scholarly journals The influence of environment: Experiences of users of myoelectric arm prosthesis—a qualitative study

2017 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cathrine Widehammar ◽  
Ingvor Pettersson ◽  
Gunnel Janeslätt ◽  
Liselotte Hermansson

Background: Prostheses are used to varying degrees; however, little is known about how environmental aspects influence this use. Objectives: To describe users’ experiences of how environmental factors influence their use of a myoelectric arm prosthesis. Study design: Qualitative and descriptive. Methods: A total of 13 patients previously provided with a myoelectric prosthetic hand participated. Their age, sex, deficiency level, etiology, current prosthesis use, and experience varied. Semi-structured interviews were audiotaped, transcribed, and analyzed through inductive content analysis. Results: Four categories were created from the data: “Prosthesis function,” “Other people’s attitudes,” “Support from family and healthcare,” and “Individual’s attitude and strategies.” The overarching theme, “Various degrees of embodiment lead to different experiences of environmental barriers and facilitators,” emerged from differences in individual responses depending on whether the individual was a daily or a non-daily prosthesis user. Environmental facilitators such as support from family and healthcare and good function and fit of the prosthesis seemed to help the embodiment of the prosthesis, leading to daily use. This embodiment seemed to reduce the influence of environmental barriers, for example, climate, attitudes, and technical shortcomings. Conclusion: Embodiment of prostheses seems to reduce the impact of environmental barriers. Support and training may facilitate the embodiment of myoelectric prosthesis use. Clinical relevance For successful prosthetic rehabilitation, environmental factors such as support and information to the patient and their social network about the benefits of prosthesis use are important. Local access to training in myoelectric control gives more people the opportunity to adapt to prosthesis use and experience less environmental barriers.

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 60-61
Author(s):  
Johan Suen

Abstract For holistic interventions and research on dementia, it is fundamental to understand care experiences from the perspectives of carers, care recipients, and care professionals. While research on care dyads and triads have highlighted the effects of communication and interactional aspects on care relationships, there is a lack of knowledge on how individual-contextual and relational factors shape the provision and receipt of care in terms of decision-making processes, resource allocation, and expectations of care outcomes. Thus, this paper sheds light on (i) how carers negotiate care provision with other important life domains such as employment, household/family roles and conflicts, as well as their own health problems, life goals, values, and aspirations for ageing; (ii) how older adults with dementia perceive support and those who provide it; (iii) the structural constraints faced by care professionals in delivering a team-based mode of dementia care; and, taken together, (iv) how community-based dementia care is impeded by barriers at the individual, relational, and institutional levels. Findings were derived from semi-structured interviews and observational data from fieldwork conducted with 20 persons with dementia (median age = 82), 20 of their carers (median age = 60), and 4 professional care providers. All respondents were clients and staff of a multidisciplinary and community-based dementia care system in Singapore. Our analysis indicates the impact of dementia care is strongly mediated by the interplay between institutional/familial contexts of care provision and the various ‘orientations’ to cognitive impairment and seeking support, which we characterised as ‘denial/acceptance’, ‘obligated’, ‘overprotective’, and ‘precariously vulnerable’.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (10) ◽  
pp. 5445
Author(s):  
Muyun Sun ◽  
Jigan Wang ◽  
Ting Wen

Creativity is the key to obtaining and maintaining competitiveness of modern organizations, and it has attracted much attention from academic circles and management practices. Shared leadership is believed to effectively influence team output. However, research on the impact of individual creativity is still in its infancy. This study adopts the qualitative comparative analysis method, taking 1584 individuals as the research objects, underpinned by a questionnaire-based survey. It investigates the influence of the team’s shared leadership network elements and organizational environmental factors on the individual creativity. We have found that there are six combination of conditions of shared leadership and organizational environmental factors constituting sufficient combination of conditions to increase or decrease individual creativity. Moreover, we have noticed that the low network density of shared leadership is a sufficient and necessary condition of reducing individual creativity. Our results also provide management suggestions for practical activities during the team management.


2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 37
Author(s):  
Beata Jeżyńska

<p>The need to keep the expected level of production in agriculture generates a serious burden on the environment. The most important environmental factors exposed to the impact of agriculture include biodiversity and water, air, and soil quality. Assessments of all these environmental aspects related to agricultural production are negative. The condition of the agricultural environment has been subject to rapid deterioration. In such a situation, environmental instruments have drawn particular attention from the European legislature when developing new guidelines of the Common Agricultural Policy to be applicable after 2020.</p>


2021 ◽  
pp. 238008442110419
Author(s):  
M. Hijryana ◽  
M. MacDougall ◽  
N. Ariani ◽  
L.S. Kusdhany ◽  
A.W.G. Walls

Introduction: The impact of periodontal disease on oral health–related quality of life (OHRQoL) has often been investigated from a quantitative research perspective, which is based on clinical findings and an OHRQoL questionnaire. Very few studies have examined the issue from the view of qualitative research. To our knowledge, there have been no previous qualitative studies focusing the effect of periodontal disease on OHRQoL in Indonesian older people. Objectives: To explore and understand the impact of periodontal disease on the OHRQoL of older people as a subjective reflection in relation to periodontal disease experiences. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted in a sample of 31 older people with generalized chronic periodontitis. Thematic analysis was used to identify the key issues in participants’ accounts. The analysis was undertaken by 2 independent coders to ensure reliability. To achieve thematic saturation, successive interviews were undertaken until 5 sequential interviews did not bring new themes. Results: Participants reported the negative effects likely related to periodontal disease. The impacts of periodontal disease were described by these older people as affecting more than pain, physical discomfort, and physical function restrictions. Periodontal disease also affected their psychological and social aspects of daily living. In addition, this study identified themes related to individual and environmental factors that may modify and personalize periodontal disease experiences. Furthermore, this study identified a misleading belief that problems related to periodontal disease were a normal part of aging, which might influence individuals’ expectations toward oral health. Relatedly, participants frequently reported that the progression of tooth mobility to tooth loss was an inevitable part of the aging process. Conclusions: Periodontal disease negatively affected participants’ OHRQoL. It is fundamental to understand older people’s perceptions toward their periodontal disease as well as individual and environmental factors that may have an influence on their periodontal disease experiences. Knowledge Transfer Statement: This study is a reflection of Indonesian older people’s subjective periodontal disease experiences. Therefore, the present study can be used to understand older people’s perceptions, attitudes, behaviors, and experiences toward periodontal disease and how this disease may affect their quality of life. This study also highlights a widespread and misleading belief that oral problems related to periodontal disease are an inevitable part of aging in this study population.


2021 ◽  
Vol 129 ◽  
pp. 01014
Author(s):  
Vladislav Kaputa ◽  
Frederik Kvočák ◽  
Miroslava Triznová ◽  
Andrej Tomić ◽  
Hana Maťová

Research background: The coronavirus pandemic in 2020 had a significant impact on all aspects of life, from the point of view of the individual by forcing social isolation, moving work and study to the home, enormous pressure on the social and health system, but also by forcing closures of services and direct contact with customers. These, as well as other factors, have also had an impact on the performance of economies around the world. Purpose of the article: The paper aims to evaluate the development of the world's major economies in terms of macroeconomic indicators and foreign trade in the pandemic period and previous periods. The social and environmental aspects of the impact of the pandemic on selected economies are also reflected. Methods: Analysis of the main macroeconomic data, comparison and synthesis of findings. Findings & Value added: The interdependence of economies and interconnectedness of markets on transport routes associated with reduced mobility, forced isolation of people and death of economic activity had a significant impact on all the observed indicators, where a significant decline in GDP could be observed in all countries except China. This country was the only one that managed to keep GDP growth in positive numbers. Unemployment development was not equal in the observed economies due to different labour market environment. On the contrary, the environment has benefited in some way.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily Anne Tarrant ◽  
Alison Torn

Purpose This study aims to explore the ways in which young people and prison staff (Prison Officers) within a youth custodial establishment experience empathy. Previous research tends to view empathy as a stable trait and one which people can develop through individual-centred therapy. There has been little consideration of the impact of relationship factors and context in relation to empathy experience and expression. The current study aims to address this by exploring the role of the custodial context in shaping empathy, including the potential impact of relationships, environmental factors and culture. Design/methodology/approach A qualitative approach was used to enable breadth and depth in the exploration of this area. Individual, semi-structured interviews were carried out with a purposive sample of three young people and three Prison Officers. Data was analysed using inductive thematic analysis informed by the guidelines of Braun and Clarke (2006) and King and Horrocks (2010). Findings Constructed themes included “constructions of empathy”, “recipe for empathy”, “institutional investment”, “the value of empathy” and “doing empathy”. Together, they provide detailed insight into the interplay of personal and wider contextual factors influencing the experience of empathy in a custodial setting. The findings suggest that the way in which young people and staff experience empathy in the custodial environment is unique. The findings suggest that empathy takes place within the context of relationships and is influenced by the nature of those relationships, along with the wider social context within which it occurs. Practical implications The findings of the current study support a move away from understanding empathy as an individual personality trait and instead viewing it as a dynamic experience that is changeable based upon the relationship and the context within which it occurs. The findings suggest that interventions aiming to develop empathy should look beyond the level of the individual and the relationship and focus upon developing environments that are supportive of empathy. Originality/value This study provides unique insights into the subjective experience of empathy in a custodial setting, presenting as one of the first to take a more holistic approach to understand this phenomenon.


2018 ◽  
Vol 32 (8) ◽  
pp. 1133-1144 ◽  
Author(s):  
Verity Longley ◽  
Sarah Peters ◽  
Caroline Swarbrick ◽  
Audrey Bowen

Objective: To identify factors influencing clinicians decision-making about ongoing stroke rehabilitation for people with pre-existing dementia/cognitive impairment and the impact on clinical practice. Design: Qualitative semi-structured interviews with stroke specialist healthcare professionals analysed using thematic analysis. Setting: Acute stroke unit, inpatient stroke rehabilitation units, and community stroke services. Participants: Twenty three professionals from six multidisciplinary stroke teams involved in decision-making about stroke patients’ rehabilitation potential and clinical pathways. Results: Factors influencing decision-making about ongoing rehabilitation were (1) gaining understanding of the individual patient, (2) clinician’s knowledge of dementia/cognitive impairment, (3) predicting rehabilitation potential, (4) organizational constraints, and (5) clinician’s perceptions of their role within the team. Decision-making led to two outcomes, either accommodating the pre-existing dementia/cognitive impairment within delivery of rehabilitation or ending rehabilitation for that patient to allocate limited resources where they were perceived more likely to be effective. Participants felt that patients with pre-existing dementia/cognitive impairment had difficulty demonstrating the required rehabilitation potential within the short timescales available in the current model of service delivery. Participants identified a need for training to improve their knowledge and confidence for decision-making and delivery of rehabilitation for this growing population. Conclusion: Clinicians’ decision-making about ongoing rehabilitation for patients with prestroke dementia/cognitive impairments is influenced by gaps in their knowledge and by service constraints. Increased training and more flexible, patient-centred services would enable clinicians to better accommodate these patients in rehabilitation.


2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (19) ◽  
pp. 270
Author(s):  
Caio Flávio Stettiner ◽  
Ednício Oliveira Lima ◽  
Eliane Pires Giavina Bianchi

Based on theoretical models, such as those proposed in the studies of McClelland and Spencer and Spencer over the last forty years, this study identifies entrepreneurs’ perception of the impact of the required skills of a job applicant in startups. It uses the snowball sampling technique and direct observation in incubators and accelerators to conduct a qualitative analysis. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the founders and managers of different impact ventures. From the analysis and discussion of this research, some of the skills required in startups are empathy, principles, ethical values, and other attributes of human nature. This study will be of practical value to job seekers, recruiters, and scholars as it suggests the skills that are required in the high-impact market, helping to develop better recruitment and training programs to their business.


2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-84
Author(s):  
Saif Nasser AlMaamari

Today, globalisation expands the affiliation of the individual from a national level to an international level. Global citizenship has been regarded as an important outcome for students in major universities around the world, yet there is little literature about how it is integrated at universities in the Arab world, although some of them emphasise it in their policies. This article reports on how one Omani University, namely Sultan Qaboos University, interpreted and implemented global citizenship education in their undergraduate programmes. Particularly, this study seeks to identify the perceptions of students who studied a course entitled Global Citizenship Education in the academic year 2018–2019. The data were collected using two tools: a questionnaire which was administered to a sample consisting of 49 students and semi-structured interviews with 10 students. The data analysis was conducted by calculating the medium for the questionnaire and by employing an inductive process where the data were coded and then the themes that emerged from the data were highlighted. The results indicated that Omani University students had different perceptions of global citizenship and their perspectives tended to be more cosmopolitan and humanistic . In addition, they highlighted the impact of the course on developing three dimensions of global citizenship education: the cognitive, socioemotional and behavioural dimensions.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-141 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victor Mueke Robinson ◽  
Heike A. Schänzel

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it highlights the emergence of Generation Z and the interface of its members with the tourism system. Second, by way of a theoretical model, the paper provides a more holistic approach to understanding Generation Z travel experiences in which the emphasis is shifted from the destination to the traveller. This is in keeping with the trend which lays more emphasis on people rather than landscape.Design/methodology/approachThis is qualitative research founded on an interpretive (constructivist) paradigm. Selecting Generation Z as the subject locates this study under generational theory and assumesprima faciea socially constructed reality. The paper is based on research conducted in New Zealand aimed at understanding the travel experiences of inbound Generation Z travellers. Data were collected from 12 semi-structured interviews lasting about 30 min each and from 5 blogs. Nvivo 11 programme was used in analysing data and developing themes. Core categories and related themes were generated forming building blocks of a theoretical model.FindingsFindings revealed interplay of multiple factors in Generation Z’s travel experiences at a destination. The factors are global in nature, destination centric and those which are immediate or proximate to the individual. To fully grasp the notion of experience requires the gestalt of the three as well as pre-trip, during-trip and post-trip factors.Research limitations/implicationsThe impact of significant events upon participants is assumed. A specific analysis of the events and the magnitude of their influence on the individual participants may be necessary.Practical implicationsDestination marketers tend to concentrate on psychological aspects to appeal to the traveller. The focus, in this case, is creating an attractive image in the mind of travellers to get them to come to the destination. This research suggests shifting the focus to understanding the evolving traveller.Social implicationsGovernments and tourism purveyors may require an ever-increasing budget to map out strategies to meet the continuously morphing needs of the future traveller. The constantly evolving global environment necessitates greater flexibility in institutional framework with less bureaucratic bottlenecks.Originality/valueGeneration Z is a relatively new entrant into the tourism market which makes this research relevant and timely. The paucity of academic literature on a generation which is contemporaneously in its “highly influenceable” period of life and entering adulthood in an increasingly changing world is further credence for this research. A more holistic theoretical model to understanding Generation Z travel experience is proposed.


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