Quality of life in children newly diagnosed with cancer and their mothers

Background With current treatments, approximately 75% of children diagnosed with cancer can expect to achieve disease-free survival. However, treatments are complex and aggressive, potentially compromising QOL for children and their parents. Although previous work has shown increased anxiety and depression among parents after diagnosis, the recent development of standardised measures of QOL enables us to look more directly at the impact of diagnosis on mothers' and children's QOL. The aims of this study are to i) describe QOL for children and their mothers after diagnosis by comparing their scores with population norms, ii) explore the relationship between mothers' worries about the illness and their QOL, and iii) determine the relationship between mothers ratings of their own QOL and their child. Method A total of 87 families took part, constituting 60% of those eligible. The children included 58 males and 29 females aged between 2 years 6 months to 16 years 3 months (mean = 7 years, median = 5 years 8 months). Diagnoses were acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL, n = 57), brain tumours (n = 11), bone tumours (n = 17) and 2 rare cancers. Mothers completed questionnaires about their own and the child's QOL. Results Mothers' reported their own and the child's QOL to be significantly lower than population norms. There were significant correlations between mothers' worries and their own and their ratings of the child's QOL and mothers' ratings of their own QOL correlated with their ratings of the child's QOL. Conclusion Both children and their mothers experience significantly compromised QOL in the months following diagnosis. Mothers who rated their own QOL to be poor also rate their child's QOL to be low. These results suggest caution is required where mothers rate their child's QOL. Efforts must continue to be made to improve QOL of children especially in the period immediately following diagnosis

Leadership Behaviour and Upward Feedback: Findings from a Longitudinal Intervention

A sample of 48 managers and 308 staff members of a community health care organization took part in a study to investigate the influence of participating in an upward feedback program on leadership behaviour, both as indicated be self-ratings and subordinates’ ratings. The research design consisted of three measurement points within one year. The intervention included managers receiving upward feedback and a management skills workshop. The results showed a negative effect of the program on leadership behaviour as rated by the staff. Furthermore, managers reduced their self-ratings in the condition where they participated in both a feedback session and an management skills workshop.Management;Leadership Behaviour;Self-rating;Upward Feedback

Modelling mode of trial

This paper presents a quantitative analysis of data collected from the mode of trial hearing in two English magistrates' courts. A model of the mode of trial procedure is offered that explores the factors that influence the mode of trial decision taken by magistrates. While legal factors such as seriousness of the offence play a part in the process, the mode of trial decision is also shaped by factors such as courtroom culture, the provision of bail and ethnicity. While this study is, in many respects, exploratory, it does point towards the importance of these extra legal factors in the mode of trial decision and indicate future areas for research

Effects of upward feedback on leadership behaviour toward subordinates

Purpose - To investigate the influence of participating in an upward feedback program on leadership behaviour, both as indicated be self-ratings and subordinates' ratings. Design/methodology/approach - The research design consisted of two measurement points within six months. The program included managers receiving an upward feedback report and a short workshop to facilitate interpretation. A sample of 45 managers and 308 staff members of a community health care organization took part. Findings - The study showed three results. First, managers lack insight into the real impact of their behavior. Second, only a small positive effect was found of the upward feedback program on the leadership behaviour as rated by their staff in terms of valuing diversity. Third, the managers' self-ratings of Presenting feedback, Fairness and Integrity & respect decreased between Time 1 and Time 2. Originality/value - The study points towards the need for HRM professionals to carefully implement upward feedback programs in order to have a real impact on the development of managers

The perfect recovery? Interactive influence of perfectionism and spillover work tasks on changes in exhaustion and mood around a vacation

This study examined week-level changes in affective well-being among school teachers as they transitioned into and out of a 1-week vacation. In addition, we investigated the interactive influence of personality characteristics (specifically perfectionism) and spillover work activities during the vacation on changes in teachers' well-being. A sample of 224 teachers completed study measures across 7 consecutive weeks, spanning the period before, during, and after a midterm vacation (providing a total of 1,525 responses across the study period). Results obtained from discontinuous multilevel growth models revealed evidence of a vacation effect, indicated by significant reductions in emotional exhaustion, anxiety, and depressed mood from before to during the vacation. Across 4 working weeks following the vacation, exhaustion and negative mood exhibited a nonlinear pattern of gradual convergence back to prevacation levels. Teachers with a higher level of perfectionistic concerns experienced elevated working week levels of exhaustion, anxious mood, and depressed mood, followed by pronounced reductions in anxious and depressed mood as they transitioned into the vacation. However, a strongly beneficial effect of the vacation was only obtained by perfectionistic teachers who refrained from spillover work tasks during the vacation. This pattern of findings is consistent with a diathesis-stress model, in that the perfectionists' vulnerability was relatively dormant (or deactivated) during a respite from job demands. Our results may provide an explanation for why engaging in work-related activities during vacations has previously exhibited weak relationships with employees' recovery and well-being

Optimized shapes of magnetic arrays for drug targeting applications

Arrays of permanent magnet elements have been utilized as light-weight, inexpensive sources for applying external magnetic fields in magnetic drug targeting applications, but they are extremely limited in the range of depths over which they can apply useful magnetic forces. In this paper, designs for optimized magnet arrays are presented, which were generated using an optimization routine to maximize the magnetic force available from an arbitrary arrangement of magnetized elements, depending on a set of design parameters including the depth of targeting (up to 50mm from the magnet) and direction of force required. A method for assembling arrays in practice is considered, quantifying the difficulty of assembly and suggesting a means for easing this difficulty without a significant compromise to the applied field or force. Finite element simulations of in vitro magnetic retention experiments were run to demonstrate the capability of a subset of arrays to retain magnetic microparticles against flow. The results suggest that, depending on the choice of array, a useful proportion of particles (more than 10%) could be retained at flow velocities up to 100 mm/s or to depths as far as 50mm from the magnet. Finally, the optimization routine was used to generate a design for a Halbach array optimized to deliver magnetic force to a depth of 50mm inside the brain

The relationship between leisure activities and psychological resources that support a sustainable career: The role of leisure seriousness and work-leisure similarity

While leisure plays an increasingly important role in individuals' lives, little is known about its potential to influence career sustainability. Drawing on Conservation of Resources (COR) theory, we investigate whether investing extra time into leisure will have a positive or negative impact on career sustainability by either generating or depleting resources. Specifically, we examine the effects of time spent on leisure on the career-related resources of resilience and self-efficacy using data on within-person changes over the course of 7 monthly surveys. We propose that the effects of leisure on resources depend on the interplay between a) the approach individuals take to their leisure activity, in particular the level of “seriousness” of a leisure activity (i.e., the extent to which individuals identify with, and persevere in, their activity), and b) the similarity between work and leisure (i.e., the extent to which work and leisure involve similar demands and skills). We found that time spent on leisure over and above an individual's average was positively related to work-related self-efficacy, but only when the individual's leisure activities were high in seriousness and low in work-leisure similarity, or when they were low in seriousness and high in similarity. Investing time in leisure was negatively associated with self-efficacy when leisure activities were high in seriousness and similar to an individual's work. Our findings paint a complex picture of the potential influence of leisure on career sustainability and highlight the need to take a nuanced approach when studying the effects of leisure

Leadership Behaviour and Upward Feedback: Findings from a Longitudinal Intervention

A sample of 48 managers and 308 staff members of a community health care organization took part in a study to investigate the influence of participating in an upward feedback program on leadership behaviour, both as indicated be self-ratings and subordinates’ ratings. The research design consisted of three measurement points within one year. The intervention included managers receiving upward feedback and a management skills workshop. The results showed a negative effect of the program on leadership behaviour as rated by the staff. Furthermore, managers reduced their self-ratings in the condition where they participated in both a feedback session and an management skills workshop

Psychometric properties of the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture: findings from the UK

Background: Patient safety culture is measured using a range of survey tools. Many provide limited data on psychometric properties and few report findings outside of the USA healthcare context. This study reports an assessment of the psychometric properties and suitability of the American Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture (HSOPC) for use within the UK. Methods: A questionnaire survey of three hospitals within a large UK Acute NHS Trust. 1,437 questionnaires were completed (37% response rate). Exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, and reliability analyses were carried out to assess the psychometric performance of this survey instrument and explore potential improvements. Results: Reliability analysis of the items within each proposed scale showed that over half failed to achieve satisfactory internal consistency (Cronbach’s Alpha < 0.7). Furthermore, a confirmatory factor analysis carried out on the UK dataset achieved a poor fit when compared to the original American model. An optimal measurement model was then constructed via exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis with split-half sample validation, and consisted of 9 dimensions compared to the original 12 in the American model. Conclusion: This is one of the few studies to provide an evaluation of an American patient safety culture survey using data from the UK. The results indicate that there is need for caution in using the HSOPC survey in the UK and underline the importance of appropriate validation of safety culture surveys before extending their usage to populations outside of the specific geographical and health care contexts in which they were developed

Relationships between two dimensions of employee perfectionism, postwork cognitive processing, and work day functioning

This daily diary study examined relations between two distinct perfectionism dimensions and work-related cognitions experienced by employees during evening leisure time. Drawing from perseverative cognitive processing theory, we hypothesized that perfectionistic concerns would be related to work-related worry and rumination during postwork evenings. In contrast, we hypothesized that a theoretically more adaptive perfectionist dimension (perfectionistic strivings) would be associated with positively valenced self-reflections about work across consecutive evenings. A sample of 148 full-time workers completed an initial survey, which included a trait perfectionism measure, reported their work-related cognitions across four consecutive evenings of a working week, rated their sleep quality immediately upon awakening on each subsequent morning, and their daily levels of emotional exhaustion and work engagement at the end of each work day. Results showed that perfectionistic concerns were indirectly negatively associated with sleep quality and work day functioning via the tendency to worry and ruminate about work. In contrast, perfectionistic strivings were indirectly positively associated with work day engagement via the propensity to experience positive thoughts about work during evening leisure time. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed