Best of
Informatics

2012

The Health Care Handbook: A Clear and Concise Guide to the American Health Care System


Elisabeth Askin - 2012
    This updated edition of the Health Care Handbook covers:• New sections on health IT, team-based care and health care quality• A clear summary of health policy and the Affordable Care Act• Inpatient & outpatient health care and delivery systems• Health insurance and the factors that make health care so expensive• Concise summaries of 32 different health professions• Medical devices, pharmaceuticals, and the research world• And much, much moreThe Handbook is the one-stop guide to the people, organizations and industries that make up the U.S. health care system and major issues the system faces today. It is rigorously researched and scrupulously unbiased yet written in a conversational and humorous tone that's a pleasure to read and illuminates the convoluted health care system and its many components. The Handbook is now used by hundreds of academic programs and health care companies.Each section of the book includes an introduction to the key facts and foundations that make the health care system work along with balanced analyses of the major challenges and controversies within health care, including medical errors, government regulation, medical malpractice, and much more. Suggested readings are included for readers who wish to learn more about specific topics.

Photoshop CS6: The Missing Manual


Lesa Snider - 2012
    This book makes learning Photoshop a breeze by explaining things in a friendly, conversational style—without technical jargon. After a thorough introduction to the program, you’ll delve deep into Photoshop’s secrets with expert tips and practical advice you can use every day.The important stuff you need to know: Learn your way around. Get a guided tour of Photoshop’s beautiful new workspace. Unlock the magic. Discover the most practical ways to use layers, channels, masks, paths, and other tools. Fine-tune your images. Learn techniques for cropping, retouching, and combining photos. Play with color. Drain, change, and add color; and create gorgeous black-and-whites and duotones. Be artistic. Create original illustrations and paintings, use text and filters effectively, and edit video clips. Share your work. Produce great-looking images for print and the Web. Work smarter and faster. Automate common chores and install plug-ins for complex tasks.

The Adobe Photoshop CS6 Book for Digital Photographers


Scott Kelby - 2012
    Instead, Scott shows you step by step the exact techniques used by today's cutting-edge digital photographers, and best of all, he shows you flat-out exactly which settings to use, when to use them, and why. That's why the previous editions of this book are widely used as the official study guides in photography courses at colleges and universities around the world.LEARN HOW THE PROS DO ITEach year, Scott trains thousands of professional photographers on how to use Photoshop, and almost without exception they have the same questions, the same problems, and the same challenges - and that's exactly what he covers in this book. You'll learn: The sharpening techniques the pros really use. The pros' tricks for fixing the most common digital photo problems fast! The step-by-step setup for getting what comes out of your printer to match exactly what you see onscreen. How to process HDR (High Dynamic Range) images using CS6's Merge to HDR Pro. How to master CS6's Content-Aware features. How to use Photoshop CS6's new video editing features to make movies from your DSLR videos. How to process RAW images like a pro (plus how to take advantage of all the new Camera Raw features in CS6!). The latest Photoshop special effects for photographers (there's a whole chapter just on these!). A host of shortcuts, workarounds, and slick "insider" tricks to send your productivity through the roof! Plus, Scott includes a special bonus chapter with his own CS6 workflow, from start to finish, and each chapter ends with a Photoshop Killer Tips section, packed with timesaving, job-saving tips that make all the difference. If you're a digital photographer, and if you're ready to learn all the "tricks of the trade" - the same ones that today's leading pros use to correct, edit, sharpen, retouch, and present their work--then you're holding the book that will do just that. Note from the publisher: August 9, 2012: All binding issues mentioned in our July 31, 2012 note below have been resolved. Thank you.July 31, 2012: We have encountered issues with the binding in our initial print run of this book. If you have purchased a copy of the book you are not happy with, please return it to the store where you made your purchase to request a replacement copy right away. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate your patience.

APA Style Guide to Electronic References


American Psychological Association - 2012
    Most important, it provides a wealth of examples for readers to model for everything from online journal articles to supplemental data sets and measurement instruments to books, videos, apps, websites, podcasts, blog posts, and social media. Approximately 70 examples are provided for readers to consider as they learn how to create reliable references for electronic sources.Students and other writers will find this guide indispensable as well as convenient to download and use when creating a reference list.

Adobe Photoshop CS6 for Photographers: A Professional Image Editor's Guide to the Creative Use of Photoshop for the Macintosh and PC


Martin Evening - 2012
    This acclaimed work covers everything from the core aspects of working in Photoshop to advanced techniques for refined workflows and professional results. Using concise advice, clear instruction and real world examples, this essential guide will give you the skills, regardless of your experience, to create professional quality results. A robust accompanying website features sample images, tutorial videos, bonus chapters and a plethora of extra resources. Quite simply, this is the essential reference for photographers of all levels using Photoshop.

The Voice in the Machine: Building Computers That Understand Speech


Roberto Pieraccini - 2012
    More than forty years later, we have advanced computer technology that Kubrick never imagined, but we do not have computers that talk and understand speech as HAL did. Is it a failure of our technology that we have not gotten much further than an automated voice that tells us to "say or press 1"? Or is there something fundamental in human language and speech that we do not yet understand deeply enough to be able to replicate in a computer? In The Voice in the Machine, Roberto Pieraccini examines six decades of work in science and technology to develop computers that can interact with humans using speech and the industry that has arisen around the quest for these technologies. He shows that although the computers today that understand speech may not have HAL's capacity for conversation, they have capabilities that make them usable in many applications today and are on a fast track of improvement and innovation.Pieraccini describes the evolution of speech recognition and speech understanding processes from waveform methods to artificial intelligence approaches to statistical learning and modeling of human speech based on a rigorous mathematical model--specifically, Hidden Markov Models (HMM). He details the development of dialog systems, the ability to produce speech, and the process of bringing talking machines to the market. Finally, he asks a question that only the future can answer: will we end up with HAL-like computers or something completely unexpected?

Statistics Translated: A Step-by-Step Guide to Analyzing and Interpreting Data


Steven R. Terrell - 2012
    This book has been replaced by Statistics Translated, Second Edition, ISBN 978-1-4625-4540-7.

Statistics for the Health Sciences: A Non-Mathematical Introduction


Christine P. Dancey - 2012
    The authors give clear explanations of the concepts underlying statistical analyses and descriptions of how these analyses are applied in health science research without complex maths formulae.The textbook takes students from the basics of research design, hypothesis testing and descriptive statistical techniques through to more advanced inferential statistical tests that health science students are likely to encounter. The strengths and weaknesses of different techniques are critically appraised throughout, and the authors emphasise how they may be used both in research and to inform best practice care in health settings.Exercises and tips throughout the book allow students to practice using SPSS. The companion website provides further practical experience of conducting statistical analyses. Features include:- multiple choice questions for both student and lecturer use- full Powerpoint slides for lecturers- practical exercises using SPSS- additional practical exercises using SAS and RThis is an essential textbook for students studying beginner and intermediate level statistics across the health sciences.