How are the Children: Challenges and Opportunities in Improving Children\u27s Mental Health

The mental health of children is critical to their growth and development, but when their well-being is considered, discussions more often gravitate toward physical health, nutrition, education, parental influences, and living conditions. While these all represent important indicators of well-being, discussions also need to consider the importance of children’s mental and behavioral health. In this brief we explore the status of Southern Nevada’s children as it relates to mental health outcomes. Like physical health, good mental health is paramount to children’s overall functioning and maturation. Frequently when a child experiences mental and behavioral health challenges, signs and symptoms manifest in the home, community, and school. Using a secondary analysis of multiple primary datasets, including the National Survey of Children’s Health; Mental Illness Surveillance among Children in the United States; and the Mental Health National Outcome Measure, we analyze the mental health status of children in Southern Nevada. In doing so we provide an overview of services, access, and the implications of the Affordable Care Act. Outcomes are considered in relation to peer states as well as national indicators. This brief provides implications for strengthening the overall mental health service infrastructure, service delivery, and community capacity so that children will experience optimal mental health outcomes

Interprofessional Teamwork Skills as Predictors of Clinical Outcomes in a Simulated Healthcare Setting

This is the published version. Copyright 2013 Journal of Allied Health.Teaching interprofessional teamwork skills is a goal of interprofessional education. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between IP teamwork skills, attitudes and clinical outcomes in a simulated clinical setting. METHODS: One hundred-twenty health professions students (medicine, pharmacy, physician assistant) worked in interprofessional teams to manage a “patient” in a health care simulation setting. Students completed the Interdisciplinary Education Perception Scale (IEPS) attitudinal survey instrument. Students’ responses were averaged by team to create an IEPS attitudes score. Teamwork skills for each team were rated by trained observers using a checklist to calculate a teamwork score (TWS). Clinical outcome scores (COS) were determined by summation of completed clinical tasks performed by the team based on an expert developed checklist. Regression analyses were conducted to determine the relationship of IEPS and TWS with COS. RESULTS: IEPS score was not a significant predictor of COS (p=0.054), but TWS was a significant predictor (p< 0.001) of COS. Results suggest that in a simulated clinical setting, students’ interprofessional teamwork skills are significant predictors of positive clinical outcomes. CONCLUSION: Interprofessional curricular models that produce effective teamwork skills can improve student performance in clinical environments and likely improve teamwork practice to positively affect patient care outcomes

The Case of Digital Ethics in IS Research – A Literature Review

Due to the rapid development in technology and the increasing digitization of organizations and society as a whole, digital ethics is becoming an increasingly important topic for researchers and practitioners of information systems (IS). This literature review shows the state of the art of ethical views present in IS research, at first establishing the relevance of the topic and then showing recent developments. Using a holistic view on ethics, this article provides (1) an overview of the number of publications considering ethics in IS research and on the different ethical constructs and theories. Additionally, it provides an overview (2) on the different fields of application. The aforementioned concepts (3) are contrasted to identify research streams and derive research gaps. Additionally (4), we provide a categorization scheme to classify ethics research in IS into 4 different types and from there (5) derive research propositions for future projects

Time to Talk: The Mental Health of Adults in Nevada

About 11.3% of the adult population in Nevada report a past-year mental illness, with nearly 4% of them experiencing disorders serious enough to impair their functionality. Almost 13% of Nevada adults have substance abuse disorders, this is the second highest statewide substance abuse prevalence rate in the country; the District of Columbia is first at 14.7% of its population (SAMSHA, 2013). With most states (including Nevada) now increasing their mental health care budgets after years of spending cuts—between 2009 and 2012 there was a $4.35-billion drop in state mental health spending (Ollove, 2013)—pertinent questions center on needed treatment, research, and policy directions. The increased federal attention and support given to mental health care access has primed states across the nation like Nevada to move toward strengthening their service infrastructure. In this brief we first compare Nevada’s mental illness prevalence rates with those of peer states and national trends and then explore some strategies that could prove useful in positioning our state to address the mental health needs of its residents. We must elevate the discussion of mental health to the same level of seriousness given to the concern for physical health challenges as experienced by adults

Comparing Moral Reasoning across Graduate Occupational and Physical Therapy Students and Practitioners

Practicing clinicians must use moral reasoning to solve ethical problems and combat moral distress. Development of moral reasoning in occupational therapy (OT) and physical therapy (PT) students has been significantly under researched. The purpose of this study was to analyze the differences in moral reasoning between first year and second year OT and PT students and between students and OT and PT practitioners. Investigators utilized a cross-sectional study design with a convenience sample of University of Indianapolis OT and PT students and a combination of convenience and snowball sampling to recruit licensed OT and PT practitioners. One hundred and fifty-four participants completed the Defining Issues Test - 2 (DIT-2; Rest et al., 1999) survey. Comparisons of N2 scores using t-tests found no differences between groups in moral reasoning schema (one’s preferred way of approaching moral issues, divided into stratified developmental levels). However, Pearson’s Chi-Square analysis for a comparison of all students to all practitioners for moral reasoning patterns (one’s ability to discriminate between types of moral reasoning schemas when presented with a complex moral dilemma) was significant between students (transitional) and practitioners (consolidated), with the greatest difference between second-year students and practitioners. Continual expansion of ethics content, including interjecting clinical experiences into the classroom, within OT and PT graduate programs may promote moral reasoning pattern development with carryover into practice. Clinical experiences provide real-world opportunities necessary to progress students from transitional to consolidated thinking patterns. To improve ethics education, authors recommend active learning strategies and ethics mentorship throughout clinical experiences

Gaseous Tidal Debris found in the NGC 3783 Group

We have conducted wide-field HI mapping of a ~5.5 x 5.5 degree region surrounding the NGC 3783 galaxy group, to an HI mass limit of ~4 x 10^8 Msun. The observations were made using the multibeam system on the Parkes 64-m radiotelescope, as part of the Galaxy Evolution Multiwavelength Study (GEMS). We find twelve HI detections in our Parkes data, four more than catalogued in HIPASS. We find two new group members, and discover an isolated region of HI gas with an HI mass of ~4 x 10^8 Msun, without a visible corresponding optical counterpart. We discuss the likelihood of this HI region being a low surface brightness galaxy, primordial gas, or a remnant of tidal debris. For the NGC 3783 group we derive a mean recession velocity of 2903 km/s, and a velocity dispersion of 190 km/s. The galaxy NGC 3783 is the nearest galaxy to the luminosity weighted centre of the group, and is at the group mean velocity. From the X-ray and dynamical state of this galaxy group, this group appears to be in the early stages of its evolution.Comment: 12 pages, MNRAS accepted: full resolution paper available at http://astronomy.swin.edu.au/~vkilborn/MF1350rv.pd