Masculinities and the Paedophile: Discursive Strategies in Irish Newspapers.

This study examines the ways in which men who relate sexually to children, identified in the press as paedophiles, are represented in four leading newspapers in the Republic of Ireland in the period from 2003-2005. Utilising a qualitative research methodology namely critical discourse analysis, a social constructionist approach and informed by post-structural perspectives, this research examines the ways in which the masculinities of the man represented as `the paedophile¿ are constructed. This research demonstrates how the normative is reinforced through the delegitimation of the masculinities of these men. The discursive regimes and cultural scenarios drawn upon in representations of `the paedophile¿ reflect degrees of deviation from hegemonic masculinity in an always already `deviant¿ group of men. Inactive heterosexuality and homosexuality are not hegemonic masculine practices, and the masculinity of supposedly, celibate clergymen and homosexual men is discursively subordinated. A consideration of the material dimensions of these discourses, illustrates how the media representation of men who relate sexually to children, confirms the normative contours of society and strategically excludes hegemonic masculinity and the wider society from association with adult male sexual interaction with children

Living well with breathlessness: How clinicians can help

Non

Living with breathlessness: a systematic literature review and qualitative synthesis

Question: What is the experience of people living with breathlessness due to medical conditions, those caring for and those treating them, with regard to quality of life and the nature of clinical interactions?Methods: Electronic databases (Ovid MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL Plus, PsycINFO) were searched (1987 to October 2017; English language), for qualitative studies exploring the experience of chronic breathlessness (patients, carers, clinicians). Two independent reviewers screened titles, abstracts and papers retrieved against inclusion criteria. Disagreements were resolved with a third reviewer. Primary qualitative data were extracted and synthesised using thematic synthesis.Results: Inclusion and synthesis of 101/2,303 international papers produced four descriptive themes: 1) widespread effects of breathlessness, 2) coping, 3) help-seeking behaviour, and 4) clinicians’ responsiveness to the symptom of breathlessness. The themes were combined to form the concept of “Breathing Space”, to show how engaged coping and appropriate help-seeking (patient) and attention to symptom (clinician) helps maximise the patient’s quality of living with breathlessness.Answers: Breathlessness has widespread impact on patient and carer and affects Breathing Space. The degree of Breathing Space is influenced by interaction between the patient’s coping style, their help-seeking behaviour and their clinician’s responsiveness to breathlessness itself in addition to managing the underlying disease

Analysis of auditory functions in grades one, two, and three.

Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston Universit

Development of an Explainable Clinical Decision Support System for the Prediction of Patient Quality of Life in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

The 36th ACM/SIGAPP Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC 2021), Virtual Event, 22-26 March 2021Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) is a rare neurodegenerative and currently incurable disease. It causes a rapid decline in motor functions and has a fatal trajectory. The aim of the treatment is mostly to alleviate symptoms and improve the patient’s quality of life (QoL). The goal of this study is to develop a Clinical Decision Support System (CDSS) in order to alert clinicians when a patient is at risk of experiencing a low QoL, so that they are better supported. The source of the data was the Irish ALS Registry and interviews with the 90 patients and their primary informal caregiver at three time-points. In this dataset, there were two different scores to measure a person’s overall QoL, based on the McGill QoL (MQoL) Questionnaire and we worked towards the prediction of both. The method we used for the development of the predictive models was Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), which was compared to a logistic regression baseline model. We used the SHAP (SHapley Additive exPlanations) values as a technique to provide local and global explanations to the outputs as well as to select the most important features. The total calculated MQoL score was predicted accurately by three features, with a F1-score on the test set equal to 0.81, a recall score of 0.78, and a precision score of 0.84, while, the addition of two features produced similar outcomes (0.79, 0.70 and 0.90 respectively). The three most important features were the age at disease onset, ALSFRS score for orthopnoea and the caregiver’s status pre-caregiving.European Commission - European Regional Development FundScience Foundation IrelandHealth Research BoardAmerican ALS Associatio

Stand Up, Speak Out! Racial Justice in Healthcare Education: Experiences of Minoritised Ethnic Students

Funded by Trinity Equality Fund 2022, the Faculty of Health Sciences Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Group and Immigrant Council of Ireland launched a project entitled ‘Stand Up, Speak Out! Racial Justice in Healthcare Education’. This report articulates the lived experiences of racism in minoritised ethnic healthcare students (MEHSs) and recommends strategies to embed racial justice in healthcare education at Trinity. The report will be made available to staff and students in the Faculty of Health Sciences, Equality Office and relevant healthcare and higher education bodies in order to promote the inclusion of students’ voices in future racial justice strategies

Young men on the margins.

Young Men on the Margins presents the direct voices of homeless men in Dublin. It highlights how, from childhood onwards, negative economic and social experiences combined at family and community level to create a process where young men moved from living at home to being out-of-home. It draws attention to the absence of appropriate economic and social supports at crucial stages to prevent the drift into homelessness. Men aged 18-30 tell us about their family relationships and family circumstances, economic deprivation, their experience of the education system, how they cope with homelessness, their experiences of drug-use and associated crime and their hopes to change their lives and integrate into society. At a broader level, Young Men on the Margins draws together some available data on the experience of marginalisation among men and boys in contemporary Irish society. This includes an exploration of the consequences of social change for men. In particular, changing family structures, male educational participation and performance, the changing nature of work, and changing value systems are considered. This provides a wider context for the understanding of the experiences of homeless men interviewed in the study. The study is of interest to those concerned with improving the well-being and social inclusion of children, families and communities in Ireland. It is also of interest to those concerned with the relationship between gender and social policy. It is of particular relevance in light of Government’s policies such as the National Anti-Poverty Strategy, the National Children’s Strategy and the Youth Homelessness Strategy. This report will be complemented by another on the issue of suicide later in 2005

Patient journey to a specialist amyotrophic lateral sclerosis multidisciplinary clinic: an exploratory study.

BACKGROUND: The multidisciplinary approach in the management of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) has been shown to provide superior care to devolved care, with better survival, improved quality of care, and quality of life. Access to expert multidisciplinary management should be a standard for patients with ALS. This analysis explores the patient journey from symptom onset and first engagement with health services, to the initial visit to a specialist ALS Multidisciplinary Clinic (MDC) in Dublin, Ireland. METHODS: A retrospective exploratory multi-method study details the patient journey to the MDC. Data from medical interviews and systematic chart review identifies interactions with the health services and key timelines for thirty five new patients presenting with a diagnosis of ALS during a 6 month period in 2013. RESULTS: The time from first symptom to diagnosis was a mean of 16 months (median 13 months), with a mean interval of 19 months (median 14.6) from first symptoms to arrival at the MDC. The majority of patients were seen by a general practitioner, and subsequently by neurology services. There was an average of four contacts with health services and 4.8 investigations/tests, prior to their first Clinic visit. On the first visit to the MDC patients are linked into an integrated \u27system\u27 that can provide specialist care and link with voluntary, palliative and community services as required. CONCLUSIONS: Engagement with a multidisciplinary team has implications for service utilization and quality of life of patients and their families. We have demonstrated that barriers exist that delay referral to specialist services. Comprehensive data recording and collection, using multiple data sources can reconstruct the timelines of the patient journey, which can in turn be used to identify pathways that can expedite early referral to specialist services

Caregiving in ALS - A mixed methods approach to the study of Burden

Background Caregiver burden affects the physical, psychological and emotional well-being of the caregiver. The purpose of this analysis was to describe an informal caregiver cohort (n?=?81), their subjective assessment of burden and difficulties experienced as a result of providing care to people with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). Methods Using mixed methods of data collection and analysis, we undertook a comprehensive assessment of burden and difficulties associated with informal caregiving in ALS. As part of a semi-structured interview a series of standardised measures were used to assess quality of life, psychological distress and subjective burden, and in an open-ended question caregivers were asked to identify difficult aspects of their caregiving experience. Results The quantitative data show that psychological distress, hours of care provided and lower quality of life, were significant predictors of caregiver burden. From the qualitative data, the caregiving difficulties were thematised around managing the practicalities of the ALS condition, the emotional and psychosocial impact; limitation and restriction, and impact on relationships. Conclusions The collection and analysis of quantitative and qualitative data better explores the complexity of caregiver burden in ALS. Understanding the components of burden and the difficulties experienced as a result of caring for someone with ALS allows for better supporting the caregiver, and assessing the impact of burden on the care recipient