Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Elaborating Patient Agency In Breast-Cancer Care: A Grounded Theoretical Analysis Of Patients Asserting Treatment Preferences, Rachel Sofia Erdman

Dissertations and Theses

Successful physician-patient communication is increasingly being acknowledged as a vital aspect of healthcare today. Research in the field has not examined all aspects of patient-centered care and the aspects that have been studied have not been grounded in actual patient action. The research done in the field has largely been studied quantitatively. The present thesis research attempts to contribute to the gap in the field of physician-patient communication by qualitatively examining patient assertiveness. This thesis examines conversations between women in Portland, Oregon recently diagnosed with breast cancer talking to their surgeons about their diagnoses and treatment options. Using grounded qualitative …

Implementing And Evaluating A Clinical Information Interface Between An Electronic Medical Record And A Patient Classification System, Tanya Osborne-Mckenzie

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Projects

As a result of the Affordable Care Act and the Institute of Medicine’s initiatives, hospitals are challenged to improve outcomes as efficiently as possible. How does the national initiative of RNs partnering with other healthcare professionals to improve the quality of patient care at a lower cost, cascade down to individual organizations? One answer may come by focusing on nurse staffing in acute care hospitals. Considering the impact RNs have on patient quality outcomes and the bottom line of hospitals, appropriate management of the RN workforce is one of the most important areas hospitals can focus on in order to …

Combating Hiv/Aids In Marginalized Communities: Papua And West Papua Provinces, Indonesia, Bani Cheema

Master's Theses

My study focuses on foreign aid and local initiatives for HIV/AIDS prevention in eastern Indonesia using the provinces of Papua and West Papua as a case study. The two provinces are home to indigenous tribal groups that are socioeconomically marginalized and most affected by the epidemic. My research investigates behavior change communication as a principal strategy undertaken by multiple organizations for HIV/AIDS prevention in this region. I take a qualitative approach by examining the effectiveness of this strategy in local communities and by revealing social and cultural barriers that impede success. Obstacles that negatively impact prevention efforts include structural violence, …

Launching A Virtual Decision Lab: Development And Field-Testing Of A Web-Based Patient Decision Support Research Platform, Aubri S. Hoffman, Hilary A. Llewellyn-Thomas, Anna N. A. Tosteson, Annette M. Oconnor

Dartmouth Scholarship

Over 100 trials show that patient decision aids effectively improve patients’ information comprehension and values-based decision making. However, gaps remain in our understanding of several fundamental and applied questions, particularly related to the design of interactive, personalized decision aids. This paper describes an interdisciplinary development process for, and early field testing of, a web-based patient decision support research platform, or virtual decision lab, to address these questions.

Identifying Professional Development Opportunities For Remote Healthcare Interpreters On A Shared Network, Suzanne M. Couture

Instructional Design Capstones Collection

Many healthcare organizations are faced with the challenge of complying with an unfunded mandate to provide language services free of charge to individuals with limited English proficiency or those who are deaf or hard of hearing. One method of increasing efficiencies and reducing disparities for these vulnerable populations is to provide access to remote audio/video interpreters on a shared network. The Health Care Interpreter Network (HCIN) is a non-profit organization based in California that comprises more than forty member hospitals and offers service in twenty languages. To support the need for on-going professional development of HCIN’s interpreters, a front-end analysis …

Women's Health And Abortion Culture In China: Policy, Perception And Practice , Naomi Bouchard

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Since China’s implementation of the Family Planning Policy in 1973, much research has been dedicated to analyzing the effects of a policy that strictly controls the reproductive lives of a population now comprisedof 1.35 billion people. Analyses focus on the rise of abortions in China, now at an annual rate of at least 13 million, but offer little insight into the perceptions of the population in regard to China’s new abortion culture. This study aims to shed light on current perceptions through a range of in-person, qualitative interviews conducted in Kunming, China. The study is limited to a sample size …

Testing A Risky Sex Behavior Intervention Pilot Website For Adolescents, Randall Starling, Don Helme, Jessica A. Nodulman, Angela D. Bryan, David B. Buller, Robert Lewis Donohew, W. Gill Woodall

Communication Faculty Publications

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Each year, teenagers account for about one-fifth of all unintended pregnancies in the United States. As such, delivering sexual risk reduction educational materials to teens in a timely fashion is of critical importance. Web-based delivery of these materials shows promise for reaching and persuading teens away from risky sexual and substance abuse behaviors. The purpose of this study was to pilot test a web-based program aimed at reducing risky sexual behavior and related outcomes among adolescents in a high school setting.

METHODS: A beta-test of the website was conducted in three public schools in New Mexico, USA …

Social Media Marketing For The Medical Industry: Best Practices To Avoid Legal And Ethical Issues, Jessica Padilla

Journalism

This study analyzes the best social media practices for medical industry professionals and the proper and ideal uses for social media. It analyzes the public relations functions of social media—relationship building, reputation management, and crisis communication. With the constant rise of social media as a widely-used medium for marketing comes increased potential for damage to a medical business’ reputation, loss of medical licensing, or lawsuits if practitioners do not act within the lines of legal and ethical standards. Medical offices must have an online presence to remain relevant and build and keep relationships with new and current patients. This study …

Impact Of An Interprofessional Communication Course On Nursing, Medical, And Pharmacy Students’ Communication Skill Self-Efficacy Beliefs, Nicholas E. Hagemeier, Rick Hess, Kyle S. Hagen, Emily L. Sorah

ETSU Faculty Works

Objective. To describe an interprofessional communication course in an academic health sciences center and to evaluate and compare interpersonal and interprofessional communication self-efficacy beliefs of medical, nursing, and pharmacy students before and after course participation, using Bandura’s self-efficacy theory as a guiding framework.

Design. First-year nursing (n=36), first-year medical (n=73), and second-year pharmacy students (n=83) enrolled in an interprofessional communication skills development course voluntarily completed a 33-item survey instrument based on Interprofessional Education Collaborative (IPEC) core competencies prior to and upon completion of the course during the fall semester of 2012.

Assessment. Nursing students entered the course with higher interpersonal …

Re-Examining Lgbt Resources On College Counseling Center Websites: An Over-Time And Cross-Country Analysis, Christopher J. Mckinley, Yi Luo, Paul J. Wright, Ashley Kraus

School of Communication and Media Scholarship and Creative Works

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students continue to perceive a hostile climate on college campuses. For students facing these challenges, the university college counseling center website (CCW) may serve as a critical resource. This study provides an updated content analysis of the prevalence of LGBT communication on CCWs. Results showed that there remains a lack of LGBT-specific information about services provided on US CCWs. Furthermore, over-time analyses of 2008 and 2013 data showed that there have been no significant increases in any LGBT communication, and CCWs from religious schools continue to provide significantly less LGBT-related …

I Get By With A Little Help From My Friends: A Qualitative Study Of Nurse Close Work Friendship And Social Support, Jennifer Ptacek

Masters Theses

The nursing profession is laden with numerous job, emotional labor, and communication stressors, which come from both patients and healthcare organizations. These frequent and simultaneous pressures can result in nurse burnout and turnover (Tracy, 2009). Socially supportive workplace communication has been identified as a solution to reducing nurse stress, burnout, and turnover (Apker & Ray, 2003), but has not specifically considered social support in nurse work friendships. A mixed qualitative method study was conducted with five nurse best friend pairs, using job observations of participants’ work friendship communication and individual and joint interviews. Two major communication themes emerged from the …

Hearing The Patient Voice: Using Video Intervention/Prevention Assessment To Understand Teens With Cystic Fibrosis, Susan Horky Lscw, Laura E. Sherman Msw, Julie Polvinen, Michael Rich Md

Patient Experience Journal

This qualitative study asked two questions: 1) How do teens with cystic fibrosis (CF) feel about their treatments; and 2) What factors lead teens to adhere, or not adhere, to treatments. To answer these questions we used an innovative approach (Video Intervention/Prevention Assessment or VIA), to learn about the experiences of teens with CF. We loaned video camcorders to teens with CF and asked them to create visual narratives of their lives. Researchers logged and coded videotapes, identifying themes that arose from the material. A primary theme was “Doctors don’t understand.” Participants also highlighted the value of routines and parental …

Enhancing Patient Experience By Training Local Trainers In Fundamental Communication Skills, Calvin L. Chou, Laura Cooley, Ellen Pearlman, Maysel Kemp White

Patient Experience Journal

Medical centers have a vested interest in improving patient experience through enhancing communication skills. The American Academy on Communication in Healthcare has helped institutions across the country establish internal expertise through delivering train-the-trainer programs. The phases of the program include preparing for implementation of the program, having program participants undergo a fundamental communication skills workshop and then understanding the theoretical and practical rationales underlying the workshop, setting up practice sessions for participants to achieve mastery, and ensuring long-term viability of a communication skills improvement initiative. Outcomes for participants include increased self-assessed personal communication skill, optimism about rolling out a communication …

Engaging Communities To Identify And Address Environmental Health Literacy Gaps, Anna G. Hoover

Anna G. Hoover

Frequently, decisions about the informational components and delivery mechanisms required to promote effective environmental health literacy are made by such technical experts as toxicologists, chemists, and communication scientists. However, because sensemaking processes are both retrospective and collective, context must be a central component for understanding the particular information needs of communities and stakeholder groups. Individual assessments of and tolerance for environmental health risks are rooted in past and present experiences that are understood, refined, and reinforced through dialogue with others who have shared similar experiences. Thus, the promotion of environmental health literacy requires formative engagement with communities and stakeholders to …

Assessing Technologies For Information-Seeking On Prostate Cancer Screening By Low-Income Men, Susan W. Mcroy, Emily M. Cramer, Hayeon Song

Journal of Patient-Centered Research and Reviews

Purpose: This paper presents a multipart investigation of the benefits and challenges in deploying automated question-answering as an alternative to web-based searching to provide information about prostate cancer screening for low-income men age 40 years and older.

Methods: The study comprised: 1) a survey assessing current use of the Internet, mobile phones and texting; 2) a controlled observational study of both web-based searching and automated question-answering for information about prostate cancer; and 3) a formative field study in which subjects interacted with a health department nurse using text messages.

Results: Survey results suggest the target population has greater access to, …

Desktop Medicine, Jason Karlawish

Jason Karlawish

No abstract provided.

Policymakers Identify Priorities For Phssr, Katherine Froeb Papa

Frontiers in Public Health Services and Systems Research

A major goal for the health services research community is to provide evidence policymakers can use to improve the public’s health. However, it can be difficult to know what evidence policymakers want and how they decide what research to fund.

In order to understand where policymakers turn for evidence and how they make funding decisions amid fiscal and political constraints, AcademyHealth conducted a 3-part Fireside Chat series in the spring of 2014. This editorial summarizes the evidence gaps identified, and provides strategies for communicating with decision makers.

The Politics Of Hpv Vaccination Advocacy: Effects Of Source Expertise On Effectiveness Of A Pro-Vaccine Message, Roger Gans

Proceedings of the New York State Communication Association

The Politics of HPV Vaccination Advocacy:

Effects of Source Expertise on Effectiveness of a Pro-Vaccine Message

Persistent public resistance to an apparently safe, effective and life-saving public health practice such as HPV vaccination illustrates a significant issue in the communication of behavioral recommendations based on evidence-based scientific data and consensus views of scientific and medical experts. This study examines the influence of source expertise on pro-HPV-vaccine advocacy messaging effectiveness among audiences of differing political ideologies. The findings support prior research indicating greater resistance to HPV vaccination among political conservatives. Subjects who self-identified politically as Centrists and Conservatives were significantly less …

Neglected Or Non-Compliant? Assessing The Difficulties Of Tuberculosis Patients In Salvador-Ba, Brazil, Erin Slatery

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Objective: The aim of this study is to analyze how Instituto Brasileiro para Investigação da Tuberculose (IBIT), a philanthropic tuberculosis clinic in Salvador, Brazil, maintains treatment abandonment rates much lower than those of surrounding public clinics. This study also aims to evaluate how professionals conceptualize and address the difficulties faced by patients.

Methods: Interviews were conducted with 8 IBIT professionals and 16 patients in treatment for tuberculosis in the aforementioned institution via semi-structured and structured questionnaires, respectively. Participant observation guided the analysis of relationships between patients and professionals.

Results: Patients found varying aspects of treatment difficult depending on personal circumstances, …

The Capus Project-Innovative Solutions For Hiv/Aids Linkage To Care, Melanie Gwynn, Jamila Ealey, Kate Racoff Musgrove

9th Annual Rural HIV Research and Training Conference (2014-2019)

“The CAPUS Project-Innovative Solutions for HIV/AIDS Linkage to Care”

Objectives: 1) Expand knowledge of the current linkage to care landscape within Georgia; 2) Identify essential components of the Resource Hub to enhance linkage to care efforts throughout Georgia; and 3)Promote effective use of the Resource Hub to facilitate HIV/AIDS linkage to care within highly impacted communities

Physicians' Attitudes About Recommending Surgery For Early Stage Lung Cancer And Possible Reasons For Racial Disparities, Franklin R. Mcguire

Journal of Health Disparities Research and Practice

PHYSICIANS’ ATTITUDES ABOUT RECOMMENDING SURGERY FOR EARLY STAGE LUNG CANCER AND POSSIBLE REASONS FOR RACIAL DISPARITIES

ABSTRACT

Purpose: Patient refusal for lung cancer surgery is significant, but other factors, such as negative framing of the treatment discussion, may be involved. Physician attitudes could influence the nuances of and therefore the conclusions of these discussions. We determined physicians’ attitudes and the influence it has on possible decisions against lung cancer surgery, particularly surgical rates for blacks, using a companion survey.

Methods: The study is a prospective, multicenter observational trial conducted at five sites in North and South Carolina from December …

A Rhetorical Analysis Of The Rethinking Aids Website, Jennifer Dettmann

Journal of Undergraduate Research at Minnesota State University, Mankato

A group of scientists known as the Group for Scientific Reappraisal of the HIV-AIDS hypothesis created a web site title, Rethinking AIDS. The group behind the web site argues that AIDS is not a sexually transmitted disease. They even question the existence of the virus entity. My analysis is driven by the critical question: Does the web site construct a reality that affectively alters our perception of HIV-AIDS? In order to answer this question, Goodnight and Poulakos 1981 article, Conspiracy rhetoric: from pragmatism to fantasy to public discourse (Western Journal of Speech), will be utilized.

Cumulating Evidence About The Social Animal: Meta-Analysis In Social-Personality Psychology, Blair T. Johnson Dr., Marcella H. Boynton Dr.

Blair T. Johnson

Like most scientific fields, social-personality psychology has experienced an explosion of research related to such central topics as aggression, attraction, gender, group processes, motivation, personality, and persuasion, to name a few. The proliferation of research can be a monster unless it is tamed with the scientific review strategy of meta-analysis, literally analyses of past analyses that produce a quantitative and empirical history of research on a particular phenomenon. The purpose of this article is to outline the basic process and statistics of meta-analysis, as they pertain to social-personality psychology. Meta-analysis involves: (i) defining the problem under review; (ii) gathering qualified …

Changing Landscapes: End-Of-Life Care & Communication At A Zen Hospice, Ellen W. Klein

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines end-of-life experiences at a small Zen hospice in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. Through an exploration of how end-of-life communication, sense-making, decision-making, and care in this setting differ from that of typical clinical settings, this project highlights and interrogates the experiences of dying as spiritually, rhetorically, narratively, relationally, and communally bound events.

Keywords: Zen hospice, end of life, narrative sensemaking, medical-ethical decision making, spirituality, healing rhetoric, communities of practice

Communication, Control, And Time: The Lived Experience Of Uncertainty In Adolescent Pregnancy, Elizabeth Dortch Dalton

Doctoral Dissertations

This study qualitatively examined the lived experience of uncertainty among pregnant adolescents. Utilizing a phenomenological approach, long interviews were conducted with 10 pregnant adolescent women between the ages of 15-18 years. Interviews were transcribed and analyzed using the process of phenomenological explication. Data, emergent themes, memos, and a detailed audit trail were maintained using the qualitative data analysis package Nvivo 10 for Mac (beta version). Findings can be summarized with eight themes that underlie the essence of uncertainty in adolescent pregnancy: suspicion and denial, disclosure and reactions, controlling the flow of information, relational renegotiation, the emerging reality of pregnancy, information …

The Effects Of Risk Disclosure In Direct-To-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising (Dtca): Prominence, Dtca Regulatory Knowledge, And Perceived Attention, Ilwoo Ju

Doctoral Dissertations

Fair balance of benefit and risk information in consumer prescription drug advertising (DTCA) has received much research attention. In this regard, it has been well-documented that varying levels of risk disclosure prominence have disproportional effects on consumer response to the DTC ad. However, little research has examined how the prominence effects can be maximized or minimized depending on consumers’ varying levels of knowledge of the FDA’s regulatory role for DTCA. In a similar vein, rare research has been conducted to investigate how such regulatory knowledge directly affects consumers’ risk disclosure coping strategies.

Drawing on consumer information processing perspectives, this research …

Consumer Perceptions And Knowledge Of Genetically Modified Organisms In Belgium: A Case Study Of The Potato Event, Maggie Jo Pruitt

Agricultural Education, Communications and Technology Undergraduate Honors Theses

It is widely known that Europeans have the strongest resistance to genetically modified organisms (GMO). Despite biotechnology advancements in the United States and other countries, European Union (EU) policymakers continue to argue over market-driven GMO regulations. Because humans depend on agriculture for survival, they tend to be concerned with the fundamental risk of combining agricultural production and scientific/technological advancements. In 2011, scientists at a large research institution in Belgium planted a field trial of GM potatoes (during this time GM foods were not in the market). On May 29, an activist group arrived at the field and uprooted the potatoes. …

Intimacy Uncertainty And Identity In Gay Male Couples Dealing With A Serodiscordant Hiv Status, Scott Allen Eldredge

Doctoral Dissertations

When individuals are diagnosed with a chronic illness, their lives instantly change. Daily routines are interrupted and attendance to the symptoms and side effects of illness and medication becomes a daily chore. However, the patient is not the only one that feels the disruptive effects of illness and the partner of the chronically ill patient must also contend with the daily effects of an illness that they themselves do not have. In the case of HIV, the infectious nature of the disease, along with the stigma associated with the disease, serve to be additional sources of stress in an already-stressful …

Informational Support And Online Information Seeking: Examining The Association Between Factors Contributing To Healthy Eating Behavior., Christopher J. Mckinley, Paul J. Wright

School of Communication and Media Scholarship and Creative Works

This study explores the nature of the relationship between informational social support and components of online health information seeking and how this process influences college students’ healthy eating intentions. Results showed that social support was positively associated with online information seeking and more favorable impressions of nutrition/healthy diet information on the web. In addition, although socialsupport was not associated with healthy eating intentions, all three information-seeking measures significantly predicted this outcome – even after controlling for numerous health-related factors. Additional mediation tests showed that social support had an indirect impact on healthy eating intentions through use as well as …

Barriers To Physical Activity: A Study Of Self-Revelation In An Online Community., Tammy R. Toscos, Sunny Consolvo, David W. Mcdonald

Tammy R Toscos

The importance of regular physical activity to overall health has been well established, yet adults in the United States are leading increasingly sedentary lives. Research suggests that lowering perceived barriers to exercise is an effective strategy for encouraging physical activity. This article describes the top barriers that emerged from a qualitative analysis of message board traffic from a three-month healthy lifestyle intervention that promoted physical activity and healthy eating. The findings further elaborate known barriers to physical activity-two of which are not reported as key barriers in prior research-and illustrate the value of a grounded approach to studying health and …