Anthropology, nursing and midwifery: a natural alliance?

Anthropology, and its supposed operationalisation within transcultural nursing, is becoming increasingly prominent in educational curricula in the U.K. This increase in interest is driven both by governmental pressure to provide more culturally appropriate care, and an intuitive notion that anthropology, nursing and other related professions such as midwifery have a common basis of mutually overlapping and re-enforcing theory and practice. This paper explores the question of whether there is a natural alliance between anthropology, and the applied aspects of health care disciplines such as nursing and midwifery, by examining some of the concepts underlying each discipline, and the ways in which these concepts are applied in practice. Anthropology is the study of culture, and it is suggested that a more complete understanding of this central concept is essential if it is to be utilised in the applied disciplines encompassed by the practice of nursing and midwifery.     

The parenting partnership: The evaluation of a human service/corporate workplace collaboration for the prevention of substance abuse and mental health problems,and the promotion of family and work adjustment

A partnership between corporate worksites, a community-based prevention agency, and families in those worksites is described. Its primary goals were the reduction of family risk and enhancement of family protective factors that predispose children and youth to substance abuse and related social and emotional difficulties. A related goal of the program is to reduce family stress levels and attitudes that may influence the parents' levels of risk for substance abuse and related disorder. The program delivery strategy is conceived of as part of the necessart efforts of prevention programs to reach target populations in host settings in which they may naturally participate, thereby reducing obstacles and barriers to participation that often impede prevention efforts. Evaluation revealed that the program was generally better able to retain parents for a fairly lengthy period, and with high rates of attendance. Program attendance was also not affected by parental background characteristics that, in other delivery approaches, are often associated with poor attendance and high drop-out levels. Results also indicated that levels of program exposure (dosage) do make a significant difference in the efficacy of such efforts as those parents in the program who participated in higher percentages and numbers of sessions (i.e. more than 80% of sessions) showed both short-term and longer-term (i.e. across 18 month follow-ups) gains in their ratings of the target child's behavior problems and strengths, substance abuse resistance related knowledge and attitudes, reduced parental stress, depression and irritability, and increased utilization of social support. By contrast, parents who received a low program exposure exhibited a more restricted set of short-term gains. The findings are discussed in terms of their importance for consideration of program dosage for prevention programs, and the need to attend to the context in which programming is offered as it may facilitate or impede efforts to provide levels of dosage and fidelity to create enduring impacts     

Seasonal changes in cyclists' performance. Part I. The British Olympic road race squad.

British Olympic road squad cyclists were monitored during the 1980 racing season to evaluate training for the Moscow Games. Riders demonstrated reductions in body fat index, % body fat and endomorphy (p greater than .05). Graded exercise, using a "Racermate" wind load simulator/racing cycle ergometer system, showed reduced cardiovascular demands to warm-up exercise, and increased cardiovascular index, VO2 maximum, aerobic/anaerobic threshold shifts during maximal exercise (NS), with no changes in gearing, equivalent road speed, absolute/relative power output and leg power. Compared with "non-select" riders demonstrated lower body fat index, % body fat and endomorphy (p greater than .05), higher Hb and PCV % (p greater than .05) and elevated neuroticism and extraversion (p greater than .05). Furthermore, "select" riders demonstrated lower HR and CV index during warm-up exercise (p greater than .05), and elevated CV index, VO2 maximum, aerobic/anerobic thresholds during maximal exercise (p greater than .05), resulting from higher gearing, equivalent road speed and absolute/relative power output (p greater than .05).     

Transient monocular abduction on upgaze with impaired downward pursuit in downgaze – a new pattern of misdirection?

A patient with a long history of diplopia on upgaze was examined clinically and electro-oculographically. Upward saccades were normal in the right eye, whilst the left eye made a diagonal saccade up and to the left, coming back to midline with a slow movement. Only minor underaction of her left lateral rectus was observed on examination and both adducting and abducting saccades were of normal velocity. Upward smooth pursuit was largely smooth, albeit with occasional saccadic intrusions; downward pursuit was smooth from upgaze to the horizontal and saccadic from there to downgaze. The saccadic defect could arise from a misdirected axonal projection from the third nerve nucleus to the left lateral rectus; the pursuit deficit could arise from a proposed misrouting of vertical smooth pursuit signals.