Measuring the effectiveness of embedding social workers in integrated primary health care teams working with older adults with complex needs

Background: Despite the policy agenda for health and social care collaboration currently focused on integrated care systems, there is limited evidence that examines whether embedding social workers in integrated primary health and social care teams working with older adults is effective. Aim: The study aimed to establish whether embedding social workers in integrated primary care teams (IPCTs) for older adults in Nottinghamshire was cost-effective. Method: A mixed methods approach collected quantitative and qualitative data that was triangulated using a TRI-Q model. Cost and care quality data were collected from patients in receipt of social worker involvement in three different IPCTs. Patients with similarly complex needs, who were receiving involvement from social work only district teams in the same localities acted as a comparator group. Interviews were conducted with patients and carers and with social workers and GPs working in the IPCTs. Seven focus groups were conducted with IPCT members representing social work and health disciplines. Results: The cost data were analysed using ANCOVA to identify any significant differences in costs across the teams. The result showed costs in two of the IPCTs were significantly lower than controls. Care quality indicators were also greater in these IPCTs. Thematic analysis highlighted the important of knowledge exchange that arose from social work embeddedness as indicative of the optimal conditions for effective integrated working and care delivery to be achieved. Conclusion: The findings suggested that embedding social workers in IPCTs offers both higher quality and more cost-effective care for older people if the optimum conditions for integration are met

How the construction of women in discourse explains society’s challenge in accepting females commit sexual offences against children

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the way gender and gender roles are socially constructed by those who have experience of females committing sexual offences against children. Design/methodology/approach: Using a discursive approach, supported by membership category analysis, a secondary analysis of qualitative data illustrates how the social construction of gender and gender roles impacts on society’s perception of females who commit sexual offences against children. Findings: Discourse analysis found three patterns employed within conversation that demonstrate how the construction of women influence society’s incomprehension of females who commit sexual offences against children: women can be trusted, women do not manipulate and groom and, women are not sexually aggressive. Research limitations/implications: A limitation of this study is the use of secondary data, which cannot provide the richness or detail found in primary accounts from people with this lived experience. The difficulty in accessing this sub-population highlights the hidden nature of the topic and the need for further research in this area. Originality/value: This is the first study to explore how gender discourse is used in discussions of females who commit sexual offences against children. The value of this exploration highlights the need of society to adjust their perceptions of the offending capabilities of women and to ensure the experiences of people who experience this form of sexual abuse receive support

Pathogen priming affects preferences for male and female body weight [oral presentation]

Research suggests that implicit cues regarding environmental factors such as resource availability can influence preferences for body weight. This research has shown that individual levels of hunger effect preferences for female body weight. It is therefore possible that the way we perceive bodies could also be affected by other environmental factors such as levels of disease and the potential existence of pathogens. Indeed research with faces has shown effects of pathogen priming on face preferences. However, as far as we know, pathogen priming studies have only used face stimuli with no research looking at the effects of pathogen priming on body weight preferences. Here participants had their body preferences measured before and after experiencing either pathogen primes, neutral primes or no primes at all. The findings indicate that pathogen priming (exposing participants to information regarding pathogens) causes participants to shift their preferences for male and female body weight, rating heavier bodies to be more attractive and healthy after being primed. Since body weight is a good visual cue to better health heavier bodies have the direct benefits of being free from infectious disease and in mate choice would result in an increase likelihood of healthy offspring. Therefore this suggests we have an evolved set of cognitive mechanisms that aid us with the detection of cues signalling environmental threat which consequently leads us to become more aware of visual health cues in environments where we perceive there is a greater risk of disease

Uptake of home-based voluntary HIV testing in sub-Saharan Africa: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Improving access to HIV testing is a key priority in scaling up HIV treatment and prevention services. Home-based voluntary counselling and testing (HBT) as an approach to delivering wide-scale HIV testing is explored here