Maggot therapy (MT) is the clinical application of living fly larvae for the treatment of non‐healing wounds and wounds that require debridement. This systematized and expanded literature review is the first study to investigate MT through the conceptual and disciplinary framework of supply chain management. The review of 491 selected academic papers was expanded to include the grey literature and online information resources to construct a first‐pass theory of the medicinal maggot supply chain. It shows that the literature to date has focused on isolated discussions of echelon‐specific issues such as diet improvement and sterilization protocols in the production echelon, and the relative effectiveness of medicinal maggot application methods in the treatment echelon. There is little knowledge in the public domain regarding the transport and distribution of medicinal maggots, but existing supply chains for vaccines, blood and pathology specimens may provide learning and supply chain integration opportunities. Maggot therapy knowledge across the treatment echelon is generally substantive but there is still insufficient knowledge regarding patients' and health care providers' attitudes toward the therapy, and their experiences of receiving and administering MT. Moreover, there is no research concerned with the humane disposal of medicinal flies during production and after treatment.
Purpose Whilst there is a growing body of research which discusses the use of remotely piloted aircraft systems (RPAS) (otherwise known as “drones”) to transport medical supplies, almost all reported cases employ short range aircraft. The purpose of this paper is to consider the advantages and challenges inherent in the use of long endurance remotely piloted aircraft systems (LE-RPAS) aircraft to support the provision of medical supplies to remote locations – specifically “medical maggots” used in maggot debridement therapy (MDT) wound care. Design/methodology/approach After introducing both MDT and the LE-RPAS technology, the paper first reports on the outcomes of a case study involving 11 semi-structured interviews with individuals who either have experience and expertise in the use of LE-RPAS or in the provision of healthcare to remote communities in Western Australia. The insights gained from this case study are then synthesised to assess the feasibility of LE-RPAS assisted delivery of medical maggots to those living in such geographically challenging locations. Findings No insuperable challenges to the concept of using LE-RPAS to transport medical maggots were uncovered during this research – rather, those who contributed to the investigations from across the spectrum from operators to users, were highly supportive of the overall concept. Practical implications The paper offers an assessment of the feasibility of the use of LE-RPAS to transport medical maggots. In doing so, it highlights a number of infrastructure and organisational challenges that would need to be overcome to operationalise this concept. Whilst the particular context of the paper relates to the provision of medical support to a remote location of a developed country, the core benefits and challenges that are exposed relate equally to the use of LE-RPAS in a post-disaster response. To this end, the paper offers a high-level route map to support the implementation of the concept. Social implications The paper proposes a novel approach to the efficient and effective provision of medical care to remote Australian communities which, in particular, reduces the need to travel significant distances to obtain treatment. In doing so, it emphasises the importance in gaining acceptance of both the use of MDT and also the operation of RPAS noting that these have previously been employed in a military, as distinct from humanitarian, context. Originality/value The paper demonstrates how the use of LE-RPAS to support remote communities offers the potential to deliver healthcare at reduced cost compared to conventional approaches. The paper also underlines the potential benefits of the use of MDT to address the growing wound burdens in remote communities. Finally, the paper expands on the existing discussion of the use of RPAS to include its capability to act as the delivery mechanism for medical maggots.
In the aftermath of disasters, MDT could play an important role facilitating timely and efficient medical treatment and improving patient outcomes. Existing social, medical, and logistic barriers will need to be overcome for MDT to be mainstreamed in Disaster Medicine.
In this paper, we describe methods for isolation, purification and solubilization of insect proteins from various tissues, including lipid-rich fat body. An Australian locust, Oedaleus australis, and its associated dipteran parasite, Trichopsidea oestracea, provided the protein samples. Protein samples of locust fat body, haemolymph and body wall as well as parasite whole-body extracts were isolated and purified of lipids and salts using chloroform-methanol extraction. Proteins were solubilized using two types of enhanced solubilizing solutions and arrayed using two-dimensional electrophoresis. We demonstrated substantial differences between the body wall protein spectra of normal locusts and those parasitized by T. oestracea. Proteins more abundant in parasitized locusts include two 70 kDa proteins with an isoelectric point (pI) of about 5.5, one approximately 55 kDa protein cluster with a pI of about 4.7 and three 40 kDa proteins with pI values of around 5.6. Proteins that decreased in parasitized locusts include a group of 45 kDa proteins with pI values between 6 and 6.8, and a cluster of 22 to 23 kDa proteins with pI values of approximately 5.4 and 5.6.
The exploration of evolutionary biology and biological adaptation can inform society's adaptation to climate change, particularly the mechanisms that bring about adaptability, such as phenotypic plasticity, epigenetics, and horizontal gene transfer. Learning from unplanned autonomous biological adaptation may be considered undesirable and incompatible with human endeavor.However, it is argued that there is no need for agency, and planned adaptation is not necessarily preferable over autonomous adaptation. What matters is the efficacy of adaptive mechanisms and their capacity to increase societal resilience to current and future impacts. In addition, there is great scope for industrial ecology (IE) to contribute approaches to climate change adaptation that generate system models and baseline data to inform decision making. The problem of "uncertainty" was chosen as an example of a challenge that is shared by biological systems, IE, and climate change adaptation to show how biological adaptation might contribute solutions. Finally, the Coastal Climate Adaptation Decision Support tool was used to demonstrate how IE and biological adaptation approaches may be mainstreamed in climate change adaptation planning and practice. In conclusion, there is close conceptual alignment between evolutionary biology and IE. The integration of biological adaptation thinking can enrich IE, add new perspectives to climate change adaptation science, and support IE's engagement with climate change adaptation. There should be no major obstacles regarding the collaboration of industrial ecologists with the climate change adaptation community, but mainstreaming of biological adaptation solutions depends greatly on successful knowledge transfer and the engagement of open-minded and informed adaptation stakeholders.
This case study describes how high school students can participate in research, development, and testing of real-life solutions for society's most intractable problems. In modern warfare, civilians make up most of the casualties, and conflict-affected communities are often isolated and have only limited access to healthcare. Most surviving casualties have limb wounds from injury or surgery, and many of these become infected and require longterm treatment or amputation. In 2020, MedMagLabs and the Queensland Virtual STEM Academy partnered to engage high school students to co-develop and test methods and training resources that empower people in conflict-affected communities to produce medicinal maggots for highly efficacious and affordable wound care. Maggot therapy is the treatment of wounds with living fly larvae to remove dead tissue, to control infection, and to promote wound healing. As opposed to most citizen science, which mainly focuses on data collection and/or educational and awareness-raising outcomes, this project focused on the co-creation of knowledge and the delivery of tangible research outcomes.
The last decade has seen strong global growth in the number of climate change adaptation projects. To understand whether adaptation is progressing and is successful, some form of longitudinal tracking is required. The six adaptation conferences organised by the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility between 2010 and 2018 provide a unique and novel opportunity to track adaptation progress in Australia. Each conference was accompanied by a call for abstracts for oral or poster presentation. The submitted abstracts form the basis of the analysis in this paper. We show that, over time, the balance of attendees shifted away from researchers and towards government employees, and the proportion of attendees submitting abstracts declined. The proportion of abstracts submitted by government employees and consultants has increased at more recent conferences. When abstract content is analysed, the results show that, over time, there has been a change in the focus of abstracts with respect to the sector, type and stage of adaptation. These trends indicate maturation of adaptation in Australia, but also suggest that lack of finance for research and action is having an impact. There is evidence that adaptation in Australia is moving from being largely planning based and towards implementation. This is encouraging, given that studies throughout the world have remarked on the barriers that exist in moving from planning to action.
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