Browsing by Author "Wilson R"

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    Exploring digital interventions to facilitate coping and discomfort for nurses experiencing the menopause in the workplace: An international qualitative study.
    (John Wiley and Sons Ltd, 2023-05-09) Cronin C; Bidwell G; Carey J; Donevant S; Hughes K-A; Kaunonen M; Marcussen J; Wilson R
    INTRODUCTION: The global nursing workforce is predominantly female, with a large proportion working in the 45-55 age group. Menopause is a transition for all women, and; therefore needs recognition as it can impact work performance and consequently staff turnover. BACKGROUND: Women will go through the menopause, but not all women are affected. The menopause transition presents a range of signs and symptoms both physical and psychological which can impact the quality of life and individuals' work/life balance. The nursing workforce is predominantly women that will work through the menopause transition. OBJECTIVES: The study explored perspectives on digital health interventions as strategies to support menopausal women and to understand the requirements for designing health interventions for support in the workplace. DESIGN: A qualitative explorative design. SETTINGS: Nurses working in a range of clinical settings in England, Finland, Denmark, New Zealand, Australia and USA. METHODS: Nurses (n = 48) participated in focus groups from six different countries from February 2020-June 2022 during the pandemic from a range of acute, primary care and education settings. Nurses were invited to participate to share their experiences. Thematic analysis was used. RESULTS: All participants were able to describe the physical symptoms of menopause, with some cultural and possible hemisphere differences; more noticeable was the psychological burden of menopause and fatigue that is not always recognized. Four themes were identified: Managing symptoms in the workplace; Recognition in the workplace; Menopause interventions; and Expectation versus the invisible reality. These themes revealed information that can be translated for implementation into digital health interventions. CONCLUSIONS: Managers of nursing female staff in the menopausal age range need greater awareness, and menopause education should involve everyone. Finally, our results demonstrate design attributes suitable for inclusion in digital health strategies that are aligned with likely alleviation of some of the discomforts of menopause. PATIENT OR PUBLIC CONTRIBUTION: No patient or public contribution.
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    Partial Biodegradable Blend with High Stability against Biodegradation for Fused Deposition Modeling
    (MDPI AG, 11/04/2022) Harris M; Mohsin H; Potgieter J; Ishfaq K; Archer R; Chen Q; De silva K; Guen M-JL; Wilson R; Arif K
    This research presents a partial biodegradable polymeric blend aimed for large-scale fused deposition modeling (FDM). The literature reports partial biodegradable blends with high contents of fossil fuel-based polymers (>20%) that make them unfriendly to the ecosystem. Furthermore, the reported polymer systems neither present good mechanical strength nor have been investigated in vulnerable environments that results in biodegradation. This research, as a continuity of previous work, presents the stability against biodegradability of a partial biodegradable blend prepared with polylactic acid (PLA) and polypropylene (PP). The blend is designed with intended excess physical interlocking and sufficient chemical grafting, which has only been investigated for thermal and hydrolytic degradation before by the same authors. The research presents, for the first time, ANOVA analysis for the statistical evaluation of endurance against biodegradability. The statistical results are complemented with thermochemical and visual analysis. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) determines the signs of intermolecular interactions that are further confirmed by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The thermochemical interactions observed in FTIR and DSC are validated with thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) is also used as a visual technique to affirm the physical interlocking. It is concluded that the blend exhibits high stability against soil biodegradation in terms of high mechanical strength and high mass retention percentage.
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    What needs to happen for school autonomy to be mobilised to create more equitable public schools and systems of education?
    (Springer Nature on behalf of The Australian Association for Research in Education Inc, 30/09/2022) Keddie A; MacDonald K; Blackmore J; Boyask R; Fitzgerald S; Mihajla G; Heffernan A; Hursh D; McGrath-Champ S; Moller J; O'Neill J; Parding K; Salokangas M; Skerrit C; Stacey M; Thomson P; Wilkins A; Wilson R; Wylie C; Yoon E-S
    The series of responses in this article were gathered as part of an online mini conference held in September 2021 that sought to explore different ideas and articulations of school autonomy reform across the world (Australia, Canada, England, Ireland, the USA, Norway, Sweden and New Zealand). It centred upon an important question: what needs to happen for school autonomy to be mobilised to create more equitable public schools and systems of education? There was consensus across the group that school autonomy reform creates further inequities at school and system levels when driven by the logics of marketisation, competition, economic efficiency and public accountability. Against the backdrop of these themes, the conference generated discussion and debate where provocations and points of agreement and disagreement about issues of social justice and the mobilisation of school autonomy reform were raised. As an important output of this discussion, we asked participants to write a short response to the guiding conference question. The following are these responses which range from philosophical considerations, systems and governance perspectives, national particularities and teacher and principal perspectives.