Conceptualizing Narrative Health and Medicine to Develop Cultural Competence to Improve Communication During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Narrative health is a technique that healthcare professionals can use to connect with patients. The events of 2020, including the global severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), have identified that patient care is largely dependent upon relationships within the healthcare environment. Relationships in the healthcare environment are established through a trusting exchange between the patient and provider, and one technique to develop this relationship and trust is through narrative health. Narrative health provides the exchange of information between patient and provider in a discussion-like manner, or narrative health. This strategy promotes cultural competence amongst the healthcare professional team and improves communication between the patient and provider. Narrative health is an important concept for healthcare professionals to understand, and narrative health should be a part of any healthcare professional’s toolbox, especially in vulnerable times like the COVID pandemic. The inclusion of narrative health in practice has the potential to improve patient outcomes and empower healthcare professionals and patients.

Distort, Extort, Deceive and Exploit: Exploring the Inner Workings of a Romance Fraud

Romance fraud is a crime where the fraudster must strike a balance between the romantic and financial aspects of the communication for their criminal intent to remain hidden. This discourse analytic research examines the setup of information early in the interaction, the use of visceral language and isolation as key tactics of exploitation enabling the distortion of reality and manipulation of power. With demands shrouded in a health narrative, and secrecy urged for the preservation of the relationship and the victim’s happiness, this research reveals how the language of this financially and emotionally devastating crime involves grooming strategies akin to coercive control and domestic violence and abuse and exposes the inaccuracies of popular narratives surrounding victims and in awareness-raising and crime prevention strategies.

12.I. Skills building seminar: Making the elevator pitch more effective: how to convince a policymaker in less than 2 minutes

Since a number of years, the European Public Health Association (EUPHA), the European Public Health Conferences and other associations, have been working hard to translate the evidence in a such a format that policymakers take notice. For example, the WHO Regional Office for Europe works on 'telling the public health narrative' and provides factsheets and infographics, in order to effectively communicate public health messages to policymakers. At the European Public Health Conference so-called pitch presentations were introduced (at Glasgow 2014), where researchers are asked to present their work in 5 minutes with maximum 5 slides (no animations), as a way to learn to present key messages from research in just a few minutes. EUPHA has organised several skills building workshops on translation of evidence in the past years, including last year's session 'making the elevator pitch work'. Lessons learned during this workshop in Marseille are: Have a clear ask (keep it simple)Appeal to the policymaker's own interests and prioritiesSpell out how action will be beneficial for the policymakerBe aware of upcoming electionsBuilt a relationship with the assistants of politicians Following the great interest in last year's workshop, this workshop will complement the outcomes of the 'lessons learned' with additional tips for convincing a policymaker. The list of lessons learned will be expended by reflecting on models of knowledge translation. Models of knowledge translation and evidence informed policymaking are abundant. Some key aspects that can be added to the list are: considering the 'policy window', making the comparison with the policy plans, identifying the relevant stakeholders and groups affected by the problem. In this skills-building workshop, we will select a number of abstracts that have been accepted by the International Scientific Committee as posters and we will invite the presenting authors to this dare: Present your work and key messages in less than 2 minutes. In order to see whether the policymaker is convinced, we are organising a small panel of policymakers and ask them to give their feedback. Are they interested? Do they remember the key message? And if all goes well, do you get an invitation to come back and present more of your work? Key messages Being able to present your key messages anywhere, anytime is needed. Telling the public health narrative and telling a story are important skills for public health professionals to have.

Multiple activities change intervention as a vehicle for changing the mental health narrative and practice

A novel intervention named multiple activities change intervention or MACI has been discussed. On 28th July 08 a 33 old male presented with history of stress, worry, and anxiety since childhood, backache since 2002, inadequate sleep, headache and body ache, acidity and abdominal discomfort, and throat discomfort – all from 2002. Results with multiple activities change intervention (MACI): baseline BDI-II score 41, 4 days later 11, and 19 days later 5. No psycho-pharmaceuticals were used. No interpretation regarding the symptoms was offered. Unfortunately, this man did not come for follow up. But there were others whom I have followed up for longer periods, and I have reported three such cases of drug resistant depression, who were utterly hopeless but showed a sharp improvement with MACI. In common mental illnesses (depression and anxiety, alcohol and tobacco use), such sharp improvements are often observed with MACI. Not so sharp but consistent improvements occurred in some other instances. As a social tool MACI has the potential to change the discourse in the field of health—and this is equally true for mental health.

Planning and health: defining the limitations of regulation and the discretionary context at the micro/site scale

Planning, at its most basic, is about making better places. In recent years, there has been a positive renewed focus on strengthening the links between planning and the promotion of well-being and good health outcomes. This is a welcome emphasis with origins relatable to the health narrative in the 1909 Housing and Town Planning Etc. Act. Within the post-1947 Town and Country Planning Act context, planning in some respects regressed to a land-use and infrastructure focus, with health considerations limited to physical-health infrastructure provisions and environmental/amenity considerations. This relatively recent ‘reuniting’ of planning and health is one way in which planning has been expressly identified as central to the ability of the state to improve the quality of life of the people. This is based on two implicit assumptions. First, that the characteristics of the built environment have an impact on the health of the population, and second, that planning, via its current policy, regulatory and legislative provisions, has the right tools to achieve positive on-the-ground changes in relation to this. The first aspect of this is well established through a public-health evidence base; the second, however, remains substantively under-researched as part of a broader lack of attention paid to the regulatory or development management aspect of planning. This article begins to address this deficit by examining the manner in which issues of health are or are not encompassed in decision making on the site scale by looking at appeal decisions into the location of fast-food outlets. By so doing, it challenges some of the assumptions inherent in policy aspirations and calls for a renewed and detailed investigation of the tools needed to achieve such good intentions on the ground.