International Family-planning Training for Nurse Practitioners

Since the mid-1970s, the Margaret Sanger Center of Planned Parenthood of New York City has prepared nurses and nurse midwives from less developed countries to be family-planning nurse practitioners. These nurse practitioners then provide services to patients, train other staff, and manage integrated family-planning clinics. More than 120 nurses and nurse midwives have arrived in groups of 10 at the Sanger Center, with 72 attending since 1981. Each course lasts 10 weeks. The core curriculum provides trainees with skills in women's health care including contraception, in training and advocacy, and in management of clinics. Whether, in the current period of scarce resources, cross-cultural training programs of this type remain a worthwhile investment, and if so, which of their components are most important to this success, is assessed.     

Passive smoking: A danger to children''s health

The most common cause of illness in infancy and childhood is acute infection of the respiratory tract. Several recent studies have reported that life-threatening respiratory disease in infancy, such as pneumonia and bronchiolitis, is directly related to the smoking habits of parents. The effects of smoking are more hazardous to youngsters because babies and young children breathe more rapidly than adults. Because of this higher breathing rate, they inhale more air—and more pollution—in comparison to their total body weight. The harmful effects of cigarette smoking on infants and children and recommendations for specific interventions to minimize or eliminate this health hazard are discussed.     

Depressive Symptoms and Associated Factors in Children With Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

PROBLEM: To compare depressive symptoms in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) to those in healthy children, and to explore the influence of individual and family factors on level of depression. METHODS: Individual interviews with 68 children, ages 7 to 12 years, in order to complete the Children's Depression Inventory. FINDINGS: Children with ADHD reported significantly more depressive symptoms than did children without ADHD; 14.7% of children with ADHD reached the threshold of a 19 point score, which suggests clinical depression. No significant effects of individual and family factors on level of depression were found. CONCLUSIONS: Children with ADHD are more inclined to experience depressive symptoms than are healthy children. To plan appropriate interventions, nurses evaluating and working with children with ADHD should always consider a possible coexistence of depressive symptoms.     

A Paradigm for Design of Closed Loop Neuromuscular Electrical Stimulator Control Systems

Abstract: The use of neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES) for rehabilitation of gait in spinal patients is widely known. The best results can be obtained with the use of biomechanical sensors and a closed loop NMES system. One of the biggest problems faced in the design of control systems for closed-loop operation, in gait rehabilitation, is the variation of the mechanical conditions during the phases of gait. This work presents a new approach to ease the design of rule-based closed loop systems for operation in conditions such as gait rehabilitation.     

Promotions and relegations in the psychiatric nursing league

This paper describes a complex set of patient and nursing data from 83 psychiatric wards. It explains how the data were collected and organized into a meaningful format using a quality league-table. The patient and nursing characteristics of high quality psychiatric wards ranking above the 74th percentile and the characteristics of low quality wards falling below the 26th percentile are compared and examined in detail. Startling similarities and differences in patient activity, nursing activity, and nursing quality in high and low quality wards are highlighted. Finally, some implications of the findings for nursing practice, management, and education are considered.