Performing Amateurism: A Study of Camgirls’ Work

International audienc

Variations and inter-relationship in outcome from emergency admissions in England: a retrospective analysis of Hospital Episode Statistics from 2005-2010.

BACKGROUND: The quality of care delivered and clinical outcomes of care are of paramount importance. Wide variations in the outcome of emergency care have been suggested, but the scale of variation, and the way in which outcomes are inter-related are poorly defined and are critical to understand how best to improve services. This study quantifies the scale of variation in three outcomes for a contemporary cohort of patients undergoing emergency medical and surgical admissions. The way in which the outcomes of different diagnoses relate to each other is investigated. METHODS: A retrospective study using the English Hospital Episode Statistics 2005-2010 with one-year follow-up for all patients with one of 20 of the commonest and highest-risk emergency medical or surgical conditions. The primary outcome was in-hospital all-cause risk-standardised mortality rate (in-RSMR). Secondary outcomes were 1-year all-cause risk-standardised mortality rate (1 yr-RSMR) and 28-day all-cause emergency readmission rate (RSRR). RESULTS: 2,406,709 adult patients underwent emergency medical or surgical admissions in the groups of interest. Clinically and statistically significant variations in outcome were observed between providers for all three outcomes (p < 0.001). For some diagnoses including heart failure, acute myocardial infarction, stroke and fractured neck of femur, more than 20% of hospitals lay above the upper 95% control limit and were statistical outliers. The risk-standardised outcomes within a given hospital for an individual diagnostic group were significantly associated with the aggregated outcome of the other clinical groups. CONCLUSIONS: Hospital-level risk-standardised outcomes for emergency admissions across a range of specialties vary considerably and cross traditional speciality boundaries. This suggests that global institutional infra-structure and processes of care influence outcomes. The implications are far reaching, both in terms of investigating performance at individual hospitals and in understanding how hospitals can learn from the best performers to improve outcomes

Role exit

Interconnections between social roles and identities can be intricate and ambiguous and, therefore, exiting a role to which we feel strongly committed can lead to the sense of identity being threatened. The idea of there being a consequence to leaving a social role rests on the premise that identities are formed within socio-cultural spaces and, therefore, when one leaves a role an empty space remains. In this chapter, we explore this process, often referred to as “role exit” and the seminal work of Blau (1972), who outlines four key reasons that may lead to such a transition. The chapter also provides a short snapshot of some of the large scale international programmes that have researched the reasons for and consequences of military exit in the United States and Canada

“Medically discharged”: forced exit due to injury, health and wellbeing

The second story of the book is provided by Jack, who experienced an injury in the first 5 years of his military service. Jack’s journey starts with his experience of joining the army, followed by a brief description of how he was injured and then culminates in his exit via medical discharge, due to a non-combat related injury. Jack helps us to understand the feeling of rejection from the armed forces and how in some ways this makes the transition back to civilian life, at least for Jack, slightly easier. In the literature that follows, we explore a snippet of theory and research which focuses on sudden and unexpected transition and its impact on our identity. We also discuss the literature in the context of forced/involuntary military exit, both for non-combat and combat related injuries

“Lifers”: exit from the armed forces after 36 years’ service

John provides the first of three stories explored in this book. John served a total of 36 years with the military holding a variety of roles both in full-time and Reserve service. He outlines the transition from regular service to civilian life and allows us to explore his lived experience and ‘sense-making’ as he recalls it. John provides us with insight into the impact of military exit on both his own identity and his relationship with others around him. In the second half of this chapter, we provide psychological perspectives alongside John’s story in order that the reader can consider the application of theories, such as Social Identity Theory and other research on military identity, in order to better understand John’s experiences

Of Hajj and home: Roots visits to Mecca and Bangladesh in everyday belonging

Muslim religiosity and South Asian ethnicities are at times experienced as rival forms of affiliation, especially for the second generation born and brought up in the West. In this article, I investigate the role of ‘roots visits’ to Bangladesh and pilgrimages to Mecca in shaping ethnic/religious affiliations of young second generation Bengalis in London’s East End. Building on Glick Schiller (2004), I argue that Bengali translocal ways of being (travel to Bangladesh) have become untethered from Bengali translocal ways of belonging (self-identifications), due in part to the more critical stance on Bengali culture propagated by deculturated Islamic institutions in the East End and to young people’s perceptions of their social class difference from Bangladeshi locals. While second generation youth who travel to Bangladesh tend to express a distancing from their ‘roots,’ those who travel on hajj or umra find that this bolsters their sense of rootedness in translocal Muslim belonging