Nurses' research utilization two years after graduation : a national survey ofassociated individual, organizational, and educational factors

Background. Nurses' research utilization (RU) as part of evidence-based practice is strongly emphasized in today's nursing education and clinical practice. The primary aim of RU is to provide high-quality nursing care to patients. Data on newly graduated nurses' RU are scarce, but a predominance of low use has been reported in recent studies. Factors associated with nurses' RU have previously been identified among individual and organizational/contextual factors, but there is a lack of knowledge about how these factors, including educational ones, interact with each other and with RU, particularly in nurses during the first years after graduation. The purpose of this study was therefore to identify factors that predict the probability for low RU among registered nurses two years after graduation. Methods. Data were collected as part of the LANE study (Longitudinal Analysis of Nursing Education), a Swedish national survey of nursing students and registered nurses. Data on nurses' instrumental, conceptual, and persuasive RU were collected two years after graduation (2007, n = 845), together with data on work contextual factors. Data on individual and educational factors were collected in the first year (2002) and last term of education (2004). Guided by an analytic schedule, bivariate analyses, followed by logistic regression modeling, were applied. Results. Of the variables associated with RU in the bivariate analyses, six were found to be significantly related to low RU in the final logistic regression model: work in the psychiatric setting, role ambiguity, sufficient staffing, low work challenge, being male, and low student activity. Conclusions. A number of factors associated with nurses' low extent of RU two years postgraduation were found, most of them potentially modifiable. These findings illustrate the multitude of factors related to low RU extent and take their interrelationships into account. This knowledge might serve as useful input in planning future studies aiming to improve nurses', specifically newly graduated nurses', RU.

Unlicensed personnel administering medications to older persons living at home : a challenge for social and care services

BACKGROUND: Administration of medication to care recipients is delegated to home-care assistants working in the municipal social care, alongside responsibility for providing personal assistance for older people. Home-care assistants have practical administration skills, but lack formal medical knowledge. AIM: The aim of this study was to explore how home-care assistants perceive administration of medication to older people living at home, as delegated to them in the context of social care. METHODS: Four focus groups consisting of 19 home-care assistants were conducted. Data were analysed using qualitative content analysis. RESULTS: According to home-care assistants, health and social care depends on delegation arrangements to function effectively, but in the first place it relieves a burden for district nurses. Even when the delegation had expired, administration of medication continued, placing the statutes of regulation in a subordinate position. There was low awareness among home-care assistants about the content of the statutes of delegation. Accepting delegation to administer medications has become an implicit prerequisite for social care work in the municipality. CONCLUSIONS: Accepting the delegation to administer medication was inevitable and routine. In practice, the regulating statute is made subordinate and consequently patient safety can be threatened. The organisation of health and social care relies on the delegation arrangement to meet the needs of a growing number of older home-care recipients. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: This is a crucial task which management within both the healthcare professions and municipal social care needs to address, to bridge the gap between statutes and practice, to create arenas for mutual collaboration in the care recipients' best interest and to ensure patient safety.

Property rights as a public policy tool: an empirical analysis of the social and economic effects

Secure property rights are considered a key determinant of economic development. However, the evaluation of the causal effects of land titling is a difficult task. The Brazilian government through a program called "Papel Passado" has issued titles, since 2004, to over 85,000 families and has the goal to reach 750,000. Furthermore, another topic in Public Policy that is crucial to developing economies is income generation and child labor force participation. Particularly, in Brazil, about 5.4 million children and teenagers between 5 and 17 years old are still working. This thesis examines the direct impact of securing a property title on income and child labor force participation. In order to isolate the causal role of ownership security, this study uses a comparison between two close and very similar communities in the City of Osasco case (a town with 650,000 people in the São Paulo metropolitan area). One of them, Jardim Canaã, was fortunated to receive the titles in 2007, the other, Jardim DR, given fiscal constraints, only will be part of the program schedule in 2012, and for that reason became the control group. Also, this thesis also aims to test if there is any relationship between land title and happiness. The estimates suggest that titling results in a substantial decrease of child labor force participation, increase of income and happiness for the families that received the title compared to the others.

Social and entrepreneurial values profiles

O empreendedor tem intrigado acadêmicos há anos. Portanto, inúmeras abordagens têm sido aplicadas para entender quem é o empreendedor, sua personalidade e comportamentos. As principais escolas de estudo sobre o tema são a escola de traços psicológicos e a escola de processos ou comportamentos. No entanto, a academia ainda carece de uma definição concreta do indivíduo responsável pelo fenômeno do empreendedorismo. Em uma tentativa de esclarecer essa questão esta pesquisa sugere uma nova abordagem para a compreensão da pessoa do empreendedor com base nos valores pessoais de Schwartz. O objetivo da tese é compreender o perfil de valores de empreendedores sociais e comerciais a fim de determinar as semelhanças e diferenças nas suas preferências de valores que orientam o comportamento empreendedor de ambos e o enfoque social de um e privado do outro. Para este fim a versão mais curta do Questionário de Perfil Valores de Schwartz foi aplicada a uma amostra de 44 empreendedores sociais e 71 comerciais. A primeira proposição da tese era que os empreendedores sociais e comerciais possuiriam um perfil de valores. A segunda era que este perfil de valores seria determinado pelo princípio organizador da ansiedade com preferência pelos valores “livres de ansiedade” em decorrência das características empreendedoras que enfatizam busca pela auto-expansão, crescimento e promoção do alcance de metas. Dessa forma os valores mais importantes para ambos os tipos de empreendedores seriam auto-determinação, estimulação, hedonismo, universalismo e benevolência. A terceira proposição era que os empreendedores sociais e comerciais atribuiriam a mais alta importância ao valor auto-determinação. A quarta propunha que os empreendedores sociais dariam maior importância do que os comerciais para benevolência e universalismo visto que esses valores presumem apreciação pelos outros, preservação e valorização do bem-estar das pessoas mais próximas bem como de qualquer ser vivo em geral. Os resultados das análises descritivas e dos testes de hipóteses apontam para a validação de todas as proposições menos a última. No entanto, apesar da quarta proposição não haver sido estatisticamente comprovada, houve uma leve tendência dos empreendedores sociais darem maior importância do que os comerciais aos valores de auto-transcendência. Conseqüentemente, para maiores esclarecimentos sobre esse tópico, outros estudos com amostras maiores e randômicas devem ser realizadas.

Geographic and Educational Factors and Risk of the First Peritonitis Episode in Brazilian Peritoneal Dialysis Study (BRAZPD) Patients

Background and objectives Peritonitis remains as the most frequent cause of peritoneal dialysis (PD) failure, impairing patient's outcome. No large multicenter study has addressed socioeconomic, educational, and geographic issues as peritonitis risk factors in countries with a large geographic area and diverse socioeconomic conditions, such as Brazil.Design, setting, participants, & measurements Incident PD patients recruited from 114 dialysis centers and reporting to BRAZPD, a multicenter observational study, from December 2004 through October 2007 were included. Clinical, dialysis-related, demographic, and socioeconomic variables were analyzed. Patients were followed up until their first peritonitis. Cox proportional model was used to determine independent factors associated with peritonitis.Results In a cumulative follow-up of 2032 patients during 22.026 patient-months, 474 (23.3%) presented a first peritonitis episode. In contrast to earlier findings, PD modality, previous hemodialysis, diabetes, gender, age, and family income were not risk predictors. Factors independently associated with increased hazard risk were lower educational level, non-white race, region where patients live, shorter distance from dialysis center, and lower number of patients per center.Conclusions Educational level and geographic factors as well as race and center size are associated with risk for the first peritonitis, independent of socioeconomic status, PD modality, and comorbidities. Clin J Am Soc Nephrol 6: 1944-1951, 2011. doi: 10.2215/CJN.11431210

Alcoholic women and men: a comparative study of social and familial aspects and outcome

Objetivos: A proporção de ocorrência de alcoolismo em homens e mulheres tem uma variação de 14:1 até 2:1, mostrando a necessidade de estudos específicos para a população feminina. O objetivo deste estudo foi analisar o perfil e a evolução de alcoolistas, segundo gênero e gravidade da dependência. Métodos: Realizou-se um estudo longitudinal retrospectivo de 114 homens e 57 mulheres alcoolistas (CID-10), inscritos no ambulatório da Faculdade de Medicina de Botucatu, no período de 1990-1994 e avaliados até julho de 1997. Utilizou-se um questionário semi-estruturado, e, para avaliação da gravidade do alcoolismo, o Short Alcohol Dependence Data. Resultados/Conclusões: Os principais resultados mostraram que a estrutura familiar estava comprometida com: relacionamento difícil para 55,6% das mulheres e 65,7% dos homens; violência familiar em 74,1% das mulheres e 61,1% dos homens. As mulheres iniciaram a ingestão mais tarde que os homens (p=0,01), em geral com seus cônjuges (p=0,00). Não houve diferença de evolução no tratamento entre os gêneros. Os principais fatores associados à melhor resposta ao tratamento, independentemente do sexo, foram: nível de gravidade de dependência do álcool (dependentes leves e moderados apresentaram 5,59 vezes mais chances de melhorar do que os dependentes graves); ser praticante de alguma religião (2,3 vezes mais chances de melhora do que os pacientes que não eram praticantes); e tempo de seguimento no programa, negativamente correlacionado a chances de melhora (0,68 vezes menos chances de melhora que aqueles que permaneceram por tempo menor em tratamento).

Social and financial aspects of the artisanal fisheries of Middle Sao Francisco River, Minas Gerais, Brazil

The presence or absence of motorized boats, partnerships and multispecies catches characterize the fisheries of Sao Francisco River, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Fishing activity based on 109 interviews, carried out in the wet (high water: February and March) and dry (low water: July and August) seasons, with professional fishermen are described. Aiming to identify the fishery income components, a covariance model was proposed, with the income as the response variable, related to the factors: fishing ground, use of motorized or paddle boat; seasonality; presence of fishing assistant, and the following covariates: capture in weight in the week Frier to the interview, fisherman experience in yrs; and distance (km) travelled for fishing. The results indicated that the main contributions to income were the absence of an engine (because of high price of the fuel), the absence of a partner (because of low capture) and the amount of fish caught by the fishermen.

Psychophysical power functions for estimates of area: Effects of age and educational levels

The purpose of the present study was to verify the memory exponents of power function for area in observers of different age and educational levels (elementary school, high school or undergraduate school), using the psychophysics method of magnitude estimation. For the age level I (17 to 30 years old) there was no difference among educational levels, although for the age level II (45 to 60 years old) the differences were significant. Tn the age level II, there was a tendency for greater variability of the responses for lower educational levels. The data obtained for the age level I did not show the same results, although a significant difference among the three educational levels was observed. We call conclude that the mnemonic processes present different results when we observe the answers from observers with different ages. This result leads us to suppose that the motivational factor related to the stimulus used can interact with the mnemonic processes.

Caries experience associated to social and preventive factors in children of a pastoral community from Limeira-SP

Aim: To evaluate caries experience and prevalence associated to social and preventive factors in 3-6-year-old children of a Pastoral Community from Limeira, Brazil. Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out through an epidemiologic research about the oral conditions of 110 children registered at the Children's Pastoral Community from the city of Limeira, SP, Brazil. Intraoral examination was performed by a trained dentist and the parents/caregivers filled out a questionnaire in order to outline the children's profile with respect to gender, parental education and oral health. Results: Differences related to gender were not detected (p= 0.3404). The most frequent periods of breastfeeding were 0 to 2 months (36.36%) and 2 to 6 months (35.45%), corresponding to 71.81% of the cases. The time bottle feeding pointed to two most frequent categories: 1) more than 12 months (35.45%) and 2) between 2 and 6 months (22.63%). Regarding parental education, the majority of the sample has not completed primary school (38.32%). It was observed a larger number of decayed teeth in male children (63.39%). Caries experience was significantly higher in children who were breastfed for only 2 months of life (41.96%). Children that did not use baby bottle or did not use a baby bottle for more than 1 year presented a smaller dmft, corresponding to 29.17% and 28.33%, respectively. Time of use of bottle and pacifier presented a significant association (p<0.05). Conclusions: The implementation of adequate strategies and actions is needed to reinforce oral health conditions in risk groups.

Model for analysing the social and economic impact of child undernutrition in Latin America

Includes bibliography

Sociodemographic vulnerability in the Caribbean: an examination of the social and demographic impediments to equitable development with participatory citizenship in the Caribbean at the dawn of the twenty-first century

Includes bibliography

Relationship between social and economic institutions: a theoretical model applicable to Latin America

Includes bibliography

Social and economic problems in Cuba during the crisis and subsequent recovery

Includes bibliography

Chile: academic performance and educational management under a rigid employment regime

Includes bibliography

Poverty reduction in Latin America: the role of demographic, social and economic factors

Includes bibliography