Cross-sectional analysis of association between socioeconomic status and utilization of primary total hip joint replacements 2006-7 : Australian orthopaedic association national joint replacement registry

Background The utilization of total hip replacement (THR) surgery is rapidly increasing, however few data examine whether these procedures are associated with socioeconomic status (SES) within Australia. This study examined primary THR across SES for both genders for the Barwon Statistical Division (BSD) of Victoria, Australia.

Methods Using the Australian Orthopaedic Association National Joint Replacement Registry data for 2006–7, primary THR with a diagnosis of osteoarthritis (OA) among residents of the BSD was ascertained. The Index of Relative Socioeconomic Disadvantage was used to measure SES; determined by matching residential addresses with Australian Bureau of Statistics census data. The data were categorised into quintiles; quintile 1 indicating the most disadvantaged. Age- and sex-specific rates of primary THR per 1,000 person years were reported for 10-year age bands using the total population at risk.

Results Females accounted for 46.9% of the 642 primary THR performed during 2006–7. THR utilization per 1,000 person years was 1.9 for males and 1.5 for females. The highest utilization of primary THR was observed in those aged 70–79 years (males 6.1, and females 5.4 per 1,000 person years). Overall, the U-shaped pattern of THR across SES gave the appearance of bimodality for both males and females, whereby rates were greater for both the most disadvantaged and least disadvantaged groups.

Conclusions Further work on a larger scale is required to determine whether relationships between SES and THR utilization for the diagnosis of OA is attributable to lifestyle factors related to SES, or alternatively reflects geographic and health system biases. Identifying contributing factors associated with SES may enhance resource planning and enable more effective and focussed preventive strategies for hip OA.

Editorial : In Australian Journal of Communication, v.38 n.3

Edition of journal guest-edited by Martin Hirst (Deakin), Wayne Hope and Alan Cocker (AUT UNiversity). Papers collected from conference organised by Centre for Journalism, Media & Democracy (JMAD). Ten of the eleven articles here were originally presented to the Political Economy of Communication conference held at the Auckland University of Technology in September 2011. This international event was organised by Journalism, Media and Democracy (JMAD), a research centre co-founded by Martin Hirst and Wayne Hope in May 2010. The founding objectives were to foster individual research projects for members; develop opportunities for collaborative, funded research projects; and arrange interdisciplinary media conferences. In September 2010, JMAD launched an inaugural one-day conference: Media, Democracy and the Public Sphere. The success of this undertaking
encouraged the centre to plan for a second, two-day conference in 2011. The invited keynote speakers, Professors Graham Murdock, Dwayne Winseck, and Janet Wasko were, and are, distinguished scholars in the political economy of communication.
They have also given identity and purpose to their field within the annual International
Association of Communication Research (IAMCR) conference, which includes a longstanding political economy of communication section. Contributors to this section are featured in the book reviewed for this issue, Wasko, J., Murdock, G., & Sousa, H. (2011). The handbook of political economy of communications.

Leaning towards collegiality: narratives of university communities of practice

This study explored the relationship between professional learning, community, narrative and identity in strategic communities established to enhance teaching and learning at three Australian universities. It adds to the field by proposing an adaptive model for understanding and fostering future communities of practice in higher education.

'Of course I didn't work … only when I had to': narratives of women's working lives and what really counted

There was a long-held belief, that, prior to the 1970s, women were no longer involved in paid labour once they were married or began to have children. Official statistics also supported this particular national narrative. This paper argues that this narrative did not accurately reflect the historical situation because the methods used to determine who worked and when did not fully capture all of women's paid labour at the time. This is reflected in a small study of older women and their recollections of paid employment. Some women initially claimed that they did no paid work after marriage, but with low key, in-depth and persistent questioning, it became clear that many women did work in an unofficial capacity (in the black economy) or alongside their husbands in their paid employment. This is a preliminary study that underlines the importance of life-course narratives in the social sciences to delve deeply into women's memories and thus their experiences.

Transforming narratives of colonial danger: imagining the environments of New Zealand and Australia in children's literature, 1862–1899

Nineteenth-century British children’s literature set in Australia and New Zealand fixates on the dangers of colonial environments. This chapter examines four British novels of the period, observing the ways in which they manifest elements of ecological imperialism and environmental racism in order to depict successful settlement. It compares these novels with fantasy fictions by Australian and New Zealand children’s authors that constitute more complicated attempts both to understand and co-exist with the natural environment. The chapter proposes that by the 1890s earlier British anxieties had dissipated in popular Australian and New Zealand fiction, in which child protagonists were newly charged with the ability to interpret and control nature.