Exclusive breastfeeding and professionals from the family health strategy

ABSTRACT Objectives: to analyze the perception of health professionals about exclusive breastfeeding in Family Health Strategy units in the city of Macaé. Methods: qualitative study carried out in four units of the Family Health Strategy in the city of Macaé, Rio de Janeiro. Thirty health professionals were interviewed from March to May 2019. Textual contents were processed in the IRaMuTeQ® software by the Descending Hierarchical Classification. Results: professionals use different strategies for actions to promote, protect and support breastfeeding in prenatal consultations, but social and cultural determinants are important issues that interfere in this process, the involvement of the family being essential for the success of this practice. Final Considerations: health professionals, including nurses, need training and qualification to strengthen the support and social network of pregnant women and insert the family in the different strategies used to improve adherence to exclusive breastfeeding.

Women and Minorities as Living Organ Donors

In this chapter, two demographic traits of living donors are observed: the over-representation of women and the under-representation of Blacks. This raises the question of whether these differences should be considered a disparity or a preference. A traditional bioethics approach would state that as long as living donors believe that the benefits of participation outweigh the risks and harms (beneficence) and the donors give a voluntary and informed consent (autonomy or, more accurately, respect for persons), then the demographics reflect a mere difference in preferences. Such an analysis, however, ignores the social, economic, and cultural determinants as well as various forms of structural discrimination (such as racism and sexism) that may imply that the distribution is less voluntary than may appear initially. The distribution also raises justice concerns regarding the fair recruitment and selection of living donors and their recipients. A vulnerabilities analysis can help explain the demographics of living donation.

The socio-cultural determinants of tourism: the case of Turkey

PurposeThe study aims to determine the socio-cultural variables that affect Turkey's tourism demand. The study proposes how important socio-cultural determinants as well as economic determinants affect tourism demand.Design/methodology/approachThe study examined a sample of 19 countries sending the most visitors to Turkey between 1996 and 2017 by using panel unit root, panel cointegration tests and cointegration estimator methods. The data set consists of variables such as GDP per capita (lnGDPP), total population number (lnPOP), urbanization level, information and communication technology (lnICT), human development index (lnHDI), education level and death rates (lnDTH).FindingsThe findings from the analysis provide evidence that the variables in the models show the expected effects on tourism demand. The findings show that apart from economic variables, socio-cultural variables also have an important effect on tourism demand.Research limitations/implicationsThe socio-cultural models used in the study were created using variables that can be quantified. The study results are valid for the countries included in the analysis.Practical implicationsThe findings of this study will contribute to policymakers in determining the market for Turkish tourism. The results show that the policies to be prepared by considering the socio-cultural characteristics of countries can increase the tourism demand.Originality/valueThe study is significant in that it focuses on socio-cultural variables rather than economic variables commonly used in the literature. The study is original in terms of both the study sample and the model and considers cross-sectional dependency (CD) and homogeneity.

People with Disabilities in the Workplace: Results of a Survey Conducted among Polish and Finnish Employers

The key aspect of the inclusion of people with disabilities (PwD) in the workplace is how they are perceived by employers who make decisions on hiring employees. The article presents the results of CAWI (Computer Assisted Web Interview) research conducted among Polish and Finnish employers (n = 414) in 2021 using a proprietary questionnaire. Employers were asked to assess the state policy in the field of PwD’s inclusion, the social atmosphere in this respect, the level of acceptance of privileges/special solutions dedicated to PwD in the workplace and the knowledge of the specificity of disability. When analysing the obtained data, we verified the differentiation of Polish and Finnish employers’ assessments, the impact of respondents’ characteristics on their assessment and the relations between the assessments of various aspects of PwD’s inclusion. For the analysis, we used the t-test of independent samples for equality of means and the Pearson correlation coefficient. The results showed that Finnish respondents assess the conditions for the full inclusion of PwD much better than Polish ones. The characteristics most differentiating employers’ assessments is gender and the fact of employing PwD. There were also correlations between the responses of respondents in both countries to three out of four analysed questions from the questionnaire. The differences found in this study indicate that it would be worth extending the research to other European countries to generalize conclusions about the influence of cultural determinants on the situation of PwD on the labour market.

Determinants of HPV-vaccination uptake and subgroups with a lower uptake in the Netherlands

Background In the Netherlands, the HPV-vaccine uptake was 52% during the 2009 catch-up campaign (birth cohorts 1993–1996). This increased to 61% in the regular immunization program (birth cohorts 2000–2001). However for birth cohorts 2003–2004 the uptake declined to 45.5%. With this study we aimed to gain insight into social, economic and cultural determinants that are associated with HPV-vaccination uptake and which subgroups with a lower HPV-vaccination uptake can be identified. In addition, we investigated whether the influence of these factors changed over time. Methods To study the determinants of HPV-vaccine uptake we performed a database study using different aggregation levels, i.e. individual level, postal code level and municipality level. All Dutch girls who were invited for HPV-vaccination through the National Immunization Program in the years 2012, 2014 and 2017 (i.e. birth cohorts 1999, 2001 and 2004, respectively) were included in the study population. We conducted multilevel logistic regression analyses to analyze the influence of the determinants on HPV-vaccination uptake, taking into account that the delivery of HPV-vaccine was nested within municipalities. Results Results showed that in particular having not received a MMR-vaccination, having one or two parents born in Morocco or Turkey, living in an area with lower socioeconomic status and higher municipal voting proportions for Christian political parties or populist parties with liberal-conservative views were associated with a lower HPV-vaccination uptake. Besides some changes in political preferences of the population and changes in the association between HPV uptake and urbanization level we found no clear determinants which could possibly explain the decrease in the HPV-vaccination uptake. Conclusions In this study we identified current social, economic and cultural determinants that are associated with HPV-vaccination uptake and which low-vaccination subgroups can be identified. However, no clear determinants were found which could explain the decrease in the HPV-vaccination uptake. Tailored information and/or consultation for groups that are associated with a lower HPV-vaccination uptake might help to increase the HPV-vaccination uptake in the future.

Organ Transplant in Present-Day Japan: Reasons behind Low Numbers of Deceased Donors

According to the International Register of Organ Donation and Transplantation, Japan is one of the countries with the lowest number of registered deceased donors. In 2019, Japan was ranked 61st out of 70 countries. The authors of this article have decided to explore the reasons for this phenomenon. In the first part of the work, religious influences (Shinto and Buddhism), the tradition of gotai manzoku, the importance of altruism and the family in the perception of death and organ transplantation by the Japanese are considered. The second part of the article presents the arguments of Alan Shewmon, who believes that brain death is not death in the biological sense. Undermining the brain’s death criterion raises doubts concerning death of patients in irreversible coma, what in result discourages transplantology in Japan. In the third part, the authors compare the results of JOTN, IRODaT and the Fact Book of Organ Transplantation 2018 in Japan from 2010 to 2018. The aim of the article is to explain the cultural determinants of transplantology in Japan, taking into account the influence of philosophical and bioethical aspects of human death.