Publications by authors named "Beth Costa"

The psychological impacts of injury have significant long-term implications on injury recovery. This review examined the effectiveness of interventions delivered within three months of injury on reducing the severity of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), anxiety and depression symptoms. A systematic search of seven databases (PsycINFO, Medline, Web of Science, CINAHL, Embase, Scopus and Cochrane Library) identified 15,224 records.

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Objective: To determine young people's knowledge of energy drinks (EDs), factors influencing ED consumption, and intervention strategies to decrease ED consumption in young people.

Design: Eight group interviews with young people (aged 12-25 years).

Setting: Community groups and secondary schools in Perth, Western Australia.

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Background: Health graduates face personal and work-related stressors during the graduate year. The extent to which employers and health graduates have a shared understanding of graduate stressors is unclear but may impact graduate support and transition into the health profession. Aim and design: The aim of this exploratory qualitative study was to identify factors that impact health graduates' transition and integration into the workplace, comparing the perspectives of health graduates and organisational representatives.

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Caffeinated Energy Drinks (EDs) are not recommended for consumption by children, yet there is a lack of age-specific recommendations and restrictions on the marketing and sale of EDs. EDs are increasingly popular among adolescents despite growing evidence of their negative health effects. In the current study we examined ED consumption patterns among 399 Australian adolescents aged 12-18 years.

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The transition from student to registered nurse is often stressful and has been attributed to a lack of work readiness. Understanding what comprises work readiness for newly registered nurses, or graduate nurses as they are referred to in Australia, may reduce attrition and improve transition into the workplace. The 64-item Work Readiness Scale (WRS), developed with a generic population of graduates, has yet to be validated against specific disciplines to confirm applicability as a measure of work readiness.

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Caffeinated energy drinks (EDs) are purported to increase energy and improve performance, but have been associated with adverse health effects and death. EDs are popular among adolescents and young adults, yet little is known about their use among young adolescents. This study explored perceptions, patterns, and contexts of ED use in six focus groups with 40 adolescents aged 12-15 years from two regional Australian schools.

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A three-year longitudinal qualitative study was undertaken to compare graduate nurses' (GNs') and Nurse Unit Managers' (NUMs') perceptions regarding the workplace factors that affect GNs' during the first year of clinical practice in a regional context in Victoria, Australia. In the first year a pilot study was used to develop a qualitative survey seeking information about GNs' transition experiences. Over the next two years 69 GNs and 25 NUMs from one health organisation completed the qualitative survey.

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Background. In Australia most chronic disease management is funded by Medicare Australia through General Practitioner Management Plans (GPMPs) and Team Care Arrangements (TCAs). Identified barriers may be reduced effectively using a broadband-based network known as the Chronic Disease Management Service (CDMS).

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Background And Aim: The current exploratory study investigated work readiness among graduate health professionals.

Design And Participants: A critical incident technique was used to elicit perceptions regarding: strategies and skills that constitute work readiness among health professionals and the work readiness factors that help or hinder health graduates' transition and integration into the workplace. Fifteen medical graduates, 26 nursing graduates and five organisational representatives from a regional hospital in Victoria, Australia participated.

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Background: Information technology (IT) is increasingly being used in general practice to manage health care including type 2 diabetes. However, there is conflicting evidence about whether IT improves diabetes outcomes. This review of the literature about IT-based diabetes management interventions explores whether methodological issues such as sample characteristics, outcome measures, and mechanisms causing change in the outcome measures could explain some of the inconsistent findings evident in IT-based diabetes management studies.

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Previous literature on necrotizing soft tissue infections (NSTIs) has focused on its diagnosis and high mortality, but to our knowledge, none have reported on the functional outcomes of patients surviving this devastating disease. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the management and assess factors associated with decreased physical function in patients who survived this life-threatening infection. A retrospective review was conducted on patients treated for NSTI in whom an evaluation of functional status was performed between 2002 and 2006.

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Management and proper approach to pediatric palm burns remains unclear. Our burn center's approach includes early, aggressive range of motion therapy, combined with a period of watchful waiting, reserving grafting only for those palms that do not heal in a timely manner. We reviewed our experience using this approach over a 10-year period.

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Societal expectations of grief impact the experience of bereavement. The congruence of societal expectations with current scientific understanding of grief is unknown. Therefore two qualitative studies explored community perceptions of grief.

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Heterotopic ossification (HO) is a well-recognized complication of burn injury that can result in significantly compromised limb function. The etiology and optimal treatment strategy for HO remain elusive. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between delay in elbow wound closure and the development of HO.

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Management of deep facial burns remains one of the greatest challenges in burn care. We have developed a protocol over the past 20 years for management of facial burns that includes excision and coverage with thick autograft. However, the results were not perfect.

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Hypertrophic scarring after burns remains a major problem and is considered to be "common". Pressure garments are commonly used as treatment even though there is little sound data that they reduce the prevalence or magnitude of the scarring. In 1999 we began a study of the efficacy of pressure garments on forearm burns.

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Although excision and grafting of burns has become common and standard, many surgeons have been reluctant to excise and graft face burns. In fact, we could find photographic results at 1 year after grafting of only eight patients in the English literature. We began excision and grafting of face burns in 1979 and presented our first 16 patients in 1986 in this journal.

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