13 research outputs found
Facilitating social coping-âseeking emotional and practical support from othersâ-as a critical strategy in maintaining the family care of people with dementia
The aim of this study was to identify how the family care of people living with dementia could be supported to make reliance on family care sustainable in the long term despite the impact of stress. A Realist Evaluation (Pawson & Tilley, 1997) was conducted to investigate this aim. An initial review established âcopingâ as a primary means of mediating stressors associated with caregiving. However, there was a need to specify which coping approaches/strategies are most effective. In-depth interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of family carers (n = 18) in a suburb in North East England from 2016 to 2017. Analysis of the data revealed âsocial copingâ (SC) that included an emotional support component as a critical mediator of family carer stress. Several key hindrances to the utilisation of SC, including underpinning causal factors, are explicated. Ways in which these hindrances might be overcome are discussed and guidelines introduced for how family carers, formal providers and practitioners can facilitate SC as a critical coping strategy in sustaining the family care of people with dementia over the long term
Alzheimer's Disease: The Resilience Approach to making the Family Care of People Living with Alzheimer's sustainable
With critical reliance on primary family carers of people living with Alzheimerâs disease (PWA) at an all-time high and set to increase markedly over the next few decades an urgent question concerns how this growing army of family carers will be supported in the future? The uniqueness and complexity of Alzheimerâs disease (AD) compared with other diseases and the myriad challenges it presents for family carers make such carers particularly vulnerable to the debilitating effects of chronic stress and its sequelae. The biopsychosocial pathways responsible for carer health deficits resulting from chronic exposure to the care environment are discussed. Further, a new epidemiological framework is introduced that attempts to capture how the dynamics at work within the AD care environment might lead it to become epidemiological in the sense that chronic exposure to it can uniquely generate carer disease outcomes. If the family care of PWA can potentially create an environment and dynamics within this that may be injurious to carers themselves, leading to premature cessation of informal care, a central issue for policy-makers and service providers concerns âwho will care for the carers and how?â
Although the present article primarily focuses on family carers of PWA, the knowledge that carersâ health has a relatively direct impact on the capacity to carry out caregiving, as well as influencing the levels of harmony or disequilibrium that exists within the care environment, crucially means that carersâ health also impacts on the wellbeing of PWA as part of a closely knit reciprocal relationship-they are mutually bound.
Further, while there is evidence to indicate that some family carers of PWA appear able to overcome the many challenges and potential attrition long-term care of a PWA can inflict on their own health, a further key question concerns how such carers manage despite adversity? What characteristics, assets and resources do these carers possess that perhaps sets them apart? Are there valuable lessons we can learn concerning how the family care of PWA might be made optimal while safeguarding family carersâ own health? This represents an important question since the vast majority of family carers, and moreover their care recipients, hope and desire to spend their final years, months, days together as a family rather than see their family member consigned to a formal institution. This article therefore argues the case for urgent public health action against the backdrop of the rising tide of AD globally.
Presently, there is a lack of any clear consensus concerning how more productive care environments might be created that better safeguard both family carersâ health and by association PWAâs health. Moreover, there is a need to move beyond syntheses of findings from the available literature that are limited to descriptive accounts based on âoutcomesâ and towards a deeper analysis of âprocess,â i.e. by focusing on what intrinsically âworksâ to support family carers of PWA and how these processes might be generated. In response, the present authors recently conducted a comprehensive Realist review of the current literature. How this review was conducted is briefly described, as are the broad findings that lead to the proposal of a new model of family care of PWA. The strengths and weaknesses of existing hypotheses are discussed for how carers can counteract the challenges to their own health that care of PWA can bring and a new hypothesis is proposed based on a Resilience approach to family care of PWA that links with humansâ âfight or flightâ response to stressors
Com o diabo no corpo: os terrĂveis papagaios do Brasil colĂŽnia
Desde a Antiguidade, papagaios, periquitos e afins (Psittacidae) fascinaram os europeus por seu vivo colorido e uma notĂĄvel capacidade de interação com seres humanos. A descoberta do Novo Mundo nada faria alĂ©m de acrescentar novos elementos ao trĂĄfico de animais exĂłticos hĂĄ muito estabelecido pelos europeus com a Ăfrica e o Oriente. Sem possuir grandes mamĂferos, a AmĂ©rica tropical participaria desse comĂ©rcio com o que tinha de mais atrativo, essencialmente felinos, primatas e aves - em particular os papagaios, os quais eram embarcados em bom nĂșmero. Contudo, a julgar pelos documentos do Brasil colĂŽnia, esses volĂĄteis podiam inspirar muito pouca simpatia, pois nenhum outro animal - exceto as formigas - foi tantas vezes mencionado como praga para a agricultura. AlĂ©m disso, alguns psitĂĄcidas mostravam-se tĂŁo loquazes que inspiravam a sĂ©ria desconfiança de serem animais demonĂacos ou possessos, pois sĂł trĂȘs classes de entidades - anjos, homens e demĂŽnios - possuĂam o dom da palavra. Nos dias de hoje, vĂĄrios representantes dos Psittacidae ainda constituem uma ameaça para a agricultura, enquanto os indivĂduos muito faladores continuam despertando a suspeita de estarem possuĂdos pelo demĂŽnio. Transcendendo a mera curiosidade, essa crença exemplifica o quĂŁo intrincadas podem ser as relaçÔes do homem com o chamado âmundo naturalâ, revelando um universo mais amplo e multifacetado do que se poderia supor a princĂpio. Nesse sentido, a existĂȘncia de aves capazes de falar torna essa relação ainda mais complexa e evidencia que as dificuldades de estabelecer o limite entre o animal e o humano se estendem alĂ©m dos primatas e envolvem as mais inusitadas espĂ©cies zoolĂłgicas.Since ancient times, parrots and their allies (Psittacidae) have fascinated Europeans by their striking colors and notable ability to interact with human beings. The discovery of the New World added new species to the international exotic animal trade, which for many centuries had brought beasts to Europe from Africa and the Orient. Lacking large mammals, tropical America participated in this trade with its most appealing species, essentially felines, primates and birds - especially parrots - which were shipped in large numbers. It should be noted, however, that at times these birds were not well liked. In fact, according to documents from colonial Brazil, only the ants rank higher than parrots as the animals most often mentioned as agricultural pests. On the other hand, some of these birds were so chatty that people suspected them to be demonic or possessed animals, since only three classes of beings - angels, men and demons - have the ability to speak. Nowadays, several Psittacidae still constitute a threat to agriculture, and the suspicion that extremely talkative birds were demon possessed has also survived. More than a joke or a mere curiosity, this belief exemplifies how intricate manâs relationships with the ânatural worldâ may be. In this sense, the existence of birds that are able to speak adds a further twist to these relationships, demonstrating that the problem of establishing a boundary between the animal and the human does not only involve primates, but also includes some unusual zoological species
An Anthology of Poetry by Saskatoon Poets
This anthology of poems, illustrated by artist's works and photographs, is described as an experiment in community poetry. Brief biographical notes on the contributors