79 research outputs found
Final Evaluation of the Rough Sleepers Initiative
The RSI was launched in 1997 in response to evidence of increasing levels of rough sleeping across the country. The programme was initially aimed at reducing levels of rough sleeping, following the broad model established by the RSI programme in England in 1990. In 1999, the programme was given a new target to end the need to sleep rough in Scotland by 2003. An evaluation of the Rough Sleepers Initiative (RSI) programme was undertaken by the Centre for Housing Policy, at the University of York, during the Autumn of 2004 and the Spring of 2005. The evaluation involved a critical review and analysis of existing research and statistical evidence, interviews with local authority officers responsible for RSI, national level interviews with individuals responsible for the development and delivery of RSI and interviews with a sample of service providers as well as former, current and potential rough sleepers
Cross-sectional survey of users of internet depression communities
Background: Internet-based depression communities provide a forum for individuals to
communicate and share information and ideas. There has been little research into the health status
and other characteristics of users of these communities.
Methods: Online cross-sectional survey of Internet depression communities to identify depressive
morbidity among users of Internet depression communities in six European countries; to
investigate whether users were in contact with health services and receiving treatment; and to
identify user perceived effects of the communities.
Results: Major depression was highly prevalent among respondents (varying by country from 40%
to 64%). Forty-nine percent of users meeting criteria for major depression were not receiving
treatment, and 35% had no consultation with health services in the previous year. Thirty-six
percent of repeat community users who had consulted a health professional in the previous year
felt that the Internet community had been an important factor in deciding to seek professional help.
Conclusions: There are high levels of untreated and undiagnosed depression in users of Internet
depression communities. This group represents a target for intervention. Internet communities can
provide information and support for stigmatizing conditions that inhibit more traditional modes of
information seeking
Making home or making do : a critical look at homemaking without a home
This paper critically examines the concept of alternative forms of ‘homemaking’ among people without a settled home. The introductory section establishes the framework for the paper, providing an overview of homelessness and the homemaking literature. Strengths in the homemaking approach are identified, which reconceptualises homelessness as a human-centered phenomenon that can be understood as ‘resistance’ to societies that block accesses to mainstream housing for people who are (also) socially and economically marginalised. Homemaking moves beyond mainstream academic analyses which explore homelessness in terms of ‘sin’ (addiction and criminality), ‘sickness’ (poor health, especially poor mental health) and ‘systems’ (housing market failure and inadequate social protection and public health systems). The paper argues that, while important in refreshing our thinking about homelessness by offering a new, radical epistemology of housing, homemaking is limited by not contextualising the dwelling practices it seeks to explain, particularly in respect of how it defines ‘homelessness’ and also risks misinterpreting transitory behavioural adaptations as something deeper
ActEarly: a City Collaboratory approach to early promotion of good health and wellbeing
Economic, physical, built, cultural, learning, social and service
environments have a profound effect on lifelong health. However, policy
thinking about health research is dominated by the ‘biomedical model’
which promotes medicalisation and an emphasis on diagnosis and
treatment at the expense of prevention. Prevention research has tended to
focus on ‘downstream’ interventions that rely on individual behaviour
change, frequently increasing inequalities. Preventive strategies often focus
on isolated leverage points and are scattered across different settings. This
paper describes a major new prevention research programme that aims to
create City Collaboratory testbeds to support the identification,
implementation and evaluation of upstream interventions within a whole
system city setting. Prevention of physical and mental ill-health will come
from the cumulative effect of multiple system-wide interventions. Rather
than scatter these interventions across many settings and evaluate single
outcomes, we will test their collective impact across multiple outcomes with
the goal of achieving a tipping point for better health. Our focus is on early
life (ActEarly) in recognition of childhood and adolescence being such
critical periods for influencing lifelong health and wellbeing
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