2,193 research outputs found
El comercio infame: capitalismo milenarista, valores humanos y justicia global en el trĂĄfico de Ăłrganos
This article documents the growth of âtransplant tourismâ and the global traffic in human bodies, desires, and needs. Organ transplantation today takes place in a transnational space with surgeons, patients, donors, sellers and brokers following new paths of capital and technology. In general, organs flow from South to North, from third to first world, and from poorer to richer bodies, and from black and brown to whites and from females to males. The âscarcityâ of organs and tissues combined with the scarcity of patients of sufficient means to pay for these expensive operations, has spawned a lucrative business driven by the market calculus of supply and demand. The spread of new medical technologies and the new needs, scarcities, and commodities âfor instance, fresh organs and tissuesâ that they inspire raises urgent public issues concerning: the reordering of relations between bodies and the state in late modernity; the appearance of âfluidâ and divisible bodies that disrupt early modern notions of the indivisible and autonomous body-self; the emergence of new forms of barter and social exchange that breach the conventional dichotomy between gifts and commodities and between kin and strangers; the interplay of magic and science; and the power of rumours and urban legends to challenge the official medical and transplant ânarrativesâ on the meanings of life, death, and sacrifice.Este artĂculo documenta el crecimiento del âturismo de transplanteâ y el trĂĄfico global de cuerpos, deseos y necesidades humanas. El transplante de Ăłrganos tiene lugar hoy en dĂa en un espacio transnacional en el que circulan cirujanos, pacientes, donantes, vendedores e intermediarios que siguen los nuevos caminos del capital y de la tecnologĂa. En general, los Ăłrganos fluyen de sur a norte, del tercer al primer mundo, de los cuerpos mĂĄs pobres a los mĂĄs ricos, de negros y cobrizos a blancos, y de mujeres a hombres. La âescasezâ de cuerpos y tejidos, en combinaciĂłn con la escasez de pacientes con medios suficientes para pagar estas costosas intervenciones, han hecho surgir un lucrativo negocio impulsado por el cĂĄlculo de oferta y demanda de mercado. La extensiĂłn de nuevas tecnologĂas mĂ©dicas y las nuevas necesidades, escasez y mercancĂas âpor ejemplo, Ăłrganos y tejidos frescosâ que inspiran, hacen surgir debates pĂșblicos de carĂĄcter urgente, relacionados con: la reordenaciĂłn de las relaciones entre los cuerpos y el Estado en la modernidad tardĂa; la apariciĂłn de cuerpos âfluidosâ y divisibles que ponen en cuestiĂłn nociones de la primera modernidad acerca de lo indivisible del cuerpo âselfâ; la apariciĂłn de nuevas formas de trueque e intercambio social que rompen la dicotomĂa convencional entre dones y mercancĂas y entre parientes y extraños; el juego mutuo entre magia y ciencia; y el poder de los rumores y leyendas urbanas de plantear un reto a las ânarrativasâ oficiales mĂ©dicas y de transplantes acerca de los significados de la vida, de la muerte y del sacrificio
Is It Ethical for Patients with Renal Disease to Purchase Kidneys from the World's Poor?
Background to the debate: In many countries, the number of patients waiting for a kidney transplant is increasing. But there is a widespread and serious shortage of kidneys for transplantation, a shortage that can lead to suffering and death. One approach to tackling the shortage is for a patient with renal disease to buy a kidney from a living donor, who is often in a developing country, a sale that couldâin theory at leastâhelp to lift the donor out of poverty. Such kidney sales are almost universally illegal. Proponents of kidney sales argue that since the practice is widespread, it would be safer to formally regulate it, and that society should respect people's autonomous control over their bodies. Critics express concern about the potential for exploitation and coercion of the poor, and about the psychological and physical after-effects on the donors of this illegal kidney trade
Preparing Our Kids for Education, Work and Life: A Report of the Task Force on Youth Aging Out
Summarizes a study of Massachusetts youth transitioning out of foster care, and offers recommendations for policies, practices, and resource conditions, including "Five Core Resources" to prepare them for higher education, work, and adulthood
Citizensâ Juries: When Older Adults Deliberate on the Benefits and Risks of Smart Health and Smart Homes
open access articleBackground: Technology-enabled healthcare or smart health has provided a wealth of
products and services to enable older people to monitor and manage their own health conditions at
home, thereby maintaining independence, whilst also reducing healthcare costs. However, despite
the growing ubiquity of smart health, innovations are often technically driven, and the older user does
not often have input into design. The purpose of the current study was to facilitate a debate about
the positive and negative perceptions and attitudes towards digital health technologies. Methods:
We conducted citizensâ juries to enable a deliberative inquiry into the benefits and risks of smart health
technologies and systems. Transcriptions of group discussions were interpreted from a perspective
of life-worlds versus systems-worlds. Results: Twenty-three participants of diverse demographics
contributed to the debate. Views of older people were felt to be frequently ignored by organisations
implementing systems and technologies. Participants demonstrated diverse levels of digital literacy
and a range of concerns about misuse of technology. Conclusion: Our interpretation contrasted
the life-world of experiences, hopes, and fears with the systems-world of surveillance, e ciencies,
and risks. This interpretation o ers new perspectives on involving older people in co-design and
governance of smart health and smart homes
Frontline direct care workers experiences of providing domiciliary care towards the end of life:a systematic literature review and narrative synthesis
Background An ageing population heralds a greater demand for palliative and end of life care. Many people approaching the end of life rely on domiciliary care services provided by a para-professional workforce. Despite low pay and status, these workers provide personal and social care to people at a difficult time in their lives. Little is known about the impact of this work on the workers themselves or how they are trained, supervised and supported. Methods A systematic search was conducted in six databases. All study designs were included. Titles and abstracts of retrieved papers were screened by two researchers working independently. Findings were analysed using a narrative synthesis approach. Results Of 747 retrieved references, 12 papers from six countries in four continents were selected for inclusion in the review. Few studies dealt directly with the experiences of direct care workers themselves. Most considered them as part of multi-professional care networks with many focusing on issues relating to the professionals involved in the teams under consideration. Internationally and within nations, workers job titles varied and in some cases obscured job role. Where this role was clear, there was much overlap between domestic, personal, social and health related tasks. There was little evidence of a consistent approach to training and supporting staff involved in care towards the end of life and a paucity of âvoiceâ for these workers in published studies. Conclusion The experiences of direct care workers in palliative homecare is poorly studied. There is considerable variability in how workers are named, the work they do, and who they report to. More research that privileges the voice of these workers and identifies the impact on them of caring for those approaching the end of life is required so that employing agencies may consider how to improve the training, supervision and support of this essential frontline workforce
Listening to the Outliers: Refining the Curriculum for Dissertation Camps
Seeking to support graduate student writers, writing centers at research universities have developed highly successful dissertation camps over the past 15 years. Previous research from North American dissertation camps has demonstrated significant benefits from these camps, as dissertation writers developed new writing habits and increased their productivity. In this study, however, a closer look at initial and follow-up survey responses provided by participants from dissertation camps at two institutionsâan Upper Midwestern university in the United States that has held camps for 11 years and an Eastern European university that held an online camp during the 2020 pandemicâsuggests that focusing on
the positive responses may obscure some telling tensions between dissertation campsâ benefits and limitations. Our research reveals tensions around four key parts of dissertation camp curriculaâdeveloping writing habits and schedules, sustaining a community of writers, focusing on the drafting stage, and emphasizing cross- disciplinary participation. Listening more deeply to these outlier responses sheds valuable light on the affordances and limitations of dissertation writing camps and on how the curricula of dissertation camps might be reimagined to better articulate and embrace those tensions
Navigating in large hospitals
Navigating around large hospitals can be a stressful and time-consuming experience for all users of the hospital infrastructure. Navigation difficulties encountered by patients and visitors can result in missed appointments or simply create a poor impression of the hospital organisation. When staff encounter navigation difficulties this can lead to cost and efficiency issues and potentially put patient safety at risk. Despite the provision of an array of in-hospital navigational aids, âgetting lostâ continues to be an everyday problem in these large complex environments.
This study aims to to identify factors which affect navigation in hospitals. We do not seek to evaluate the effectiveness of a single navigation aid, instead the objective of this study was to understand the environment in which a new system must operate and the gaps in provision left by existing navigation aids. This study is intended to be used to inform the development of new in hospital navigational aids, be they technological or otherwise.
Eleven participants, all users of a large hospital site, were asked to describe specific first hand experiences of navigating in a hospital. The âCritical Incidence Techniqueâ was applied in a series of semi-structured interviews to elicit information about a participants navigation experience. This work presents the results of these interviews, with concepts identified and organised into five themes: The âImpactâ of poor navigation, âBarriersâ to effective navigation, âEnhancersâ for effective navigation, âTypes of Navigation Aidsâ and user groups with âSpecific Navigational Needsâ. The number of navigation aids available to participants was identified as an issue in itself, we found examples of thirty seven distinct sources of information available to a hospital user.
We begin by introducing previous work on in-hospital navigation before describing the study design employed in this research. The themes and categories identified from the interview data are enumerated and described, with examples given from the interview transcripts. Finally we go on to give a discussion of some potential navigation solutions in light of the identified factors. This study highlights that a candidate navigation aid must be carefully designed and implemented if it is to compliment the thirty seven other sources of navigation information available to the hospital user
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