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Liam Sasser was no stranger to research when he arrived at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation last month for the John H. Saxon Service Academy Summer Research Program.
Read more(This story was produced in partnership with the Oklahoma nonprofit newsroom The Frontier).
Read moreI once watched a movie about people trapped in a New York City subway tunnel, and above all, they knew to avoid the third rail. Electrically powered subways derive their power through contact with a high voltage rail (very deadly) located between the train tracks, and this is where we get the term “third-rail” in politics.
Read moreTop Story – Inflation Down, Economy Rises Report Reveals
Read moreIt is the busiest travel season of the year, and Paralyzed Veterans of America (PVA) is warning that airplane travel is often inhumane and dangerous for many people with disabilities.The warning comes as reports link a California woman’s death to complications after an airline broke her custommade wheelchair, causing her to spend weeks in a loaner chair and possibly leading to a deadly pressure sore.Broken wheelchairs are common, as well as injuries from improper transfers to and from airline seats, and no access to inflight restrooms, according to PVA, an organization that has advocated for veterans and all people with disabilities for 75 years.Paralyzed Marine Veteran Charles Brown, the national president of PVA, was critically injured two years ago when airline personnel improperly transferred him from his power wheelchair into an aisle chair to board a plane. Airline contractors, who were inadequately trained, dropped him onto the jet bridge, fracturing his tailbone and causing a serious infection in his spine that doctors say he was lucky to survive. Now Brown is leading the charge for change.”It is unacceptable that 35 years after the legislation was passed someone in a wheelchair still cannot access a bathroom on an airplane and risks serious injury or death because airline personnel are not properly trained,” Brown says.”These are basic safety and civil rights issues, and every American should be outraged at the inhumane circumstances paralyzed veterans and millions of others with disabilities are forced to deal with to travel on an airplane,” adds Brown.Air travel is subject to different regulations than public spaces on land, and PVA says air travel is the top complaint heard from its members. It’s been 35 years since the Air Carrier Access Act was passed, which legally began the move toward accessible air travel, but PVA says the industry is still decades behind in safety accommodations, particularly for wheelchair users.PVA is leading the fight to demand safer, more accessible airline travel for people with disabilities and is asking the public to join them by signing their petition at PVA.org/ AirTravel. The nonprofit organization is pushing for new legislation demanding stricter standards for accessibility on planes and better enforcement of the law.These issues potentially affect 65 million Americans with disabilities, which could include you or someone in your family in the future.These issues potentially affect 65 million Americans with disabilities, which could include you or someone in your family in the future. To learn more about accessible travel, sign PVA’s petition, and join their fight, visit PVA.org/ AirTravel.
Read moreRetirement is a milestone that is often the byproduct of decades of hard work. Though a growing number of working professionals have no intention of ever retiring, the vast majority of adults look forward to the day when they can call it a career.
Read moreProstate cancer is an illness that develops in the prostate gland, which is found only in males. Other than skin cancer, prostate cancer is the second most common type of cancer among American and Canadian men. It also is the second-leading cause of cancer death among men after lung cancer in the United States and the third-leading among men in Canada.
Read moreTechnology may have changed the way people shop, but when it comes to customer service, consumers still want a more traditional way to ask questions or voice concerns. The Drift and SurveyMonkey Audience 2019 State of Conversational Marketing report found that, among 1,000 survey respondents, 39 percent indicated they had a good customer service experience with an online chat platform. Such positive experiences were far less frequent with chatbots, as only 16 percent of respondents indicated they had good customer service interactions with these widely utilized programs designed to simulate conversations with human users. Survey respondents indicated live chats with human beings outperformed chatbots because communication with humans was easier and more convenient. But chatbots still have a place in customer service solutions, as forecasters predict they will provide an avenue to considerable revenue in the years to come. In fact, one estimate from Juniper Research indicates that chatbots are expected to drive more than $112 billion in retail sales by 2023. That’s no small feat, as retail sales from chatbot interactions were estimated to total $7.3 billion in 2019. The meteoric rise in estimated sales from chatbot-related interactions underscores how profitable these services can be if used correctly.
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