Empowering Chinese university health service providers to become mental health champions: insights from the ACE-LYNX intervention.

Background: Evidence shows that there is a high prevalence of mental health challenges including depression and anxiety, among Chinese university students. Providing mental health care providers with professional training is crucial to implementing effective mental health promotion initiatives in university settings. Globally, the focus of the mental health system is shifting to recovery and the importance of empowerment is increasingly being emphasized.

Including formal and informal caregivers in the development of Play Intervention for Dementia: a qualitative study.

Background: Play Intervention for Dementia is a practice initiative using play to help people living with dementia (PWD) experience engagements, autonomy, and cognitive stimulation. This program was developed under a participatory paradigm, with extensive contribution from formal and informal caregivers. This article describes how caregivers contributed to the practice principles, materials, and assessment during the development phase of Play Intervention for Dementia through community-based participatory research (CBPR).

Social Work in Funeral Homes, a Unique Chinese Practice?

Social workers were introduced to funeral homes in China amid the transition and expansion of both the funeral home industry and the social work profession and are proving to play a valuable, though under-researched role in serving not just clients but also communities and funeral home staff. Funeral home social work fills gaps in after-death care and mental health and is distinct from palliative, hospice, end-of-life, and bereavement social work. Based on the experiences of funeral homes that employ social workers, this article argues that this innovation may bring new ideas to bridge some of the service gaps in after-death care in China and globally.

Cognitive Stimulating Play Intervention for Dementia: A Feasibility Randomized Controlled Trial.

This study investigates the feasibility and the preliminary efficacy of a Cognitive Stimulating Play Intervention on cognitive functions. Thirty older people with early to moderate dementia were recruited from 2 day-care centers, which were randomized into intervention and control groups. The recruitment, attendance, completion rates, and the interview with staff showed that the intervention was feasible.

Perspectives of Canadian oocyte donors and recipients on donor compensation and the establishment of a personal health information registry.

We report the views of 33 women who were involved in an altruistic oocyte donation program about provisions under Canada's Assisted Human Reproduction Act 2004 to prohibit donor compensation and to establish a Personal Health Information Registry. The participants had been either donors of oocytes to a recipient known to them (15) or recipients of such donation (18) through services provided by a clinic in a large Canadian city, and they each participated in a semi-structured face-to-face or telephone interview. Among the 15 donor participants, seven were friends of the recipient, six were sisters, one was a niece of the recipient, and one donor donated twice, once to her sister and once to a friend.

Relationships between culture and health status: a multi-site study of the older Chinese in Canada.

This study examined the relationships between culture and the health status of older Chinese in Canada. Data were collected through face-to-face interviews with a cross-sectional, randomly selected sample of 2,272 older Chinese between 55 and 101 years of age in seven Canadian cities. Health status was assessed by the number of chronic illnesses, by limitations in ADL and IADL, and by information on the Medical Outcome Study Short Form SF-36.