Professional development of mental health educators through peer learning

Introduction/background: The School of Nursing, Midwifery and Nutrition teach students to use the ventrogluteal (VG) site as the preferred site for intramuscular injections. While on clinical placement, third year nursing students enrolled in a mental health subject identified that clinical preceptors and educators were not familiar with the VG site and felt uncomfortable when supervising students performing this task, and preferred instead for the student to use the dorsogluteal site for intramuscular administration of antipsychotic medications. In response to this identified theory-practice gap a practical educational intervention was developed by staff at James Cook University, in collaboration with mental health educators at the hospital, for hospital clinicians

The challenges of conducting a nurse-led intervention in a randomized controlled trial with vulnerable participants

This paper discusses the challenges encountered by researchers while conducting a randomized controlled trial (RCT) testing the efficacy of a healthy lifestyle educational and exercise intervention for people with serious mental illness. RCTs, even though considered the “gold standard” of research designs, are still prone to risks of potential bias and threats to their validity. Based on researcher reflexivity, the combination of reflection and action, during the conduct of the study, this paper outlines a number of challenges faced by the researchers. These included managing the need of participants to tell their story and be heard, reluctance of participants to remain in allocated groups, participant literacy, dual role of the nurse nurse-researcher, and reporting the benefits of nonstatistical results of a quantitative research project. Recommendations for conducting future behaviour intervention studies of this type include the incorporation of a reflexive component for the nurse nurse-researcher, highlighting the importance of taking a reflexive stance in both qualitative and quantitative research designs

Healthcare Access Experiences Among Indigenous Women in Northern Rural Thailand: A Focused Ethnographic Study

Introduction: Persistent inequities in health and access to healthcare services for indigenous women living in Thailand remain a significant challenge. This study provides narrative accounts of Indigenous women’s experiences accessing healthcare in northern and rural Thailand and explores the complexity of culture and its interaction with multiple intersecting influences on health behaviours.Methods: A focused ethnographic study was conducted to understand and describe the culture of health behaviors and other cultural phenomena. We recruited 21 female participants aged 20-41 years between March and April of 2017. In-depth semi-structured interviews conducted in Thai were used to explore the experiences of the participants living in a northern rural village. Data analysis was informed and guided by Roper and Shapira’s framework for ethnographic analysis.Results: Seven themes presented across three phases of experience (pre-access, making choices, and encountering difficulties) revealed an in-depth understanding of the Indigenous women’s lives, the broader sociocultural context in which they lived, and the challenges they faced when accessing healthcare. Analysis of data showed that the participants did not have equal access to healthcare and often disproportionately experienced discriminatory practices and negative attitudes of mainstream healthcare providers.Conclusions: This is the only study to date that discusses healthcare access challenges experienced by Indigenous women living in a northern rural Thai village. There is an urgent need to focus on citizenship, employment, and general health conditions; gender, familial, and labor roles; specific health conditions, wellness, and cultural practices; the seeking of healthcare services; healthcare provider relationships; the ability to access needed care; and optimization of self-care. Future efforts to improve healthcare access and reduce disease burden might benefit from these findings and allow for the development of more effective strategies, programs, and policies

Values and Media Literacy: Exploring the Relationship Between the Values People Prioritize in Their Life and Their Attitudes Toward Media Literacy

Media literacy is often described as an approach that can be used to address pressing public concerns ranging from combating misinformation to supporting citizens’ full participation in society. What is little understood, however, is the importance people give to the role of media literacy in their own lives. Drawing on data from a representative survey of Australian adults, this article examines the importance given to 14 media literacy abilities that are often the focus of media literacy programs. Incorporating Schwartz’s framework of motivational values into our analysis, we find that the specific media literacy abilities people identify as important are generally closely aligned with the underlying values they prioritize in their lives. Furthermore, people’s values offer more predictive power than sociodemographic characteristics when it comes to understanding the importance people place on specific media literacy outcomes. The article argues that by understanding how and why people respond differently to the goals of media literacy, educators can design more appealing and effective media literacy interventions

A 'rite of passage?': bullying experiences of nursing students in Australia

Background: Bullying in nursing remains an unacceptable international phenomenon and one that is widely reported in the literature. Recently, reports of bullying and harassment of nursing students have been increasing. Aim: This paper aims to describe bullying and harassment experienced by Australian nursing students while on clinical placement, as told by the participants. Methods: As part of a larger study, 884 Australian baccalaureate nursing students were surveyed to identify the nature and extent of their experiences of bullying and/or harassment during clinical placement. Almost half of the students (430) provided open-ended comments. These textual data were explored using a content analysis approach. Findings: The major themes derived from the analysis consisted of: manifestations of bullying and harassment; the perpetrators, consequences and impacts. Bullying behaviours included various forms of verbal, physical and sexual abuse. Perpetrators of bullying included other nurses, medical professionals, administrative and support staff. Students reported anxiety, panic attacks, physical symptoms of distress and loss of confidence and self-esteem from their experience of bullying during clinical placement. Discussion: Bullying in nursing is a widespread yet poorly understood phenomenon that impacts negatively on the learning experience of vulnerable nursing students, effecting them physically, mentally and emotionally. The potential implications of the bullying of nursing students on patient care reinforces the need for the culture of bullying that exists amongst the nursing profession to be addressed. Conclusion: The findings of this research have implications for nursing educators and clinicians. Recommendations include ensuring adequate preparation of students, clinical instructors and registered nurses who work with students in the practice environment

Values and media literacy : exploring the relationship between the values people prioritize in their life and their attitudes toward media literacy

Media literacy is often described as an approach that can be used to address pressing public concerns ranging from combating misinformation to supporting citizens’ full participation in society. What is little understood, however, is the importance people give to the role of media literacy in their own lives. Drawing on data from a representative survey of Australian adults, this article examines the importance given to 14 media literacy abilities that are often the focus of media literacy programs. Incorporating Schwartz’s framework of motivational values into our analysis, we find that the specific media literacy abilities people identify as important are generally closely aligned with the underlying values they prioritize in their lives. Furthermore, people’s values offer more predictive power than sociodemographic characteristics when it comes to understanding the importance people place on specific media literacy outcomes. The article argues that by understanding how and why people respond differently to the goals of media literacy, educators can design more appealing and effective media literacy interventions

Healthcare Access Experiences Among Indigenous Women in Northern Rural Thailand: A Focused Ethnographic Study

Introduction: Persistent inequities in health and access to healthcare services for indigenous women living in Thailand remain a significant challenge. This study provides narrative accounts of Indigenous women’s experiences accessing healthcare in northern and rural Thailand and explores the complexity of culture and its interaction with multiple intersecting influences on health behaviours. Methods: A focused ethnographic study was conducted to understand and describe the culture of health behaviors and other cultural phenomena. We recruited 21 female participants aged 20-41 years between March and April of 2017. In-depth semi-structured interviews conducted in Thai were used to explore the experiences of the participants living in a northern rural village. Data analysis was informed and guided by Roper and Shapira’s framework for ethnographic analysis. Results: Seven themes presented across three phases of experience (pre-access, making choices, and encountering difficulties) revealed an in-depth understanding of the Indigenous women’s lives, the broader sociocultural context in which they lived, and the challenges they faced when accessing healthcare. Analysis of data showed that the participants did not have equal access to healthcare and often disproportionately experienced discriminatory practices and negative attitudes of mainstream healthcare providers. Conclusions: This is the only study to date that discusses healthcare access challenges experienced by Indigenous women living in a northern rural Thai village. There is an urgent need to focus on citizenship, employment, and general health conditions; gender, familial, and labor roles; specific health conditions, wellness, and cultural practices; the seeking of healthcare services; healthcare provider relationships; the ability to access needed care; and optimization of self-care. Future efforts to improve healthcare access and reduce disease burden might benefit from these findings and allow for the development of more effective strategies, programs, and policies

News and Young Australians in 2023: How Children and Teens Access, Perceive and are Affected by News Media

The Young People and News longitudinal survey series provides comprehensive findings about the news attitudes, practices and experiences of young Australians aged 8-16 years. The 2023 survey analysis shows that news plays an important role in young people’s everyday lives and most young people get news from diverse sources. Family is the most frequent and trusted source of news for young people. Young people have a low level of trust in Australian news organisations, and they do not believe that they are understood by these organisations. There has been an increase in the number of young people who get news from social media, however, there is a low level of awareness of how algorithms deliver news. Although there has been a modest increase in the number of young people who had a news literacy lesson in school, three in four young people did not receive any lessons in school over the past year to help them determine if news content is true and trustworthy, indicating a gap in media literacy education

Are there consequences of labeling patients with prehypertension? An experimental study of effects on blood pressure and quality of life

Objective The prehypertension classification was introduced to facilitate prevention efforts among patients at increased risk for hypertension. Although patients who have been told that they have hypertension report worse outcomes than unaware hypertensives, little is known about whether or not prehypertension labeling has negative effects. We evaluated the effects of labeling individuals with prehypertension on blood pressure and health-related quality of life three months later. Methods One hundred adults (aged 19 to 82 [mean=40.0] years; 54% women; 64% racial/ethnic minorities) with screening blood pressure in the prehypertensive range (120–139/80–89 mm Hg) and no history of diagnosis or treatment of elevated blood pressure were randomly assigned to either a “Labeled” group in which they were informed of their prehypertension, or an “Unlabeled” group in which they were not informed. Subjects underwent office blood pressure measurement, 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring and completed self-report questionnaires at baseline and at three months. Results Multilevel mixed effects regression analyses indicated that changes in the white coat effect, office blood pressure, mean daytime ambulatory blood pressure, and physical and mental health did not differ significantly between the two groups. Adjusting for age, sex, race/ethnicity and body mass index did not affect the results. Conclusion These findings suggest that labeling patients with prehypertension does not have negative effects on blood pressure or quality of life. Additional research is needed to develop approaches to communicating with patients about their blood pressure that will maximize the clinical and public health impact of the prehypertension classification

Primary care micro-teams: a protocol for an international systematic review to describe and examine the opportunities and challenges of implementation for patients and healthcare professionals

Introduction: There has been a recent trend towards creating larger primary care practices with the assumption that interdisciplinary teams can deliver improved and more cost-effective services to patients with better accessibility. Micro-teams have been proposed to mitigate some of the potential challenges with practice expansion, including continuity of care. We aim to review the available literature to improve understanding of how micro-teams are described and the opportunities which primary care micro-teams can provide for practice staff and patients and limitations to their introduction and implementation. Our review asks: how is micro-team implementation described? What are the experiences of healthcare professionals and patients concerning micro-teams in primary care? What are the reported implications of micro-teams for patient care? // Methods and analysis: CINAHL, Cochrane Library, Embase, MEDLINE and Scopus will be searched for studies in English. Grey literature will be sourced from Google Scholar, government websites, CCG websites, general practice directives and strategies with advice from stakeholders. Included studies will give evidence regarding the implementation of micro-teams. Data will be synthesised using framework analysis. We will use iterative stakeholder and public and patient participation to embed the perspectives of those whom micro-teams could impact. Included studies will be quality assessed using the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool. The quality assessment will not be used to exclude any evidence but rather to develop a narrative discussion evaluating included literature. // Ethics and dissemination: Ethical approval will not be necessary for this systematic review as there will only be a secondary analysis of data already available in scientific databases and the grey literature. This protocol has been submitted for registration to be made available on a review database (PROSPERO). Findings will be disseminated widely through peer-reviewed publication and in various media, for example, conferences, congresses or symposia