Helping community-based students on a final consolidation placement make the transition to registered practice.

The pressure of role transition on new nurse registrants has affected recruitment and retention, which, along with an ageing workforce, has resulted in a global shortage of nurses that is now reaching crisis point. This article examines and discusses what can be done to attract and prepare the future workforce in the community, focusing on helping students to make the transition to registered practice that begins during their final consolidation of practice placement. There is currently limited evidence on the effectiveness of how community placement teams prepare finalist students for registered practice and this could be seen as an opportunity lost given the urgent need to recruit more registered nurses to work in primary care. Recommendations for enhancing this crucial stage of the student journey are made, and a case for the need to know more from students about how they experience their final practice placement when allocated to a community setting is presented

An advanced concept that promises ecological and economic viability

The actuality of supersonic commercial service being provided by Concorde is demonstrating to the world the advantages offered by supersonic travel for both business and recreation. Public acceptance will gradually and persistently stimulate interest to proceed with a second generation design that meets updated economic and ecological standards. It is estimated that this concept could operate profitably on world-wide routes with a revenue structure based upon economy fares. Airplanes will meet all present day ecological requirements regarding noise and emissions

Modelling the evaporation of thin films of colloidal suspensions using Dynamical Density Functional Theory

Recent experiments have shown that various structures may be formed during the evaporative dewetting of thin films of colloidal suspensions. Nano-particle deposits of strongly branched `flower-like', labyrinthine and network structures are observed. They are caused by the different transport processes and the rich phase behaviour of the system. We develop a model for the system, based on a dynamical density functional theory, which reproduces these structures. The model is employed to determine the influences of the solvent evaporation and of the diffusion of the colloidal particles and of the liquid over the surface. Finally, we investigate the conditions needed for `liquid-particle' phase separation to occur and discuss its effect on the self-organised nano-structures

Psychopolitics: Peter Sedgwick’s legacy for mental health movements

This paper re-considers the relevance of Peter Sedgwick's Psychopolitics (1982) for a politics of mental health. Psychopolitics offered an indictment of ‘anti-psychiatry’ the failure of which, Sedgwick argued, lay in its deconstruction of the category of ‘mental illness’, a gesture that resulted in a politics of nihilism. ‘The radical who is only a radical nihilist’, Sedgwick observed, ‘is for all practical purposes the most adamant of conservatives’. Sedgwick argued, rather, that the concept of ‘mental illness’ could be a truly critical concept if it was deployed ‘to make demands upon the health service facilities of the society in which we live’. The paper contextualizes Psychopolitics within the ‘crisis tendencies’ of its time, surveying the shifting welfare landscape of the subsequent 25 years alongside Sedgwick's continuing relevance. It considers the dilemma that the discourse of ‘mental illness’ – Sedgwick's critical concept – has fallen out of favour with radical mental health movements yet remains paradigmatic within psychiatry itself. Finally, the paper endorses a contemporary perspective that, while necessarily updating Psychopolitics, remains nonetheless ‘Sedgwickian’

Theory and simulation of gelation, arrest and yielding in attracting colloids

We present some recent theory and simulation results addressing the phenomena of colloidal gelation at both high and low volume fractions, in the presence of short-range attractive interactions. We discuss the ability of mode-coupling theory and its adaptations to address situations with strong heterogeneity in density and/or dynamics. We include a discussion of the effect of attractions on the shear-thinning and yield behaviour under flow.Comment: 17 pages, 6 figure

The racist bodily imaginary: the image of the body-in-pieces in (post)apartheid culture

This paper outlines a reoccurring motif within the racist imaginary of (post)apartheid culture: the black body-in-pieces. This disturbing visual idiom is approached from three conceptual perspectives. By linking ideas prevalent in Frantz Fanon’s description of colonial racism with psychoanalytic concepts such as Lacan’s notion of the corps morcelé, the paper offers, firstly, an account of the black body-in-pieces as fantasmatic preoccupation of the (post)apartheid imaginary. The role of such images is approached, secondly, through the lens of affect theory which eschews a representational ‘reading’ of such images in favour of attention to their asignifying intensities and the role they play in effectively constituting such bodies. Lastly, Judith Butler’s discussion of war photography and the conditions of grievability introduces an ethical dimension to the discussion and helps draw attention to the unsavory relations of enjoyment occasioned by such images

Unknowable bodies, unthinkable sexualities: lesbian and transgender legal invisibility in the Toronto women's bathhouse raid

Although litigation involving sexual orientation and gender identity discrimination claims has generated considerable public attention in recent years, lesbian and transgender bodies and sexualities still remain largely invisible in Anglo-American courts. While such invisibility is generally attributed to social norms that fail to recognize lesbian and transgender experiences, the capacity to 'not see' or 'not know' queer bodies and sexualities also involves wilful acts of ignorance. Drawing from R. v Hornick (2002) a Canadian case involving the police raid of a women's bathhouse, this article explores how lesbian and transgender bodies and sexualities are actively rendered invisible via legal knowledge practices, norms and rationalities. It argues that limited knowledge and limited thinking not only regulate the borders of visibility and belonging, but play an active part in shaping identities, governing conduct and producing subjectivity

Association of Housing Disrepair Indicators with Cockroach and Rodent Infestations in a Cohort of Pregnant Latina Women and Their Children

Health burdens associated with poor housing and indoor pest infestations are likely to affect young children in particular, who spend most of their time indoors at home. We completed environmental assessments in 644 homes of pregnant Latina women and their children living in the Salinas Valley, California. High residential densities were common, with 39% of homes housing > 1.5 persons per room. Housing disrepair was also common: 58% of homes had peeling paint, 43% had mold, 25% had water damage, and 11% had rotting wood. Evidence of cockroaches and rodents was present in 60% and 32% of homes, respectively. Compared with representative national survey data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, homes in our sample were more likely to have rodents, peeling paint, leaks under sinks, and much higher residential densities. The odds of rodent infestations in homes increased in the presence of peeling paint [odds ratio (OR) 2.1; 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.5–3.1], water damage (OR 1.9; 95% CI, 1.2–2.7), and mold (OR 1.5; 95% CI, 1.0–2.1). The odds of cockroach infestation increased in the presence of peeling paint (OR 3.8; 95% CI, 2.7–5.6), water damage (OR 1.9; 95% CI, 1.2–2.9), or high residential density (OR 2.1; 95% CI, 1.2–3.8). Homes that were less clean than average were more prone to both types of infestations. Pesticides were stored or used in 51% of households, partly to control roach and rodent infestations. These data indicate that adverse housing conditions are common in this community and increase the likelihood of pest infestations and home pesticide use. Interventions to improve housing and promote children’s health and safety in this population are needed