What do we mean by 'gender' and how does this relate to health?
How is 'biology' best understood?
What does a focus on the division of labour bring to our understanding of health work?
Is (gender) 'equity' in health possible?
How have developments such as the resurgence of emotions and the new genetics affected these and other social relations at the turn of the century?
These are just some of the questions addressed in Gender, Health and Healing in which a whole range of issues are brought together and connected to emerging concerns in contemporary life such as the new genetics and transformations in biomedical knowledge and practices. It offers a challenging assessment of gender relations and embodied practices across the public/private divide, using health and healing as paradigmatic examples.
This thought-provoking volume lies at the intersection of gender studies, the sociology of health and healing, health policy, the critical analysis of scientific knowledge and the current debates around the body, health and emotions. Bringing together new and leading scholars in the field, it provides a unique critical overview of contemporary debates in health care for an interdisciplinary readership.

This extensively illustrated book provides an accessible and up-to-date introduction to obstetric anaesthesia and analgesia. With only three principal authors, there is a consistency of style within a comprehensive textbook that presents the basic science, pharmacology and clinical practice relevant to obstetric anaesthesia. Chapters cover topics such as analgesia during labour, anaesthesia and postoperative analgesia for caesarean delivery, major obstetric and anaesthetic complications, evaluation of the foetus and resuscitation of the neonate, and common clinical scenarios such as management of pre-eclampsia, obesity, multiple gestation and co-existing disease.

Clinical supervision has been available to nurses for over a decade. This book, edited by leading practitioners in the field, looks at how clinical supervision has developed during this period and what the issues are for the future, including:
* education and training in clinical supervision
* the introduction of clinical supervision into policy and practice
* the practice of clinical supervision within the different nurse specialisms
* current research activity
* international perspectives and experiences.
The book is firmly grounded in clinical practice and all the contributors write from real experience. They include clinicians, educationalists, researchers and policy makers from the UK, Finland, America and Australia.
Containing the latest research evidence, Fundamental Themes in Clinical Supervision demonstrates the potential of this form of training to support staff and improve client care an essential tool for nurses and other health professionals.

Clinical supervision has been available to nurses for over a decade. This book, edited by leading practitioners in the field, looks at how clinical supervision has developed during this period and what the issues are for the future, including:
* education and training in clinical supervision
* the introduction of clinical supervision into policy and practice
* the practice of clinical supervision within the different nurse specialisms
* current research activity
* international perspectives and experiences.
The book is firmly grounded in clinical practice and all the contributors write from real experience. They include clinicians, educationalists, researchers and policy makers from the UK, Finland, America and Australia.
Containing the latest research evidence, Fundamental Themes in Clinical Supervision demonstrates the potential of this form of training to support staff and improve client care an essential tool for nurses and other health professionals.

This collection brings together the leading research in maternity care from the United States, Canada and Europe to discuss systems of care for pregnancy and childbirth. The essays focus on the practical side of "good" social science and "feminist-friendly" research. The text not only looks at maternity, but also the act of childbirth, with the goal of providing not just comparative perspectives of care, but also to integrate the differences in care within each essay for a truly international understanding of maternity care.

This book is a collection of original essays on the meaning of providing care. These essays address not only the work of caring for the elderly, but also the work of caring for children, the infirm and those with disabilities.
The essays approach the topic from an ethical standpoint and also from a more practical, feminist and sociological point of view. The main goal of this book is to re-conceive the notion of care work, beginning with steps as simple as replacing the phrase 'caregiver' with the phrase 'care worker'.

To be at the birth of a baby is special, yet there is an increasing secularisation and reliance on technology in contemporary maternity care, particularly in the western context. Through exploration of experiences at birth this book explores joy at birth, which is often ignored and overlooked beyond the activities that help to ensure survival. This book draws on a collection of stories of birth from mothers, birth partners, obstetricians and midwives, that demonstrate joy at birth across professional groups and in different types of births and locations with or without technological interventions. Each chapter introduces stories of joy that highlight embodied, spatial and relational meanings. Employing the Heideggerian notion of a human being, it sketches out an ontological focus that draws our gaze to the everyday taken-for-granted ways of being at birth. Based on phenomenological experiential data and rigorous interpretive analysis underpinned by seminal philosophical writings, this book calls for readers to attend to the wholeness of birth in all situations and at all births in ways not attempted before. It will be of great interest to midwives, and those working in and studying maternity, obstetrics and neonatology, as well as social and medical anthropology, sociology, cultural, organisational and clinical psychology and spirituality.

Based on major multi-centre research in the UK, Dying to Care identifies why work stress is a problem in health care generally, and in HIV health care in particular. The similarities and differences between work stress experienced in general health care settings and in HIV/AIDS are explored in a state-of-the-art review of research and experience in the field to date.
The book has a practical focus, and goes on to explore ways in which the unique stresses of patient advocacy in HIV/AIDS can be addressed, identifying the best approaches for management. Highlighting the practical importance of a clear distinction between the burnout and work stress for design of strategies for burnout prevention, the emergence of the concept of burnout is described and the general historical confusion between work stress and burnout examined. This will be a key handbook for managers, physicians, nurses, social workers, health advisors and counsellors working in or alongside healthcare.

Based on major multi-centre research in the UK, Dying to Care identifies why work stress is a problem in health care generally, and in HIV health care in particular. The similarities and differences between work stress experienced in general health care settings and in HIV/AIDS are explored in a state-of-the-art review of research and experience in the field to date.
The book has a practical focus, and goes on to explore ways in which the unique stresses of patient advocacy in HIV/AIDS can be addressed, identifying the best approaches for management. Highlighting the practical importance of a clear distinction between the burnout and work stress for design of strategies for burnout prevention, the emergence of the concept of burnout is described and the general historical confusion between work stress and burnout examined. This will be a key handbook for managers, physicians, nurses, social workers, health advisors and counsellors working in or alongside healthcare.

First published in 1999, this volume discusses how the nursing and health care fields are developing rapidly. This series of monographs offers up-to-date reports of recently completed research projects in the fields of nursing and health care. The aim of the series is to report studies that have relevance to contemporary nursing and health care practice. It includes reports of research into aspects of clinical nursing care, management and education. The series is of interest to all nurses and health care workers, researchers, managers and educators in the field.

This accessible introduction to phenomenology for nurses explains what has become one of the most widely used qualitative research methods within mental healthcare.

Motor Neurone Disease is one of the most difficult conditions to manage medically and socially. A disease which leads to the loss of control of most muscle systems of the body, it has no known cause and no cure. For this reason, clinicians have traditionally been reluctant to reveal the diagnosis to sufferers or their families and the condition has become known as one of the best kept secrets of medical practice. However in recent years a number of organizations have set up to support sufferers and their families and consequently, the public profile of the condition has changed dramatically.
Motor Neurone Disease provides an extremely helpful guide to the medical facts relating to the condition and considers the psycho-social effects on sufferers and those who care for them. It will be essential reading for doctors, nurses, social workers, physio-, speech and occupational therapists as well as all those suffering from Motor Neurone Disease, their families and carers.

Midwives, Society and Childbirth is the first book to examine midwives' lives and work in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries on a national and international scale. Focusing on six countries from Europe, the approach is interdisciplinary with the studies written by a diverse team of social, medical and midwifery historians, sociologists, and those with experience in delivering childbirth services.
Questioning for the first time many conventional historical assumptions, this book is fundamental to a better understanding of the effect on midwives of the unprecedented progress of science in general and obstetric science in particular from the late nineteenth century. The contributors challenge the traditional bleak picture of midwives' decline in the face of institutional obstetrics, medical technology, and the growing power of the medical profession, while stressing the importance of regional influences and locality.


Related link: The Society for the Social History of Medicine
eBook available with sample pages: 0203435893

Examining current political and policy debates concerning children and young people, this text provides a discussion of the politics of childhood, focusing on topics such as: the family; education and schooling; mental health; crime and justice; and sexuality.

Examining debates concerning children and young people, this text discusses the politics of childhood, focusing on topics such as: the family; education and schooling; mental health; crime and justice; and sexuality.

Originally published 1995 The Making of Man-Midwifery looks at how the eighteenth century witnessed a revolution in childbirth practices. By the last quarter of the century increasing numbers of babies were being delivered by men - a dramatic shift from the women-only ritual that had been standard throughout Western history. This authoritative and challenging work explains this transformation in medical practice and remarkable shift in gender relations. By tracing the actual development and transmission of the new midwifery skills through the period, the book addresses both technological and feminist arguments of the period. The study is distinctive in treating childbirth as both a bodily and a social event and in explaining how the two were intimately connected. Practical obstetrics is shown to have been shaped by the social relations surrounding deliveries, and specific techniques were associated with distinctive places and political allegiances. The books studies how increasing numbers emergent male-midwives had overtaken women in the skill of delivering children and how as such expectant mothers chose to use these male-midwives, thus heralding the growth of male-midwives in the period.

The harmful consequences of alcoholism for the unborn child are still largely unknown. This book presents a detailed description of fetal alcohol syndrome as well as fetal alcohol spectrum disorders with respect to their clinical presentation, diagnosis, epidemiology, and pathogenesis. It also includes detailed considerations of underlying psychopathology, prevention, and therapy as well as the social consequences and impacts to patients.

Caring for the well newborn is an essential element of everyday midwifery practice. Providing a comprehensive guide to the problems associated with newborn babies, Care of the Newborn by Ten Teachers is a key textbook for trainee midwives. The ten teachers involved in writing this book are drawn from all over the UK and bring together a wealth of experience in midwifery and neonatal nursing teaching and practice. The emphasis is on caring for the normal neonate, with deviations from the normal threaded throughout. Taking a holistic approach, each chapter links theory and practice, with explicit reference to professional standards and guidelines. As well as infant feeding, skin care and thernal care practice, this book covers signs and causes of common problems such as jaundice, infections, respiratory problems, and birth injury, providing care and treatment strategies for the neonate and family. This easy-to-follow full colour design, with superb diagrams and photographs and helpful features such as key points, case histories and chapters overviews, makes this essential reading for all student midwives, as well as those on post-qualifying courses in neonatal care. It is also a useful reference for practising midwives and neonatal nurses.

An easy to understand text, which at the same time reflects contemporary health care practice, emphasising inter-professional care and cultural sensitivity to clients or patients. Discussing common ethical problems in all aspects of interdisciplinary clinical practice and presents both sides of any ethical issue.Case studies throughout make ethical issues applied and relevant to your clinical practice, so that you can understand how you can apply ethics in everyday situations including Primary Care, Mental Health, Complex CareThe book is packed with activities and pointers on professional development, and contains advice on keeping a reflective journal.

There is much concern expressed in nursing and other health care professions about the theory/practice gap. This volume is written for those dealing with the learning disabled in a professional capacity, and is structured to enable practitioners from a variety of backgrounds to apply theoretical concepts with real understanding of the issues involved. Themes, such as consumerism, empowerment, paternalism and informed choice, incorporate many complex concepts and contemporary issues. The authors introduce and explain the relevant concepts and show how they relate to practice through detailed case studies. They also identify the practical implications for care delivery and summarize the key points. The linking of practice to contemporary theories is designed to make "Learning Disabilities" particularly useful on introductory courses, but should also be an effective resource for the trained practitioner.

There is much concern expressed in nursing and other health care professions about the theory/practice gap. This volume is written for those dealing with the learning disabled in a professional capacity, and is structured to enable practitioners from a variety of backgrounds to apply theoretical concepts with real understanding of the issues involved. Themes, such as consumerism, empowerment, paternalism and informed choice, incorporate many complex concepts and contemporary issues. The authors introduce and explain the relevant concepts and show how they relate to practice through detailed case studies. They also identify the practical implications for care delivery and summarize the key points. The linking of practice to contemporary theories is designed to make "Learning Disabilities" particularly useful on introductory courses, but should also be an effective resource for the trained practitioner.

This text provides a comprehensive overview of psychological approaches to understanding addictions. Without denying the importance of biological Factors, Emphasis Is Placed More Upon Social, Psychological And Emotional factors as is necessary to a complete understanding of addiction. Within this framework, an addiction is not limited to substance-based behaviours such as drinking alcohol, smoking or drug use. Although these important areas are covered, a wider perspective is taken to include behavioural addictions such as gambling, violence and joy riding. Finally, prevention approaches are discussed with reference to the public health model which encompasses issues relating to the agent, the host and the environment. A list of resources and references is provided for those wishing to obtain further information.; Written in a jargon-free style, "The Psychology of Addiction" is aimed at students at the beginning of their courses. It should also be a valuable resource for professionals: nurses, social workers, police and probation officers and medical students, who often encounter the problems described in the book.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203401476

The first book to present the history, ideas, life and works of Chinese midwives and birth attendants, this volume seeks to encapsulate and explain the changing ideas about the practice of midwifery in China. Using participant observations and interviews, it examines each phase of the development of midwifery in depth. Providing a systematic study of the existing literature and contemporary national health policies, it analyses the factors contributing to the current demise of midwifery in China, such as the absence of national regulation, high standards of education and national midwives' associations. Furthermore, it argues that China's national statistics in the past six decades demonstrate clear evidence that minimising maternal mortality rates will only happen through wider availability of services, rather than through obstetric technology or facility based care. Ultimately, therefore this book supports the view that humanity and midwifery will survive to overcome domination by both technology and market forces and that economic growth and medical technology alone will not be sufficient in providing effective healthcare. This book is an indispensable resource for the study of Chinese midwifery, both in theory and in practice. As such it will be useful to students and scholars of Midwifery, Women's Health, Sociology and culture and society in China.

Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT) remains one of the most effective forms of neurostimulation for severe mental illness. Sound scientific research underpins contemporary practice challenging the complex history and stigma that surround this treatment. The Electroconvulsive Therapy Workbook integrates the history of ECT with major advances in practice, including ultrabrief ECT, in a hands-on workbook format. Novel forms of neurostimulation are reviewed, highlighting the future directions of practice in this exciting area. The book is also richly illustrated with historical and technical images and includes 'clinical wisdom' sections that provide the reader with clinical insights into ECT practice. Online eResources are also available, featuring a wide range of questions and answers related to each chapter to help test and consolidate readers' understanding of ECT, as well as regionally specific legislation governing ECT practice in Australia and New Zealand. This comprehensive introduction to ECT is a must-read for doctors in training, psychiatrists who require credentialing in this procedure, anaesthetists, nursing staff who work in ECT and other professionals who have an interest in ECT as well as consumer and carer networks.