South East London Palliative and End of Life Care Education and Training Strategy: Meeting the Education and Training Needs of the Health & Social Care Workforce Involved in the Care of Patients and Carers at the End of Life.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Aims 1. The aims of this strategy are • to ensure that a full range of education and training related to the adult end of life care pathway is available across South East London to meet the needs of our health and social care workforce • to enable those responsible for end of life care education and training commissioning to procure comprehensively from a full range of education providers in a systematic and strategic manner. Background 2. The work that underpins this strategy was begun by the South East London Cancer Network via its Palliative and End of Life Care Coordinating Group and then developed by way of the Marie Curie Delivering Choice Programme’s Education and Training work stream.

Meeting the emotional needs of parents who have a child with complex needs

The physical and financial demands of caring for a child with complex needs are acknowledged by health professionals. However the emotional needs of parents are not often recognised by health professionals until parents are at a heightened level of stress. This paper is based on a literature review of current articles, research papers and government documentation. The focus is on how health professionals, and nurses in particular should meet the emotional needs of parents who have child with complex needs, particularly at the point of diagnosis. Giving birth to a child with severe health problems impacts upon parents at an emotional time of transition, particularly if there were no concerns identified during pregnancy. For some parents a grief response or state of chronic sorrow may be triggered. The reality of caring for a baby who is critically ill or disabled can be an enormous and unexpected shock for both parents. Parents need emotional support and guidance, as they may have to change their expectations for their child’s development and even life span. Primary support often comes from parent support groups rather than health professionals. The review discusses how home visits, practical help and early support can all help to alleviate stress. It is important for nurses to realise that if parents’ emotional needs are unmet they can lead to clinical depression or mental illness. This literature review looks at the emotional impact on parents and explores how nurses can address this issue in order to support parents more effectively. It identifies key areas that nurses could address that would help alleviate parents’ emotional stress.

Absence makes the professional try harder? Meeting the needs of socially excluded young men who become fathers

Research on socially excluded young fathers has been minimally addressed in the literature (SEU 1999, 2004). Indeed, research on young parents which informs health and social care professionals is often presented ‘through the eyes of the mother’ (Reeves 2006). Young parents in general and young fathers in particular are notoriously difficult to gain access to and engage with (Tyrer et al 2005) particularly if they have had previous negative involvement with the statutory services. Moreover, as Daniel and Taylor (1999, 2001, 2003) point out, professionals working in the health and care services often have an intense ‘maternal’ focus and this often excludes fathers from discussion and decisions about their children. The focus of this paper, drawing on two narrative studies of young fathers aged between 15-24 from the US and USA, is to evaluate the features of professional relationships that young fathers describe as finding helpful. Indeed, the findings discuss moving away from a culture of parenting classes, which all the young men interviewed described as finding problematical and in some cases embarrassing, to a culture of support which actively draws on their strengths and helps them become providers for their new families.

Safety issues with the South African Pebble Bed Modular Reactor: when were the issues apparent? A briefing paper

This is a briefing report on when the safety issues identified in a July 2008 report by Jülich should have become apparent In July 2008, the German Jülich nuclear research centre published a report entitled ‘A safety re-evaluation of the AVR pebble bed reactor operation and its consequences for future HTR concepts.’ It concluded: ‘pebble bed HTRs require additional safety related R&D effort and updating of safety analyses before construction.’

Meeting the health needs of people with learning disabilities: guidance for nursing staff

This guide has been produced to support registered nurses and nursing students in primary and secondary care, who are trained in branches other than learning disabilities, to deliver high quality health care to people with learning disabilities.

What serious game studios want from ICT research: identifying developers’ needs

Although many scholars recognise the great potential of games for teaching and learning, the EU-based industry for such “serious” games” is highly fragmented and its growth figures remain well behind those of the leisure game market. Serious gaming has been designated as a priority area by the European Commission in its Horizon 2020 Framework Programme for Research and Innovation. The RAGE project, which is funded as part of the Horizon 2020 Programme, is a technology-driven research and innovation project that will make available a series of self-contained gaming software modules that support game studios in the development of serious games. As game studios are a critical factor in the uptake of serious games, the RAGE projects will base its work on their views and needs as to achieve maximum impact. This paper presents the results of a survey among European game studios about their development related needs and expectations. The survey is aimed at identifying a baseline reference for successfully supporting game studios with advanced ICTs for serious games.

The evaluation of time series: their scientific value and contribution to policy needs. Occasional Publication of the Marine Biological Association 22

In 2000 a Review of Current Marine Observations in relation to present and future needs was undertaken by the Inter-Agency Committee for Marine Science and Technology (IACMST). The Marine Environmental Change Network (MECN) was initiated in 2002 as a direct response to the recommendations of the report. A key part of the current phase of the MECN is to ensure that information from the network is provided to policy makers and other end-users to enable them to produce more accurate assessments of ecosystem state and gain a clearer understanding of factors influencing change in marine ecosystems. The MECN holds workshops on an annual basis, bringing together partners maintaining time-series and long-term datasets as well as end-users interested in outputs from the network. It was decided that the first workshop of the MECN continuation phase should consist of an evaluation of the time series and data sets maintained by partners in the MECN with regard to their ‘fit for purpose’ for answering key science questions and informing policy development. This report is based on the outcomes of the workshop. Section one of the report contains a brief introduction to monitoring, time series and long-term datasets. The various terms are defined and the need for MECN type data to complement compliance monitoring programmes is discussed. Outlines are also given of initiatives such as the United Kingdom Marine Monitoring and Assessment Strategy (UKMMAS) and Oceans 2025. Section two contains detailed information for each of the MECN time series / long-term datasets including information on scientific outputs and current objectives. This information is mainly based on the presentations given at the workshop and therefore follows a format whereby the following headings are addressed: Origin of time series including original objectives; current objectives; policy relevance; products (advice, publications, science and society). Section three consists of comments made by the review panel concerning all the time series and the network. Needs or issues highlighted by the panel with regard to the future of long-term datasets and time-series in the UK are shown along with advice and potential solutions where offered. The recommendations are divided into 4 categories; ‘The MECN and end-user requirements’; ‘Procedures & protocols’; ‘Securing data series’ and ‘Future developments’. Ever since marine environmental protection issues really came to the fore in the 1960s, it has been recognised that there is a requirement for a suitable evidence base on environmental change in order to support policy and management for UK waters. Section four gives a brief summary of the development of marine policy in the UK along with comments on the availability and necessity of long-term marine observations for the implementation of this policy. Policy relating to three main areas is discussed; Marine Conservation (protecting biodiversity and marine ecosystems); Marine Pollution and Fisheries. The conclusion of this section is that there has always been a specific requirement for information on long-term change in marine ecosystems around the UK in order to address concerns over pollution, fishing and general conservation. It is now imperative that this need is addressed in order for the UK to be able to fulfil its policy commitments and manage marine ecosystems in the light of climate change and other factors.

Apparent Specific Dynamic Action In Mytilus-Edulis L

The results of experiments recorded by Bayne & Scullard (1977) confirmed earlier studies (Bayne, 1973) in describing a decline in the rate of oxygen uptake (Vo2) by Mytilus edulis during starvation, eventually reaching a steady-state value, called the standard rate of oxygen consumption. Earlier experiments had also shown that if such starved mussels were fed, oxygen uptake increased rapidly to a high level called the active rate of oxygen consumption (Thompson & Bayne, 1972; Bayne, Thompson & Widdows, 1973). Some of this increase in metabolic rate is undoubtedly due to an increased filtration rate that is stimulated by the presence of food (the ‘mechanical cost of feeding’ discussed by Bayne et al. 1976), and part is due to the ‘physiological costs of feeding’, which includes energy utilized in digestion and assimilation of the food, and energy that is lost during deamination and other catabolic processes that accompany digestion (Warren & Davis, 1967). Increases in metabolic rate associated with feeding have been called the specific dynamic action (SDA) of the ration (see Harper, 1971, for a discussion) or the apparent SDA (Beamish, 1974)5 and they have been related to aspects of protein metabolism (Krebs, 1964). This paper describes the results of some experiments designed to examine the relationships between SDA and ammonia excretion in Mytilus edulis L.