Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

The Lived Experiences Of An Injured Athlete And Members Of A Performance Management Team During Injury Rehabilitation: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, Courtney Wynne Hess

Theses and Dissertations

In response to an ever growing understanding of the biopsychosocial nature of health and well-being, multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches to rehabilitation have grown in acceptance over the past decade. Studies that have explored the effect of these two approaches have found them to be effective in improving rehabilitation outcomes (McAlister et al., 2001; Tur et al., 2003). Although they have been shown to be objectively effective, the impact that these approaches have on the lived experiences of the team employing them, and the athlete or patient they serve, is not well understood. As such, the purpose of the current study …

Comparison Of Conversation And Narrative Language Abilities In Children With Autism: Diagnostic And Therapeutic Considerations, Corissa Kroenke

Theses and Dissertations

Many children with autism experience significant difficulty with comprehension and expression of spoken language. Speech-language pathologists (SLPs) require sensitive assessments to describe the unique profiles of individual clients with autism so that appropriate treatments can be prescribed. Language sample analysis is a current best-practice for describing language profiles in children with language difficulties, though there is a limited literature describing clinical best-practices for children with autism. The purpose of this study was to analyze the difference in conversation and narrative language abilities in children with autism. Language ability was also analyzed in comparison to age-matched typically developing peers. This goal …

Relationship-Based Care: A Test Of The Quality Caring Model's Association With Nurses' Perceptions Of Work And Patient Relationships, Kristopher Heindel

Theses and Dissertations

This study assesses whether ambulatory surgery nurses who apply concepts from the Quality Caring Model (QCM) will experience different work perceptions and patient relationships than do nurses who do not directly apply QCM concepts. The QCM contends that if nurses demonstrate caring through their interaction, a patient experiences a greater level of satisfaction with the healthcare encounter. Conceptualized from the framework of a service relationship, this thesis posits that nurses employing the QCM should also perceive more positive relationship qualities with their patients and more positive workplace experiences than other nurses who are not utilizing QCM principles. Data from 27 …

Health Of The Nation: The Impact Of Racial And Income Segregation On Food Insecurity In The United States, Mark Anthony Caldwell

Theses and Dissertations

One in six Americans experience food insecurity as a result of not being able to consistently obtain the food they need. Food insecurity ranges from not being able to afford balanced meals to the skipping meals as a way to stretch food budgets. Food insecurity impacts many people in the United States, but it disproportionately impacts people of color and those living in poverty. Racial and income segregation may act to concentrate food insecurity in a few geographic areas with high concentrations of minority and/or poor residents. This is an issue of major concern because studies have shown that racial …

Hearing The Voices Of Hiv Positive Women In Kenya: Secondary Analysis Of Interview Data Using Dialogic/Performance Analysis, Lenore L. Boris

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of the study is to demonstrate the use of the dialogic/performance methodology in health research by conducting a secondary analysis of interview data collected from women in Kenya who are HIV positive. Dialogic/performance analysis is a dynamic, interpretive narrative analytical technique. Qualitative research literature inadequately provides specific methodological guidance especially when reusing a data set. Further, the use of the dialogic/ performance method is very limited in health research. These factors point to the significance of this work in explaining dialogic/ performance analysis thereby potentially expanding its use by both novice and experienced qualitative researchers. Guidance for conducting …

Lived Experiences Of Nursing Autonomy: A Phenomenological Exploration, Rebekah Kalen Dubrosky

Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

LIVED EXPERIENCES OF NURSING AUTONOMY: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL EXPLORATION

by Rebekah Dubrosky

The University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee, 2015 Under the Supervision of Professor Mary Jo Baisch

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore the meaning that acute care, bedside nurses’ assign to their autonomous actions. A feminist critique of the nursing work environment was applied using standpoint theory. This was balanced and supplemented by a post-modern critique using Foucault’s method of assessing power and knowledge in relation to the discipline of a profession. This study was designed to explore how issues of gender, knowledge, and power affected …

Facilitating And Enhancing Biomedical Knowledge Translation: An In Silico Approach To Patient-Centered Pharmacogenomic Outcomes Research, Kourosh Ravvaz

Theses and Dissertations

Current research paradigms such as traditional randomized control trials mostly rely on relatively narrow efficacy data which results in high internal validity and low external validity. Given this fact and the need to address many complex real-world healthcare questions in short periods of time, alternative research designs and approaches should be considered in translational research. In silico modeling studies, along with longitudinal observational studies, are considered as appropriate feasible means to address the slow pace of translational research. Taking into consideration this fact, there is a need for an approach that tests newly discovered genetic tests, via an in silico …

Family Connections: The Impact Of Self-Disclosure, Solidarity, And Stereotyping On Relational Satisfaction In Grandparent-Adult Grandchild Dyads, Deanne Priddis

Theses and Dissertations

As life expectancy increases, the length of time in both the grandparent and adult grandchild role increase. The grandparent-adult grandchild relationship is integral to the health and preservation of the family system. The sample for this quantitative study included 62 grandparent-adult grandchild dyads, 124 individuals. Findings indicate that both the grandparents and the adult grandchildren experienced meaning and burden in the grandparent-adult grandchild relationship. The six different types of solidarity (affectual, consensual, structural, associational, functional, and normative) had varying associations with relational satisfaction for the grandparents and adult grandchildren. Although there are several self-disclosures in a close grandparent-adult grandchild relationship, …

"I Know I Can't Be The Only Lesbian Out There:" An Inductive Thematic Analysis Of A Virtual Community Of Lesbian Breast Cancer Survivors, Rachael Lynn Wandrey

Theses and Dissertations

Sexual minority women are at a significantly greater risk for developing breast cancer (BC) than heterosexual women. Little is known about the unique BC experiences of lesbian women. The present thesis describes the findings of an inductive thematic analysis of messages posted to a large lesbian-specific discussion forum found on breastcancer.org. Fifteen themes were identified, including privileging sensation over appearance, experiencing heterosexism in medical contexts, believing others perceive a lack of distress over breast loss because of patient’s lesbian sexual orientation, feeling pressure from surgeons to get reconstructive surgery, and viewing the BC journey as a sexual-identity disclosure crisis. In …

Mentally Disordered Or Culturally Displaced? How The Ptsd Label Transforms Personhood In Us Military Veterans, Katinka Hooyer

Theses and Dissertations

Medical experts claim that Posttraumatic Stress Disorder among United States military service personnel, who served in Iraq and Afghanistan has contributed to an “epidemic of suicide” in the U.S. However, veterans, military commanders, and mental health providers argue that feelings of grief, guilt, mistrust, rage, and alienation are actually normal moral reactions to the abnormal situations that war creates. Furthermore, they argue that these normal reactions are currently transformed into a psychiatric diagnosis that promises clinical solution – a cure. Recent epidemiologic studies suggest that evidence-based clinical treatments are ineffective for a majority of veterans with PTSD and that the …

Predicting Postraumatic Stress Disorder In Single-Incident Trauma Survivors With An Acute Injury, Joshua C. Hunt

Theses and Dissertations

The objective of this study was to create a brief and easily administered screen that can be used by hospital staff to identify those at risk for the later development of PTSD. Utilizing previous research examining pretrauma, peritrauma, and posttrauma risk factors for the development of PTSD among single-incident trauma survivors with an acute injury, an item pool was created and reviewed by experts in the field. This item pool along with a previously created screen were given to patients admitted to two level 1 trauma centers in the U.S. A follow-up was conducted at one month in which participants …