M. Chatziarsenis, E. Makri, W. Sapouna‐Chatziarseni, M. Fioretos, T. Faresjö, E. Trell and C. Lionis
Addresses the important question of the optimal share and distribution of primary and hospital care, stating that the end‐user consensus is essential. On a classical medical…
Abstract
Addresses the important question of the optimal share and distribution of primary and hospital care, stating that the end‐user consensus is essential. On a classical medical ground with integrated medical services the care seeking patterns and preferences were investigated in a representative sample of the, hence reasonably unbiased, native population. In a small Cretan township hospital combining secondary and primary care, a questionnaire of habits, perceptions and expectations of health services delivery and provision was distributed to a consecutive visitor sample. Overall, primary care was well and realistically appreciated. In six of the 12 conditions, mostly with fever and/or pain, general practitioners were clearly preferred while in three, as a rule organ‐associated, specialists were the first choice. The consumer‐oriented survey brings additional support to the vital role of primary care in the ongoing health systems development.
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Despite numerous studies on the separate health consequences of economic crises and post-migration difficulties, very little is known about the processes through which the…
Abstract
Purpose
Despite numerous studies on the separate health consequences of economic crises and post-migration difficulties, very little is known about the processes through which the intersection of economic crisis and post-migration adversity contribute to migrants’ health vulnerabilities. The purpose of this paper is to examine existing literature about how newly arrived and long-term migrants’ health and well-being are affected by the economic crisis in Greece.
Design/methodology/approach
The ongoing economic recession in Greece, combined with the recent migration crisis, provided an adequate context for investigating migrants’ health and well-being. A narrative literature review was performed on whether and how migrants’ health and well-being are affected by the economic and the migration crises in the particular case of Greece. Papers published between January 2010 and December 2017 were selected based on review of titles and abstracts, followed by a full text review.
Findings
The review identified a surprisingly limited number of relevant studies. Ultimately five studies were selected and their findings summarised. There was only one study attempting to unravel the specific processes through which the crisis and the post-migration problems impact cumulatively on migrants’ health and well-being and to suggest healthcare improvements. Further research on this topic is urgently needed.
Originality/value
This paper explores existing research looking at how migrants’ health and well-being are affected by the economic and the migration crises in Greece. The emerging dearth of research evidence on the above topic is also critically discussed from a socio-political point of view and recommendations are made related to healthcare practice and services set up for migrants’ health and care.
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Heather L. Rogers, Susana Pablo Hernando, Silvia Núñez - Fernández, Alvaro Sanchez, Carlos Martos, Maribel Moreno and Gonzalo Grandes
This study aims to elucidate the health care organization, management and policy barriers and facilitators associated with implementation of an evidence-based health promotion…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to elucidate the health care organization, management and policy barriers and facilitators associated with implementation of an evidence-based health promotion intervention in primary care centers in the Basque Country, Spain.
Design/methodology/approach
Seven focus groups were conducted with 49 health professionals from six primary care centers participating in the Prescribing Healthy Life program. Text was analyzed using the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR) focusing on those constructs related to health care organization, management and policy.
Findings
The health promotion intervention was found to be compatible with the values of primary care professionals. However, professionals at all centers reported barriers to implementation related to: (1) external policy and incentives, (2) compatibility with existing workflow and (3) available resources to carry out the program. Specific barriers in these areas related to lack of financial and political support, consultation time constraints and difficulty managing competing day-to-day demands. Other barriers and facilitators were related to the constructs networks and communication, culture, relative priority and leadership engagement. A set of six specific barrier-facilitator pairs emerged.
Originality/value
Implementation science and, specifically, the CFIR constructs were used as a guide. Barriers and facilitators related to the implementation of a health promotion program in primary care were identified. Healthcare managers and policy makers can modify these factors to foster a more propitious implementation environment. These factors should be appropriately monitored, both in pre-implementation phases and during the implementation process, in order to ensure effective integration of health promotion into the primary care setting.
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Increasing physical activity can reduce obesity risk among adolescents. This study analyses how behaviours, ethnicity and various sociocultural characteristics may influence the…
Abstract
Increasing physical activity can reduce obesity risk among adolescents. This study analyses how behaviours, ethnicity and various sociocultural characteristics may influence the likelihood of engaging in active commute and other healthy activities. The authors analyse data from the 2010 National Youth Physical Activity and Nutrition Survey. The sample included US Hispanic high school students from 9th to 12th grade. Quasi-Poisson regression was used to understand the association between 24 possible variables and the number of days physically active at least 60 minutes per day. This study will present findings by race and ethnicity: non-Hispanic whites and blacks, as well as Hispanics. The research findings uncover that walking is the most predominant physical activity among Hispanics, especially from school to home, which indicates engagement in active transportation. This study shows the need for tailoring physical activity and health programmes by race and ethnicity. Interventions that encourage active commute can be effective for adolescents to achieve physical activity guidelines – at least 60 minutes per day.
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The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of women as human capital on sustainable development in the Egyptian community factories. Presently, sustainability has become…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of women as human capital on sustainable development in the Egyptian community factories. Presently, sustainability has become one of the targets all over the world , especially the Egyptian strategy that focuses more on women’s empowerment as human capital. There is a positive trend among organizations, governments and communities to focus more on the lead of sustainability in all our daily activities and business activities.
Design/methodology/approach
Self-administered questionnaires were distributed to gather data from 100 engineers (50 women and 50 men) employees of Egyptian factories and industries located in Egypt. To analyze, the collected data, regression analysis and correlation coefficient were employed to examine the study objectives and questions. A statistical Package for Social Sciences has been used for data analysis.
Findings
Results reveal that there is a direct positive relationship between women as a capital and sustainable development with its four interrelated pillars (economic, social, environmental and education) in a positive and significant way and the three factors of Human Capital (leadership and motivation, qualifications and satisfaction and creativity).
Research limitations/implications
The findings only apply to the sample (engineering women, men) that has participated in the questionnaire in the Egyptian factories. More research would be recommended in terms of further research study, highlighting the role of women in other categories in the STEM field as they are the human capital crucial for sustainable development and highlighting its impact on the Egyptian sustainable strategy 2030.
Practical implications
Although the Egyptian strategy reinforces gender equality and gaining more roles for women in the Egyptian community, there is still absence of women in factories and science. Based on the findings, there are three concerns that must be addressed: First, opportunities need to be embedded in the factories for more women, especially in engineering categories. Second, authorities must encourage human capital development for women. Third, there is a strong need to create responsible leadership between all human capitals which are especially important in areas of industry.
Social implications
Egyptian factories need to support women’s enthusiasm for innovation, continuously advance science and engineering, foster a business environment that fosters the coexistence of science and technology, the economy and society, support enterprise transformation and optimize the industrial structure of Egyptian industry. Simultaneously, it should encourage and promote the transformation of female achievements and strengthen the role of women leadership enterprises in Egyptian society. In order to promote the ideas of women, more money must be spent on scientific research, human capital must be allocated more effectively and fresh momentum for sustainable economic growth must be generated. It must expand training investment, encourage high-quality human capital and remove the bottleneck.
Originality/value
This paper is unique in presenting women as human capital in Egyptian society and reflects its impact on sustainable development pillars. Although much literature and study is dealing with the two topics of human capital and sustainable development separately or with links to other topics, they have not been dealt with together and there is a scarcity in the literature related to these topics focusing on women separately.
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This paper aims to systematically review the current literature on compassion in mental health from a historical, service user and carer (SUAC)/academic researcher perspective…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to systematically review the current literature on compassion in mental health from a historical, service user and carer (SUAC)/academic researcher perspective with respect to the current paradigm/biomedical model.
Design/methodology/approach
Searches were conducted in CIANHL Complete, Academic Search Complete, British Education Index, ERIC, MEDLINE, PsycArticles, Scorpus, Proquest Central using a simplified PRISM approach.
Findings
In the UK, the SUAC-movement facilitated the adoption of more compassionate mental health in statutory services. Across the world, compassion-based approaches may be viewed as beneficial, especially to those experiencing a biomedical model “treatment”. Health-care workers, suffering burnout and fatigue during neoliberal economics, benefit from compassion training, both in their practice and personally. Randomised control trials (RCTs) demonstrate compassion-type interventions are effective, given sufficient intervention timing, duration and design methodology. Psychology creates outcome measures of adequacies and deficiencies in compassion, demonstrating their importance statistically, with reservations. The effective protection of mental health by self-compassion in both SUACs and health care professionals is evident. It is clear from qualitative research that SUACs prefer compassionate mental health. It also makes a large difference to mental health in general populations. Implications for practice and suggestions for future research are given, including a necessity to fund RCTs comparing compassionate mental health interventions with the biomedical model. Unless statutory mental health services adopt this emerging evidence base, medics and their SUACs will continue to rely on pharmaceuticals.
Originality/value
This is the first integrated literature review of compassion in mental health from a historical, SUAC/academic researcher viewpoint using all research methodologies.
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Mia von Knorring, Kristina Alexanderson and Miriam A Eliasson
– The purpose of this paper is to explore how healthcare managers construct the manager role in relation to the medical profession in their organisations.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore how healthcare managers construct the manager role in relation to the medical profession in their organisations.
Design/methodology/approach
In total, 18 of Sweden’s 20 healthcare chief executive officers (CEOs) and 20 clinical department managers (CDMs) were interviewed about their views on management of physicians. Interviews were performed in the context of one aspect of healthcare management; i.e., management of physicians’ sickness certification practice. A discourse analysis approach was used for data analysis.
Findings
Few managers used a management-based discourse to construct the manager role. Instead, a profession-based discourse dominated and managers frequently used the attributes “physician” or “non-physician” to categorise themselves or other managers in their managerial roles. Some managers, both CEOs and CDMs, shifted between the management- and profession-based discourses, resulting in a kind of “yes, but […]” approach to management in the organisations. The dominating profession-based discourse served to reproduce the power and status of physicians within the organisation, thereby rendering the manager role weaker than the medical profession for both physician and non-physician managers.
Research limitations/implications
Further studies are needed to explore the impact of gender, managerial level, and basic profession on how managers construct the manager role in relation to physicians.
Practical implications
The results suggest that there is a need to address the organisational conditions for managers’ role taking in healthcare organisations.
Originality/value
Despite the general strengthening of the manager position in healthcare through political reforms during the last decades, this study shows that a profession-based discourse clearly dominated in how the managers constructed the manager role in relation to the medical profession on the workplace level in their organisations.
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Vassiliki Costarelli and Maria Michou
The pandemic of COVID-19 led to considerable challenges with respect to people's health, dietary behavior and satisfaction with life. This study aims to investigate perceived…
Abstract
Purpose
The pandemic of COVID-19 led to considerable challenges with respect to people's health, dietary behavior and satisfaction with life. This study aims to investigate perceived stress levels, in relation to diet quality and life satisfaction in Greek adults, during the COVID-19 lockdown.
Design/methodology/approach
This is a cross-sectional study which took place in Greece in the course of the strict lockdown period, in the third COVID-19 wave. A sample of 2,029 adults aged 18 years and above participated in an online survey. The questionnaire consisted of questions on sociodemographic and anthropometric characteristics. The Perceived Stress Scale, the Satisfaction with Life Scale and the Mediterranean Diet Assessment Tool were also used.
Findings
Linear regression has shown that women (p < 0.0001), younger individuals (p < 0.0001), obese individuals (p = 0.047), those with lower levels of satisfaction with life (p < 0.0001) and lower adherence to Mediterranean diet (p = 0.0001) were positively associated with higher levels of stress.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study conducted in Greece aiming at investigating concurrently, levels of perceived stress, with respect to levels of satisfaction with life and diet quality in adults, during the lockdown period of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Marina Papalexi, David Bamford and Liz Breen
This study aims to explore the downstream pharmaceutical supply chain (PSC) and provides insight to the delivery process of medicines and associated operational inefficiencies.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to explore the downstream pharmaceutical supply chain (PSC) and provides insight to the delivery process of medicines and associated operational inefficiencies.
Design/methodology/approach
An exploratory, qualitative approach was adopted to examine PSC inefficiency within two European contexts, namely, the UK and Greece. Data was gathered through interviews and a thematic analysis conducted to analyse the data and identify challenges faced by both supply chains(SCs).
Findings
The medicines delivery system needs to be enhanced in terms of quality, visibility, speed and cost to perform effectively. The findings demonstrated that although the healthcare SCs in the two European contexts have different operational structures, the results are in concordance with each other. Financial, communication, waste and complexity issues were the major concerns.
Research limitations/implications
To the knowledge this is the first study to examine aspects of the medicines SC via a cross-case analysis in the UK and Greece and extends the body of knowledge. A broader sample of responses is warranted to further validate these findings.
Practical implications
The study outputs can inform pharmacies’ strategic to instigate targeted improvement interventions. The implications of which may be extrapolated further to other European healthcare organisations.
Originality/value
This research contributes to the academic literature by adding further theoretical insights to SC strategy development, especially those that have been characterised as highly complex. The study identifies four key areas of intervention needed within this SC (in both countries) to promote higher level efficiencies and effectiveness.