It's in your hands : the value of handsearching in conducting systematic reviews of public health interventions

Background While there is an emerging evidence base in public health, the evidence can often be difficult to find. Indexing of journals in MEDLINE has assisted those conducting systematic reviews to more easily identify published studies. However, information technology and the processes associated with indexing are not infallible. Studies may not be correctly marked by study design which may mean they are missed in the electronic searching process. Handsearching for evidence of intervention effectiveness has therefore become a recognized tool in the systematic review process.

Methods Resources to guide handsearching activity currently are clinically focused, and may not be sensitive to the characteristics of public health studies where study terminology may differ. In response to this issue, the Cochrane Health Promotion and Public Health Field (the Field) developed and implemented a small study to recruit and support handsearchers from around the world to identify health promotion and public health trials and systematic reviews. A strategic framework was developed to recruit and support handsearchers to search six public health-related journals.

Results In total, 131 trials and 21 systematic reviews were identified. The greatest value of handsearching was found to be in supplement editions and abstract sections of journals

Conclusions The study focused exclusively on indexed journals with the intention that tools and methods developed could be used to explore the potential for handsearching in non-indexed journals and for unpublished studies. The findings from this study will continue to support handsearching efforts and in doing so contribute to high quality systematic reviews of public health interventions.

Children's mental health and wellbeing and hands-on contact with nature

Research on the health and wellbeing benefits of contact with animals and plants indicates the natural environment may have significant positive psychological and physiological effects on human health and wellbeing. In terms of children, studies have demonstrated that children function better cognitively and emotionally in 'green' environments and have more creative play. In Australia as well as internationally, many schools appear to be incorporating nature-based activities into their curricula, mostly via sustainability education. Although these programs appear to be successful, few have been evaluated, particularly in terms of the potential benefits to health and wellbeing. This paper reports on a pilot survey investigating the mental health benefits of contact with nature for primary school children in Melbourne, Australia. A survey of principals and teachers was conducted in urban primary schools within a 20km radius of Melbourne. As well as gathering data on the types and extent of environmental and other nature-based activities in the sample schools, items addressing the perceptions of principals and teachers of the potential effects of these activities on children's mental health and wellbeing were also included. Despite a lower than expected response rate, some interesting findings emerged. Although preliminary, results indicate that participants' perceptions of the benefits to mental health and wellbeing from participation in hands-on nature based activities at their school are positive and encompass many aspects of mental health.

Our health in our hands : building effective community partnerships for rural health service provision

This paper reports findings from a study in two small Tasmanian rural communities that examined the process of developing and sustaining partnerships between health services and their communities. It identifies a generic framework for partnership development that appears to be common to partnerships, regardless of their purpose or of partners involved. The framework comprises ten predictors or indicators of effectiveness, and a sequential nine-stage partnership development process. Integral to the framework are social capital, and the leadership practices of health service and community leaders. The influence of context on the partnership development process is also examined, with reference to historical precedent, age or maturity of the partnership, and community readiness.

Shaking hands on the fringe : negotiating the Aboriginal world at King George's Sound

In 1826 the British set up a garrison on the edges of an Aboriginal world at King George’s Sound, the site of present day Albany, Western Australia, with the aim of deterring the French from occupying the area.

The British newcomers and the area’s Indigenous inhabitants, the King Ya-nup, came to share a small space, forcing both cultures to adapt in order to communicate and interact with one another. Within this sphere associations and friendships were formed that were as surprising as they were unique.

This ethnographic history narrates several intimate cross-cultural stories of the developing relationships between British and Aboriginal individuals at King George’s Sound. The episodes recounted go beyond the common ‘friendly’ or ‘violent’ encounters, unearthing instead how and why particular King Ya-nup engaged with the British world, utilising the new presence to seeming advantage.

Shaking Hands on the Fringe presents innovative history writing and beautifully crafted prose in the tradition of Greg Dening and other writers of ethnographic history.

Despite the limited scope of the subject, the first two points liberate this book into a national (and international) interest: it is not a local book.

Shilpa’s filthy hands

The celebrity Big Brother race row centers, in part, on the preparation, handling and consumption of food. While the ritual of formal and informal dining is a key trope of the series, in this instance it is used to construct notions of difference and Otherness. Eating/not eating Indian becomes a symbol of purity and danger: of Shilpa's filthy natural self that somehow lurked beneath her glamorous exterior. If one eats Indian one is consuming the Other, with the potential to be taken over or spoiled by it. Shilpa, then, comes to stand for a complex and contradictory mix of Eastern/Oriental gender stereotypes. However, at the same time, the racialised grammar of representation used to mark her out as Other draws attention to the white bodies attempting to deny her wholeness. In choosing to eat/not eat Indian one opens up a dynamic space for an interrogation of whiteness to emerge. In fact, Jade, Jo, and Danielle become inferior signifiers of national identity in an age of global consumption. By contrast, Shilpa becomes 'surplus value', a supericonic sign that resists the name calling, fetishisation, marginalisation demanded by those on the show. The Big Brother race row may well be a text that directly speaks to the new post-colonial communication flows in place in the contemporary age.

Subjective and objective point of view as metaphor in Mitko Panov’s With Raised Hands

What are we watching here? What is the nature of our discomfort? The point of view established in the opening of With Raised Hands – through the lens of a German camera recording the round-up of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto – uncomfortably implicates us in this act of violence. The subsequent shifts in point of view are also supported by temporal shifts, both of which function at deeper, metaphorical levels to support the developing story.

Learning leadership is in your hands : toward a scholarship of teaching in practical legal training

A scholarship of teaching in post-graduate pre-admission practical legal training is germane to perceptions of the quality of accreditation of young Australian lawyers practicing in a globalised profession. Traditional forms of teaching scholarship in law have been identified as influencing the well being of law students and practitioners. This article reviews literature that frames a definition and prerequisites for a scholarship of teaching, its traditional and potential forms, and its subject matter. It considers the present position of a scholarship of teaching in practical legal training, and the historical and organisational epistemological approaches to professional practical training (compared to academic education) that shape that position. Problems of validity, measurement, performativity, and engagement in teaching scholarship are introduced, followed by consideration of possible methodological approaches drawing on Schon’s conception of action research, together with emergent methodologies, technologies and practical considerations that enable individual practitioners to pursue and lead a scholarship of teaching in practical legal training. The article frames questions for further doctoral research in relation to practical legal training teachers’ engagement with the scholarship of teaching.

Learning leadership is in your hands : toward a scholarship of teaching in practical legal training

This article seeks to promote discussion about scholarship of teaching in Australian postgraduate pre-admission practical legal training (PLT). This is germane to perceptions of the quality of accreditation of young Australian lawyers practicing in a globalised profession. The article gives a definition and outlines the prerequisites for scholarship of teaching. The present position of teacher engagement with scholarship of teaching in Australian PLT is considered, together with the historical and organisational epistemological approaches to professional practical training. Problems of validity, measurement, performativity, and engagement in teaching scholarship are discussed. Possible methodological approaches, including Schön’s conception of action research, together with other methodologies, technologies, and practical considerations, are considered. These discussion points are directed toward future exploration of PLT teachers’ engagement with, and leadership in, the scholarship of teaching in PLT.