Face-to-face versus online training for the interpretation of findings in the fiberoptic endoscopic exam of the swallow procedure.

Objective: The aim of this study was to evaluate the comparative effectiveness of an online, interdisciplinary, interactive course designed to increase the ability to accurately interpret the fiberoptic endoscopic exam of the swallow (FEES) procedure to traditional, face-to-face (F2F) lectures for both graduate medical education (GME) and graduate speech language pathology (GSLP) programs.

Design: This was a prospective, quantitative, nonrandomized study. Participants were medical residents in physical medicine and rehabilitation from two affiliated programs and graduate students in speech language pathology from two instructional cohorts at a single institution.

Acute hospital dementia care: results from a national audit.

Background: Admission to an acute hospital can be distressing and disorientating for a person with dementia, and is associated with decline in cognitive and functional ability. The objective of this audit was to assess the quality of dementia care in acute hospitals in the Republic of Ireland.

Methods: Across all 35 acute public hospitals, data was collected on care from admission through discharge using a retrospective chart review (n = 660), hospital organisation interview with senior management (n = 35), and ward level organisation interview with ward managers (n = 76).

Joyce Clifford the Scholar: In Her Own Words.

Dr Joyce H. Clifford was world renowned for her excellence in nursing administration and leadership. The purpose of this article is to examine her complete body of published scholarship and analyze her papers as a method of understanding her intellectual progression as a leader in the discipline, as well as to document how her conceptualization of professional practice and the practice environment advanced nursing practice and patient and family care.

A cost comparison of hospice care in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and lung cancer.

The authors compare the cost of hospice care provided to 25 amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients and 159 lung cancer patients by the Wissahickon Hospice of the University of Pennsylvania. The mean length of stay was 86.7 days for ALS patients and 35.

Development and psychometric evaluation of the Professional Practice Environment (PPE) scale.

Purpose: To describe the Professional Practice Environment (PPE) scale, its conceptual development and psychometric evaluation, and its uses in measuring eight characteristics of the professional practice environment in an acute care setting.

Design And Methods: The 38-item PPE Scale was validated on a sample of 849 professional practice staff at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. Psychometric analysis included: item analysis, principal components analysis (PCA) with varimax rotation and Kaiser normalization, and internal consistency reliability using Cronbach's alpha coefficient.

Online cancer support groups: a review of the research literature.

This article explores current research on online cancer support groups. A review of the literature revealed 9 research articles (describing 10 research studies) that focused on computer-mediated or Internet cancer support groups. The researchers in 9 of the 10 studies concluded that online cancer support groups helped people cope more effectively with their disease.

How do children describe pain? A tentative assessment.

In a study to determine how children describe the experience of pain, we queried a convenience sample of 100 children in hospitals and 114 children in church and private schools who were between 9 and 12 years old. The questions were designed to seek correlations by age among boys and girls, and between hospitalized and non-hospitalized children that would aid health professionals in strategies that will identify and assist the child who is in pain. The preliminary results show that children clearly describe pain, that there are no appreciable differences by age groups, but that children who are hospitalized describe pain differently from children who are not.