Objective This study explored factors that underpin decisions to seek emergency department (ED) care for chronic non-cancer pain in patients identifying as culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) or Australian-born. Design and Methods A mixed-methods study underpinned by The Behavioural Model of Health Services Use conceptual framework. Consenting consecutive patients attending the ED for a chronic pain condition were recruited to a CALD (n = 45) or Australian-born (n = 45) cohort. Statistical comparisons compared the demographic, pain, health literacy and episode of care profiles of both cohorts. Twenty-three CALD and 16 Australian-born participants consented to an audio-recorded semi-structured interview (n = 24) or focus group (n = 5) conducted in their preferred language. Interviews were translated and transcribed into English for analysis using applied thematic analysis, guided by the conceptual framework. Data were triangulated to investigate the patterns of ED utilisation and contributing factors for both cohorts. Results ED attendance was a product of escalating distress, influenced by the degree to which a participant’s perceived need outweighed their capacity to manage their pain. This interaction was amplified by the presence of predisposing factors, including constrained social positions, trauma exposure and biomedical health beliefs. Importantly, experiences varied between the two cohorts with higher degrees of pain catastrophising, lower health literacy and greater social challenges present for the CALD cohort. Conclusion This study highlights the role contextual factors play in amplifying pain-related distress for CALD and Australian-born patients with chronic pain. The findings support a need for healthcare providers to recognise features of higher vulnerability and consider streamlining access to available support services.

As the continuous increasing of the total number of workers with the undergraduate degree, it is not going to university but going to what kind of university becomes increasingly important on affecting the returns of labor market. Using the adult data from the China Family Panel Studies in 2010 and based on the OLS regression model, this paper analyzes the market returns variation of workers graduated from universities of "project 211" and non-"project 211". The result shows that the market returns of workers who graduated from "project 211" universities are significantly higher than those of workers who graduated from non-"project 211" universities. Although the estimation coefficient based on the propensity score matching method is slightly less than the partial regression coefficient of OLS regression results, the result is still significant. Therefore, the result once again supports the human capital theory, and rejects the screening theory.

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Dents in buried pipelines can be formed due to a number of causes: third party machinery strikes, rock strikes during backfilling, pipe resting on rock, and amongst others. Dents in pipelines would not only affect short and/or long-term integrity, but would also have a potential impact on the pass capacity of in-line inspection and cleaning tools when the size of the dent is large enough. Rebound for an originally constrained dent can decrease the dent depth and improve the pass capacity of in-line inspection and cleaning tools. In order to estimate the rebound capacity of dents especially in spiral weld pipelines, a full-scale dent rebound testing program of X65 steel pipeline was designed and performed. The full scale testing was conducted on the parent material and the spiral welds. Hemispherical and pyramidal indenters were used to generate dents to different depths. Strains around the denting area during formation of the dent and changes in depths due to rebounding after removing indenter were measured. Following each rebound test, the dent profile was portrayed with a 3D laser scanner and the maximum equivalent strain was then calculated. With the information obtained from the above measurements, detailed analyses were performed and a numerical model was developed. In this paper, the approach used for the study is described first. The results and findings are then presented. The effectiveness of the developed numerical model for dent integrity management is demonstrated.