Work and informal caregiving: challenges and opportunities

Working in an employed role has become increasingly influential in structuring the lives of informal caregivers with this having a significant impact on their socio-economic wellbeing. Over the life course most caregivers move through periods of both commodified work (being employed in the labour market) and non-commodified work (caring and family work). Many carers are unable to sustain paid employment in light of increasing demands of caregiving, choosing to focus on their caregiving responsibilities. However, at the point when these responsibilities end, they are left financially worse off and face difficulties accessing paid work again with many unable to return to their previous roles. Paid work and caregiving are perceived as different spheres - but for caregivers each creates conflicting demands. Uncommodified activities are less valued yet the informal sector carries the burden of social care with the monetary value placed on informal caregiving in the UK at £119 billion per year (1). Drawing on findings from a recent mixed methods study, this paper will discuss ways in which informal caregivers negotiate their employment status including how their ‘employability’ can be enhanced through skills and knowledge gained from caregiving. Reference (1) Buckner and Yeandle (2011) Valuing Carers 2011: Calculating the Value of Carers’ Support, Carers UK, The Centre for International Research on Care, Labour and Equalities and the University of Leeds, London, UK

An integrated literature review of death education in pre-registration nursing curricula: key themes

Recent policy has raised the profile of end-of-life care internationally, with the aim of increasing access to quality care for everyone experiencing life-limiting illness. This reflects an international shift in the provision of palliative care to encompass chronic conditions other than cancer. Nurses have an important role in delivering this care and need to be equipped with particular knowledge and skills. However, pre-registration nursing curricula have traditionally had a limited emphasis on death and dying and nurses report feeling unprepared to care for dying patients. This has led to claims that death education in pre-registration curricula is inadequate. This integrated review explores published literature that reports on death education within pre-registration nurse education. Presenting an international overview, the aim of the review is to contribute to knowledge about the nature and extent of death education in pre-registration curricula. In the context of this paper, death education encompasses both palliative and end-of-life care. Electronic searches of major bibliographic databases found inconsistencies across educational provision with variations in quantity, content and approach. Despite an increasing amount of death education in pre-registration curricula, there remains a deficit in key areas such as knowledge, skills, organisation of care and teamwork

Nitration of primary amines to form primary nitramines (Review)

Poster presentation at 19th Seminar on New Trends in Research of Energetic Materials; Pardubice, Czech Republic; 20/04/2016-22/04/2016The nitration of primary amines to form primary nitramines is a rarely reported synthetic procedure which proceeds through a minimum of two steps. This is in stark contrast to the nitration of alcohols and secondary amines which is readily achievable by a number of methods in a single step. In general the primary amine must initially be activated to nitration as direct exposure to nitrating media tends to result in the formation of an ionic nitrate salt. This activation may be achieved through the use of a multitude of protecting groups that are stable to the nitrating conditions used thereafter. The review presented here is an attempt to bring together the published literature on this often overlooked synthetic procedure in energetic materials chemistry

Organizational perceptions of e-commerce: Re-assessing the benefits

This paper reports on preliminary findings from a wider and more in-depth study of six traditional organizations from different sectors that have successfully introduced e-commerce initiatives. The research adopted a case study approach, within which a questionnaire, identifying 16 generic benefits synthesized from the literature, was administered. The organizations were also asked to characterize whether e-commerce was strategic for them or not. The findings suggest that those organizations that perceived e-commerce to be strategic tended to consider intangible benefits as more important than tangible benefits, indicating perhaps a move away from the traditional view of e-commerce as a marketing driver to increase or create sales. Those organizations perceiving e-commerce as non-strategic rated the tangible benefits in much the same way as the strategic organizations, but rated the intangibles lower. Also it was found that e-commerce was important as a communication tool, not only with customers, as might be expected, but also with staff within the organization. The value of intra-organizational e-commerce was also found to be important, perhaps more than previously thought, as was its use in communicating and disseminating knowledge. The findings also reflect the importance of the sector and environment of the organization in determining their perceptions of e-commerce

Systematic in situ hydration neutron reflectometry study on Nafion thin films

Reported herein is a neutron reflectometry (NR) study on hydrated Nafion thin films (∼30 nm) on a silicon substrate with native oxide. The Nafion morphology is investigated systematically across the whole relative humidity range using both H2O and D2O vapours to enable a comparative study. By utilising this systematic approach two key results have been obtained. The first is that by leveraging the strong positive scattering signal from the D2O vapour, a complete and systematic water adsorption isotherm (Type II) for a Nafion thin film is produced. Utilising the slight negative scattering signal of the H2O enabled the quantification of the hydration dependent evolution of the formation of Nafion/water lamellae near the substrate surface. The number of lamellae layers increases continuously with hydration, and does not form abruptly. We also report the effects of swelling on the thin films across the relative humidity ranges. The work reported should prove useful in quantifying other hydration dependent properties of Nafion thin films such as conductivity and understanding Nafion/semiconductor based devices, as well as showcasing a NR methodology for other hydrophilic polymers

Unambiguous detection of nitrated explosive vapours by fluorescence quenching of dendrimer films

Unambiguous and selective standoff (non-contact) infield detection of nitro-containingexplosives and taggants is an important goal but difficult to achieve with standard analyticaltechniques. Oxidative fluorescence quenching is emerging as a high sensitivity method fordetecting such materials but is prone to false positives—everyday items such as perfumeselicit similar responses. Here we report thin films of light-emitting dendrimers that detectvapours of explosives and taggants selectively—fluorescence quenching is not observed for arange of common interferents. Using a combination of neutron reflectometry, quartz crystalmicrobalance and photophysical measurements we show that the origin of the selectivity isprimarily electronic and not the diffusion kinetics of the analyte or its distribution in the film.The results are a major advance in the development of sensing materials for the standoffdetection of nitro-based explosive vapours, and deliver significant insights into the physicalprocesses that govern the sensing efficacy

A qualitative evaluation of the impact of a palliative care course on preregistration nursing students' practice in Cameroon

Background Current evidence suggests that palliative care education can improve preregistration nursing students’ competencies in palliative care. However, it is not known whether these competencies are translated into students’ practice in the care of patients who are approaching the end of life. This paper seeks to contribute to the palliative care evidence base by examining how nursing students in receipt of education report transfer of learning to practice, and what the barriers and facilitators may be, in a resource-poor country. Methods We utilised focus groups and individual critical incident interviews to explore nursing students’ palliative care learning transfer. Three focus groups, consisting of 23 participants and 10 individual critical incident interviews were conducted with preregistration nursing student who had attended a palliative care course in Cameroon and had experience caring for a patient approaching the end of life. Data was analysed thematically, using the framework approach. Results The results suggest that nursing students in receipt of palliative care education can transfer their learning to practice. Students reported recognizing patients with palliative care needs, providing patients with physical, psychosocial and spiritual support and communicating patient information to the wider care team. They did however perceive some barriers to this transfer which were either related to themselves, qualified nurses, the practice setting or family caregivers and patients. Conclusion The findings from this study suggest that nursing student in receipt of palliative care education can use their learning in practice to provide care to patients and their families approaching the end of life. Nevertheless, these findings need to be treated with some caution given the self-reported nature of the data. Demonstrating the link between preregistration palliative care education and patient care is vital to ensuring that newly acquired knowledge and skills are translated and embedded into clinical practice. This study also has implications for advocating for palliative care policies and adequately preparing clinical placement sites for students’ learning and transfer of learning

Primary alkylphosphine–borane polymers: Synthesis, low glass transition temperature, and a predictive capability thereof

With a multitude of potential applications, poly(phosphine–borane)s are an interesting class of polymer comprising main-group elements within the inorganic polymer backbone. A new family of primary alkylphosphine–borane polymers was synthesized by a solvent-free rhodium-catalyzed dehydrocoupling reaction and characterized by conventional chemicophysical techniques. The thermal stability of the polymers is strongly affected by the size and shape of the alkyl side chain with longer substituents imparting greater stability. The polymers show substantial stability toward UV illumination and immersion in water; however, they undergo a loss of alkylphosphine units during thermal degradation. The polymers exhibit glass transition temperatures (Tg) as low as −70 °C. A group interaction model (GIM) framework was developed to allow the semiquantitative prediction of Tg values, and the properties of the materials in this study were used to validate the model