Few companies have the resilience to survive a major overhaul in market focus, but Gunns Limited is doing just that. The Tasmania-based company is Australia's largest supplier of hardwood and softwood forestry products, and is currently undergoing a radical transition period towards a more sustainable and secure business model. As one of Australia's longest standing companies, Gunns has forged a commitment to benefit not only its clients, but also its local community. This has been a strategic response to a long-running dispute over Gunns' history of logging native forests, ...

Making the TACTIX program more effective than ever for personal fitness trainers and other fitness pros, the National Exercise & Sports Trainers Association (NESTA) recently announced that the unique online certification program now qualifies for continuing education credits in its Personal Fitness Trainer program. TACTIX is a fitness-focused business system that blends martial arts, practical self-defense skills, boot camp skills, strength training and metabolic conditioning, offering martial arts finesse without any of the contact of sparring, making it safe and ...

For years, the Intense Mixed Performance Accelerated Cross Training known as IMPACT has helped personal trainers make an impact on their clients' lives and their own earnings. Now it is making an impact in another way: IMPACT's online certification program now qualifies for continuing education credits through the National Exercise & Sports Trainers Association's (NESTA) Personal Fitness Trainer program. Developed by NESTA founder John Spencer Ellis and award-winning fitness coach and spokesperson Kelli Calabrese, the online IMPACT training and business systems helps ...

Ventana Research is set to commence new benchmark research and provide education on Next-Generation Workforce Management. Ventana Research finds traditional workforce management is evolving from just a time and attendance centered world to a new form of next-generation workforce management, which requires, among many things, collaborative and mobile tools for workers and managers. Traditional administrative-focused workforce management processes have a reputation of being time-consuming, error-prone and inefficient. Because these inefficiencies do not serve today's ...

Christopher Flach (20th Century) Lot 140 Estimate $3,000 - $5,000 Pre-Lot Text PROPERTY FROM THE ESTATE OF JEAN DELEAGE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Deleage Sale Information Sale 2530 Christie's Auction House 10 - 11 January 2012 New York, Rockefeller Plaza 20 Rockefeller Plaza New York, NY 10020 Tel: +1 212 636 2000 Fax: +1 212 636 2399 Featured artists included, Christopher Flach, Jim Dine, Francisco Goya, Milton Avery, David Salle, and Joan Miro. http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/lot_details.aspx?intObjectID=5524489About Christie's Christie's ...

Specialty Home Improvement, a family-owned design and remodel firm recently earned two Regional Contractor of the Year (CotY) awards from the National Association of the Remodeling Industry (NARI). The CotYs were awarded for "Best Interior Residential Specialty Remodel" and for "Best Bathroom Remodel between $30,000 - $60,000". According to the NARI website, "The Contractor of the Year (CotY) awards are given each year by NARI Headquarters to members who have demonstrated outstanding work through their remodeling projects." The awards help ...

Due to an increase in tablet and mobile devices, careLearning, a leader in Internet-based learning for healthcare organizations, asked KnowledgeShift to convert their extensive library of compliance courses from Flash to a mobile friendly version to ensure that their clients with tablets would be able to view all of their content regardless of which device they were accessing it from. "We know that more and more employees in healthcare and other industries are being armed with tablets or other mobile devices that don't support Flash," states Nancy Munro, CEO ...

The recent news that vehicle insurer Allstate plans to issue refunds to policyholders who are unhappy after a filing a claim for damages shows the insurer is among those that realize the value of keeping their customers happy following an accident, according to Online Auto Insurance (OAI). Insuring vehicles is a multibillion-dollar business, and industry experts say some coverage providers try to limit losses by keeping payouts as low as possible. But while that may save them money in the short term, research shows it could cost more in the long haul by prompting policyholders ...

More people will survive sudden cardiac arrest when 9-1-1 dispatchers help bystanders assess victims and begin CPR immediately, according to a new American Heart Association scientific statement published in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association. In the 2010 resuscitation guidelines, the association advised 9-1-1 dispatchers to help bystanders assess anyone who may have had a cardiac arrest and then direct them to begin CPR. The new scientific statement provides more specific information about how emergency dispatchers should provide such help and ...

Your risk of heart attack may increase during the days and weeks after the death of a close loved one, according to research reported in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association. A study of 1,985 adult heart attack survivors showed that after a significant person's death, heart attack risks: Increased to 21 times higher than normal within the first day. Were almost six times higher than normal within the first week. Continued to decline steadily over the first month. "Caretakers, healthcare providers, and the bereaved themselves need to recognize ...

DURHAM, N.C. -- Researchers at Duke University Medical Center have developed a new way to identify the genes of harmful microbes, particularly those that have been difficult to study in the laboratory. This new method uses chemicals to create mutant bacteria, followed by genomic sequencing to identify all mutations. By looking for common genes that were mutated in Chlamydia sharing a particular trait, the investigators were able to rapidly "zero in" on the genes responsible for that trait. The approach is versatile and inexpensive enough that it could be applied to ...

Acute kidney injury (AKI) has severe consequences, with a 25 to 80 percent risk of in-hospital death. Researchers have found a way to diagnose AKI using a urine test, enabling emergency departments to identify these high-risk patients when they first arrive at the hospital. The study will be published online on January 9, 2012, in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Physicians typically measure a patient's creatinine levels to determine kidney function. But creatinine levels can remain normal for several hours after acute kidney damage, and an accurate ...

Spine Institute Northwest announced today it has launched a new website, designed to inform and engage current and future patients as they consider their options for back pain relief, including spinal injection, minimally invasive spinal surgery and other non surgical therapy options. The new site, at www.spineinstitutenorthwest.com, has moved to a dynamic, data-driven design, including a new blog. The site aims to make it easier for those suffering from chronic pain, sports injuries, leg, foot and ankle problems or people with physical therapy needs to learn more about ...

STANFORD, Calif. — A well-known protein complex responsible for controlling how DNA is expressed plays a previously unsuspected role in preventing pancreatic cancer, according to researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine. Technological advances in the way researchers can compare normal and tumor DNA showed that the gene for at least one subunit of the multi-subunit SWI/SNF protein complex was either deleted, mutated or rearranged in about a third of the 70 human pancreatic cancers that the Stanford team examined. Additionally, the researchers found that ...

CHICAGO – The anticoagulant dabigatran is associated with an increased risk of myocardial infarction (heart attack) or acute coronary syndrome in a broad spectrum of patients when tested against some other medicines, according to a study published Online First by the Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. "Clinicians should consider the potential of these serious harmful cardiovascular effects with use of dabigatran," the study concludes. Dabigatran etexilate was approved by the European Medicines Agency in 2008 for prevention of venous thromboembolism ...

CHICAGO – The use of statins in postmenopausal women is associated with increased diabetes risk, according to a study published Online First by the Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. But researchers note statins address the cardiovascular consequences of diabetes and current American Diabetes Association guidelines for primary and secondary prevention should not change. Likewise, researchers write that guidelines for statin use in nondiabetic populations also should not change. Annie L. Culver, B. Pharm, Rochester Methodist Hospital, Mayo ...

CHICAGO – A substantial proportion of emergency department eye care in Florida is reimbursed through Medicaid or paid for out of pocket by patients, and those findings may help in strategic planning as the debate over how best to implement the nation's new health care reform law progresses, according to a study published in the Archives of Ophthalmology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) will increase insurance coverage in large part by expanding eligibility for Medicaid, "an already stressed and underfunded system ...

CHICAGO – Replacing visual acuity screenings for new Medicare enrollees with coverage of a dilated eye exam for healthy patients entering the government insurance program for the elderly "would be highly cost-effective," suggests a study being published Online First by the Archives of Ophthalmology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. People can enroll in Medicare after they turn 65 and are supposed to receive a visual acuity screening and other preventive health checks as part of a Welcome to Medicare health evaluation within 12 months of enrollment. In 2009, the U.S. ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – New research shows that infectious disease-fighting drugs could be designed to block a pathogen's entry into cells rather than to kill the bug itself. Historically, medications for infectious diseases have been designed to kill the offending pathogen. This new strategy is important, researchers say, because many parasites and bacteria can eventually mutate their way around drugs that target them, resulting in drug resistance. In this study, scientists showed that using an experimental agent to block one type of an enzyme in cell cultures and mice prevented ...

Wearing a nicotine patch may help improve memory loss in older adults with mild cognitive impairment, according to a study published today in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. The study looked at individuals with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), the stage between normal aging and dementia when others begin to notice that an individual is developing mild memory or thinking problems. Many older adults with MCI go on to develop Alzheimer's disease. The study looked at 74 non-smokers with MCI and an average age of 76. Half of the patients ...

Over the past 10 years, Americans drank more sugar-sweetened beverages than ever—as much as 13 billion gallons a year—making these drinks the largest source of added sugar and excess calories in the American diet and, arguably, the single largest dietary factor in the current obesity epidemic. While many states have a sales tax on soda, experts believe they are too low to impact consumption. In a study conducted at Columbia University Medical Center and the University of California, San Francisco, researchers estimated that if a higher, penny-per-ounce tax were imposed ...

CHICAGO -- A 2010 outbreak of Legionnaires' disease in Wisconsin has been linked to a decorative fountain in a hospital lobby, according to a study published in the February issue of Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology, the journal of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America. When the outbreak of Legionnaires' disease was detected among eight people in southeast Wisconsin, state and local public health officials worked closely with hospital staff to launch an investigation to determine the source of the outbreak. Legionnaires' disease is a severe and ...

ALBANY, Calif. -- An interactive tool developed by researchers from the USDA Forest Service's Pacific Southwest Research Station (PSW) will help wind energy facility operators make informed decisions on efficient ways to reduce impacts on migratory bats. Fatalities of migratory bats at wind energy facilities have become a frequent occurrence. Bat migration patterns are poorly understood and the relationship between fatalities at wind energy facilities and migratory behavior are still being studied. Previous research has shown that adjusting the operations of turbines ...

Rice University researchers have figured out what gives armchair nanotubes their unique bright colors: hydrogen-like objects called excitons. Their findings appear in the online edition of the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Armchair carbon nanotubes – so named for the "U"-shaped configuration of the atoms at their uncapped tips – are one-dimensional metals and have no band gap. This means electrons flow from one end to the other with little resistivity, the very property that may someday make armchair quantum wires possible. The Rice researchers show armchair ...

A new study from SUNY Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York, shows that MAL3-101, a recently developed inhibitor of the heat shock protein 70 (Hsp70), appears to have potent anti-tumor effects on multiple myeloma, a bone marrow cancer. Despite aggressive modes of treatments, myeloma ultimately remains incurable. The disease has a high incidence in the communities served by SUNY Downstate. The findings, published in a recent issue of Journal of Oncology, are the result of a collaborative effort among researchers working in the laboratory of Olcay Batuman, MD, ...