Elena De la Poza

Modelling the consumption of anxiolytics and its addictive behaviour

Background: Population-based anxiolytics consumption (AX) is a widely debated subject because long-term AX may lead to tolerance and addiction. This study aims to obtain mathematical models that identify the various behaviours in AX prescription in accordance with gender, age and the continuous prescription of other drugs associated with chronic diseases. Methods: Data were obtained from an electronic prescriptions database (n=12,211,992) received by patients (n=504,224) visiting the Primary Health Care Centres in the province of Castellon (East Spain) in 2009. A linear regression model was used to explain the number of defined daily doses (DDD) of AX prescribed in accordance with age, gender and more than 5 prescriptions of any drug associated with chronic diseases other than AX. We used the logistic regression model to quantify the joint influence of the explanatory variables on the likelihood (L) of prescribing increasingly high DDD of AX. Results: The mean annual DDD per patient was 133.13, and the DDD prescribed was 38.06 day/1000 inhabitants. Few differences, although significant, in prescriptions per gender were observed; males received fewer prescriptions than females. Conversely, differences in age groups were substantial; the older subjects become, the higher the prescribed DDD, although these differences disappeared after the age of 65. AX use was also positively associated with the presence of comorbidity: depression, psychosis and epilepsy. Sporadic AX prescriptions were not associated with any factor, except continuous use. Conclusions: The prevalence of prescribing AX in the general population visiting the primary health centres in Castellon is over 16%. Prescriptions and the DDD of AX are barely higher for females than for males, and age is the most influential factor; the older the patient, the higher the number of prescribed DDD. The likelihood of potentially addictive behaviours is higher among the elderly and patients with comorbidity, mainly those patients with other chronic psychiatric conditions.

A Short-Term Population Model of the Suicide Risk: The Case of Spain

A relevant proportion of deaths by suicide have been attributed to other causes that produce the number of suicides remains hidden. The existence of a hidden number of cases is explained by the nature of the problem. Problems like this involve violence, and produce fear and social shame in victims’ families. The existence of violence, fear and social shame experienced by victims favours a considerable number of suicides, identified as accidents or natural deaths. This paper proposes a short time discrete compartmental mathematical model to measure the suicidal risk for the case of Spain. The compartment model classifies and quantifies the amount of the Spanish population within the age intervals (16, 78) by their degree of suicide risk and their changes over time. Intercompartmental transits are due to the combination of quantitative and qualitative factors. Results are computed and simulations are performed to analyze the sensitivity of the model under uncertain coefficients.

The impact of Internet on the artist reputation

This work analyzes the relationship between the digital information provided by the search engine Google on the Internet and the volume of sales or revenues in the art market in order to quantify the variable artists reputation. In particular, the usefulness of digital media information is analyzed to interpret past sales in the art market or, conversely, to estimate future sales in the short term. Finally, we study the ability of digital information to explain the volume of activity (number of lots sold) or what is the same the degree of liquidity of the secondary market of artworks.

Analyzing premium risk behavior of European retail distribution companies in the period 2010-2015.

This study is a practical case to determine the behavior of companies quoting at different stock markets and comparing those with their respective market indices. Sharpe’s methodology is applied to identify the market line that measures the relationship between each stock value and the market trends. The objective is to identify behavior patters of the selectedcompanies, quantifying its level of dependence with the market movements. Finally, the assets are classified according to their Beta values as aggressive, defensive and neutral. This study is useful for the financial agents when selecting assets of investment according to the investors risk profile. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4995/ICBM.2015.1375

Corrigendum to “Preface: The challenge of modelling aggregated human behaviour” [Math. Comput. Modelling 57 (2013) 1617–1618]

Corrigendum Corrigendum to ‘‘Preface: The challenge of modelling aggregated human behaviour’’ [Math. Comput. Modelling 57 (2013) 1617–1618] Lucas Jodar a, Elena de la Poza b, Juan Carlos Cortes a, Luis Acedo a,∗ a Instituto Universitario de Matematica Multidisciplinar, Universitat Politecnica de Valencia, Spain b Departamento de Economia y Ciencias Sociales, Universitat Politecnica de Valencia, Spain