back and crooked glasses to the front.
He wears pinstripe suits. Not subtle pinstripes. Big thick Al Capone pinstripes. White shirts with dagger collars. Hardware on his lapel like a modern major-general. A pocket square folded in the shape of the Sydney Opera House.
He looks more like an aging bagman than the poster boy for a political revolution.
In fact, he's both.
Sen. Gerstein and Prime Minister Stephen Harper were the only two members of the Conservative Party of Canada to make substantial addresses at last weekend's convention in Calgary. Of the two, Gerstein's was the more enlightening. It was a stunning disquisition on the new cash-flow politics practised by our governing party.
"All political parties," said the senator, who has been fundraising since the days of Diefenbaker, "require money to operate."
That's hardly news but, as Gerstein explained, the way money is collected has changed. Successive Liberal and Conservative governments have rewritten the rules in important ways. Party donations have been capped at $1,200 per person. Government contributions to the parties (on a cash-per-vote basis) are being phased out.
That means a bagman-in-chief like Gerstein can no longer reach his fundraising targets by trolling for massive donations from bank presidents, corporate heads, special interest groups. Nor can he count on taxpayer subsidies to bankroll an election campaign.
"To raise money successfully," said the senator, "a political party must appeal to Canadians of ordinary means . . . The Conservative party's fundraising success is built not on the depth of our donors' pockets but on the breadth of our donor base and that is what the other parties do not understand and why they are lagging behind."
The opposition is indeed lagging. The Conservatives raised $17 million in 2012, more than the Liberals and the NDP combined and a huge number for a non-election year. It is on track to repeat this feat in 2013 (although the Liberals seem to be catching up). Gerstein and his colleagues have raked in more than $220 million in the last decade. They have $14 million cash in the bank.
They have also spent $7 million on fundraising technology and voter management software. These tools enable the bagman to launch sophisticated campaigns that identify potential supporters and move them "up the support pyramid," from casual ally to party member to donor.
Conservative fundraising prowess, says Gerstein, has been key to the party's three consecutive election victories. He was careful not to take all the credit. He shared some with his Prime Minister. And that is where he got profound.
If there is one thing he has learned about raising money, said Gerstein, it is that what comes out of Harper's mouth determines what falls into the bagman's boots: "Message creates momentum creates money."
Think about that for a minute. What Gerstein told the world Saturday afternoon is that the Prime Minister gets to keep his job so long as his message—his policies, stances, decisions—moves Conservative activists to send cheques.
Gerstein stopped short of saying that the government adjusts its message to improve its finances but, come on . . . there's a majority on the line.
Last summer, an indignant group of 150 Canadian CEOs complained to Ottawa that its approach to wireless competition was bad public policy and harmful to business. It was almost universally acknowledged that the CEOs had a point. Harper blew them off.
One hundred and fifty CEOs may rule Canadian business, but at $1,200 a head they are worth at most $180,000 to Harper. And the PM knows that a lot of those CEOs won't write a cheque for any cause without getting their names on buildings. So 150 of the biggest, fattest CEOs in Canada wield less clout in Ottawa than any 150 Conservative hotheads in my home riding of Edmonton Centre.
Instead of answering the CEOs or sorting out his wireless policy, Harper launched a website that played on public dissatisfaction (often justifiable) with high prices and poor service in the wireless sector. The site steered traffic to party membership and fundraising pages. No doubt many of the good people of Edmonton Centre contributed.
Bay Street no longer matters in Canadian politics. And it will not matter whichever party is in power so long as the current fundraising rules hold. Gerstein's logic is unassailable. The contribution cap and the phasing out of per-vote subsidies makes his way the only way to win.
CEOs had better get used to it, and we all need to get used to national parties more interested in capitalizing on problems than in fixing them.
Get used to reams of government policy inexplicable but for its ability to grease the bagman's gears.
Another example. There was a posse of correctional officers in Calgary on the weekend. One would be forgiven for thinking they were in town to support a Prime Minister who is notoriously tough on crime. Rather, they were protesting the government's insistence on double bunking convicts.
The guards know that double bunking actually increases violence in prisons. That's contrary to the PM's crime-fighting objectives.
But Harper's interest in public safety is not primarily concerned with meaningful reform. Abusing convicts plays well in Edmonton Centre, makes the bagman's phone ring, makes another Conservative majority in 2015 that much more likely.
The guards should have stayed home.
The subset of Conservative supporters who write cheques appears to be about 100,000 strong. These individuals are the real powers behind the Harper throne, the current Canadian political elite. They probably wield more clout than the entire Conservative caucus.
It is tempting to deplore their ascendance. But that someone is always paying the piper in our politics. Policies are always warped by influence. Now they're just differently warped.
Little was reported of Gerstein's speech beyond a soundbite on the Duffy scandal. No one listens closely to bagmen, however loud their pinstripes. Yet whenever an inexplicable decision emerges from the Harper government, we all search for clues—is it the PM's faith, his economic beliefs, his advisers, his Alberta roots, his populist leanings?
All of those things inform Harper's thinking. None explains the inexplicable so well as Gerstein's law: message = money = mandate.
FILED UNDER: conservative convention conservative party Irving Gerstein Maclean's Politics political fundraising Stephen Harper


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Westminster bubble
Analysing what makes British politics tick
As Scotland decides its future, lie back and think of England
Published: August 28, 2014 1.28am EDT
Eunice Goes, Richmond American International University
Eunice Goes
Associate Professor of Communications, Richmond American International University
This may no longer be enough for the English if Scotland votes no. Laura Lean/PA
For many English people, the forthcoming referendum on Scottish independence is a reminder of England's Cinderella status in the United Kingdom. While Scotland and Northern Ireland enjoy a large degree of self-government, Wales has significant administrative autonomy (and is in the process of gaining a wide range of new legislative powers), England is entirely governed by Westminster and Whitehall.
But this constitutional state of affairs is no longer considered acceptable by many English who feel overlooked by Westminster politicians and short-changed by asymmetrical devolution. In particular, English voters seem to resent the fact that Scottish MPs can vote on matters that affect England whilst Scottish issues are (mostly) decided by the Holyrood parliament.
An opinion poll commissioned by the universities of Edinburgh and Cardiff revealed that 62% of English voters agree that, following a no vote, "Scottish MPs should be prevented from voting on laws that apply only in England". This hardening of attitudes towards Scotland is hardly shocking but what came as a surprise to many is that 54% of voters supported the idea of an English parliament.
Until now the Westminster elite assumed English voters were not interested in self-government. That was a comforting thought to those who believed that the best answer to the "West Lothian question" was not to ask it.
But in reality the English were never given the chance to taste genuine self-government. Proposals for an English Parliament were never contemplated and for good reasons too. As a representative body of the largest and richest nation of the United Kingdom, an English Parliament would dwarf the devolved bodies of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and would reduce Westminster to political and constitutional irrelevance.
The eight English regional assemblies proposed by the last Labour government in 2003 were an unsatisfactory solution too. Those regional assemblies had so few legislative powers that they were little more than talking shops. So it is not surprising that in 2004 voters from the Northeast of England voted no on the referendum that proposed to create what they saw as an extra layer of politicians and bureaucrats.
The 2004 referendum in the Northeast of England put an end to the debate on English devolution, but maybe it is time to revisit the idea of regional assemblies. The result of the Scottish referendum may make it a necessity. If, as the opinion polls suggest, Scottish voters reject independence, the train is already in place for Westminster to grant further fiscal powers to Holyrood. The three main parties have recently given assurances to Scotland about the scenario of "devo-max".
And as MPs and peers return to Westminster in the coming weeks they will pen the final amendments to the Wales Bill which will grant more powers, including borrowing and taxation powers, to the Welsh Assembly. These two developments will emphasise the asymmetrical nature of devolution and will foment further English resentment towards the non-English MPs sitting in Westminster.
More importantly, the mood also changed in England. English devolution is no longer a cause defended only by fringe groups such as the English Democrats. This cause is gaining some momentum amongst English (and some Scottish) MPs. More importantly, English voters seem to be open to the idea. As Professor Professor Michael Kenny showed in his book The Politics of English Nationhood, Scottish, Northern Irish and Welsh devolution, rising mistrust towards the European Union, and the sense of economic and cultural insecurity brought by globalisation have contributed to the rise of an English national identity.
In Westminster, the three main political parties have been aware of the changing mood in England but for a variety of reasons – namely electoral considerations and a fear of stirring the wrong type of nationalism – do not know how to respond to it. The parties of the coalition seem to be in two minds about it. Having abolished the English regional development agencies in 2010 the coalition has recently promised a £6bn fund to boost development in the English regions.
The Labour Party seems less confused but it is equally timid. This spring, Labour leader Ed Miliband made proposals for devolution of fiscal powers to English cities. But they are too modest, too technocratic and do not seem to either recognise rising English national identity or to address the constitutional problems created by Scottish and Welsh devolution.
In fairness, these are not easy problems to solve. Having ruled out big bang solutions like an English parliament, piecemeal proposals such as regional representation in the House of Lords or those made by the McKay Commission leave the fundamental problem of the English question unanswered. But this does not mean that there are no other options.
As the Scottish secretary Alistair Carmichael recently suggested there is a "logical conclusion" to this constitutional conundrum. That logical solution is federalism and English regional assemblies. He may well be right.
Published: August 14, 2014 Warsi was right – evidence shows Tories ignore ethnic minorities at their peril
Published: September 19, 2014 Scottish vote gives UK a chance to repair itself – but it's a big job

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


In this article I'm going to explain how to bind DataList from XML file in ASP.NET using C#.
ItemTemplate: Contains the HTML elements and controls to render once for each row in the data source.
AlternatingItemTemplate: Contains the HTML elements and controls to render once for every other row in the data source. Typically, you use this template to create a different look for the alternating rows, such as a different background color than the color that is specified in the ItemTemplate property.
SelectedItemTemplate: Contains the elements to render when the user selects an item in the DataList control. Typically, you use this template to visually distinguish the selected row with a different background or font color. You can also expand the item by displaying additional fields from the data source.
Here I'll show you how to bind DataList from XML file to display employee details by repeating structure such as table.
Here we have to create XML file and write some sample data about employee details.
How to bind DataList from XML file in ASP.NET using C#In this article I'm going to explain how to bind DataList from XML file in ASP.NET using C#. The DataList Web server control displays data in a format that you can define using templates and styles. The DataList control is useful for data in any repeating structure, such as a table. The DataList control can display rows in different layouts, such as ordering them in columns or rows.
How to bind XML data to GridView - ASP.NET using C#In this article I'm going to explain how to bind GridView from XML file in ASP.NET using C#. I've already written few articles about XML. In this article I'll show you how to bind GridView from XML. First we have to create XML file and write some sample data about employee details. Then we've to read that data from XML file and we can display the data to GridView.


Before the post begins (or after you read it), if you would like to donate to my 2014 CHA Fundraising, please click this link.
My first Citizens for Humane Action Dog Jog was in August 2008. It's something I'll never forget. The day before the race, my divorce became final, then, in a horrible twist of fate…. my grandfather passed away a few hours later. It was, without question, one of the worst days of my life.
I had signed up for the Dog Jog a few weeks prior because I wanted something to look forward to and thought this would be a good distraction.
When I arrived at the race, I found my good friend, Billy. It was great to have some support at the race. You can see from the picture how young and thin I was.
Tobey was so happy that day. And I felt great helping homeless animals. It was exactly what I needed. We ran 5k in 23 minutes and 34 seconds (7:30 average).
I've kept the Dog Jog on my Calendar ever since. I even showed up with a severely sprained ankle one year. I didn't run, but I was there. I've raised more than $3,400 since my first race.
I started bringing my Lillian and the woman who would become my wife. The event morphed into something I looked forward to every year. Something I could do to give back to the animals that can't help themselves and something I could do with my best friend Tobey.
This year, Tobey is turning 9. It's something that I'm having a hard time with. He's started to slow down physically, which breaks my heart. It takes him longer to recover from runs, and he can't go as fast as he could before. That's why this year's Dog Jog is so important to me.
There is a real chance this could be the last formal run we do together. We likely won't beat our personal record (22:35 in 2009), but we will remain committed to the cause.
We're going to show up and we're going to have an amazing time helping other dogs. In the end, that's what the CHA Dog Jog is all about.
If you'd like to contribute to my cause, you can do so here…. if you'd like to leave a note, please use the comment box below.
Since the weather has been warming up lately, I've started running again with the Superfriends. I started in February with a modest 6 runs for close to 13 miles. Once the snow melted in March, I've been able to kick it up a notch and have 13 runs under my belt for nearly 36 miles. My 2014 log is below.
If I run outside, I always take at least one of the Pups. This year, I've been taking both of them. If they're being good, I'll let them run around off leash. It's usually harmless as they sniff everything and have a great time running around. This leads to today's run when I let them off leash and they encountered a skunk.
I had them running next to me because we were coming around a bend and I didn't know what was ahead. Once the coast was clear from people and dogs, I told them to run ahead. They both took off at full speed up a hill. I couldn't see what was going on but I could hear intense barking and I could see fur flying in the air. I immediately started sprinting to see what was going on. When I got within sight, Lillian was rolling on her back on the ground and Tobey was attacking a skunk.
I immediately started calling them back to me to get them away from the skunk. Lillian came first and I could smell that she had gotten sprayed. Tobey really wanted to avenge his sister so he was still attacking the skunk and refused to leave. Once I got his attention, I called him back and immediately got him on the leash and headed for home at an increased pace to assess the damage.
Of course, I had none of these things on hand so I tied the dogs to the front door and rushed to CVS to buy the supplies. I mixed everything up and did a quick assessment of the situation. As I mentioned, Tobey avoided getting sprayed. He kept licking his chops so I think he managed to get a few good bites in. Since he didn't stink, I got him inside and started using the solution on Lils. After several minutes, the smell was still in the air, but Lillian was ok. I washed her off and got her in the house.
Since the house had a smell, my next move was to rush to the grocery store to get some vinegar to boil to neutralize the inside smell. I got back, I put it on the stove to boil and proceeded to give the pups real baths.
In the end, the house still has a slight smell. I can't tell if it's from the vinegar or the skunk… but more importantly, the pups don't smell and the formula worked like a champ.
If your dog ever gets skunked, I highly recommend the formula above and the below video.
If you have any thoughts on Lil getting skunked or any other tips or tricks, please drop a comment in the box below.
Let me start by saying that I love running with my weimaraners. I love the company and the pure excitement for running. I would go as far as saying that running is one of Tobey's favorite things in life (Lillian's is eating). It's gotten to the point where it's almost unbearable for me running alone. One of my events I look forward to each year is the CHA Dog Jog in August. Since 2009, Tobey and I have raised close to $3300 for homeless animals in and near Columbus (although… to be fair, Tobey hasn't done much fundraising).
Anyway, I usually try to take both pups when I run. Lillian (our Blue Weimaraner) runs on the left and Tobey (our Gray Weimaraner) runs on the right. This adds a level of complexity because I don't have full use of my arms because I'm holding the leashes. If I'm going for a long run or if I'm tired, my preference is to roll with only Tobey and leave Lillian behind. This is what happened the other day. Thankfully my wife recorded Lillian's reaction to us leaving her behind.
If you want to drop a note about how sad Lillian sounds or how cruel I was for leaving her, please use the comment box below.


text:
Nick Walkley
NW Notes
January 12, 2015 January 12, 2015 Nick Walkley Resources, Review
Pacho Flores – 'Cantar'
Sometimes there is talent in the world that doesn't always get the recognition it deserves. Fortunately, in the age of blogging and social media, the power to elevate that talent now lies with us and to a lesser extent with the corporations who will continue to flex their financial muscles to force exposure and airplay. It might only be a matter of time before everyone has heard of Pacho, but by writing this CD review I'd like to get there first.
In an increasingly image-driven industry, it is not a surprise that major classical record companies are looking for artists who can deliver the whole package. Sex sells: if that means tossing your hair around mid-performance to set a few pace-makers racing and that in turn generates a few more sales, then from a commercialist point of view then why not?
"Who is the best trumpet player in the world?"… is a question many music enthusiasts would usually follow with a string of names most often played on classical radio stations, who coincidentally also often have long blonde hair… but that's for another blog rant.
My own answer to that is a little more complex than '"who is Classic FM's most played Trumpeter?…" which is an unimaginative but apparently common way of deciding that title. I have no criticism for the work of artists who may fit in to that category, only the perception that because they are getting more commercial airplay means that they are somehow more accomplished musicians.
My favourite trumpeter would vary depending on what context they were in, e.g. symphonic, commercial lead, period baroque, classical soloist, jazz soloist, ensemble leader… etc. Having a favourite pair of socks is no good if they are only made of thin cotton and there is six inches of snow outside. It might be a lovely pattern, but it won't keep your feet warm. Similarly, Miles Davis was probably never going to delight us with his rendition of the Telemann concerto. (Equally, no-one sets a mood better than Miles).
As far as classical trumpet soloists are concerned, I have recently discovered a new benchmark. This time last year I was fortunate to stumble across this particular artist at a masterclass he was giving at the Royal Academy of Music, London. Very few of us that attended had any prior knowledge of our visitor. The following night, a majority of us followed down to the Venezuelan Embassy to make a desperate attempt to blag our way into a sold-out recital he was giving at the Bolivar Hall there.
Pacho Flores is a now thirty-something year old product of El Sistema, the revolutionary music project in Venezuela that has gone beyond being a majorly successful cultural project and is now producing some of the world's greatest fresh-faced musical talent. He was in London for a few performance dates, and also to promote his recently recorded debut solo album. He has all the requirements of a contemporary solo performer: Undeniably accomplished as a musician, charismatic, passionate, creative, and most importantly looks good in a suit and is appropriately photogenic. Deutsche Grammophon won the race for his signature, and 12 months on I finally have his debut solo CD 'Cantar' on repeat.
This disc selects a more limited palette than I heard in his recital a year ago. The focus here is on the Baroque, featuring three full concerto recordings, three interludes of Bach, and a selection of other relevant gems.
On first hearing through it strikes me that there is such variety and contrast between the pieces, which is surprising considering the selection. Both the programming and production here are very carefully balanced to achieve this, and save us from what otherwise might have been a monotonous listen.
It seems odd to open with Handel's 'The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba' when the same composer provided some of the very first great orchestral trumpet repertoire. However, it is exquisitely played. Here Flores duets with himself playing the original Oboe parts, and the Konzerthausorchester Berlin are also magnificent under the direction of Christian Vasquez.
The first major work of the disc is Neruda's 'Trumpet Concerto in E flat'. This has been a favourite of trumpet exam entrants everywhere since exams were invented, but hardly (if ever) played on the correct instrument. Here, finally, we have a recording by a virtuoso soloist playing the Corno da Caccia. Like every other instrument on this disc, it has been made for him by Stomvi.
This concerto is a personal favourite, and one I've studied and performed. This recording is easily the most impressive I've heard. Not only is it a more accurate presentation of the sound, the performance is brilliant in interpretation. Beautiful themes are elegantly decorated on their reprise without being over-garnished. Flores is a master craftsman at work.
The first Bach interlude is a solemn affair – 'Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland'. Flores' trumpet floats effortlessly over the clockwork organ accompaniment.
Our first hearing of the Piccolo trumpet comes in an adaptation of Cimarosa's 'Oboe Concerto'. Trumpet writing of this era doesn't offer the vehicle for virtuosity or expressiveness that other instrumental repertoire could at this time, and Flores wouldn't be the first to borrow from the Baroque Oboe repertoire to showcase that. The results are dazzling, with some of the most brilliant playing on the disc.
For Bach's 'Agnus Dei' the flugelhorn is deployed to great effect, creating a beautiful melancholy interlude with a tone that refreshes the pallette like a well balanced sorbet in an eleven course meal.
The only contemporary offering on the disc is from Ephraím Oscher, entitled 'Soledad' (Solitude). The intrusion into this Baroque feast is welcome in this case. If this disc were like a nest of eggs, this track would be the parakeet chick that fell into a nest of owls, and despite its exotic origin grew into a wise old bird anyway. At first you don't notice the differences: Similar instrumentation and diatonic language disguises it's modernity, whilst allowing for a melodic platform for Flores to release his lyrical qualities without the formal straightjacket of Baroque convention. It develops to be more daring and decorative to a point at which you worry that he has broken all of the rules, until you remember this was written long after Schoenberg and Stravinsky and realise this is a welcome new addition to the catalogue of original trumpet repertoire.
The third Bach interlude is an imaginative arrangement of 'Prelude no 12 in F minor', from the Well Tempered Clavier. Oscher has also provided these extra extensions to the repertoire, orchestrating with such skill as if they were never written for anything else.
Daquin's 'Le Coucou' is again a vehicle for dazzling virtuosity and a demonstration of perfect airflow, articulation and phrasing. Following on from this a dip into a Renaissance sounding 'Tarantella II' from De Murcia laced with Guitars and Tambourines, equally delightful and uplifting.
Tartini's 'Concerto for Trumpet' is the final substantial work on offer. Again, the interpretation is as elegant as it is brilliant. There is a touch of Marsalis in the swagger with which these performances are delivered, but with all the refined qualities of Hardenberger. Flores' complete command over instrumental technique is unlike any other I've heard, allowing total freedom for expression. Better still, it is never used simply because he can.
The 'bonus track' is a deviation from the Baroque theme – it seems customary for Flores to share something from home with us as an encore and here it is an orchestration of Alvaro Paiva Bimbo's 'Soy tu ayer'. Originally a song with guitar, here it is beautifully adapted to wave a cheery farewell from Flores' floated flugel lines.
With this debut CD Flores has shown that his name will takes its place among the star names of Classical Trumpet Soloists with the potential to outshine them all. The disc is dedicated to Maurice André, and this is a piece of work I imagine he might have been proud to have inspired. However, by adopting a focus on the Baroque, it gives us only a narrow selection of what Flores is capable of. This is no bad thing, especially for Deutsche Grammaphone who have left me eagerly anticipating the release of another disc!
With the Baroque box ticked, perhaps next a focus on the Romantic or Contemporary repertoire? Or are we destined for a chronological progression into Classical with some landmark interpretations of Haydn and Hummel? I understand Flores is also a fine improviser, not at all unfamiliar with the Popular music styles of his native South America. With all that in mind, I hope we can expect this to be the first in a series of exquisite volumes of work which showcase an all round remarkable talent. I for one will be collecting every disc and taking delight in watching his career flourish.
But will he be 'the best in the world'?… Maybe. Just don't ask me.
Tagged baroque, cantar, CD review, classical music, pacho flores, Trumpet
One thought on "Pacho Flores – 'Cantar'"
createmusic says:
Reblogged this on I Write The Music.
#Plogisms
The past few months have not been the easiest, to put it mildly. Before summer, I had an 'emergency' meeting with a career advisor in the face of an uncertain future in Norway, perhaps even resulting in needing to return to the UK. She said, "ok... where are you in three months time? Describe a picture for yourself". I said something like "up on Fløyen, watching the sunset over Bergen, within walking distance to a new home in the city and looking forward to a busy day in a new design-related job the next morning." I didn't think I'd get to take it, but here is that picture. ✅ #careerchange #careergoals #newstart #bergennorway #makeithappen #fløyen #norwegiansunset
Fun times ahead!!! #sykkeltur #myrdal
Nå snakker vi!!! Now we're talking! #finse - #flåm #sykkeltur #rallarvegen
Sketch stop at 1650m... #Steinbergdalshytta - #geitaryggen - #finsehytta via Klemsbu, looking out to #hardangerjøkulen #landscapedrawing #charcoaldrawing #sketchbook #utpåtur
Another sketch of a way-marker in #aurlandsdalen guiding hikers down to @steinbergdalshytta (open and serving once again!). These simple stacks of rocks are an interesting and architectural subject but they have an important function: Keeping sight of these will help you from getting lost in the vast open mountain areas, and guide you towards warmth and shelter... or on a day like today coffee, warm food, waffles and ice cream! ☕🥘🥞🍦☀#sketching #hikingnorway #steinbergdalshytta #fjelltur #dennorsketuristforening #fjellhytte #norskkunst #skisse #sketchbook #sketchbooktour #skissebok
Hiking down from cosy Steinbergdalshytta to Østerbø today in Aurlandsdalen. 4 hours trip through spectacular mountains, with a couple of rest stops. Had a bit of competition for the best spots though... 🐏🐏🐏😂 #sheep #aurlandsdalen #steinbergdalshytta #østerbø #utpåtur #norwegianmountains #norwaynature


I'm also interested in this. I have a 3" inexpensive tilt vise that cannot be called accurate or long lasting, and the clamping pressure is not great. It sits pretty high, so I'm looking for something lower profile, more accurate, and with wider jaws for milling. What has been your experience?
I've had a $250 Shars 4" (202-0991) vise for about a year now and I'm very happy with it, but they're out of stock at the moment.
You might consider Glacern as well.
There is a huge number of sellers on the Bay who are offering Chinese "precision" 4" milling machine vises for around $81, free shipping. I do like this style of vise myself, because it's easy to set up squarely. Just use a machinist's square across the front edge of the table, set the vise against it, and lock it down. Can be mounted on its side, etc. You might even consider getting both one of these and a 5" vise from Glacern or similar source. Two vises are sometimes good to have.
PS - these may all be from the same seller, using different aliases. I notice that all of them come from Ontario, CA.
I have a 6" shars vise at work and like it well enough. At home I have an old 5" kurt that I fixed up. I would go and find a used kurt with your $300. You would do ok with the shars as well.
I sure like the Glacier vise's, would you go for the 4" premium for $599 or the 4" standard for $349 or the 5" standard for $379.
I torn the 4" premium can clap laying on its side and open's to 5". I also wonder if the 5" standard is to large for my g0704.
Tormach has vises in your price and size range.
They very well may be from the foundry as the ebay vises.
But tormach puts their name on them, stands behind them, and sells some useful jaws for them. The also probably do some quality control, like Shars and their rejects get sold by someone else.
Checking the prices at tormach might make Shars look pretty good.
I have 2, 5" tormach vises and 1, 4" vise purchased from little machine shop. My experiences with Kurt and Orange vises was limited and previous to owning the Tormachs, but I do not feel limited with the Tormach vises.
I bought a PM 5" precision vise with swivel base last year off ebay - around $130 with an ebay coupon. So far very happy with it.
Bought this HFS 5" milling vise. Its not bad so far. Looks like an exact copy of what Grizzly sells..probably the exact same thing.
Took a bunch of cleanup, but it isnt terrible. Was going to upgrade to a Kurt recently but I see they discontinued the 5" so I will stick with this one.
My vises are all flangless type.
Precision ground on the out side surfaces.
Can be mounted sidewise or vertically.
All three of them can be mounted on the table at the same time with a bit of room to spare for G54, G55, and G56 operations in one cycle.
I have a couple vises that are bridgeport size. I don't know to measure them but they are in good shape. Jaw width is 5-6 inches, and I would be welling to sell. They are heavy and shipping would be expensive. I'm in Michigan.
I also wonder if the 5" standard is to large for my g0704.
5" is too large for a BF20 style mill, in my opinion anyway. You won't be able to make full use of the capacity of the vise. You might have to mount the vise on the outermost table slot & might not have enough Y travel to make good use of the vise (different if you go flangeless). I have a RF45 style mill with a 9" table & use a 5" Glacern, it's bordeline too big for it.
But then again people have used 5" vises on BF20s & 6" vises on RF45s. I would look at the dimensions of the 5" vise (Glacern has nice spec sheets on their vises) & compare that to your table size.
The flangeless vise's are more versatile, try not to use a swivel base whenever you can for accuracy and rigidity.
With the flangeless vise, you have the ability to turn the vise on edge, giving you more flexibility of use.
Thank for the offer, I went and bought a Glacern vise.
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Measuring patient safety culture in Taiwan using the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture (HSOPSC)
I-Chi Chen1, 2Email author and
Hung-Hui Li1
BMC Health Services Research201010:152
© Chen and Li; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2010
Received: 5 October 2009
Accepted: 7 June 2010
Patient safety is a critical component to the quality of health care. As health care organizations endeavour to improve their quality of care, there is a growing recognition of the importance of establishing a culture of patient safety. In this research, the authors use the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture (HSOPSC) questionnaire to assess the culture of patient safety in Taiwan and attempt to provide an explanation for some of the phenomena that are unique in Taiwan.
The authors used HSOPSC to measure the 12 dimensions of the patient safety culture from 42 hospitals in Taiwan. The survey received 788 respondents including physicians, nurses, and non-clinical staff. This study used SPSS 15.0 for Windows and Amos 7 software tools to perform the statistical analysis on the survey data, including descriptive statistics and confirmatory factor analysis of the structural equation model.
The overall average positive response rate for the 12 patient safety culture dimensions of the HSOPSC survey was 64%, slightly higher than the average positive response rate for the AHRQ data (61%). The results showed that hospital staff in Taiwan feel positively toward patient safety culture in their organization. The dimension that received the highest positive response rate was "Teamwork within units", similar to the results reported in the US. The dimension with the lowest percentage of positive responses was "Staffing". Statistical analysis showed discrepancies between Taiwan and the US in three dimensions, including "Feedback and communication about error", "Communication openness", and "Frequency of event reporting".
The HSOPSC measurement provides evidence for assessing patient safety culture in Taiwan. The results show that in general, hospital staffs in Taiwan feel positively toward patient safety culture within their organization. The existence of discrepancies between the US data and the Taiwanese data suggest that cultural uniqueness should be taken into consideration whenever safety culture measurement tools are applied in different cultural settings.
Communication Openness
Health Care Organization
Patient Safety Culture
Patient safety is crucial to the health care quality. According to the adverse event reports in Taiwan, there were 14,945 cases reported in 2007, and many of these accidents and deaths could have been prevented [1]. Those accidents and failures were extremely costly both for the patients and for the health care system. As health care industries strive to improve, there is a growing recognition of the importance of establishing a culture of patient safety.
Patient safety in health care organizations has received much attention following the Institute of Medicine report "To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System" [2]. The concept of patient safety culture originated from research of safety in hazardous industries. Cox and Cox [3] defined safety culture as the collection of attitudes, beliefs, perceptions, and values that employees share in relation to safety. Similarly, Nieva & Sorra [4] defined patient safety culture as the product of individual and group values, attitudes, perceptions, competencies, and patterns of behaviour that determine the commitment to, and the style and proficiency of, an organization's safety management. An organization with a 'safety culture' is open and fair with staff when incidents occur, learns from mistakes, and rather than blaming individuals, looks at what went wrong in the system [3, 4].
Patient safety culture is a complex framework which involves different dimensions that guides many discretionary behaviours of patient safety [4, 5]. According to the Agency of Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) [6], patient safety culture requires an understanding of the values, beliefs, and norms about what is important in an organization and what attitudes and behaviours related to patient safety are supported, rewarded, and expected. Therefore, it is important for health care organizations to assess their culture regarding patient safety in order to improve patient safety within the health care process.
The Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture (HSOPSC) of AHRQ [6] is a tool for assessing the safety culture of hospitals as a whole, or for specific units within the hospitals. HSOPSC has good psychometric criteria testing, including item analysis, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, and inter-correlation and reliability analysis [7–10]. HSOPSC has been tested on a large sample, and has good supporting documentation [8, 9, 11]. HSOPSC also has been used in different countries including the United States, Canada, and Belgium, and has been translated into different languages. In addition to HSOPSC, AHRQ also provides a database of 382 hospitals in the US participating in the HSOPSC survey. The database consists of data from 108,621 respondents who completed the survey, including nurses, physicians, technicians, pharmacists and administrators in 2007.
The main objective of this research was to use the HSOPSC measurement tool to evaluate patient safety culture in Taiwan's hospitals and attempt to provide explanation of some of the phenomena in patient safety culture that are unique in Taiwan. The findings of this study should provide health care organizations in Taiwan a better understanding about patient safety culture in Taiwan's hospitals.
HSOPSC Questionnaire
HSOPSC was pilot tested, revised, and then released in November 2004 by AHRQ [6]. It was designed to measure 12 factors (dimensions) of patient safety culture. The HSOPSC questionnaire contains 42 items which mostly use the 5-point Likert response scale of agreement ("Strongly disagree" to "Strongly agree") or frequency ("Never" to "Always"). The survey measures:
Seven unit-level aspects of safety culture
Supervisor/manager expectations and actions promoting safety (4 items)
Organizational learning-continuous improvement (3 items)
Teamwork within units (4 items)
Communication openness (3 items)
Feedback and communication about error (3 items)
Nonpunitive response to error (3 items)
Staffing (4 items)
Three hospital-level aspects of safety culture
Hospital management support for patient safety (3 items)
Teamwork across hospital units (4 items)
Hospital handoffs and transitions (4 items)
Two outcome variables
Overall perceptions of safety (4 items)
Frequency of event reporting (3 items)
The HSOPSC questions were translated into Chinese by one translator with background in patient safety research. The translation was then reviewed by a task group including eight professional experts from the medical, nursing, and patient safety fields.
For construct validity, the authors used the principal component analysis extraction method and the Varimax rotation method, the total variance explained by the 12 factors covered by HSOPSC was 61.57 percent (KMO = 0.868, p = 0.000). According to Fleming [9], the reliability expressed as Cronbach's α for the AHRQ data ranged from 0.63 to 0.84, whereas for the data in this research, the Cronbach's α ranged from 0.51 to 0.84, slightly lower than the AHRQ data, which implied that the consistency of the responses on each survey item for the data in this study is less than for the AHRQ data.
Sample and data collection
Random sampling was used to survey a wide range of hospital staffs throughout Taiwan, including physicians representing each department, nurses representing each clinical nursing unit, and non-clinical staff. There are in total 23 medical centers, 20 regional hospitals, and 306 community hospitals in Taiwan. Of the 306 community hospitals, 23 are teaching hospitals. Only teaching hospitals were included in this study. A total of 50 hospitals (out of 68 teaching hospitals) were randomly selected for the survey, including 16 medical centers, 18 regional hospitals, and 16 community hospitals. For each hospital, a sample of 20 staff members was chosen randomly by a research coordinator in the hospital, which consisted of about 6 physicians, 12 nurses, and 2 administrators. The sample roughly represented all professional groups within a proportional allocation in Taiwan. The total sample size for the survey was 1000, including 300 physicians, 600 nurses, and 100 administrators. The investigation was conducted from January 2006 to February 2008.
To ensure the privacy of the respondents, the survey was strictly anonymous. Also, to allow for confidentiality, respondents were asked to put their completed questionnaire in a sealed envelope and the envelopes are collected by the research coordinator and then returned directly to the researchers. Formal consent to participate the survey was granted by the management board of each hospital. Formal ethical approval was not needed for this study according to Taiwan's law.
After receiving the completed questionnaires, a preprocessing step was applied to remove incomplete or invalid data. The exclusion criteria used were similar to [6, 10]: (1) no entire section completed; (2) fewer than half the items answered; or (3) all items answered the same. After removing incomplete questionnaires, a total of 788 respondents (230 physicians, 478 nurses, and 80 administrators) from 42 hospitals had successfully completed the questionnaire. Therefore, the final response rate for the survey was 78.8%.
This study used SPSS 15.0 for Windows and Amos 7 to perform the statistical analysis. First, descriptive statistics of the demographic characteristics of respondents, characteristics of hospitals, and the average percentage of positive responses on patient safety culture were computed. The average percentage of positive responses, defined as the average of the item-level percent positive responses within a HSOPSC dimension, represented positive reaction toward patient safety culture. Second, descriptive statistics and t-test were used to explore the differences between the data of this study and the 2007 AHRQ database, and also used to examine the differences in average positive response rate between the supervisors and non-supervisors within the data. Thirdly, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) of SEM was performed to justify the adequacy of the HSOPSC assessment on the data in Taiwan. Lastly, construct reliability (CR) and internal correlation were tested to assist in better understanding of the measurement and concept of HSOPSC in Taiwan. CR also provided an indication of the internal consistency of the 12 dimensions. Internal correlation, on the other hand, showed the discriminant validity among the 12 dimensions.
In the following sections, we first show the demographic statistics for the respondents taking the survey. Next, we present the results of the HSOPSC survey at three different levels: the unit level, the hospital level, and the outcome level. The comparison between our data and the AHRQ data are also given. Following that are results comparing the differences in average positive response rate between the supervision group and non-supervision group. Finally, the results of applying HSOPSC in Taiwan are given.
Demographic statistics
A total of 788 respondents from 42 hospitals (10 medical centers, 16 regional hospitals and 16 community hospitals) in Taiwan completed the survey. As shown in Table 1, about 29.2% (230) of the respondents were physicians across different departments, 60.6% (478) were nurses, and 10.2% (80) were administrators, which included clerks, secretaries, and managers. The average age of the respondents was 35 years old, and most of them were female (73.7%). They had worked an average of one to five years in their hospital. The largest percentage of physician respondents worked in medicine (60.8%), followed by surgery (19.6%) and cross unit (19.6%). Most of the nurses worked in general wards (36.4%), followed by cross department (27.0%), and then outpatient department (19.4%). The majority of the administrators did not have direct contact with the patients (92.5%). Among the respondents, 38.8% (306) were in a supervisory position. Since the government and hospital authority in Taiwan gave an impetus to patient safety, many of the hospital staffs (78.8%) received patient safety training programs within the hospital, but only 45.7% (360) received training programs outside the hospital. Furthermore, 96.2% of the hospitals had their own patient safety reporting mechanism, and 87.6% of them also had a specific department in charge with patient safety affairs. Table 1 also shows the demographic statistics separately for the supervisors and non-supervisors. As shown, majority (63.1%) of the supervisors were physicians. Comparing with the non-supervision group, the supervision group had higher education level (95.4% had college degree or higher versus 76.3%) and had longer working experience (50.6% had worked more than 5 years versus 30.1%) in hospitals. On the other hand, the non-supervision group had higher percentage in receiving patient safety training inside hospital (81.7%), and it consisted mostly female (92.3%).
Demographic characteristics of respondents.
-supervisor
Non-supervisor
Hospital level
Work unit/department
Medical center hospital
Regional hospital
Surgery a
Community hospital
Medicine b
Cross unit
Staff position
Obstetrics/
General ward
Indirect to patient c
Direct to patient d
Working time in hospital
Working hours per week
21 years or more
More than 100 hours
Patient safety training (in hospital)
Patient safety training (outside hospital)
Adverse event report system set-up
Patient safety department set-up
Level of position
a: Include surgery, ER and ICU.
b: Include internal, medicine, obstetrics, pediatrics, family medicine, and psychiatry.
c: Include information, human resource management, finance, secretary, and general affairs.
d: Include front desk, medical record department, and medical affairs.
Unit-level aspects of patient safety culture
The unit-level aspects of patient safety culture represent the perception of respondents on patient safety culture within their department and unit. Table 2 shows the average percentage of positive responses for each of the 12 dimensions that HSOPSC measures, for both the 2007 AHRQ data and the data from this study (Taiwan). The results are sorted in descending order based on the AHRQ data, and the t-test results between the AHRQ data and Taiwan data are shown in the last column. The unit-level aspect of patient safety culture covers items 1, 2, 4, 6, 7, 10, and 12 in Table 2. The average percentage of positive responses for "Teamwork within units" is 94% in Taiwan, which is much higher than that reported by the AHRQ (78%). The results indicate that most of the respondents in this study feel supportive and respected in their unit or work place, and they are more likely to cooperate and coordinate with their co-workers. For the "Supervisor/manager expectations and actions promoting safety" dimension, the average percentage of positive responses for Taiwan is 83%, which is also higher than the AHRQ data (74%). The differences between the AHRQ data and the Taiwan data for both dimensions are significant different in a statistical sense.
Average positive response rate for the HSOPSC results for Taiwan and AHRQ data.
HSOPSC Dimension
AHRQ
Response (%)
1. Teamwork within units
0.009***
2. Supervisor/manager expectations & actions promoting patient safety
0.026**
3. Hospital management support for patient safety
4. Organizational learning -- continuous improvement
5. Overall perceptions of safety
6. Feedback & communication about error
7. Communication openness
8. Frequency of event reporting
9. Teamwork across hospital units
10. Staffing
11. Hospital Handoffs & transitions
12. Nonpunitive response to error
***Significant different at α = 0.01, ** Significant different at α = 0.05.
The "Organizational learning--continuous improvement" dimension of patient safety culture represents a learning culture in which mistakes lead to positive changes and changes are evaluated for effectiveness. In Taiwan, most of the respondents agreed that their hospitals had constructive activities to improve patient safety culture. The percentage of positive responses for organizational learning in Taiwan is significantly higher than in the AHRQ data. However, for the "Feedback and communication about error" and "Communication openness" dimensions, the positive response rates for Taiwan are slightly lower than the AHRQ, although the differences are not significant.
In the past, when failure or error occurred, it usually resulted in punishing people instead of acknowledging the problem existed. The "Nonpunitive response to error" dimension measures to what extent the hospital staff feels that their mistakes are not held against them, and the mistakes are not kept in their personnel file. For both Taiwan and the AHRQ data, the positive response rate for this item is lower than 50%, and it also has one of the lowest scores among the twelve dimensions of patient safety culture.
The last unit-level patient safety culture dimension is "Staffing"; it shows whether a health care unit has adequate staff allocation to handle the workload and whether the working hours are appropriate for providing the best care for the patients. The percentage of positive responses for this item is the lowest for patient safety culture in this survey, and it is significant different from the AHRQ data.
Hospital-level aspects of patient safety culture
The hospital-level aspects of patient safety culture cover items 3, 9, and 11 in Table 2. The "Hospital management support for patient safety" dimension is an indication of whether the management team provides a work climate that promotes patient safety. In Taiwan, the positive response rate for this item is 62%, which is lower than the AHRQ data (69%). For the "Teamwork across hospital units" dimension, on the other hand, the positive response rate for Taiwan (72%) is significantly higher than that for the AHRQ data (57%). Hospital workers in Taiwan seem to have better cooperation and coordination across different units or departments.
Medical problems and accidents may occur during shift changes. Therefore, unhindered handoff and transition is desirable to assure patient safety in the hospital. However, most respondents in Taiwan and the US feel that hospitals are not doing enough and the average percentage of positive responses for both surveys on this item are below 50%.
Outcome-level aspects of patient safety culture
The outcome-level measurements of patient safety culture include "Overall perceptions of safety" and "Frequency of event reporting" (items 5 and 8 in Table 2). Overall perception of patient safety culture is an indication of good procedures and systems for preventing errors and the lack of patient safety problems. The percentage of positive response for Taiwan for this item is 65%, a little higher than the AHRQ result (63%). For the frequency of event reporting factor, the positive response rate is 56% for Taiwan, and 59% for the AHRQ data, but the difference is not significant.
Supervision group versus non-supervision group
As shown in Table 1, 38.8% of the respondents in this study were in a supervisory position, and since there exists a presumption that supervisors will tend to give better scores, it is therefore important to examine the effect of position factor on the patient safety culture measurements. The average positive response rates for each of the 12 HSOPSC dimensions computed separately for the supervision group and the non-supervision group are summarized below:
Supervisor/manager expectations and actions promoting safety: 84% for supervisors and 82% for non-supervisors,
Organizational learning--continuous improvement: 84% for supervisors and 84% for non-supervisors,
Teamwork within units: 93% for supervisors and 94% for non-supervisors,
Communication openness: 59% for supervisors and 57% for non-supervisors,
Feedback and communication about error: 61% for supervisors and 58% for non-supervisors,
Nonpunitive response to error: 52% for supervisors and 41% for non-supervisors,
Staffing: 42% for supervisors and 37% for non-supervisors,
Hospital management support for patient safety: 60% for supervisors and 64% for non-supervisors,
Teamwork across hospital units: 76% for supervisors and 71% for non-supervisors,
Hospital handoffs and transitions: 54% for supervisors and 45% for non-supervisors,
Overall perceptions of safety: 67% for supervisors and 64% for non-supervisors,
Frequency of event reporting: 60% for supervisors and 56% for non-supervisors.
As we can see the average positive response rates for the supervision group were generally slightly higher than the rates for the non-supervision group, expect for the "Teamwork within unit" and the "Hospital management support for patient safety" dimensions, which the non-supervision group actually gave higher positive response rates. For all 12 dimensions, however, none of the differences in average positive response rate between the supervision group and non-supervision group were significant based on t-test.
HSOPSC application in Taiwan
To justify the validity of using the HSOPSC on assessing patient safety culture in Taiwan, we used confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in a structural equation model (SEM) to explore the fitness of applying HSOPSC in Taiwan. Table 3 summarizes the CFA results of applying HSOPSC on Taiwan data. The X 2 value of the CFA analysis is 63.65 (p-value = 0.002), implying that there is a discrepancy between the data in Taiwan and the hypothetical model. However, in using X 2 to test model fitness we must also consider sample size and the number of factors; a large sample size and large number of factors tend to decrease the fitness of the model [12]. The Normalized chi-square (NC) provides an alternative index of model fitness. As suggested by Hair et al. [13], an NC value larger than 1 and smaller than 5 should indicate fitness between the hypothetical model and sample data. The NC value for the data in this research is 1.872, thus indicates goodness of fit for the HSOPSC model with the Taiwan data. Furthermore, as shown in Table 3, almost all of the CFA statistics meet their respective goodness of fit criteria. The CFA results indicate acceptable model fitness between the hypothetical model of patient safety culture and the data in this study.
Confirmatory factor analysis of applying HSOPSC in Taiwan.
Likelihood ratio X 2
Normalized chi-square
Root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA)
Goodness of fit index (GFI)
Adjusted goodness of fit index (AGFI)
Expected cross-validity index (ECVI)
Normalized fit index (NFI)
Relative fit index (RFI)
Incremental fit index (IFI)
Tucker-Lewis index (TLI)
Comparative fit index (CFI)
Parsimony adjusted NFI (PNFI)
Parsimonious goodness of fit index (PGFI)
Akaike information criterion (AIC)
151.6***
Critical number (CN)
***Meet the goodness of fit criteria.
Table 4 shows the regression estimations for each dimension of the HSOPSC model. All 12 estimates are significant (p-value < 0.001) and are positive values, which means each dimension has its influence on patient safety culture. Of the 12 dimensions, nine have factor weights larger than 0.5, indicating that the nine factors have a direct effect on patient safety culture. The "Overall perception of patient safety" dimension has the highest factor weight, followed by the "Teamwork across hospital unit" dimension. The three dimensions that have factor weights less than 0.5 are "Feedback and communication about error", "Communication openness", and "Frequency of event reporting" (items 6, 7, and 8 in Table 4), which suggests that these factors have less influence on patient safety culture for the data in this study.
Regression estimations for HSOPSC dimensions.
S.E.
Factor weights
2. Supervisor/manager expectations & actions promoting safety
Table 5 shows the construct reliability (CR) values which are often used in conjunction with SEM. According to [13], CR values larger than 0.7 suggest good reliability, and values between 0.6 and 0.7 may be acceptable provided that other indicators of a model's construct validity are good. High construct reliability indicates that internal consistency exists. As shown in Table 5, many of the factors show good internal consistency. However, there are five factors that have CR values lower than 0.6, including "Staffing", "Overall perception of safety", "Communication openness", "Feedback and communication about error", and "Frequency of event reporting". There are several possible reasons for low internal consistency. One reason is that the factor structure of the HSOPSC model for these items might not fit the data well; another possible reason is that the sample size of the data might not be large enough to achieve consistency [13]. Also in Table 5, for discriminant validity, none of the 12 factors show high internal correlation, which provides evidence that the construct of patient safety culture is unique and captures some phenomena which is actually different in different dimensions.
Construct reliability and internal correlation of HSOPSC.
Note: 1 Teamwork within units; 2 Supervisor/manager expectation and actions promoting safety; 3 Hospital management support for patient safety; 4 Organizational learning--continuous improvement; 5 Overall perception of safety; 6 Feedback and communication abort error; 7 Communication openness; 8 Frequency of event reporting; 9 Teamwork across hospital units; 10 Staffing; 11 Hospital handoffs and transitions; and 12 Nonpunitive response to error.
The HSOPSC survey by AHRQ has been used to meet the increasing demand for patient safety culture assessment in the Western countries, especially in the US. In this study, we used HSOPSC to measure patient safety culture in Taiwan. Samples of 788 respondents from 42 hospitals across Taiwan were evaluated. Overall, the mean positive response rate for the 12 patient safety culture dimensions of the HSOPSC survey was 64%, slightly higher than the AHRQ data (61%). The results show that hospital staffs in Taiwan feel positively toward patient safety culture in their organization. The dimension that received the highest positive response rate was "Teamwork within units", which is similar to the results reported in US [6], Belgium [10], and Dutch [14]. On the other hand, the dimension that had the lowest percentage of positive responses was "Staffing", meaning that most of the respondents feel that staff allocation is not adequate to handle patient safety related workload. A similar finding was reported by Hellings and associates [10].
The HSOPSC survey results in this study reveal that the hospitals and health care organizations in Taiwan should have imperatives to:
◆ allocate staffs and working hours more adequately,
◆ develop a nonpunitive culture,
◆ focus on patient transfer and transition through the different units in the hospital,
◆ create an open communication atmosphere for reporting adverse events,
◆ establish an environment which helps staff report mistakes and errors spontaneously.
A positive safety culture will improve patient safety performance [15], which could help organization enhancing safety outcomes such as micro accident, self-report accident, safety behavior, and safety audit scores [16–19].
Most of the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) indices indicate goodness of fit for applying the HSOPSC model of patient safety culture in Taiwan. Nevertheless, there are still some indices which do not support such a claim. This is not unexpected because questionnaires developed in one cultural setting normally cannot be translated and used directly in another cultural setting [20]. Our results show that there exist some discrepancies between the HSOPSC model and the data in Taiwan, particularly for the dimensions of "Feedback and communication about error", "Communication openness", and "Frequency of event reporting". Such discrepancies may be partly explained by the differences in organizational behavior between cultural settings, including management values, organizational commitments, leadership, and relationships within organizations [21, 22].
The authors discovered several observations when applying HSOPSC measurements in Taiwan that might help explain some of the differences in patient safety culture between US and Taiwan. First, most of the respondents in Taiwan are shy of speaking up or asking questions when something which does not seem right has happened. Festinger [23] mentioned that in Chinese society, people care about others' thinking about their attitude and behavior. Chinese people tend to have strong social conformity in opinion or behavior, and also pursue interpersonal harmony. Harmonious relationships can maintain a stable social order that becomes the collective emotion of the Chinese [24]. Many Chinese think that communication openness might break the interpersonal harmony [25]. Therefore, when assessing the communication openness dimension of the HSOPSC in Taiwan or in Chinese society, concerns related to the internal psychological process of communication need to be addressed. For example, proper wordings should be used in the communication process in healthcare organizations during patient safety culture survey.
Second, many Taiwanese try to avoid discussing adverse events and errors directly and choose to stay silent. Previous studies found that Chinese society tends to be more collective than the Western society [26, 27]. Yang and Yeh [28] mentioned that this kind of phenomenon is called "familial collectivism", which is the association of similarity between family and organizations. Adverse event reporting is an interaction between authority (as a father) and staff (as a child), which is considered a complicated relationship [29]. Chinese would tend to use metaphor and indirect methods to express their opinions, thus inhibiting them from expressing opinions freely. As stated in [30], culture plays a significant role in the interaction between supervisors and subordinates, and consequently culture differences may influence the degree of subordinates' supervisory commitment. In Taiwan, most employees tend to commit to the leaders [31]. When a staff member reports an error, he or she will become a 'whistleblower' and is seen as acting against the supervisor. Accordingly, the dimensions of "Communication openness" and "Frequency of event reporting" of patient safety culture have different implications for Taiwan and for the US.
Overall, HSOPSC has many strengths, such as good psychometric properties and comprehensive coverage of safety culture. However, patient safety culture studies must consider the diversity of cultures. Despite the progress of patient safety assessment that has been made in recent years, there remains a significant patient safety issue that has yet to be formally recognized and systematically addressed, namely, the issue of culture and its possible links to patient safety [32].
There is currently a major effort to improve patient safety in many countries, and health care providers have been encouraged to assess the current state of their safety culture. Patient safety culture assessment tools provide an avenue to understand what staffs think and how they act towards patient safety. This paper discussed the application of the HSOPSC survey to assess the patient safety culture in Taiwan. A total of 788 staff members from 42 hospitals across Taiwan completed the survey. In general, hospital staffs in Taiwan feel positively toward patient safety culture within their organization. However, several dimensions of patient safety culture had low positive response scores, including "Staffing", "Nonpunitive response to error", and "Hospital Handoffs & transitions". Hospitals and health care organizations in Taiwan should address those issues while examining their quality of care. This paper also explored the differences in patient safety culture between the US and Taiwan using HSOPSC and gave explanations for some of the discrepancies found in the results.
The internal consistency of the data in this study was lower than that of the AHRQ data. The original AHRQ database is a large heterogeneous samples made up of many different health care organizations. Therefore, expanding the scale of the survey in Taiwan to cover more health care providers and practitioners is necessary for the future research. Moreover, patient safety culture measurements should consider the interaction between organizational and individual factors, which provide better understanding of group dynamics and individual attitudes of patient safety culture.
Thanks to Dr. Hsiu Fen Tan and Dr. Hung Fu Tseng for making substantial contributions to the acquisition of the data and assistance in data analysis, and Dr. Hui Fuang (Pang) Ng and Mr. Joel Van Valin for revising the language of the manuscript. The helpful comments of the reviewers and the editors are gratefully acknowledged.
ICC and HHL contributed to the conception of this paper, participated in its design and drafted the manuscript; ICC conceived the statistical methodology, provided the acquisition of data and performed statistical analyses. All authors have seen and approved the final version. ICC and HHL had full access to all of the data in the study and take responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis.
College of Management, Yuan Ze University, TaoYuan, Taiwan
Department of Health Care Administration, Oriental Institute of Technology, Taipei County, Taiwan
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instead of an after-thought or novelty component.
Offsite construction cuts time to housing delivery, improves design quality and can in the end be cost-effective when delivered at scale. Industry game-changers, such as Laing O'Rourke and L&G, are starting to systemise the modular housing build process at scale, which is delivering more security and normalising the approach for funders who have hitherto been cautious about its success rate.
The announcement was a step forward, but to maximise the full potential of modular housing, the method needs to be totally integrated into the wider house-building process. What we would like to see is offsite construction becoming a guaranteed element – or at the least a consideration – in any development.


text:
Q: Can I compose types in Swift? How can I compose types similar to protocol composition in Swift?
For example, I have a likes data which is a dictionary with values either having Int or String, but not others.
likes: {
    "1": {
        "id": "l1"
        "ts": 1551796878504
        "userId": "u1"
    }
}

Current, I use a variable with type,
var likes: [String: [String: Any]]

but, I would like it to be of type
var likes: [String: [String: AlphaNum]]

Can I use something like typealias AlphaNum = String & Int or something similar, without using class or struct?

A: I know the question has already been answered, but it seems to me like you are trying to work with JSON, and for this reason I would highly recommend using the Decodableprotocol in swift

Decodable: A type that can decode itself from an external representation docs

This will easily handle all your incoming JSON, for example:
struct decodableIncomming: Decodable {
  let name: String
  let ID: Int
  let externalURL: URL
}

let json = """
{
 "name": "Robert Jhonson",
 "ID": 1234256,
 "externalURL": "http://someurl.com/helloworld"
}
""".data(using: .utf8)! // data in JSON which might be requested from a url

let decodedStruct = try JSONDecoder().decode(Swifter.self, from: json) // Decode data
print(decodedStruct) //Decoded structure ready to use

A: You could create your own Protocol and let String and Int conform to it:
protocol ValueProtocol {}

extension String:ValueProtocol{}
extension Int:ValueProtocol{}

var likes:[String : [String:ValueProtocol]] = ["1": [
                    "id": "l1",
                    "ts": 1551796878504,
                    "userId": "u1"
                ]
            ]

But to use the ValueProtocols, you would also have to add functions like getValue to it, depending on your needs.

A: No you can't, as you can see typealias AlphaNum = String & Int it's & operator not | \\ or and you can't using [String: [String: AlphaNum]] because the inner Dictionary value is basically String & Int , a value can't be two types either one of them, look into this question, as the answers is about creating a dummy protocol, and use that however there are no shared properties between Int and String but one, Description, therefore  even with dummy protocol you would have to cast at some point, unless you are only using Description referring to the answer,
 protocol IntOrString {
    var description: String { get }
}

extension Int : IntOrString {}
extension String : IntOrString {}

And using it like this, var likes: [String: [String: IntOrString]] .
After getting into the IntOrString value you may use .description property .

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


If champaign is too expensive to celebrate with, Zobo is just 50 naira these Hausa illiterates !
I only see a ram in white apparel.
Did u say attempt !!!!!
Are these people really human ?
And these are the people being worshipped by Afonjas. Goes a long way to show you the mentality of a typical afonjan.
What is the correlation between a Northerner celebrating as he chooses to, and the Yorubas who are in no way related to this news report?
All of a sudden, the Northerner is no longer a friend because PDP did not win Kano?
What do the Igbos benefit from all this hate mongering that has become their addiction and preoccupation, while others are making plans for themselves?
If that man doesn't catch cancer and other ailments from that stunt then he'll live to a ripe old age.
These people are crazy mehnnn!
They have also vowed a flatinno cannot even smell Presidency.
Ganduje would be popping champagne with his friends and family while devising better plans to help himself to his state's treasury as usual and this maluu is busy drinking drainage water.
Attempting to drink or inhaling the gutter smell to get high?
Why blame him for his action. We know where they come from and drinking animal waste and gutter water has been part of their life, Let him drink more. Some fish dwell and survive in such environment , so his own life is not different the animals that dwell in such stagnant water .
Honestly speaking, poverty is the worst problem man can face in his life time. The way poor masses celebrate politicians' victories is second to none!
Neither their children nor the biggest beneficiaries celebrate in such manner.
May the God almighty distance us from such despicable attitude.
That's how they translated kwana gida to house warming.... nonsense.


text:
Google Voice Arrives on the iPhone. For Real This Time. Officially.
Former CEO of The Next Web. A fan of startups, entrepreneurship, getting things done faster, penning the occasional blog post, taking photos (show all) Former CEO of The Next Web. A fan of startups, entrepreneurship, getting things done faster, penning the occasional blog post, taking photos, designing, listening to good music and making lurrrve.
As we suspected, after an initial rejection almost a year and a half ago, Apple has now accepted the official Google Voice app into the app store. You can download the app here (iTunes link).
Apple initially rejected the app because it "replaced certain iPhone functions and features." Google reacted by going as far as possible to bring the app's features to a Google Voice mobile web app with some success but clearly this native app release should prove a far superior user experience.
We'll probably never know why Apple decide to change its policy but it may very well be in relation to The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) inquiry into the rejection of Google's app. AT&T has always maintained it had nothing to do with the apps rejection from the app store – understandably, that's difficult to believe.
There were signs that Google's official app would find its way into the app store when Sean Kovacs, creator of the app GV Mobile +, announced in September that his app had now been re-accepted into the app store after being removed a year earlier.
Full review and details of the app to come but in the mean time, this is what you're getting:
Access to all the major Google Voice features on your iPhone, like:
Cheap rates for international calls
Free text messaging to U.S. numbers
Display your Google Voice number as caller ID when making calls
In addition to these benefits, the app provides some features that make using Google Voice on your iPhone a much better experience:
With push notifications, the app will alert you instantly when you receive a new voicemail or text message
Most of your calls will be placed via Direct Access Numbers, making them connect just as quickly as regular phone calls
You'll need an iPhone with iOS 3.1 or later and a valid Google Voice account to use the app and unsurprisingly the app is still available in the U.S. only.
5 life-changing Google Docs features you might have missed in 2022
Can we 'reprogramme' our brain for happiness? Former head of Google X says yes
Scathing study exposes Google's harmful approach to AI development
Google sets new record for calculating pi — but what's the point?


text:
Hopen est un groupe de pop français, originaire d'Avignon, dans le Vaucluse. Ses 3 premiers albums se sont vendus à plus de .

Biographie
Hopen est formé en  par quatre frères originaires d'Avignon, dans le Vaucluse. Contraction de « Hope » et « open », le groupe désire annoncer l'espérance au grand public.

En 2017, ils s'installent à Boulogne-Billancourt, dans les Hauts-de-Seine, avec leurs épouses et tous sont désormais parents. « Nous avons emménagé ici suite à notre rencontre avec Michel Aupetit, alors évêque de Nanterre, raconte Camille. Il nous a félicités pour tout ce nous apportions et notre capacité à rassembler de plus en plus de jeunes. Il nous a proposé de nous installer dans la chapelle Saint-Pierre, rue du Point-du-Jour, pour y répéter ».
En 2018, le groupe publie un nouvel album, Que le monde sache.

Récompenses
En , Hopen est élu meilleur groupe de l'année (Prix du public) lors de la deuxième édition des Angels Music Awards.

Discographie

Bibliographie
 Hopen et Joseph Challier, Que la louange éclate !, Éditions de l'Emmanuel, 160 p.

Notes et références

Liens externes

Groupe français de pop rock
Groupe de rock chrétien
Groupe d'electropop
Groupe musical formé en 2013

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


There are a wide variety of attractions located in Franklin County. Parks, historic cities and landmarks, caverns and more can all be found in Franklin County.
Below is a list of some of the attractions that can be found in Franklin County. Do you know of more? Let us know!


text:
Izanagi a Izanami jsou stvořitelským párem v japonské mytologii. Společně vytvořili první zemi a zplodili japonské ostrovy a další božstva, při posledním porodu však Izanami zemřela a odešla do podsvětí, zatímco z Izanagiho vzešla tři nejdůležitější japonská božstva. Amaterasu, Cukijomi a Susanoo.

Mýtus
Podle kroniky Kodžiki z 8. století se na počátku na místě zvaném Takamagahara "Vysoké nebeské pláně" zrodil neviditelný bůh Ama no Minakanuši "Pán středu nebes" a po něm další dva: Takamimusubi a Kamimusubi. Následně stvořili dalších pět nebeských božstev a následovalo sedm generací dalších nebeských božstev. Osmou generaci tvořil sourozenecký pár Izanagi no mikoto "Vznešený muž" a Izanami no mikoto "Vznešená žena". Ti byli nebeskými bohy požádáni, aby dokončili a upevnili dosud plovoucí zemi a tak na "plovoucí klenbě nebes", snad duze, počali zdobeným kopím míchat slanou vodu a když jej pozvedli z kapek vznikl první ostrov zvaný Onogoro.

Na ostrově dvojice vztyčila "nebeský sloup", postavila si palác a rozhodla se začít s plozením, čemuž následoval svatební rituál a jejich pohlavní spojení. Prvním dítětem těchto bohů byla Hiroko "dítě-pijavice", jako následek toho, že během svatebního rituálu promluvila Izanami první a porušila tak pravidla. Hiriko byla dána rákosové loďky, odevzdána moři a svatba byla zopakována správným způsobem. Božský pár byl odměněn hojným potomstvem: japonskými ostrovy, bohy větrů, hor a stromů, ale během porodu boha ohně Kagucuči byla Izanami tak popálena, že zemřela. Přesto však z jejích zvratků, výkalů a moči, jež z ní vzešli během porodu vznikali další bohové a z jejího mrtvého těla vzniklo osm bohů hromu a další božstva ohně. Izanagi byl nejdříve přemožen žalem a z jeho slz vznikla také další božstva, poté zabil svého syna, z jehož těla se opět zrodila božstva.

Izanagi se následně rozhodl že svoji ženu přivede zpátky z Jomi – podsvětí. U brány světa mrtvých se s Izanami setkal a prosil ji, aby se vrátila, ta souhlasila, že si o jeho přání promluví s podsvětními božstvy, ale vymínila si, aby se na ni nezkoušel  dívat a počkal před bránou. Když však Izanagi dlouho čekal, rozhodl se vydat dovnitř, kde si posvítil ulomeným zubem z hřebenu. Uvnitř však spatřil svou ženu jako hnijící mrtvolu prolezlou červy a začal utíkat. Izanami rozezlená nedodržením slibu za ním poslala čarodějnici, osm bohů hromu a skupinu bojovníků. Na svém útěku Izanagi odvrátil své pronásledovatele pomocí tří broskví, které jim hodil a nakonec unikl i své manželce a bránu podsvětí zavalil velkým kamenem.

Po návštěvě podsvětí se musel Izanagi očistit a učinil tak u malého potoka ve městě Hjúga na Kjúšú. Z šatů, jež před koupelí odložil vzniklo několik dalších bohů, další povstali během jeho očisty, a nakonec došlo ke vzniku tří nejdůležitějších japonských bohů: Amaterasu, když si Izanagi čistil pravé oko, Cukijomi, když čistil levé oko a Susanoo, když si čistil nos. Mezi tyto své děti pak rozdělil vládu nad světem: Amaterasu nad nebesy, Cukijomimu nad nocí a Susanoovi nad oceánem. Zatímco dva starší sourozenci poslušně přijali své místo, tak Susanoo se vzepřel tomu vládnout vodám a chtěl raději odejít do říše své matky, na což Izanagi zareagoval, tím že svého syna vyhnal. Poté, co tak Izanagi splnil své poslání odešel pryč. Podle některých verzí mýtů odešel na nebesa, podle jiné byl pohřben v městě Taga na Honšú.

Reference

Externí odkazy

Japonská božstva
Stvořitelská božstva
Mytické dvojice


In this new monthly feature I'll be recording my experiences reading with my toddler daughter. These will include my observations of her behavior with books, a current list of favorite titles, and tips from my experience that may help other parents.
Morning reading. On many mornings, Miss Muffet wakes up, grabs a book, and "reads" to herself for a little while before we even know she is awake. I have started leaving a few sturdy board books in her sleeping space so she can get to them easily when she wakes up. It's a much better start to the day than fussing or crying!
Paperbacks. Miss Muffet loves paperback books. I gave her two review copies I was finished with and she has explored them fully, including folding and ripping many of the pages. It's nice to be able to hand her some books that she is allowed to destroy in order to keep from destroying every book she encounters.
Preferences. As she becomes less of a baby and more of a toddler, Miss Muffet is also starting to make her preferences known. When she wants a particular book to be read, she will throw it or bang it against something until a grown-up takes notice. If the story ends, and she wants to hear it again, she immediately starts to cry until she is either distracted by something else or someone begins the book over again. I think she could easily listen to the same book 25 times in a row.
Labeling. Though Miss Muffet does like to listen to a story, she has started interrupting frequently to point out pieces of the illustrations and ask me to label them, Often, she will say "Whassat?" or "Da?" and if she likes a particular word, she will point to that item several more times so I will repeat it for her. I see this paying off greatly in her vocabulary development; there are now dozens of animals and objects she can recognize by name, even if she can't yet say the words.
This is a short lift-the-flap book, also from the library. It focuses on animal sounds. For some reason, Miss Muffet got the idea that every time she opens a flap, she should scream at the top of her lungs. Even now that I know to expect it, I still laugh hysterically every single time it happens, which probably does nothing whatsoever to discourage her. There are others in this series, and I plan to seek them out on our next library trip.
I consider this a picture book for preschoolers, so having a 14-month-old sit still and listen to it repeatedly amazes me. Surprisingly, it is not the monkeys who catch her attention, but the peddler himself, and his colorful caps. I am trying to teach her to point her finger, shake her fist, and stomp her feet like the peddler does when he begs the monkeys for his caps back. So far, she just seems to like watching me do those motions, but I know one of these days she will surprise me by joining in.
DK My First Word Board Book This was one of her favorite books of 2014, but now that she is so into labeling, it has taken on a new significance for Miss Muffet. I get tired of reading the same labels over and over again, so I try to incorporate songs with as many pages as possible. On the food page, we sing "Going on a Picnic" and on the Farm page, we sing "Old MacDonald" and on the transportation page, we sing about every vehicle to the tune of "The Wheels on the Bus." And occasionally, when I can't take it anymore, I hide this book.
We have subscriptions to both Babybug and Highlights Hello. The first issue of Hello that we received has a story in it about sitting in a big, soft chair, and Little Miss Muffet absolutely loves it. We usually read the whole magazine at least once a day (it's short), but sometimes we do an encore (or five) of just that one story because she can't get enough of it.
Read when the mood strikes. Sometimes we start a book, and it becomes clear immediately that Miss Muffet is much more interested in something else. In that case, we set the book aside and try again later when she is more receptive.
Always read when asked. If Miss Muffet brings me a book, I almost always read it unless I am in the middle of something that can't be interrupted. I don't always indulge every demand for repeat readings, but I will usually do at least two encores before trying to move her attention to something else.
Talk about the pictures. Sometimes instead of reading a book straight through, we choose a page or two and just spend some time with the illustrations. I name objects for her to find, or ask her to label items I know she has the words for. This kind of interactivity often keeps her engaged better than reading what is written.


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