Legal issues in end-of-life care for speech-language pathologists and social workers: A scoping review.

Purpose: End-of-life law governs end-of-life decision-making in clinical practice. There has been little analysis of the specific legal issues relevant to allied health professionals working in end-of-life care.

Method: A scoping review was undertaken to identify and examine the extent, range, and nature of literature on the legal issues relevant to end-of-life practice for Australian speech-language pathologists and social workers, including current gaps.

Estimating phenological sensitivity in contemporary vs. historical data sets: Effects of climate resolution and spatial scale.

Premise: Phenological sensitivity, or the degree to which a species' phenology shifts in response to warming, is an important parameter for comparing and predicting species' responses to climate change. Phenological sensitivity is often measured using herbarium specimens or local studies in natural populations. These approaches differ widely in spatiotemporal scales, yet few studies explicitly consider effects of the geographic extent and resolution of climate data when comparing phenological sensitivities quantified from different data sets for a given species.

Operationalizing legal rights in end-of- life decision-making: A qualitative study.

Background: For a patient's legal right to make end-of-life treatment decisions to be respected, health care practitioners, patients and their substitute decision-makers must know what rights exist and how to assert them (or support others to assert them). Yet very little is known about what enhances or obstructs the operationalization of legal rights from the perspective of patients, family members and substitute decision-makers.

Aim: To explore barriers and facilitators to the operationalization of rights in end-of-life decision-making from the perspectives of terminally-ill patients and family members and substitute decision-makers of terminally ill patients in Australia.

Role of Law in End-of-Life Decision-Making: Perspectives of Patients, Substitute Decision-Makers and Families.

The law regulating medical end-of-life decisions aims to support patients to receive high-quality health care. It does so through ensuring treatment received reflects the person's wishes and values and protecting health professionals who provide adequate pain and symptom relief even if that treatment may coincidentally hasten death. However, good decision-making is predicated by those involved, including patients themselves and those supporting patients, being familiar with the law and the role it plays in the decision-making process.

Embarking to Caregiving Role: A Thematic Analysis of Malay Caregivers of Older Adults with Mental Health Problems Perspectives.

Religion and culture affect the meaning and practicalities of caring for families with mental illness in Malaysia. Such care also differs according to social background, family values and support, commitment, availability, practicality and the needs of the care recipient. This qualitative study explores 14 Malay caregivers of the older adults with mental health problems in Kelantan, Malaysia.

Managing social support needs in older age for childless Malaysians living in poverty.

Objective: To explore how older people manage social support needs when they are childless and living in poverty in the Malaysian context where social policy emphasises family as the primary provider of social support.

Methods: Semi-structured interviews were completed with a purposive sample of 34 childless and older Malaysians living in poverty in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. A thematic content analysis focused on their reports of managing social support needs.

Disrupted prevention: condom and contraception access and use among young adults during the initial months of the COVID-19 pandemic. An online survey.

Background: The initial response to COVID-19 in the UK involved a rapid contraction of face-to-face sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services and widespread use of remote workarounds. This study sought to illuminate young people's experiences of accessing and using condoms and contraception in the early months of the pandemic.

Methods: We analysed data, including open-text responses, from an online survey conducted in June-July 2020 with a convenience sample of 2005 16-24-year-olds living in Scotland.

The impact of COVID-19 on the management of heart failure: a United Kingdom patient questionnaire study.

Aims: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has created significant challenges to healthcare globally, necessitating rapid restructuring of service provision. This questionnaire survey was conducted amongst adult heart failure (HF) patients in the United Kingdom (UK), to understand the impact of COVID-19 upon HF services.

Methods And Results: The survey was conducted by the Pumping Marvellous Foundation, a UK HF patient charity.

Community Knowledge of Law on End-of-life Decision-making: An Australian Telephone Survey.

The law has a clear role to play in supporting patients and their substitute decision-makers (SDMs) to be involved in end-of-life (EOL) decision-making. Although existing literature suggests that knowledge of EOL law is variable among health professionals, there is little information about the extent and sources of such knowledge within the general community. A telephone survey of a representative sample of adults in three Australian States used six case scenarios to examine the extent to which adults know their legal duties, rights and powers as patients or SDMs; the sources from which people derive relevant legal knowledge; experiences of EOL decision-making; and individual characteristics associated with levels of knowledge.

Prevalence of advance care directives in the community: a telephone survey of three Australian States.

Background: The community prevalence of advance care directives (ACD) is low despite known benefits of advance care planning for patients, families and health professionals.

Aim: To determine the community prevalence of instructional and appointing ACD in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland and factors associated with completion of these documents.

Methods: A telephone survey of adults living in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland (n = 1175) about completion of instructional ACD (making their own decisions about future healthcare) and appointing ACD (appointing another to decide).

Community knowledge of law at the end of life: availability and accessibility of web-based resources.

Objective The aim of the present study was to identify online resources community members may access to inform themselves about their legal duties and rights in end-of-life decision making. Methods Resource mapping identified online resources that members of the public in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland are likely to identify, and assessed the ease or difficulty in locating them. Resources were then critically analysed for accessibility of language and format using the Patient Education Materials Assessment Tool (PEMAT).

Perceptions and employment intentions among aged care nurses and nursing assistants from diverse cultural backgrounds: A qualitative interview study.

The residential aged care industry faces shortages and high turnover rates of direct care workers. This situation is further complicated by the increasing cultural diversity of residents and staff. To retain direct care workers, it is crucial to explore their perceptions of the rewards and difficulties of care work, and their employment intentions in multicultural environments.

Can clinical supervision sustain our workforce in the current healthcare landscape? Findings from a Queensland study of allied health professionals.

Objective: Clinical supervision is widely recognised as a mechanism for providing professional support, professional development and clinical governance for healthcare workers. There have been limited studies about the effectiveness of clinical supervision for allied health and minimal studies conducted within the Australian health context. The aim of the present study was to identify whether clinical supervision was perceived to be effective by allied health professionals and to identify components that contributed to effectiveness.

Predictors of financial capacity performance in older adults using the Financial Competence Assessment Inventory.

Background: Declines in financial capacity in later life may arise from both neurocognitive and/or psychiatric disorders. The influence of socio-demographic, cognitive, health, and psychiatric variables on financial capacity performance was explored.

Methods: Seventy-six healthy community-dwelling adults and 25 older patients referred for assessment of financial capacity were assessed on pertinent cognitive, psychiatric, and financial capacity measures, including Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination - Revised (ACE-R), Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly (IQCODE), Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS), Geriatric Anxiety Inventory (GAI), selected Neuropsychiatric Inventory (NPI) items, Financial Competence Assessment Inventory (FCAI), and Social Vulnerability Scale (SVS).

Models for predicting turnover of residential aged care nurses: a structural equation modelling analysis of secondary data.

Background: Nurse turnover in the residential aged care industry is a pressing issue. Researchers have shown ongoing interest in exploring how the factors that are amendable to change in aged care policy, regulation and funding and in organizational procedures (e.g.

Enduring powers of attorney: promoting attorneys' accountability as substitute decision makers.

Aim: The misuse and abuse of Enduring Powers of Attorney (EPAs) by attorneys, particularly in relation to financial decision-making, is a growing concern. This paper explores the opportunities to enhance accountability of attorneys at the time of the execution of the document in Queensland.

Method: A four-stage multi-method design comprised a critical reference group; semi-structured interviews with 32 principals or potential principals, attorneys and witnesses; two focus groups with service providers and a state-wide survey of 76 principals, attorneys and witnesses.

Promoting the use of enduring powers of attorney in older adults: a literature review.

This review aims to identify factors that facilitate the establishment of enduring powers of attorney (EPOAs), and those that create a barrier to their establishment. The primary aim was to provide guidance about how to encourage future planning while people are cognitively able to make such important decisions. A detailed search of the literature was conducted to identify research looking at the motivating factors behind putting future-planning strategies in place.

Environment cleaning without chemicals in clinical settings.

Effective cleaning of elements in the health care environment has a crucial role in reducing the risk of health care-acquired infection. We assessed ultramicrofiber cloth and steam technology in 2 clinical settings. This new technology performed extremely well.

The Morphology Index: predictive value of malignancy among clinicians at various levels of training.

Objective: To determine whether clinicians at various levels of training can reproduce and apply the Morphology Index when compared to Ueland's Morphology Index data, and to determine intra-observer variability when applied by observers at various levels of training.

Methods: One hundred four transvaginal ultrasound images of adnexal masses obtained at Indiana University between 1991 and 2003 were identified which had correlating surgical pathology. The images were scored by four investigators at four different levels of training.

Pilot study to measure cleaning effectiveness in health care.

Environmental surfaces are likely to contribute to the transmission of health care-associated pathogens. The present study aimed to determine the most effective regimen or product for removing bioburden. An adenosine triphosphate assessment technique was used to compare cleaning methods and products for removing bioburden from soiled surfaces.

The new caring: financial asset management and older people.

Increasing longevity and the growing proportion of the aged in the population in most countries have served to focus on the question of how governments and older people can finance living, health, and care options in retirement. Prudent management of income and assets is an increasingly complex and important aspect of aging as assets and expectations of self-financing increase. Although many informal caregivers act as asset managers and/or substitute decision-makers for older people, little attention has been paid to this increasingly important aspect of care.

A sustained reduction in the transmission of methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus in an intensive care unit.

Introduction: In 2001, screening for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) was initiated in the intensive care unit at Dandenong Hospital, Melbourne, Australia. This followed the identification of a clinical isolate of vancomycin intermediate-resistant S. aureus (VISA).

Effects of gender on physiological responses during submaximal exercise and recovery.

Purpose: This investigation was conducted to compare the physiological responses of men and women, both during and following an exercise bout at the same relative submaximal intensity.

Methods: Ten untrained men (20.7+/-0.

Supervision practices in allied mental health: relationships of supervision characteristics to perceived impact and job satisfaction.

This study examined whether supervision characteristics impacted on mental health practice and morale, and developed a new Supervision Attitude Scale (SAS). Telephone surveys were conducted with a representative sample of 272 staff from public mental health services across Queensland. Although supervision was widely received and positively rated, it had low average intensity, and assessment and training of skills was rarely incorporated.