Julkaisuarkisto
Viimeksi lisätyt
- Ladataan...Oral health care for people with disabilities: Perspectives of health care professionals, caregivers, and patients
Turun yliopiston julkaisuja - Annales Universitatis Turkuensis, Ser D: Medica, Odontologica : 1984 (Turun yliopisto, 2026-06-12)People with disabilities (PWDs) often have poor oral health and inadequate health services. This disproportionate burden underscores the need for research into barriers to effective and accessible care. This thesis aimed to examine the perspectives of PWDs by investigating their challenges in accessing dental care, Oral Health-Related Quality of Life (OHRQoL), and levels of dental fear and anxiety (DFA). In addition, the thesis investigated the role of education in preparing providers for special care dentistry (SCD). Five original studies investigated clinical, institutional and educational factors that influence oral care utilising various study designs. The challenges of dental care and education for PWDs were investigated in Trinidad and Tobago (T&T) by interviewing healthcare professionals (HCPs) and caregivers. Surveys assessed OHRQoL and DFA of patients aged 6–18 years at the Special Needs Dental Clinic (SNDC) and the Child Dental Health Unit (CDHU). The impact of a workshop on SCD for dentists, dental students and allied HCPs was evaluated using questionnaires. An international survey assessed the effect of dental student training delivered at European and American universities. Barriers to care included cost, limited access to dental care for PWDs, and HCPs’ readiness. OHRQoL among children at these clinics was generally poor, especially for those with disabilities, who were significantly more likely to experience DFA at a moderate level than those without. Lack of knowledge and professional development motivated participants’ attendance at the SCD workshop. The participants perceived communication and non-compliance as the main challenges in dental treatment at the SCD workshop. The dental students showed a positive intention to treat PWDs after SCD training. Variations in clinical exposure, health care systems, and cultural expectations were observed between the international universities. This thesis indicates that addressing barriers in oral care access, clinical preparedness, and training can improve dental experiences for PWDs. Educational initiatives may foster positive attitudes and readiness among HCPs, leading to better dental care, improved OHRQoL, and reduced DFA among PWDs.Vammaisten suun terveys on usein heikko ja terveyspalvelut riittämättömät. Tämän opinnäytetyön tavoitteena oli tutkia vammaisten henkilöiden näkemyksiä hammas hoidon saannista, suuterveyteen liittyvää elämänlaatua (OHRQoL), hammashoito pelkoa ja ahdistusta. Lisäksi selvitettiin koulutuksen roolia palveluntuottajien valmennuksessa erityistarpeisten hammashoitoon. Viidessä alkuperäistutkimuksessa analysoitiin kliinisten, palvelujärjestelmään ja koulutukseen liittyvien tekijöiden vaikutusta suun hoitoon monipuolisin tutkimusasetelmin. Vammaisten henkilöiden hammashoidon ja koulutuksen haasteita tutkittiin Trinidad & Tobagossa haastattelemalla terveydenhuollon ammattilaisia ja huoltajia. Kyselytutkimuksilla selvitettiin 6–18-vuotiaiden potilaiden elämänlaatua ja hammashoitopelkoa. Lisäksi analysoitiin suun terveydenhuollon ammattilaisille ja hammaslääketieteen opiskelijoille suunnatun kurssin vaikutusta vammaisten hoitoon. Kansainvälisessä tutkimuksessa analysoitiin hammaslääketieteen opiskelijoiden koulutuksen vaikusta vammaisten henkilöiden hoitoon Euroopassa ja Yhdys valloissa. Hoidon esteitä olivat hoidon kustannukset, vammaisten rajallinen pääsy hammashoitoon ja terveydenhuollon ammattilaisten valmius. Vammaisten lasten suunterveyteen liittyvä elämänlaatu oli yleisesti ottaen heikko ja he kokivat hammashoitopelkoa ja kohtalaista ahdistusta useammin kuin vammattomat. Tiedon puute ja ammatillinen kehittyminen motivoivat osallistujia erityiskurssille. Kurssin osallistujat kokivat kommunikaation ja hoitomyöntyvyyden puutteen suurimmiksi hoitohaasteiksi. Koulutuksen jälkeen hammaslääketieteen opiskelijoilla oli myönteinen asenne hoitaa vammaisia potilaita. Erilaiset kliiniset kokemukset, terveyden huoltojärjestelmät ja kulttuuriset odotukset selittivät yliopistojen välisiä eroja eri maissa. Tämä opinnäytetyö osoittaa, että poistamalla suun terveydenhuollon esteitä, kehittämällä kliinistä valmiutta ja koulutusta voidaan parantaa vammaisten hammashoitoa. Koulutuksella voidaan edistää suun terveydenhuollon ammattilaisten myönteisiä asenteita ja valmiutta parempaan hammashoitoon, kohentaa vammaisten elämänlaatua ja vähentää hammashoitopelkoa. - Ladataan...Tuntemattomalla päähän?: Oppimateriaali kieli- ja kulttuurituntemuksen syventämiseen kaunokirjallisuutta lukemallaParente-Čapková , Viola; Kekki, Niina; Jytilä, Riitta; Salmela, Alexandra; Jokela, Hanna; Fárová, Lenka (Turun yliopisto, 2026-05-29)
- Ladataan...Building LLM-Based Voice Agents for Requirements Elicitation: An Experience Report on Early PrototypesWeerakoon, Oshani; Mäkilä, Tuomas; Kaila, Erkki; Oyedeji, Shola
This paper presents an experience report on the development and pre-testing of voice-based agentic workflows that uses two large language models, OpenAI’s GPT-4o-mini and Google’s Gemma3:27b to conduct requirement elicitation discussions in software projects. The growing use of independent AI agents for specialized tasks has motivated our exploration of voice agents as "requirements elicitors" within software projects. The paper describes the approaches attempted during development, including those that were successful and those that failed, along with insights gathered from implementing and testing the use cases. We conducted a pre-test round with five participants, comparing the performance of the two agents under two case studies. At this stage, the OpenAI-based agent showed a higher requirements coverage, identifying 77.5% of relevant requirements on average, while the Gemma-based agent captured 35.0%. In terms of usability, participants rated the OpenAI agent 4.0/5, compared to 3.3/5 for the Gemma agent, highlighting a more natural conversational flow, better contextual understanding, and improved responsiveness. We propose deploying this voice agent as the first agent in an extended multi-agent requirements engineering workflow to support requirement elicitation sessions alongside a human requirement engineer, which will be the extension of this work. The methods, design choices, and lessons learned documented in this report aim to guide practitioners and researchers in adapting similar agent-based approaches in their own domains.
- Ladataan...Automated Image Colorization using Generative Adversarial NetworksSharma, Jaisal; Shrestha, Rahul; Pant, Dibakar Raj; Skon, Jukka-Pekka; Heikkonen, Jukka; Kanth, RajeevAutomated colorization of grayscale images is one of the fundamental challenges in the Computer Vision(CV) domain. Self-supervised learning methods are an effective approach to learn general visual features automatically, without having to manually annotate image datasets. Generative Adversarial Networks (GAN) are applied for the colorization method as they are capable of learning visual characteristics from any image without the need for annotated data. They possess a loss function to train the mapping and have ability to learn the mapping from input to output image. The effectiveness of different color spaces (LAB, YUV, and HSI) for image colorization using GAN is investigated. The evaluation of colorization quality is carried out by calculating the pixel accuracy using Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio (PSNR), and assessing structural integrity using Structural Similarity Indexing Method (SSIM). Using such methods, a comparative approach is demonstrated to study colorization effectiveness of the old black and white images. The SSIM and PSNR values obtained for different color space models are LAB (0.947 and 32.69 dB), YUV (0.842 and 27.65 dB) and HSI (0.851 and 28.72 dB) respectively. Among the three models, LAB color space performed the best with the SSIM and PSNR value of 0.947 and 32.69 dB.
- Ladataan...Evolution induced state shifts in a long-term microbial community experimentKivikoski, Mikko; Cairns, Johannes; Hogle, Shane L.; Pausio, Sanna; Becks, Lutz; Mustonen, Ville; Hiltunen, Teppo (National Academy of Sciences)
Biological communities are complex, dynamic systems that underpin ecosystem functionality, yet their long-term dynamics and predictability remain poorly understood. Understanding how Darwinian evolution shapes these systems through eco-evolutionary feedback is a central challenge in ecology and evolution. Experimental studies using simplified microbial assemblages have yielded important insights into the ecological principles governing community states. However, an important knowledge gap is how selection within member species drives changes of community state in multispecies systems. Here, we present a four-year evolution experiment involving a 23-species synthetic bacterial community propagated in two environments: a control medium and the same medium supplemented with the antibiotic streptomycin. Through combined analyses of community composition and genome evolution, we quantified the temporal changes in species abundances and the evolutionary trajectories of individual community members. The extended duration of the experiment enabled the detection of adaptive mutations and community state shifts that occur only over long evolutionary timescales. We show that community dynamics are environment dependent and reproducible across replicates and that evolution of streptomycin resistance in a previously streptomycin-sensitive species on its own can induce abrupt community state shifts. Our results provide a direct demonstration of eco-evolutionary feedbacks within a multispecies community, revealing how a single adaptive mutation can reorganize complex ecological networks.