Health Care Services Research Papers (original) (raw)

The aim of any health care service is to provide optimal quality care to clients and families regardless of their ethnic group. As today's Australian society comprises a multicultural population that encompasses clients with... more

The aim of any health care service is to provide optimal quality care to clients and families regardless of their ethnic group. As today's Australian society comprises a multicultural population that encompasses clients with different cultural norms and values, this study examined undergraduate nursing students' self-efficacy in providing transcultural nursing care. A sample of 196 nursing students enrolled in the first and fourth year of a pre-registration nursing program in a Western Australian University were invited to participate in a survey incorporating a transcultural self-efficacy tool (TSET) designed by Jeffery [Unpublished instrument copyrighted by author, 1994]. The findings revealed that fourth year students, exposed to increased theoretical information and clinical experience, had a more positive perception of their self-efficacy in providing transcultural nursing skills than the first year students. In addition, the study found that age, gender, country of birth, languages spoken at home and previous work experience did not influence the nursing students' perception of self-efficacy in performing transcultural care. The study supports the notion that educational preparation and relevant clinical experience is important in providing nursing students with the opportunity to develop self-efficacy in performing effective and efficient transcultural nursing in today's multicultural health care system. It is for this reason that educators need to focus on providing students with relevant theoretical information and ensure sufficient clinical exposure to support student learning in the undergraduate program.

The needs of breastfeeding women who work away from home differ from those of other women, particularly those who breastfeed exclusively. Sixty-nine factory workers were interviewed in Sao Paulo, both during pregnancy and when they... more

The needs of breastfeeding women who work away from home differ from those of other women, particularly those who breastfeed exclusively. Sixty-nine factory workers were interviewed in Sao Paulo, both during pregnancy and when they returned to work. Median durations of exclusive (EBF), predominant (PBF), and any breastfeeding (BF) were found to be 10 days, 70 days, and 150 days, respectively. Despite having used the 4-month leave to which they were entitled, by 1 month, 86% of the respondents had given tea, 50% water, and 42% artificial baby milk. Only 2 women were still exclusively breastfeeding when they returned to work. Various personal characteristics were associated with longer duration of breastfeeding. Maternity ward routines were generally not supportive, but duration of PBF was longer where better support was received. Duration of EBF was longer among women with support for breastfeeding at work, and shorter for those working on weekends or doing shift work. Thus, women may have adjusted their feeding patterns based on whether or not they anticipated workplace support. Only weekend work and socioeconomic status were linked to shorter duration of breastfeeding. Stronger social and health care support for EBF may be needed before the full impact of workplace support can be usefully studied in Brazil.

There is an essential need to provide a solution to reduce the elder care expenses according to growth in ratio of elderly population in the world and the high cost of health care services that are offered for each elderly person.... more

There is an essential need to provide a solution to reduce the elder care expenses according to growth in ratio of elderly population in the world and the high cost of health care services that are offered for each elderly person. Tele-homecare is one of the most appropriate solutions for this issue. The importance and necessity to provide a new

This is the first European study that has evaluated educational level in a large sample of hypertensive outpatients. We established the educational level of the hypertensive outpatients in our unit, and determined whether the awareness of... more

This is the first European study that has evaluated educational level in a large sample of hypertensive outpatients. We established the educational level of the hypertensive outpatients in our unit, and determined whether the awareness of hypertension and its organ damage was education-related. We analysed data from 812 consecutive outpatients (378 men, mean age 50 +/- 10 years) with essential stage I-II hypertension. Subjects were subdivided into two categories: group A subjects were highly educated; group B subjects had a little education. Data were compared with educational level from the 1991 population census for the Campania region (ISTAT data) and with 200 type 2 diabetes patients (96 men, mean age 51 +/- 9 years) from the nearest diabetes unit. For each hypertensive patient we considered clinical, echocardiographic and biochemical parameters. Data from the last census showed a high percentage (80%) of subjects with low education. The percentage of type 2 diabetic patients with little education was high (190 patients, 95%). Conversely, it is somewhat surprising that most hypertensive patients reached high standards of education and worked at sedentary jobs (group A: 736 patients, 91%; P < 0.0001). Multivariate analysis showed that only diastolic blood pressure (P = 0.03) was independently associated with low educational level. Compared to diabetes, hypertension and its risk factors are relatively unknown to people with little education. Education is associated with greater health care and awareness that may overcome the risk related to low physical activity. Thus, we stress the importance of a sound health policy able to reach out to the uneducated and make them aware of hypertension and the health care services available to them.

In this paper, novel integer programming formulations are developed for solving the optimal scheduling of patients waiting for radiotherapy treatment. In this specific clinical domain, the suitable management and control of a patients’... more

In this paper, novel integer programming formulations are developed for solving the optimal scheduling of patients waiting for radiotherapy treatment. In this specific clinical domain, the suitable management and control of a patients’ waiting list strongly affect both the quality of the therapeutical outcome, in terms of effectiveness, and the cost-saving use of the overall therapeutical resources, in terms of efficiency. The proposed models allow the best scheduling strategy to be devised by taking into account the quality of the health care service offered to the patient as well as the status and the preferences of the patient. The computational experiments, carried out on realistic scenarios and considering real data, are very promising and show the efficiency and robustness of the proposed models to address the problem under consideration.

Risk and protective factors of psychosocial development in children in different residential care settings need to be further studied internationally, in order to develop working methods for social and health care services. Standardized... more

Risk and protective factors of psychosocial development in children in different residential care settings need to be further studied internationally, in order to develop working methods for social and health care services. Standardized methods of the CBCL, TRF, and CGAS, were used to evaluate psychosocial functioning of children in children's homes in Finland. Further, data on sociodemographic situations and traumatic events in their lives were assembled. The percentage of behavioural and emotional problems within clinical or borderline range in the different ratings was 55–80%. Combined traumatization, sexual abuse, school difficulties, male sex, older age (>11 years) and older age at first and on-going placement (>7 years), as well as difficulties in relationships with parents are likely to be associated with more severe behaviour problems and lower general functioning. The results of this study show that children and adolescents in social service residential settings are a highly vulnerable group and that these children have extensive mental health needs.

The aim of this population-based study was to (1) describe living conditions and actual health care utilization among 85 year olds; (2) determine factors that affect hospital admissions in this age. The study was conducted on 85-year-old... more

The aim of this population-based study was to (1) describe living conditions and actual health care utilization among 85 year olds; (2) determine factors that affect hospital admissions in this age. The study was conducted on 85-year-old residents in Linköping municipality, Sweden. The data collected included medical records, health care utilization during the preceding 12 months and a postal questionnaire on assistance, assistive technology, functional impairment, feelings of loneliness, worries and health-related quality of life measured by the EQ-5D. Out of 650 eligible individuals, 496 (78% of those alive) participated. Despite the prevalence of multi-morbidity (68%) and mental discomfort, the majority managed self-care (85%), usual activities (74%) and had high (>60/100) self-rated health evaluated by a visual analog scale (VAS). The non-hospitalized group reported a better health status than the hospitalized group in terms of medical aspects, living conditions and subjectiv...

This article introduces a series of white papers developed by the ADEA Commission on Change and Innovation (CCI) to explore the case for change in dental education. This preamble to the series argues that there is a compelling need for... more

This article introduces a series of white papers developed by the ADEA Commission on Change and Innovation (CCI) to explore the case for change in dental education. This preamble to the series argues that there is a compelling need for rethinking the approach to dental education in the United States. Three issues facing dental education are explored: 1) the challenging financial environment of higher education, making dental schools very expensive and tuition-intensive for universities to operate and producing high debt levels for students that limit access to education and restrict career choices; 2) the profession's apparent loss of vision for taking care of the oral health needs of all components of society and the resultant potential for marginalization of dentistry as a specialized health care service available only to the affluent; and 3) the nature of dental school education itself, which has been described as convoluted, expensive, and often deeply dissatisfying to its s...

The world is experiencing a rapid rise in chronic health problems, which places an enormous burden on health care services. Modifiable health behaviors are largely responsible for this high prevalence and incidence of chronic diseases.... more

The world is experiencing a rapid rise in chronic health problems, which places an enormous burden on health care services. Modifiable health behaviors are largely responsible for this high prevalence and incidence of chronic diseases. This realization has made initiatives that promote healthy behaviors an international and interdisciplinary priority. How can nurses and other health care providers get the message across to their patients in order to maximize likelihood of leading to desired outcomes? Message tailoring is a well-established health communication approach shown to increase the persuasiveness of message effects in the promotion of healthy behaviors. Message framing is an effective message tailoring strategy that has been well-studied in the psychology literature over the past 20-plus years across a breadth of health behaviors while being severely understudied in the nursing literature. Numerous variables, especially those related to individual differences, have been sho...

Background This article aims to investigate the processes, actors and other influencing factors behind the development and the national scale-up of the One Stop Crisis Centre (OSCC) policy and the subsequent health model for... more

Background This article aims to investigate the processes, actors and other influencing factors behind the development and the national scale-up of the One Stop Crisis Centre (OSCC) policy and the subsequent health model for violence-response. Methods Methods used included policy analysis of legal, policy and regulatory framework documents, and in-depth interviews with key informants from governmental and non-governmental organisations in two States of Malaysia. Results The findings show that women's NGOs and health professionals were instrumental in the formulation and scaling-up of the OSCC policy. However, the subsequent breakdown of the NGO-health coalition negatively impacted on the long-term implementation of the policy, which lacked financial resources and clear policy guidance from the Ministry of Health. Conclusion The findings confirm that a clearly-defined partnership between NGOs and health staff can be very powerful for influencing the legal and policy environment in which health care services for intimate partner violence are developed. It is critical to gain high level support from the Ministry of Health in order to institutionalise the violence-response across the entire health care system. Without clear operational details and resources policy implementation cannot be fully ensured and taken to scale.

Although therapeutic itineraries have been studied in a variety of contexts, little research has investigated care-seekers’ quests for traditional medical treatments outside their own ethnic boundaries. The present study investigated 19... more

Although therapeutic itineraries have been studied in a variety of contexts, little research has investigated care-seekers’ quests for traditional medical treatments outside their own ethnic boundaries. The present study investigated 19 Igbo women seeking traditional cures from Ibibio indigenous healers in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria. Emerging data show that these Igbo women were uptaking Ibibio indigenous treatments primarily for health

The study on patient satisfaction at priyadarshini dental college and hospital are conducted to measure the level of satisfaction as well quality of dental care provided .the total 100 randomly patients... more

The study on patient satisfaction at priyadarshini
dental college and hospital are conducted to measure the
level of satisfaction as well quality of dental care provided
.the total 100 randomly patients were surveyed .a
questionnaire of 22 question were used to collect the
information from the patients, most of patients were satisfied
with the quality of care they received but some were
dissatisfied due to the unable to understand explanation of
treatment option provided by dental students and the long
waiting time for the treatment, patient satisfaction is key
determinant of quality of care.

Fewer men than women are diagnosed with depression, although commentaries about men's depression suggest that the lower reported rates may be due to the widespread use of generic diagnostic criteria that are not sensitive to depression in... more

Fewer men than women are diagnosed with depression, although commentaries about men's depression suggest that the lower reported rates may be due to the widespread use of generic diagnostic criteria that are not sensitive to depression in men, as well as men's reluctance to express concerns about their mental health or access professional health care services. This article provides an overview of the connections between depression and masculinities and, based on that literature, recommendations are made for how we might better understand, identify and treat men's depression in gender-sensitive ways.

Clinical pharmacology and clinical pharmacy bring together professionals who have fi rm grounding in the principles of drug therapy and who aim to improve the safety and effi cacy of treat- ments for the benefi ts of patients. However,... more

Clinical pharmacology and clinical pharmacy bring together professionals who have fi rm grounding in the principles of drug therapy and who aim to improve the safety and effi cacy of treat- ments for the benefi ts of patients. However, there are clear diff erences, typically in the undergraduate and less prominent in postgraduate education. Clinical pharmacologists and clinical pharmacists are

Mothers, newborns, and children are inseparably linked in life and in health care needs. In the past, maternal and child health policy and programmes tended to address the mother and child separately, resulting in gaps in care which... more

Mothers, newborns, and children are inseparably linked in life and in health care needs. In the past, maternal and child health policy and programmes tended to address the mother and child separately, resulting in gaps in care which especially affect newborn babies. How can these gaps be addressed, especially during birth and the first days of life, when most mothers

This study addressed the problem of determining the services provided by the RHUs in the municipalities of Aliaga, Licab, and Quezon and the factors that influence the delivery of these services. With the use of the descriptive method and... more

This study addressed the problem of determining the services provided by the RHUs in the municipalities of Aliaga, Licab, and Quezon and the factors that influence the delivery of these services. With the use of the descriptive method and employing a set of questionnaire, it was revealed that the three municipalities provide primary health care services but lack facilities for Level 1 hospital. Further, the factors of inadequate facilities, personnel complement, and unsound fiscal management affect the delivery of health care services to the residents in the municipalities concerned. From these findings, it was recommended that there should be a policy of the lead agency, the Department of Health, to prescribe penalties for the local governments to at least compel them to achieve the least requirement for healthcare provision. The healthcare services should be insulated from political control for it can be used as a tool for political gains. Finally, this study should serve as a ref...