Service-learning for graduate students.

Although service-learning is gaining momentum in academic settings across the country, it has not been described as a feature of graduate education. This project incorporated a ten-hour service requirement into a unit on theories of nurse caring as part of a course for graduate nursing students, Theories and Concepts of Nursing. The authors describe the service-learning experience, as well as the extensive class reflection process and written synthesis with caring theory and the University mission after completion of the service.

Social support and adjustment in women following coronary artery bypass surgery.

Social support expected, discrepancies in support (differences between support expected and received), and self-esteem were used to predict emotional (tension and depression) and functional outcomes (recreation, housework, and social life) in a sample of women who had coronary artery bypass surgery (N = 86). Women were interviewed before hospital discharge (T1) and 1 (T2) and 3 (T3) months later. Higher self-esteem was associated with lower depression and tension (T3) and less disruption in social interaction (T2 and T3) and recreation (T3).

A learning partnership in Ecuador.

Recognizing the need to provide community-based experiences for its undergraduates, the US' Spalding University of Louisville, Kentucky, teamed up with Catholic University in Quito, Ecuador, to fulfil this need and at the same time meet its School of Nursing's curriculum goal of developing concepts of caring and diversity. Below, how this partnership helped meet the objectives of a community health course in a diverse setting.

The Neonatal Skin Risk Assessment Scale for predicting skin breakdown in neonates.

An instrument was developed to assess neonates at risk for skin breakdown, based on the Braden Scale for Predicting Pressure Sore Risk in adults. Using such an instrument to predict, and thus prevent, skin breakdown could decrease costs associated with prolonged hospital stays in neonates. The Neonatal Skin Risk Assessment Scale (NSRAS) was piloted with 32 neonates.

The Postpartum Support Questionnaire: reliability and validity.

Support has been found to be related to perinatal health, resulting in the development of the Postpartum Support Questionnaire based on the four categories of support (informational, material, emotional and comparison) identified by House (1981) and Cronenwett (1985). Data from four studies (N = 207) provided evidence of the psychometric properties of the instrument. Internal consistency reliability was demonstrated (alpha = .

Social support and postpartum depression.

Discrepancies between prenatal social support expectations and subsequent perceptions of support actually received were examined in relation to postpartum depression. Low-risk primiparous women (N = 105) were surveyed 1 month before and 1 month after delivery. Almost half of the women prenatally and one third postpartially had depression scores which would lead them to be classified as possibly depressed (CES-D scores of 16 or greater).