Mental health nurses’ attitudes, behaviour, experience and knowledge regarding adults with a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder:systematic, integrative literature review

Aims and objectives To establish whether mental health nurses responses to people with borderline personality disorder are problematic and, if so, to inform solutions to support change. Background There is some evidence that people diagnosed with borderline personality disorder are unpopular among mental health nurses who respond to them in ways which could be counter-therapeutic. Interventions to improve nurses’ attitudes have had limited success. Design Systematic, integrative literature review. Methods Computerised databases were searched from inception to April 2015 for papers describing primary research focused on mental health nurses’ attitudes, behaviour, experience, and knowledge regarding adults diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. Analysis of qualitative studies employed metasynthesis; analysis of quantitative studies was informed by the theory of planned behaviour. Results Forty studies were included. Only one used direct observation of clinical practice. Nurses’ knowledge and experiences vary widely. They find the group very challenging to work with, report having many training needs, and, objectively, their attitudes are poorer than other professionals’ and poorer than towards other diagnostic groups. Nurses say they need a coherent therapeutic framework to guide their practice, and their experience of caregiving seems improved where this exists. Conclusions Mental health nurses’ responses to people with borderline personality disorder are sometimes counter-therapeutic. As interventions to change them have had limited success there is a need for fresh thinking. Observational research to better understand the link between attitudes and clinical practice is required. Evidence-based education about borderline personality disorder is necessary, but developing nurses to lead in the design, implementation and teaching of coherent therapeutic frameworks may have greater benefits. Relevance to clinical practice There should be greater focus on development and implementation of a team-wide approach, with nurses as equal partners, when working with patients with borderline personality disorder

The Children Left Behind

This essay addresses the health needs of youth, arguing that schools are an ideal place for providing health services and proposing that school districts provide school-based health centers (SBHCs) to attend to the dental, emotional, and physical health needs of students

Migraine and Anxiety in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Migraine and anxiety are common health conditions that are highly comorbid. In this study, I examined the relationship between migraine and anxiety in the context of migraine triggers and the COVID-19 pandemic. 188 participants (mean age = 34.18 years; 10.63% male, 85.63% female, 3.72% other) who were recruited online completed two measures of state-level anxiety and two measures of migraine disability. The first two measures prompted participants to report the anxiety and migraine disability they experienced before the COVID-19 pandemic. The second two measures prompted participants to report the anxiety and migraine disability they experienced during what they personally believed to be the worst period of the pandemic. My first hypothesis was supported: Migraineurs reported greater state-level anxiety and greater migraine disability during what they believed to be the worst months of the COVID-19 pandemic in comparison to before the COVID-19 pandemic. My second hypothesis was not supported, as state-level anxiety did not increase more severely for migraineurs who were unaware of or unable to avoid their triggers. Potential limitations include the considerable amount of time elapsed between the beginning of the pandemic and data collection, which may have affected participant’s ability to accurately remember their past state-level anxiety and migraine disability. Future research should continue to examine the relationship between migraine, anxiety, and migraine triggers, particularly in the event of future public health crises. In sum, my results suggest that migraineurs’ state-level anxiety and migraine disability increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, considering the high current and lifetime prevalence of migraine, the results of this study emphasize that it is imperative to research the mental health of this population

Alien Registration- Gray, Emma V. (Easton, Aroostook County)

https://digitalmaine.com/alien_docs/26315/thumbnail.jp

Dan Shechtman and His Discovery of Quasicrystals

This poster for the Natural Sciences Poster Session at Parkland College features chemist and material science professor Dan Shechtman who discovered Quasicrystals in 1982

Investigating Cognitive Functioning in a Sample of Spinal Cord Injury Inpatients, in Relation to the Cognitive Demands of their Specialized Rehabilitation Program: A Pilot Exploratory Study

Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) rehabilitation programs have significant and specific cognitive demands, requiring patients to acquire knowledge and new skills while adjusting to their profoundly altered physiology. Existing research from high income countries (HIC) has shown that SCI is associated with cognitive dysfunction, which is in turn linked to poorer rehabilitation outcomes and ultimately increased costs of care. The aetiology of SCI in South Africa is distinct from HICs, which implies differences in associated risks and mediators for cognitive pathology (e.g., focal traumatic injuries, HIV-associated non-traumatic injuries), which render questionable the local generalizability of existing research evidence. There are no South African studies on cognitive dysfunction related to SCI, and research in this area from other developing world countries is sparse. Therefore, this study aimed to address the evidence gap by investigating the cognitive profile of a sample of SCI rehabilitation inpatients in relation to the cognitive demands of their SCI rehabilitation programme, at a specialized public neurorehabilitation hospital in Cape Town. This exploratory pilot study used quantitative methodology to describe the cognitive profile of a sample of new SCI rehabilitation inpatients shortly after their admission. Twentynine participants aged 18-65, who were predominantly male and from lower socioeconomic backgrounds were included in the study. All participants completed a battery of neuropsychological tests, where the assessment tools chosen measured cognitive domains identified as essential for engagement with a specialized SCI rehabilitation program. Participants also completed selected questionnaires screening for common psychological, behavioural and somatic comorbidities, with established links to cognitive dysfunction. Interpretation of the cognitive test results was undertaken through comparison with internationally and locally normed results, in conjunction with an exploration of the presence of comorbidities with known risk to cognitive function. In comparison to international data, the sample's cognitive performance was indicative of dysfunction across all domains assessed, while performance was relatively better in certain cognitive domains, relative to available South African normative data. Considering all available normative data and local trends, learning and memory, attention and certain executive functions emerged as possible areas of cognitive deficit. The potential mismatch between SCI rehabilitation programme cognitive demands and the sample's cognitive profile was evident, while their profile of comorbidities placed them at risk for cognitive dysfunction in multiple domains. This pilot study provided evidence to suggest that, despite their distinct epidemiology and lower rates of comorbid TBI, local SCI rehabilitation inpatients are at risk of cognitive dysfunction, where cognitive domains potentially affected are integral to their specialized SCI rehabilitation programme. As a pilot study conducted in the context of a pandemic, multiple areas for further investigation with altered methodology were identified. Nonetheless it was clear that additional in-depth research in this area would benefit the SCI rehabilitation community at large. Future studies should include a well-matched control group, where COVID-19 clinical research disruptions precluded this design in the current study

IVD Formation in Monodelphis domestica

The research summarized on this poster supports the use of the gray short-tailed opossum (Monodelphis domestica) as a lab animal for research into invertebral disc formation and degeneration. Preliminary data suggests that some genes involved in the formation and maintenance of the notochord in mice are the same in the short-tailed opossum. Data also suggests the ossification of the vertebral column of pups proceeds anteriorly to posteriorly and that much of the maturation of the nucleus puposus happens in the first ten days