Virginia Minogue, Mary Cooke, Anne-Laure Donskoy and Penny Vicary
Service user and carer involvement in all aspects of the health and care research process, from co-applicant on funding applications to active engagement in a research study, is…
Abstract
Purpose
Service user and carer involvement in all aspects of the health and care research process, from co-applicant on funding applications to active engagement in a research study, is now a requirement for most research funders. However, as co-production increases and service users and carers take on more responsibilities, this involvement has legal, governance and ethical implications. The purpose of this paper is to raise awareness of the issues and consider potential solutions.
Design/methodology/approach
Experiences of engagement as co-applicants in research funding applications, of involvement as research study team members, and as co-researchers were gathered from a range of service user and carer experts. Consultation and a workshop gathered further evidence from a range of stakeholders across the research management community.
Findings
Service users and carers, who contribute to the research protocol and process, feel a strong sense of responsibility to ensure the high quality of a research study. However, they may be new to their roles, status and key responsibilities when acting as project team members, co-researchers or co-applicants engaging in funding applications. The responsibility of sponsors, grant holding organisations, funders and other members of the research community is to communicate with and support service users and carers in those roles. More needs to be done to understand the contractual, a legal and governance issues and responsibilities that are specific to service user and carer co-applicants, project team members and co-researchers, from both an organisational and individual service user and carer perspective.
Practical implications
The implications of the findings are to raise awareness of the practical, legal and ethical issues arising from this type of involvement and the potential risks arising from lack of cohesion or understanding. The review also highlights the concerns and barriers service users and carers may find in becoming involved.
Originality/value
The findings highlight a range of issues for research regulators, sponsors and investigators to consider to ensure service users and carers can fulfil their responsibilities and be supported in doing so.
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Gerard Mc Carroll and Mary Cooke
This study aims to establish a correlation between a patient’s mini mental state examination (MMSE) score and their ability to remember how to use common assistive dressing…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to establish a correlation between a patient’s mini mental state examination (MMSE) score and their ability to remember how to use common assistive dressing devices.
Design/methodology/approach
The study was a prospective, cross-sectional and correlational study. A final sample of 63 patients formed the study. Patients’ cognition was measured using the MMSE, and a new assessment tool was developed to assess patients’ ability to use three assistive devices and piloted on 15 patients to address normality, reliability, validity and clinical usefulness. Pearson’s rank correlation coefficient was used to establish direct correlations between the MMSE score and the assessment tool score. Eta squared was used to calculate the effect size to achieve an indication of the difference between the groups. Ethical approval had been granted by the regional ethics committee. The null hypothesis states that patients with an MMSE score of 22 or less show no difference in their ability to safely and appropriately use assistive devices provided and demonstrated by an occupational therapist than patients with an MMSE score of 23 or higher.
Findings
The null hypothesis was rejected and patients with an MMSE score of 22 or less showed a significant difficulty in their ability to use the three devices. Correlation coefficients showed significant positive correlations between MMSE scores and assistive devices scoring tool results for all three devices: Helping hand (r = 6.677, n = 60, p = 0.01), shoe horn (r = 0.649, n = 54, p = 0.01) and sock aid (r = 0.877, n = 54, p = 0.01).
Originality/value
The study is in an Irish context and demonstrated primary, objective evidence of the impact of impaired cognition on functional ability. Patients with cognitive deficits pose a larger safety challenge but still should be afforded an opportunity to use and benefit from assistive devices. The assessment tool is a new and unique instrument and although requires further development, may conceivably act not just as an assessment instrument but also an effective treatment tool.
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Christopher M. Hartt, Albert J. Mills and Jean Helms Mills
This paper aims to study the role of non-corporeal Actant theory in historical research through a case study of the trajectory of the New Deal as one of the foremost institutions…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to study the role of non-corporeal Actant theory in historical research through a case study of the trajectory of the New Deal as one of the foremost institutions in the USA since its inception in the early 1930s.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors follow the trajectory of the New Deal through a focus on Vice President Henry A. Wallace. Drawing on ANTi-History, the authors view history as a powerful discourse for organizing understandings of the past and non-corporeal Actants as a key influence on making sense of (past) events.
Findings
The authors conclude that non-corporeal Actants influence the shaping of management and organization studies that serve paradoxically to obfuscate history and its relationship to the past.
Research limitations/implications
The authors drew on a series of published studies of Henry Wallace and archival material in the Roosevelt Library, but the study would benefit from an in-depth analysis of the Wallace archives.
Practical implications
The authors reveal the influences of non-corporeal Actants as a method for dealing with the past. The authors do this through the use of ANTi-History as a method of historical analysis.
Social implications
The past is an important source of understanding of the present and future; this innovative approach increases the potential to understand.
Originality/value
Decisions are often black boxes. Non-Corporeal Actants are a new tool with which to see the underlying inputs of choice.
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Analyzes the role of women in the New York Bureau of Municipal Research (BMR) in the early years of the twentieth century. It shows that early practitioners of urban‐oriented…
Abstract
Analyzes the role of women in the New York Bureau of Municipal Research (BMR) in the early years of the twentieth century. It shows that early practitioners of urban‐oriented scientific management had close ties to the reform/social‐work community.
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Richard A.E. North, Jim P. Duguid and Michael A. Sheard
Describes a study to measure the quality of service provided by food‐poisoning surveillance agencies in England and Wales in terms of the requirements of a representative consumer…
Abstract
Describes a study to measure the quality of service provided by food‐poisoning surveillance agencies in England and Wales in terms of the requirements of a representative consumer ‐ the egg producing industry ‐ adopting “egg associated” outbreak investigation reports as the reference output. Defines and makes use of four primary performance indicators: accessibility of information; completeness of evidence supplied in food‐poisoning outbreak investigation reports as to the sources of infection in “egg‐associated” outbreaks; timeliness of information published; and utility of information and advice aimed at preventing or controlling food poisoning. Finds that quality expectations in each parameter measured are not met. Examines reasons why surveillance agencies have not delivered the quality demanded. Makes use of detailed case studies to illustrate inadequacies of current practice. Attributes failure to deliver “accessibility” to a lack of recognition on the status or nature of “consumers”, combined with a self‐maintenance motivation of the part of the surveillance agencies. Finds that failures to deliver “completeness” and “utility” may result from the same defects which give rise to the lack of “accessibility” in that, failing to recognize the consumers of a public service for what they are, the agencies feel no need to provide them with the data they require. The research indicates that self‐maintenance by scientific epidemiologists may introduce biases which when combined with a politically inspired need to transfer responsibility for food‐poisoning outbreaks, skew the conduct of investigations and their conclusions. Contends that this is compounded by serious and multiple inadequacies in the conduct of investigations, arising at least in part from the lack of training and relative inexperience of investigators, the whole conditioned by interdisciplinary rivalry between the professional groups staffing the different agencies. Finds that in addition failures to exploit or develop epidemiological technologies has affected the ability of investigators to resolve the uncertainties identified. Makes recommendations directed at improving the performance of the surveillance agencies which, if adopted will substantially enhance food poisoning control efforts.
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Smedleys Ltd v. Breed effectively disposes of Section 3 (3), Food and Drugs Act, 1955 as a defence in law in what nowadays constitutes the commonest source of all food…
Abstract
Smedleys Ltd v. Breed effectively disposes of Section 3 (3), Food and Drugs Act, 1955 as a defence in law in what nowadays constitutes the commonest source of all food prosecutions, viz., foreign matter in food. Their Lord‐ships' judgment is indeed a brilliant exposition of the law on the subject, but the result of their dismissal of the appeal can only be seen, as one of their number stated, that local authorities and magistrates for all practical purposes can ignore the subsection, and from the numerous reports of legal proceedings, this is what they have been doing for many years. It was resurrected in a case, similar in circumstance to that in Smedleys, a couple of years ago, in respect of a snail in black currant jam, in which the snail and black currants were identical in size and appearance.
At each New Year we stand at the threshold of fresh scenes and hopes, of opportunities and pastures new. It is the time for casting off shackles and burdens that have weighed us…
Abstract
At each New Year we stand at the threshold of fresh scenes and hopes, of opportunities and pastures new. It is the time for casting off shackles and burdens that have weighed us down in the old year; almost a new chapter of life. We scan the prevailing scene for signs that will chart the year's unrolling and beyond, and hope profoundly for a smooth passage. The present is largely the product of the past, but of the future, who knows? Man therefore forever seems to be entering upon something new—a change, a challenge, events of great portent. This, of course, is what life is all about. Trends usually precede events, often by a decade or more, yet it is a paradox that so many are taken by surprise when they occur. Trends there have been and well marked; signs, too, for the discerning. In fields particular, they portend overall progress; in general, not a few bode ill.
Motivated by the call of the Congress for Industrial Organizations (CIO) for greater labour involvement in management (a call informed by the principles of the Taylor Society), US…
Abstract
Purpose
Motivated by the call of the Congress for Industrial Organizations (CIO) for greater labour involvement in management (a call informed by the principles of the Taylor Society), US business launched a crusade in 1944 under the banner, “The Right to Manage”. The purpose of this paper is to extend earlier explorations of the ideas that inspired the leaders of the CIO.
Design/methodology/approach
Through examining the work of the neglected feminist, and labour and social activist, Mary van Kleeck, the paper shows how the ideas concerning the democratisation of management, and the determination of decision making by knowledge, not profit, evolved into Taylorism's principal tenets.
Findings
The paper finds that an analysis of Mary van Kleeck's work helps explain why many of the ideas that prevailed among inter‐war Taylor Society members deeply disturbed employers, while concomitantly enthusing the CIO.
Originality/value
This paper redresses the view of scientific management's history that misleadingly stresses the initial hostility between Taylor's circle and organised labour, which has become entrenched in management folklore and accepted as axiomatic within the discipline, while ignoring the subsequent commitment of Taylor and the Taylor Society to management democratisation.
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In a manufacturing environment, the 5Ss in practice can result in considerable improvements in environmental performance in parallel with improved housekeeping and health and…
Abstract
In a manufacturing environment, the 5Ss in practice can result in considerable improvements in environmental performance in parallel with improved housekeeping and health and safety. The 5Ss in theory are a set of straightforward steps to continual improvement. In practice implementation of the 5Ss is influenced by human factors and resource limitations that can interfere with the effectiveness of the technique. Effective implementation of the 5Ss depends on top level commitment and total involvement of staff at all levels within a firm. Likewise, environmental management that results in real improvement depends upon commitment at the top and involvement and commitment of employees from all levels and functions of the business, in improvement actions. This paper explores the practical use of the 5Ss for environmental, housekeeping and health and safety improvement purposes at Cooke Brothers Ltd. The factors that act as barriers to the implementation of the 5Ss, possible solutions and the benefits to the firm through observed and measured improvements in environmental performance are identified.