Showing papers in "Social Science & Medicine in 1999"

TL;DR: This revised framework provides a dynamic view of treatment decision-making by recognizing that the approach adopted at the outset of a medical encounter may change as the interaction evolves and has practical applications for clinical practice, research and medical education.

TL;DR: A theoretical model is proposed to clarify and predict changes in QOL as a result of the interaction of a catalyst, referring to changes in the respondent's health status, and a dynamic feedback loop aimed at maintaining or improving the perception of QOL.

TL;DR: A systematic literature review of longitudinal studies published between 1985 and 1997 that reported statistical associations between individual base-line risk factors and subsequent functional status in community-living older persons revealed that some risk factors have been neglected in past research.

TL;DR: Quality of life is dependent upon finding a balance between body, mind and spirit in the self and on establishing and maintaining an harmonious set of relationships within the person's social context and external environment.

TL;DR: It is argued that for the vast majority of survivors posttraumatic stress is a pseudocondition, a reframing of the understandable suffering of war as a technical problem to which short-term technical solutions like counselling are applicable.

TL;DR: Qualitative considerations and promising assessment approaches for measuring response shift phenomenon in observational and interventional clinical research are presented and its hierarchical structure is discussed.

TL;DR: Cross-national data is used to examine the impact of both public spending on health and non-health factors (economic, educational, cultural) in determining child (under-5) and infant mortality, finding that whereas health spending is not a powerful determinant of mortality, 95% of cross-national variation in mortality can be explained by a country's income per capita.

TL;DR: A review and critique of models of disability is presented, tracing the development of frameworks and classificatory instruments (International Classification of Impairments, Disabilities and Handicaps) over the past 20 years.

TL;DR: A conceptual framework for investigating the influence of the social context on community health, using crime as the indicator of collective wellbeing is presented and it is argued that two sets of societal characteristics influence the level of crime: the degree of relative deprivation in society and the degreeof cohesiveness in social relations among citizens.

TL;DR: Older women's much higher level of functional impairment co-exists with a lack of gender difference in self-assessed health, and women are less likely to assess their health as being poor than men of the same age after accounting for structural factors.

TL;DR: Female gender remained an independent predictor of higher utilization over the 22-year period studied, and psychosocial and health factors measured at the initial interview predicted service use even 19-22 years later, indicating that efforts to help patients assess their service needs should target the attitudinal and behavioral factors that vary with gender, rather than health-related knowledge alone.

TL;DR: Odds ratios indicate that subjects with high levels of social support were significantly less likely to be sedentary than those with low support, even after adjusting for race/ethnicity.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined the attitudes of people aged 65 and older from different ethnic groups toward forgoing life support and concluded that ethnicity is strongly related to attitudes toward and personal wishes for the use of life support in the event of coma or terminal illness.

TL;DR: Findings suggest that development agencies who focus on women as a priority group have failed to recognize their unique vulnerability to common mental disorders and need to reorient their priorities accordingly.

TL;DR: It is suggested that a response shift may be induced by a therapeutic strategy involving the externalization and re-internalization of concern among physically ill patients.

TL;DR: A professional training in the three disciplines of nursing, social work and medicine, coupled with a strong personal religious faith, provided the biographical context for the development of Cicely Saunders' concern with pain and an emphasis on pain as a key which unlocks other problems is found.

TL;DR: The weakening of the social network with age does not seem to affect the level of emotional support and in turn seems to be partly compensated for by a simultaneous decline in relational strain, which declines with age for all kinds of social relations.

TL;DR: The shape of the relationship found between income and health is compatible with worse health in countries with greater income inequality, without the need to postulate any direct effect of income inequality itself.

TL;DR: The findings suggest the value of models which include a wide range of structural and behavioral variables and affirm the importance of looking more closely at gender differences in the determinants of health.

TL;DR: It is argued that benefit assessment within health economics should extend beyond health outcomes and future research should investigate more thoroughly the potential application of conjoint analysis in this area.

TL;DR: Researchers, clinicians and policy makers would understand and address both sex-specific and non-sex-specific health problems differently if the social as well as biological sources of differences in men's and women's health were better understood.

TL;DR: Research suggests that psychosocial factors, like ineffective coping strategies, anxiety and/or depression are associated with a lower pregnancy rate following IVF-procedures, and support has been found suggesting that stress reduction through relaxation training or behavioral treatment improves conception rates.

TL;DR: Evaluating the impact of the stroke on the informal carers' quality of life found that carers ability to cope with the stroke was enhanced both by the use of positive coping strategies and more concrete measures e.g. more stroke information.

TL;DR: Comparing men's and women's answers to a global, commonly used question about chronic illness and to a series of more specific prompts finds no gender differences in the initial reporting of conditions and no evidence that women were more likely to report 'trivial' or mental health conditions in response to the initial question.

TL;DR: Self-ratings of young adults (18-34 years) were found to be related to body mass index even when health problems were adjusted for, with both obesity and underweight contributing to less than good self-rated health.

TL;DR: The results strongly supported the basic hypothesis that WHI mediates the impact of some work and home characteristics on psychological health indicators and the work-related health indicators, particularly depersonalization.

TL;DR: Using the results of studies carried out by the Social Science and Immunization Project in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, India, Malawi, the Netherlands and the Philippines, patterns of vaccination acceptance and non-acceptance are described and patterns of refusal and resistance are discussed.

TL;DR: A reflective examination of the contested power dynamics of the research relationship within a participatory evaluation process of the Healthier Communities initiative in New Mexico argues that evaluation design, implementation and utilization of findings will be compromised.

TL;DR: The study applies multilevel modelling techniques to data from the British Health and Lifestyle Survey and ward (local neighbourhood) level deprivation scores based on four variables from the national Census and suggests that the character of the local neighbourhood plays a role in shaping smoking behaviour.

TL;DR: Empirical evidence suggests a widening gap in health status between urban and rural residents in the transitional period, correlated with increasing gaps in income and health care utilization, which is associated with changes in health care financing and organization.