Florence Nightingale's two greatest life achievements-pioneering of nursing and the reform. of hospitals-were amazing considering that most Victorian women of her age group did not attend universities or pursue professional careers. It was her father, William Nightingale, who believed women, especially his children, should get an education. So Nightingale and her sister learned Italian, Latin, Greek, history, and mathematics. She in particular received excellent early preparation in mathematics.
During Nightingale's time at Scutari, she collected data and systematized record-keeping practices. Nightingale was able to use the data as a tool for improving city and military hospitals. Nightingale's calculations of the death rate showed that with an improvement of sanitary methods, deaths would decrease. In February, 1855, the death rate at the hospital was 42.7 percent of the cases treated. When Nightingale's sanitary reform. was implemented, the death rate declined. Nightingale took her statistical data and represented them graphically.
As Nightingale demonstrated, statistics provided an organized way of learning and lead to improvements in medical and surgical practices. She also developed a Model Hospital Statistical Form. for hospitals to collect and generate consistent data and statistics. She became a Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society in 1858 and an honorary member of the American Statistical Association in 1874. Karl Pearson acknowledged Nightingale as a "prophetess" in the development of applied statistics.
What does the word "sanitation" mean in the passage?
A. Medication.
B. Cleanness.
C. Nursing.
D. Reforms
What does the author try to prove in this passage?
A. Women can be as successful as men.
B. Education plays a vital role in one's success.
C. Mathematics could be used to improve medical practices.
D. A career in medical field is also available for women.
Scher, of Uniformed Services University, in Bethesda, Maryland, and colleagues assessed re ports of major life changes among 206 men and women who met criteria for chronic daily headache (180 or more headache days per year). They assessed similar reports from 507 men and women with "episodic" headache (2 to 104 headache days per year).
The investigators assessed changes in work, marital status, children's status, or residence; as well as deaths of family or close friends. They also inquired about self-defined "extremely stressful situations," such as financial problems, an ongoing individual illness or that of a family member, or an ongoing abusive relationship. Compared with men and women with episodic headache, men and women with chronic daily headache were more likely to have experienced major life events in the 2-year period prior to the onset of their headache condition, the researchers report in the medical journal Cephalalgia.
The strongest predictor of chronic daily headache was an ongoing extremely stressful situation. The researchers also noted a higher proportion of chronic daily headache among people 40 years and older. In this group, "a change in work status was related to increased risk for chronic daily headache, while in contrast, those younger than 40 years showed a decreased risk for chronic daily headache after a job change," Scher told Reuters Health.
These findings are generally consistent with prior research related to other chronic pain conditions, the investigators note. "Our finding that the relationship may be stronger for those older than 40 was an interesting, but secondary, finding that should be replicated in other samples," Scher said.
What does the word "precipitate" most probably mean?
A. To cause something to happen.
B. To prevent something from happening.
C. To predict something to happen.
D. To prepare for something to happen.
How should we understand the process of oscillation?
A. Cosmic rays are used to produce muon neutrinos.
B. Muon neutrinos went missing during experiments.
Cosmic rays hit the upper atmosphere.
D. One flavor of neutrinos is changed into another one.