Selecting social work students:lessons from research in Scotland

The issue of selection of students to social work programmes is one that remains highly contested. While it is clear that there is no single way of choosing the next generation of social work students, nevertheless, there are a number of strongly held beliefs about what ‘best practice’ means in this fraught field. These can be difficult to challenge, and even harder to shift, in spite of contrary evidence. This paper presents research conducted in Scotland in 2016 as part of the Scottish Government-sponsored Review of Social Work Education. The research set out to consider what selection processes were being used in Scotland and why; more fundamentally, it sought to explore the views of those involved in social work education alongside evidence about the outcomes of the selection processes (that is, data on student retention and success). The article concludes that while there is little evidence that one method of selection to social work programmes is intrinsically better than another, issues of fairness and transparency in selection, as well as diversity, remain pressing

ELISA: a cryocooled 10 GHz oscillator with 10-15 frequency stability

This article reports the design, the breadboarding and the validation of an ultra-stable Cryogenic Sapphire Oscillator operated in an autonomous cryocooler. The objective of this project was to demonstrate the feasibility of a frequency stability of 3x10-15 between 1 s and 1,000 s for the European Space Agency deep space stations. This represents the lowest fractional frequency instability ever achieved with cryocoolers. The preliminary results presented in this paper validate the design we adopted for the sapphire resonator, the cold source and the oscillator loop.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figure

The selection of search sources influences the findings of a systematic review of people’s views: a case study in public health

Background For systematic reviews providing evidence for policy decisions in specific geographical regions, there is a need to minimise regional bias when seeking out relevant research studies. Studies on people’s views tend to be dispersed across a range of bibliographic databases and other search sources. It is recognised that a comprehensive literature search can provide unique evidence not found from a focused search; however, the geographical focus of databases as a potential source of bias on the findings of a research review is less clear. This case study describes search source selection for research about people’s views and how supplementary searches designed to redress geographical bias influenced the findings of a systematic review. Our research questions are: a) what was the impact of search methods employed to redress potential database selection bias on the overall findings of the review? and b) how did each search source contribute to the identification of all the research studies included in the review? Methods The contribution of 25 search sources in locating 28 studies included within a systematic review on UK children’s views of body size, shape and weight was analysed retrospectively. The impact of utilising seven search sources chosen to identify UK-based literature on the review’s findings was assessed. Results Over a sixth (5 out of 28) of the studies were located only through supplementary searches of three sources. These five studies were of a disproportionally high quality compared with the other studies in the review. The retrieval of these studies added direction, detail and strength to the overall findings of the review. All studies in the review were located within 21 search sources. Precision for 21 sources ranged from 0.21% to 1.64%. Conclusions For reducing geographical bias and increasing the coverage and context-specificity of systematic reviews of people’s perspectives and experiences, searching that is sensitive and aimed at reducing geographical bias in database sources is recommended

End of life care for people who use alcohol and other drugs: findings from a Rapid Evidence Assessment.

People who use alcohol and other drugs(hereafter ‘substances’) and who are over the age of 40 are now more likely to die of a non-drug related cause than people who use substances under the age of 40. This population will therefore potentially need greater access to palliative and end-of-life care services. Initially, the purpose of this rapid evidence assessment (REA), conducted August 2016- August 2017, was to explore the peer-reviewed evidence base in relation to end-of-life care for people with problematic substance use. The following databases were searched using date parameters of 1st January 2004-1st August 2016: Amed, Psycharticles, Ovid, Ageinfo, Medline, Ebscohost, ASSIA, Social Care Online, Web of Knowledge, Web of Science, SSCI, Samsha, NIAAA. Data were extracted using a pre-defined protocol incorporating inclusion and exclusion criteria. Given the dearth of evidence emerging on interventions and practice responses to problematic substance use, the inclusion criteria were broadened to include any peer-reviewed literature focussing on substance use specifically and end of life care. There were 60 papers that met the inclusion criteria. These were quality assessed and rated low, moderate or high quality. Using a textual thematic approach to categorise findings, papers fell into three broad groups i) pain and symptom management, ii) homeless and marginalised groups, and iii) alcohol-related papers. In general, this small and diverse literature lacked depth and quality. The papers suggest there are clear challenges for health and social care professionals in meeting the end-of-life needs of people who use substances. Addressing issues like safe prescribing for pain management becomes more challenging in the presence of substance use and requires flexible service provision from both alcohol/drug services and end of life care providers. Work is needed to develop models of good practice in working with co-existing substance use and end of life conditions as well as prevalence studies to provide a wider context for policy and practice development

Giving up the ghost: Findings on fathers and social work from a study of pre-birth child protection

This article reports findings from an ethnographic study of pre-birth child protection, conducted in an urban Scottish setting. The study was designed to explore the interactions between practitioners and families in the context of child protection involvement during a pregnancy. This research aimed to understand the activities that constituted pre-birth child protection assessment, and the meaning attached to those activities by social workers and expectant parents. Very different perspectives on fathers and fatherhood emerged through the study. Fathers shared their feelings of familial tenderness in the context of research interviews. Yet social workers often focused on the risks that the fathers posed. This focus on risk led professionals to ignore or exclude fathers in significant ways. Fathers were denied opportunities to take an active role in their families and care planning for their infants, whilst mothers were over-responsibilised. Children meanwhile were potentially denied the relationship, care and identity benefits of involved fatherhood. This article shows how pre-birth child protection processes and practice can function so as to limit the contribution of expectant fathers. The way that fathers and fathering are understood continues to be a wider problem for social work, requiring development through research and practice. This study was not immune to the challenge of involving men in social work research in meaningful ways. Nevertheless, the findings highlight how participation in social work research can create a forum for fathers to share their concerns, and the importance of their perspective for practice

Identification of genetic variants associated with Huntington's disease progression: a genome-wide association study

Background Huntington's disease is caused by a CAG repeat expansion in the huntingtin gene, HTT. Age at onset has been used as a quantitative phenotype in genetic analysis looking for Huntington's disease modifiers, but is hard to define and not always available. Therefore, we aimed to generate a novel measure of disease progression and to identify genetic markers associated with this progression measure. Methods We generated a progression score on the basis of principal component analysis of prospectively acquired longitudinal changes in motor, cognitive, and imaging measures in the 218 indivduals in the TRACK-HD cohort of Huntington's disease gene mutation carriers (data collected 2008–11). We generated a parallel progression score using data from 1773 previously genotyped participants from the European Huntington's Disease Network REGISTRY study of Huntington's disease mutation carriers (data collected 2003–13). We did a genome-wide association analyses in terms of progression for 216 TRACK-HD participants and 1773 REGISTRY participants, then a meta-analysis of these results was undertaken. Findings Longitudinal motor, cognitive, and imaging scores were correlated with each other in TRACK-HD participants, justifying use of a single, cross-domain measure of disease progression in both studies. The TRACK-HD and REGISTRY progression measures were correlated with each other (r=0·674), and with age at onset (TRACK-HD, r=0·315; REGISTRY, r=0·234). The meta-analysis of progression in TRACK-HD and REGISTRY gave a genome-wide significant signal (p=1·12 × 10−10) on chromosome 5 spanning three genes: MSH3, DHFR, and MTRNR2L2. The genes in this locus were associated with progression in TRACK-HD (MSH3 p=2·94 × 10−8 DHFR p=8·37 × 10−7 MTRNR2L2 p=2·15 × 10−9) and to a lesser extent in REGISTRY (MSH3 p=9·36 × 10−4 DHFR p=8·45 × 10−4 MTRNR2L2 p=1·20 × 10−3). The lead single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) in TRACK-HD (rs557874766) was genome-wide significant in the meta-analysis (p=1·58 × 10−8), and encodes an aminoacid change (Pro67Ala) in MSH3. In TRACK-HD, each copy of the minor allele at this SNP was associated with a 0·4 units per year (95% CI 0·16–0·66) reduction in the rate of change of the Unified Huntington's Disease Rating Scale (UHDRS) Total Motor Score, and a reduction of 0·12 units per year (95% CI 0·06–0·18) in the rate of change of UHDRS Total Functional Capacity score. These associations remained significant after adjusting for age of onset. Interpretation The multidomain progression measure in TRACK-HD was associated with a functional variant that was genome-wide significant in our meta-analysis. The association in only 216 participants implies that the progression measure is a sensitive reflection of disease burden, that the effect size at this locus is large, or both. Knockout of Msh3 reduces somatic expansion in Huntington's disease mouse models, suggesting this mechanism as an area for future therapeutic investigation