Objectives To estimate the prevalence of obese patients advised by health professionals about weight loss and weight loss strategies. Methods A national sample of 1,873 obese adults (body mass index =30 kg/m2, = 18 years) was surveyed. Multivariable linear regression was used to determine characteristics associated with receiving weight loss advice, and advice on diet and physical activity. Linear regression was used to evaluate characteristics associated with how much weight loss was advised. Results Among obese adults visiting a physician (past 12 months), 39.0% reported being advised to lose weight. Men had lower odds of being advised to lose weight. Adults 40 – 49 years of age, reporting fair/poor health, and chronic diseases had greater odds of being advised to lose weight compared to referent groups. Among adults receiving advice on amount of weight to lose, a mean 20.9% total body weight reduction was recommended. Of those advised to lose weight, 64.2% were told to change their diet, 85.7% to increase physical activity, and 58.5% to use both strategies. Conclusions Obese adults should be advised by health professionals more frequently about weight loss and the use of caloric reduction and increased physical activity as the recommended weight loss strategy.

The global landscape has seen the advent of new technology in offering innovative financial services and products and reshaping the financial sector, namely FinTech. In this review, we discuss the literature on recent FinTech development and its interaction with both banks and consumers. We synthesize the insights it provides into two domains: credit supply and payment and clearing services. The rise of FinTech has introduced digital transformation of the “bricks‐and‐mortar” banking model and dramatically changed the way financial services are delivered. We also present several future questions and directions that are worthy of investigation for researchers and policy‐makers.

This paper proposes a novel robotic animal herding system based on a network of autonomous barking drones. The objective of such a system is to replace traditional herding methods (e.g., dogs) so that a large number (e.g., thousands) of farm animals such as sheep can be quickly collected from a sparse status and then driven to a designated location (e.g., a sheepfold). In this paper, we particularly focus on the motion control of the barking drones. To this end, a computationally efficient sliding mode based control algorithm is developed, which navigates the drones to track the moving boundary of the animals’ footprint and enables the drones to avoid collisions with others. Extensive computer simulations, where the dynamics of the animals follow Reynolds’ rules, show the effectiveness of the proposed approach.

The New Rural Cooperative Medical Insurance (NCMS) in China has provided benefits for rural migrant workers’ health service utilization, but the financial coordination and mutual aid of NCMS is mainly based on the county or district as a unit, leading NCMS with the characteristics of regional segmentation. Our study aims to explore their health service utilization, as well as to decompose differences of the health service utilization into contributors.Data from the China Labor-Force Dynamic Survey in 2016 and Urban Statistical Yearbook in 2016 were used. We used coarsened exact matching to control the confounding factors in order to enhance the comparison of two groups. The Fairlie decomposition method was used to analyze the differences and the sources of health service utilization.Influencing factors of health service utilization for rural migrant workers with NCMS were diversified, especially contextual characteristic and individual characteristics. The proportion of ethnic minorities, the number of medical institutions for 10,000 people in the community, the number of beds for 10,000 people in the city, and the urban service quality index were the major contributors of the differences. The proportion of difference in the health service utilization of rural migrant workers with NCMS caused by health service need were −54.73% and 6.92%, respectively. The inequities of the probability of two weeks outpatient, and the probability of inpatients, were −0.006 and −0.007, respectively. There were substantial differences in the health service utilization between rural migrant workers with NCMS in the county/district and rural migrant workers with NCMS across the county/district. Our results illustrated the inequity from the differences on basis of characteristic effect and the discrimination effect. Our studies clarified that health service needs of should be fully considered, contributing to a more reliable understanding of the health service utilization of rural migrant workers.

There is a growing concern about the fertility preservation for adult cancer patients of reproductive age. Very little literature exists about fertility preservation of cancer survivors in Chinese text. This study is first to describe the knowledge level, attitude, and practice behaviors among physicians concerning fertility preservation in adult cancer patients in China. A cross-sectional survey with 30-item was conducted to assess Chinese oncology physicians' knowledge, attitude, and behaviors regarding fertility issues. Of 360 oncology physicians, 206 (57.2%) submitted valid questionnaires. With possible overall scores for knowledge and attitude of 9 and 15, respectively, physicians' responses to the questionnaires were 3.91 ± 1.67 and 12.29 ± 1.23. Only 49.5% of physicians routinely informed their cancer patients of childbearing age about the risk of infertility with cancer treatment. The knowledge score of the men physicians was 2-fold that of the women. Physicians aged 20-29 years were significantly more likely than other age groups to prioritize cancer treatment over fertility concerns. Men physicians were significantly more comfortable than the women discussing fertility preservation issues and cooperating with fertility specialists. The oncology physicians in China had limited knowledge of fertility preservation and rarely discussed these issues with their patients, although their attitude was positive. Results suggest that oncology physicians would welcome an in-house fertility-related training program. Key Messages This is the first study to address the topic of fertility preservation as it relates to the care that oncologists provide to cancer patients in China. These results revealed the importance of providing fertility-related training program to oncology physicians. Moreover, this study should provide useful information for other Asian countries, and highlight both the similarities and differences between Capsule Chinese oncology physicians had unsatisfactory knowledge and practice behaviors, while they held a positive attitude toward fertility preservation for cancer patients. Some training programs and a guideline are necessary in China.