โ Scribed by Ramsay, M A
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
O rgan transplantation programs are often re- quired to operate at any time of the day or night. Indications for this include reduction of graft ischemia time, a failing recipient, scheduling pressures, and physician preferences. Taking care of high-acuity patients undergoing major organ transplantation can be very testing at the best of times, but many would agree that between 2 and 4 AM this is especially strenuous. If, in addition to this, a complex set of data collection is undertaken as part of an extensive research project, is accuracy affected?
Despite the existence of an extensive volume of research data in the area of sleep deprivation and performance, information relating directly to physicians is inconsistent. However, when these data are combined with those obtained from aviation and industry, valid conclusions can be made.
The human being is a complicated physiological machine that is prone to err. The incidence of human error is increased by fatigue, sleep deprivation, and stress. 1 As performance deteriorates, errors of omission occur with increasing frequency. In the research arena this might be exhibited by not recording data points at a specific time. These errors may weaken the statistical analysis of the results but rarely destroy the project. As performance further deteriorates, errors of commission occur-''mistakes'' that may be technical or judgmental errors such as aborting a data collection computer file before it has been ''backed up.'' These mistakes may make the research project unsalvageable.
Fatigue is the inability or unwillingness to continue effective performance and is caused by excessive workload, stress, sleep loss, and circadian disruption. 2 Fatigue and sleep deprivation are different entities. Fatigue is more responsible for performance changes than are circadian rhythm disruptions, and it can be affected by environmen-From the
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It is almost exceptional that psychotherapy researchers set out to answer questions like these: What are some new and better ways of doing actual in-session psychotherapeutic work? What are some new and better changes that psychotherapy can help bring about, and what are some new and better ways of
A discovery-oriented approach to psychotherapy research relies on discoveryoriented research questions. Four such questions are illustrated, together with the logistics of this approach to research, and the practical working steps in carrying out a program of discovery-oriented research. A case is m