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How occupational physicians pay attention to the values of employees: a qualitative study
No full textPurposeThe Dutch Association for Occupational Medicine considers employee values to be an essential pillar in occupational medicine. The occupational physician should focus on what an employee finds valuable. However, it is unclear how occupational physicians comply with this policy and pay attention to employee values. The present study aims to fill this gap by mapping to what extent occupational physicians pay attention to employee values.MethodWe used an exploratory qualitative research method through in-depth interviews with 10 Dutch occupational physicians. Additionally, two non-participating observations were conducted.Results & conclusionThe results show that values remain mostly implicit and are applied intuitively or unconsciously but not explicitly. Hence, the ethical requirements of the Dutch Association for Occupational Medicine policy remain underexposed and under-executed. Multiple facets foster or impede a conversation about values. As far values were mentioned they were mainly extrinsic, social, and prestige-oriented. Intrinsic values were hardly mentioned. However, a few occupational physicians explicitly stated that they pay attention to values and reported that heeding to employee values contributes to better collaboration and decision-making with the employee. We argue that paying attention to intrinsic values may improve the overall work quality of occupational physicians and benefit employee well-being
Micro-disruptions and struggles for success in Beirut
No full textMiddle-Eastern contexts where war, corruption, and oppressive regimes compromise and undermine wellbeing, security and basic freedoms, do not give much hope or outlook for improvement. Even against massive and protracted protests, illegitimate power endures. Some local initiatives “disrupt” these hostile and dehumanizing environments by fostering communities of refuge, care, hope and empowerment. In my Beirut-based research I employ a micro-interactional and emotion-focused sociology to dissect the innerworkings of such communities. Research settings include NGO programs, schools, martial arts gyms, basketball courts, and street corners. They contain interaction rituals, each with their own rhythms, focus, shared mood, and physical deployment. These dynamics chart young people’s disparate paths of development.In different constructive interaction rituals, young people experience three components of success: temporary boosts of positivity, a more durable elevation over difficult circumstances, and grounding in encouraging networks and stabilizing emotional states. These components in varying constellations have important restorative effects for young people suffering from debilitating and discouraging interactions. Concretely, these experiences empower young people’s efforts in education, labor and personal development. I pay substantial attention to youth workers and other adults’ contributions to young people’s struggles for success.Local initiatives can become networked “pockets of resistance, creating multiple sites of micro disruption” as sociologist Erika Summers-Effler puts it. Without outright challenging prevailing macro-structures and regimes, these initiatives provide positive counterweights for overwhelming hardship. The “horizontal” (local, peer-based) multiplication can become a grassroots change, potentially influencing “vertical” power structures. This research is an ongoing exploration of hope in contexts of despair.<br/
The Impact of Hospice Care Structures on Care Processes: A Retrospective Cohort Study
No full textBackground: Palliative care is subject to substantial variations in care, which may be shaped through adapting the organisational structures through which care is provided. Whilst the goal of these structures is to improve patient care, there is a lack of evidence regarding their effect on care processes and patient outcomes. Aims: This study aims to describe the relationship between care structures and the quantity and domains of care processes in hospice care. Design: Retrospective cohort study. Settings/Participants: Data were collected from Dutch hospice patient’s clinical records and hospice surveys, detailing hospice structures, patient clinical characteristics and care processes. Results: 662 patients were included from 42 hospices, mean age 76.1 years. Hospices were categorised according to their care structures - structured clinical documentation and multidisciplinary meetings. Patients receiving care in hospices with structured multidisciplinary meetings had an increased quantity of documented care processes per patient on admission through identification (median 4 vs 3, P < .001), medication (2 vs 1, P = .004) and non-medication (1 vs 0, P < .001) interventions, monitoring (2 vs 1, P < .001) and evaluation (0 vs 0, P = .014), and prior to death. Similar increases were identified for patients who received care in hospices with structured documentation upon admission, but these changes were not consistent prior to death. Conclusions: This study details that the care structures of documentation and multidisciplinary meetings are associated with increased quantity and breadth of documentation of care processes in hospice care. Employing these existing structures may result in improvements in the documentation of patient care processes, and thus better communication around patient care
De Etappes van het traditionele humanisme:The Stages of Traditional Humanism
No full textThis article is the first part of a series on the controversie between humanism, posthumanism and ecohumanism. This part is a history of humanism based on Foucault's archaeology of knowledge: the stages of humanism are seen as the background of current discussions on and against humanism. According to us there are five epochal traditions of humanism: Ancient Humanism, Renaissance Humanism, Enlightend Humanism, Bildungshumanism and Social Humanism. This last one encompasses many forms of humanism that appeared in the 20th century. We need to understand these traditions in order to evaluate the controversy between post- and ecohumanism in our times
