This edited volume of original chapters brings together researchers from around the world who are exploring the facets of health care organization and delivery that are sometimes marginal to mainstream patient safety theories and methodologies but offer important insights into the socio-cultural and organizational context of patient safety. By examining these critical insights or perspectives and drawing upon theories and methodologies often neglected by mainstream safety researchers, this collection shows we can learn more about not only the barriers and drivers to implementing patient safety programmes, but also about the more fundamental issues that shape notions of safety, alternate strategies for enhancing safety, and the wider implications of the safety agenda on the future of health care delivery. In so doing, A Socio-cultural Perspective on Patient Safety challenges the taken-for-granted assumptions around fundamental philosophical and political issues upon which mainstream orthodoxy relies. The book draws upon a range of theoretical and empirical approaches from across the social sciences to investigate and question the patient safety movement. Each chapter takes as its focus and question a particular aspect of the patient safety reforms, from its policy context and theoretical foundations to its practical application and manifestation in clinical practice, whilst also considering the wider implications for the organization and delivery of health care services. Accordingly, the chapters each draw upon a distinct theoretical or methodological approach to critically explore specific dimensions of the patient safety agenda. Taken as a whole, the collection advances a strong, coherent argument that is much needed to counter some of the uncritical assumptions that need to be described and analyzed if patient safety is indeed to be achieved.

Since the naming of hepatitis C in 1989, knowledge about the disease has grown exponentially. So too, however, has the stigma with which it is linked. Associated with injecting drug use and tainted blood scandals, hepatitis C inspires fear and blame. Making Disease, Making Citizens takes a timely look at the disease, those directly affected by it and its social and cultural implications. Drawing on personal interviews and a range of textual sources, the book presents a scholarly and engaging analysis of a newly identified and highly controversial disease and its relationship to philosophies of health, risk and harm in the West. It maps the social and medical negotiations taking place around the disease, shedding light on the ways these negotiations are also co-producing new selves. Adopting a feminist science and technology studies approach, this theoretically sophisticated, empirically informed analysis of the social construction of disease and the philosophy of health will appeal to those with interests in the sociology of health and medicine, health communication and harm reduction, and science and technology studies.

'An essential guide' (Dr Mark Hyman, author of Young Forever) to navigating life with the cognitive and mental health impairments that often accompany Long Covid. Early in the Covid-19 pandemic, the shocking mortality figures obscured the fact that death is not the only adverse outcome associated with the virus. Today, as many as 30 to 50 percent of Covid-19 survivors still experience symptoms long after their acute illness has passed, with problems especially prominent in the areas of cognitive and mental health. For long haulers, this struggle with Long Covid has irrevocably changed their lives. Many have lost their ability to work, attend school, or look after their children. They often feel misunderstood and dismissed by others. Their once-full lives are now filled only with doctors' appointments that seem more and more futile. In Clearing the Fog, neuropsychologist Dr. James C. Jackson offers people suffering from Long Covid and their families a roadmap to help them manage their 'new normal'. Focussing on cognitive impairment and mental health issues, he shows readers: - the ways they can manifest and disrupt - suggestions for how and when to seek professional evaluations - science-based treatment options and strategies - information on navigating health care systems and disability insurance - validation and hope as patients wrestle with their new diagnosis In addition, Dr Jackson shares his own experience with chronic illness , relating to long haulers with vulnerability and compassion. Through moving stories, as well as hands-on guidance, Clearing the Fog will help long haulers understand their current situation while offering multiple ways to address it, make sense of it, and move through it with the goal of thriving instead of merely surviving.

EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence. Though a globally shared experience, the COVID-19 pandemic has affected societies across the world in radically different ways. This book examines the unique implications of the pandemic in the Global South. With international contributors from a variety of disciplines including health, economics and geography, the book investigates the pandemic's effects on development, medicine, gender (in)equality and human rights, among other issues. Its analysis illuminates further subsequent crises of interconnection, a pervasive health provision crisis and a resulting rise in socioeconomic inequality. The book's assessment offers an urgent discourse on the ways in which the impact of COVID-19 can be mitigated in some of the most challenging socioeconomic contexts in the world.

Shaping Neighbourhoods is unique in combining all aspects of the spatial planning of neighbourhoods and towns whilst emphasising positive outcomes for people's health and global sustainability. This new edition retains the combination of radicalism, evidence-based advice and pragmatism that made earlier editions so popular. This updated edition strengthens guidance in relation to climate change and biodiversity, tackling crises of population health that are pushing up health-care budgets, but have elements of their origins in poor place spatial planning - such as isolation, lack of everyday physical activity, and respiratory problems. It is underpinned by new research into how people use their localities, and the best way to achieve inclusive, healthy, low-carbon settlements. The guide can assist with: * Understanding the principles for planning healthy and sustainable neighbourhoods and towns * Planning collaborative and inclusive processes for multi-sectoral working * Developing know-how and skills in matching local need with urban form * Discovering new ways to integrate development with natural systems * Designing places with character and recognising good urban form Whether you are a student faced with a local planning project; a public health professional, planner, urban designer or developer involved in new development or regeneration; a council concerned with promoting healthy and sustainable environments; or a community group wanting to improve your neighbourhood - you will find help here.

Introduces innovative state-of-the-art methods for delineation of hospital service areas Studies the temporal trend of intra-urban commuting patterns based on the most recent data Explains the best practices and one-stop solution for urban and regional planning, and public health Includes free ready-to-download GIS-based simulation tools and sample data and an explanation of optimization and statistical techniques for measuring commutes Presents a methodology that can be easily applicable to other studies in urban planning

This book explores the series of issues that emerge at the intersection of disability, care and family law. Disability studies is an area of increasing academic interest. In addition to a subject in its own right, there has been growing concern to ensure that mainstream subjects diversify and include marginalised voices, including those of disabled people. Family law in modern times is often based on an "able-bodied autonomous norm" but can fit less well with the complexities of living with disability. In response, this book addresses a range of important and highly topical issues: whether care proceedings are used too often in cases where parents have disabilities; how the law should respond to children who care for disabled parents - and the care of older family members with disabilities. It also considers the challenges posed by the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, particularly around the different institutional and state responsibilities captured in the Convention, and around decision-making for both disabled adults and children. This interdisciplinary collection - with contributors from law, criminology, sociology and social policy as well as from policy and activist backgrounds - will appeal to academic family lawyers and disability scholars as well as students interested in issues around family law, disability and care.

Empowering Mindfulness for Women is centred around a a 5-day intensive mindfulness course attended by eight women from different backgrounds. The reader is invited to imagine they are actively participating in the teaching and learning moments and turning points encountered in teaching and learning mindfulness around themes such as making space for mindfulness, safeguarding mindfulness for women, engendering mindfulness, mindfulness dreaming and a mandala of wisdoms. Evocative accounts of experience bring to life the women's growing awareness that mindfulness can be both a separate practice and a natural part of life and that it can help them to nurture what they have neglected in themselves by not tapping into the full spectrum of their experience. Each chapter provides useful follow-up activities and questions for individual or group reflection, journaling, sharing and conversation. Empowering Mindfulness for Women is aimed at those who teach mindfulness to women in educational, community or clinical settings and at women who want to learn mindfulness in a manner that positions them as experts in their own learning.

Responding to the public concern caused by recent hospital scandals and accounts of unintended harm to patients, this author draws on her experience of analysing the health care systems of over a dozen countries and examines whether greater regulation has increased patient safety and health care quality. The book adopts a new approach to mapping developments in health care systems in Europe, North America and Australia and pieces together evidence of which regulatory strategies and mechanisms work well to ensure safer patient care. It identifies the regulatory bodies, the regulatory principles and the implementation strategies adopted to improve governance in health care systems and suggests a conceptual framework for responsive regulation. The book will be of interest to government actors, health care professionals and medico-legal scholars.

Sexuality and sexual identity have been relatively marginalized areas in both social work education and practice. However, changes in policy and legislation in the UK and other countries over the past decade have brought discussions of sexuality into the mainstream public service agenda. In social work and social care, gay and lesbian citizenship rights have been explicitly recognised. In the fields of adoption and fostering new regulations and guidance have helped improve and develop practice around assessment and intervention. It remains the case, however, that sex is often perceived as a problem area within social work and social care, discussed only in relation to sexually diverse communities or in the realm of dysfunction or pathology. This collection aims to generate a more proactive and challenging discussion of sexuality and sexual identity in social work. Its starting point is that sexuality is an essential aspect of individual identity, that users must be able to express their sexuality, and that it is essential for social workers to be able to respond and discuss sexual issues appropriately. The contributions are informed by feminist research, considering, in particular, the experiences of women working in and using social care services since the 1990s. In addition to a consideration of the wider policy, legislative and service providers' perspectives, the book includes reflective accounts as well as research-led contributions, offering a comprehensive and balanced account of this important field, which aims to inform both theory and practice.

-Accessible introduction to the full spectrum of diseases and disasters for students of politics, human security studies and development studies -Case studies include Covid-19, Haiti Earthquake 2010, Hurricane Maria, Typhoon Haiyan, Second Congo War; Yemen Civil War; Tajikistan Civil War, AIDS in Africa, Malaria, SARS, and Ebola -Timely new textbook to address issues arising from the Covid-19 global pandemic

This book aims to encourage a more reflective, multidisciplinary approach to public safety, and the 'reenfranchisement' of those affected by this new phenomenon. Over the past decade health and safety has become a major issue of public interest. There are countless stories of health and safety activities interfering with public life, preventing some beneficial activity from taking place - even creating absurd or dangerous situations. On the one hand, risk assessment, properly conducted, is highly beneficial - it saves lives and prevents injuries. But on the other, it can damage public life. Why has this come about, and does it have to be like that? The authors examine the origins of the problem, look critically at the tools used by safety assessors and their underlying assumptions, and consider important differences between public life and industry (where the approaches largely originated). They illuminate the whole with an analysis of legal requirements, attitudes of stakeholders, and recent research on risk perception and decision making. The result is a profound and important analysis of risk and safety culture and a framework for managing public safety more effectively.

This ground-breaking book challenges us to re-think ourselves as techno-sapiens-a new species we are creating as we continually co-evolve ourselves with our technologies. While some of its chapters are imaginary, they are all empirically grounded in ethnography and richly theorized from diverse disciplines. The authors go far beyond a techno-optimism vs. techno-pessimism stance, stretching our thinking about birthing techno-sapiens to consider not only how our cyborgian reproductive lives are constrained and/or enabled by technology but are also about emotions and spirit. The world of reproductive health care and particularly that of genetic engineering is developing exponentially, and current challenges are vastly different from those of a decade ago. The book is provocative, intended to generate debate, ideas, and future research and to influence ethical policy and practice in human techno-reproduction. It will be of interest across the social sciences and humanities, for reproductive scholars, bioethicists, techno-scientists, and those involved in the development and delivery of maternity services.

Program Evaluation 3rd edition has the hallmarks of thoroughness, insight and fluency of other editions but brings us up to date with a map of the evaluation territory new travelers will find invaluable.' Professor Murray Saunders, UK and European Evaluation Societies John Owen's Program Evaluation helps practitioners clarify distinctions between what we evaluate, the various motivations for conducting evaluation, and the approaches attendant to each. Timely evaluation examples liberally sprinkled throughout this book make it exceptionally useful and helpful to practitioners. I highly recommend Program Evaluation.' Professor Marvin Alkin, UCLA Graduate School of Education + Information Studies Everyone involved with policy and program development and delivery is being asked to plan more carefully, reflect more critically and justify their decisions. The key to this is evaluation. Program Evaluation offers a conceptual yet straightforward and practical overview of the evaluation process for both beginners and experienced practitioners. It shows evaluators how to identify appropriate forms, approaches and methods, using an original framework. John Owen examines the contributions of evaluation to program provision, and offers proven techniques for involving stakeholders in the planning process and for disseminating the evaluation findings. This third edition has been thoroughly revised to incorporate recent research on evaluation and new examples of good practice. It includes sections of management of evaluation, negotiating evaluation plans, program logic and ex ante evaluation, evidence based practice, performance management and accountability. With international examples from a range of health, education, welfare, community and other settings, Program Evaluation is an essential reference for anyone involved in evaluation in both the public and private sectors.

'Northern Exposures' is an important and thought-provoking book that shows how the labor movement has embraced environmental protection and is beginning to create a new and more sustainable vision for the future. Dave Bennett's knowledge and commitment shine through. He is, by turns, the skeptical philosopher sifting the evidence and the passionate partisan arguing for the rights of the people. It makes for a rich and exhilarating mixture.-Nigel Crisp, Permanent Secretary, U.K. Department of Health, and Chief Executive, National Health Service (2000-2006), Author, Turning the World Upside Down: The Search for Global Health in the 21st Century (Royal Society of Medicine Press, 2010)

Although drinking, smoking and obesity have attracted social and moral condemnation to varying degrees for more than two hundred years, over the past few decades they have come under intense attack from the field of public health as an 'unholy trinity' of lifestyle behaviours with apparently devastating medical, social and economic consequences. Indeed, we appear to be in the midst of an important historical moment in which policies and practices that would have been unthinkable a decade ago (e.g., outdoor smoking bans, incarcerating pregnant women for drinking alcohol, and prohibiting restaurants from serving food to fat people), have become acceptable responses to the 'risks' that alcohol, tobacco and obesity are perceived to pose. Hailing from Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom and the USA, and drawing on examples from all four countries, contributors interrogate the ways in which alcohol, tobacco and fat have come to be constructed as 'problems' requiring intervention and expose the social, cultural and political roots of the current public health obsession with lifestyle. No prior collection has set out to provide an in-depth examination of alcohol, tobacco and obesity through the comparative approach taken in this volume. This book therefore represents an invaluable and timely contribution to critical studies of public health, health inequities, health policy, and the sociology of risk more broadly.

There has been a general assumption in the international debate surrounding organ procurement that Presumed Consent (opting-out) systems produce better results than Express Consent (opting-in) systems. This study uses the French case to challenge this widely held assumption and argues that the French presumed consent systems coexist with patterns of behaviour that in practice do not mobilize the law. It explores four key areas to current research in socio-legal studies focussing on the state and nature of social solidarity, social engineering and the changing nature of the citizen-state relations, state intervention in the event of death and discretion in use of corpses and recent modifications of the status of medical professionals as figures of authority and agents of state policy. Using material based on interviews with medical professionals, this title will be a valuable resource for researchers, academics, policy-makers and practitioners with an interest in this complex and topical subject.

The Asia-Pacific region has not only the greatest concentration of population but is, arguably, the future economic centre of the world. Epidemiological transition in the region is occurring much faster than it did in the West and many countries face the emerging problem of chronic diseases at the same time as they continue to grapple with communicable diseases.

This book explores how disease patterns and health problems in Asia and the Pacific, and collective responses to them, have been shaped over time by cultural, economic, social, demographic, environmental and political factors. With fourteen chapters, each devoted to a country in the region, the authors take a comparative and historical approach to the evolution of public health and preventive medicine, and offer a broader understanding of the links in a globalizing world between health on the one hand and culture, economy, polity and society on the other.

Public Health in Asia and the Pacific presents the importance of the non-medical context in the history of human disease, as well as the significance of disease in the larger histories of the region. It will appeal to scholars and policy makers in the fields of public health, the history of medicine, and those with a wider interest in the Asia-Pacific region.

Judith Lorber and Lisa Jean Moore consider the interface between the social institutions of gender and Western medicine in this brief, lively textbook. They offer a distinct feminist viewpoint to analyze issues of power and politics concerning physical illness. SIGNS labeled the first edition 'a rich and imaginative work.' In the extensively revised second edition of this successful text, the authors add chapters on disability and genital surgeries. They also update and expand their discussions of social epidemiology, AIDS, the health professions, PMS, menopause, and feminist health care. For a creative, feminist-oriented alternative to traditional texts on medical sociology, medical anthropology, and the history of medicine, this is an ideal choice.

Public Health and the US Military is a cultural history of the US Army Medical Department focusing on its accomplishments and organization coincident with the creation of modern public health in the Progressive Era. A period of tremendous social change, this time bore witness to the creation of an ideology of public health that influences public policy even today. The US Army Medical Department exerted tremendous influence on the methods adopted by the nation's leading civilian public health figures and agencies at the turn of the twentieth century.

Public Health and the US Military also examines the challenges faced by military physicians struggling to win recognition and legitimacy as expert peers by other Army officers and within the civilian sphere. Following the experience of typhoid fever outbreaks in the volunteer camps during the Spanish-American War, and the success of uniformed researchers and sanitarians in confronting yellow fever and hookworm disease in Cuba and Puerto Rico, the Medical Department's influence and reputation grew in the decades before the First World War. Under the direction of sanitary-minded medical officers, the Army Medical Department instituted critical public health reforms at home and abroad, and developed a model of sanitary tactics for wartime mobilization that would face its most critical test in 1917.

The first large conceptual overview of the role of the US Army Medical Department in American society during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this book details the culture and quest for legitimacy of an institution dedicated to promoting public health and scientific medicine.

Over the last century public health efforts, such as immunization, safer food practices, public health education and promotion, improved sanitation, and water purification have been very successful in eradicating and controlling a host of diseases. The result has been a dramatic improvement in health and life expectancy. However, the impact that mental illnesses have on individuals and society as a whole has largely been overlooked by the discipline.This pioneering volume examines the evidence-base for incorporating mental health into the public health agenda by linking the available research on population mental health with public mental health policy and practice. Issues covered in the book include the influence of health and mental health policies on the care and well-being of individuals with mental illness, the interconnectedness of physical and mental disorders, the obstacles to adopting a public health orientation to mental health/mental illness, and the potential application of public health models of intervention.Setting out a unique and innovative model for integrated public mental health care, Population Mental Health identifies the tools and strategies of public health practice surveillance and screening, early identification, preventive interventions, health promotion and community action and their application to twenty-first century public mental health policy and practice.

A handbook for how we can use the power of our hormones to master any stage of life. Joint pain, weight gain, migraines, acne, sleepless nights, loss of libido - all of these and more can be caused by hormone imbalances. Our health is impacted by our hormones all the way through our lives. So why do we often assume they're mainly 'a menopause thing', and wait until hot flushes arrive before we take them seriously? The truth is that many women find that their hormone-related symptoms aren't acknowledged, despite the impact they can have, years before menopause hits, on almost every aspect of their lives. With advances in medical science, however, effective new treatment options are available, including modern hormone replacement therapy (HRT), diet, and exercise. So why don't more of us know that help is at hand? Why are we still being told that we have to put up with these conditions? Our Hormones, Our Health is written by two doctors who draw on their experience as practitioners, and as women. With the aid of pioneering research from epigenetics, stress medicine, nutritional medicine, and modern HRT, they show us how women can live with health and happiness - no matter what their age.

For decades, Life and Loss has been the book clinicians have relied on for a full and nuanced presentation of the many issues with which grieving children grapple, as well as an honest exploration of the interrelationship between unresolved grief, educational success, and responsible citizenry. This classic edition, which includes a new preface from the author, brings this exploration firmly into the twenty-first century and makes a convincing case that children's grief is no longer restricted only to loss-identified children. Children's grief is now endemic; it is global. Life and Loss is not just the book mental health professionals need to understand grief in the twenty-first century-it's the book they need to work with grief in a practical and constructive way.

Since the late 1990s approaches to women's reproductive health has shifted from a service-based model to a human rights approach. This approach associates reproductive health with freedom from discrimination and enjoyment of a satisfying and safe sex life, and full access to information and services related to reproduction. In spite of this shift, and the global effort to promote women's reproductive health through the enhancement of human rights and gender equality, progress has been very slow. In this book the author fills a much-needed empirical study of women's reproductive health. The author assesses data from 137 developing countries (or areas) and challenges the prevailing bioscience and public health models by linking women's reproductive health to gender equality measures and development policies. Discussion on abortion rights, regional variations and reproductive health needs among refugees and internally displaced persons are also discussed. This is a timely study which provides a theoretical and social policy basis for monitoring and improving women's reproductive health in developing countries. This is particularly important in the light of insufficient research in the field and a lack of analysis on the empirical and theoretical linkages between reproductive health and gender equality. The book will be of interest to researchers, professionals and students interested in women's health issues, gender/women's studies and human rights.

Domestic violence, childhood sexual abuse, rape and sexual assault, and sexual exploitation through prostitution, pornography and trafficking can have many significant adverse impacts on a survivor's health and wellbeing, in the short, medium and long-term. Taking a life-course approach, the book explores what is known about appropriate treatment responses to those who have experienced, and those who perpetrate, domestic and sexual violence and abuse. The book also examines key factors that are important in understanding how and why different groups experience heightened risks of domestic and sexual violence and abuse, namely: gender and sexuality; race and culture; disability; and abuse by professionals. Drawing together results from specially commissioned research, the views of experts by experience, experts by profession and the published research literature, the book argues that sufficient is already known to delineate an appropriate public health framework, encompassing primary, secondary and tertiary prevention, to successfully tackle the important public health issue represented by domestic and sexual violence and abuse. Domestic and Sexual Violence and Abuse equips health and social care professionals and services to identify and respond to the needs of affected individuals with a view to the prevention and early intervention.