Psychiatrists as Partners in Suicide Prevention for Pediatric Medical Settings

The article discusses the role of psychiatrists and other mental health clinicians in preventing suicide, which remains a global public health crisis and the third leading cause of death among U.S. youth. Topics include effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the pediatric mental health crisis, available tools to conduct a brief suicide safety assessment, and initiatives that can empower primary care providers to better address mental health concerns when specialty care is unavailable.

Annual Retention Survey Results

Fiona Ellwood looks at the current recruitment landscape.

Aspects Regarding Sustainability among Private Dental Practitioners from Bucharest, Romania: A Pilot Study.

Oral health professionals' knowledge of sustainability is essential for promoting environmental protection in dental healthcare. This pilot study involved an online survey addressed to 70 dental private practitioners from Bucharest, Romania, to evaluate their awareness of the concept of sustainability in dentistry. The performed statistical analysis revealed that 41.4% of the participants were well aware of sustainability in dentistry, with older participants demonstrating significantly higher levels of such awareness (p = 0.001). Sustainability awareness among participants correlates positively with their knowledge of the negative environmental impacts of dental activity (p < 0.001) and with the concern for sustainable dentistry implementation in their workplace (p = 0.037). Improper biohazardous waste disposal was identified as the primary cause of negative environmental impact of dental practices by 87.1% of participants. Installing high energy-efficient dental equipment was selected as the most important action to implement sustainability in participants' dental practices (64.3%). Overall, 51.4% of the participants reported that the COVID-19 pandemic had a medium impact on their dental activity in terms of sustainability. Our study found that participants have a moderate level of awareness regarding sustainability in dentistry, highlighting the need for education on sustainability for oral health professionals.

Female leaders' experiences during COVID-19: Mothering and leading in times of peril

This research began with my tearful reflections as an exasperated mother unsure how to mother and lead in the volatility and fear of a global health crisis. Overwhelmed with the uncertainty of constantly shifting leadership demands, designing new learning systems, and the burden of caring for students and teachers, I spent countless hours planning, collaborating, communicating, acting, and reacting. As intensive leadership consumed my days, I neglected all but the most basic care of my own young children. I toiled in isolation 15 feet away from them, yet unreachable, sequestered behind my home office door. My two daughters were left to fend for themselves in a lonely house, and they suffered. The early abuse and neglect from their biological parents changed their developing brains, so now felt safety is a constant negotiation. Consumed by the fear of failing at work, and failing the teachers, staff, and children for whom I felt responsible, I was completely unaware that I had failed my children during those intense months. I felt forced to choose my job over my girls, a "no choice choice" (Borda, 2021).As I wrestled with both roles, I wondered how other mother/leaders were managing the cataclysmic changes to their mothering and leading roles. I invited 16 other mother/leaders to share their pandemic accounts, and as their stories encountered mine, our collective navigations coalesced to reveal themes about the cultures of mothering and leading that permeated our lives. Using narratives, images, photographs, collages, written, aural, and sensory data, this study interrogated the social norms of intensive mothering (Hays, 1996) and intensive leadership (Baker, 2016) that mother/leaders encountered, reframed, and resisted during the precarity of COVID-19 (Dolman, 2018). This study created a space where the norms that constrain mother/leaders during crises can be assessed critically with the hopes that they can be dislodged and replaced with more matricentric sensitive policies and practices. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

A poetic autoethnography of when poetry became my synergistic approach for pedagogy and andragogy

As an early career educator with various teaching roles in the U.S. higher education context and as an international student from India, the author's research interests are second language writing, multicultural literacy development, and equality and equity in language education. This poetic autoethnographic chapter focuses on two social identities: (1) teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) scholar and (2) international multilingual student. It elaborates on the author's experiences of finding solace in poetry when there was emotional uncertainty in the author's life as an early career teacher during the COVID-19 pandemic. The chapter focuses on how the author managed the stress of beginning PhD studies during the same time. Throughout this poetic autoethnographic inquiry, it uses the poems the author wrote during the semester of spring 2021 as data. The poems include lilts of identities, which include the legal status that an F-1 (i.e., nonimmigrant) student visa, the race the author belongs to, the "accented" English (i.e., Indian English), the skin color, and the stress experienced related to COVID-19. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

A naturalistic study of how selected school contexts adapted roles and responsibilities during the COVID-19 pandemic phases: A cultural theory perspective

The purpose of this naturalistic study is to explore, through the lens of cultural theory, how selected school contexts adapted roles and responsibilities in educational processes during three of the COVID-19 pandemic phases: (a) infection, (b) social distancing, and (c) management. The COVID-19 pandemic forced educators and the districts in which they serve to make significant changes to how they educate students. Schools had to adapt to different roles as well as meet state practices and mandated standards (OSDE, 2020;Rauf, 2020;Schwartz, 2020b). While all districts were forced to make significant changes in their roles and responsibilities because of the COVID-19 pandemic, research indicates that some school contexts adjusted to these changes more readily than others (Gewertz, 2020;Kunichoff, 2020;Peroff, 2020;Reuters, 2020;Schleicher, 2020;Turner et al., 2020). One explanation for these differing adjustments can be found in the tenets of cultural theory, which explain how members' roles, values, beliefs, and behaviors in an organization, along with the rules that govern the organization, are important in understanding how contextual meaning is constructed and transposed when implementing change (Harris, 1995;Harris, 2015). This study used naturalistic inquiry methods (Erlandson, Harris, Skipper & Allen, 1993), which allows the researcher to understand the everyday life of the people involved in the educational environment. The naturalistic inquiry method was chosen to provide a holistic picture of what the impact is on the lives of the teachers, school culture, and the principal, within the school context. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Experiences of Palestinian patients with hospital services: a mixed-methods study.

BACKGROUND: This study aimed at assessing patient experiences with hospital services and key factors associated with better experiences. METHODS: The study design is cross-sectional supported by qualitative interviews. The Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) was used as data collection instrument. A convenience sample of 391 volunteers aged ≥18 years participated in this study. Qualitative interviews were conducted with patients and healthcare providers to further enrich and explain the quantitative results. RESULTS: The average age of the sample was 41.34, SD (16.4), range (18-87). Females represented 61.9% of the whole sample. Almost 75% were from the West Bank and 25% from the Gaza Strip. The majority of respondents reported that doctors and nurses were respectful, listened to them and explained clearly to them always or most of the time. Only 29.4% of respondents were given written information about the symptoms they may have after discharge from the hospital. Factors that were independently associated with higher scores on the HCAHPS scale were; being females (coef: 0.87, 95% CI: 0.157 to 1.587, p=0.017), being healthy (coef: -1.58, 95% CI: -2.458 to -0.706, p=0.000), being with high financial status (coef: 1.51, 95% CI: 0.437 to 2.582, p=0.006), being from Gaza (coef: 1.45, 95% CI: 0.484 to 2.408, p=0.003) and who visited hospitals outside of Palestine (coef: 3.37, 95% CI: 1.812 to 4.934, p=0.000). Overcrowding, weak organisational and management processes, and inadequate supply of goods, medicines, and equipment were reported factors impeding quality services via in-depth interviews. CONCLUSIONS: The overall hospital experiences of Palestinian patients were moderate but varied significantly based on patients' factors such as sex, health status, financial status and residency as well as by hospital type. Hospitals in Palestine should invest more in improving their services including communications with patients, the hospital environment and communication with patients.

When COVID-19 struck the world and elite sports: Psychological challenges and support provision in five countries during the first phase of the pandemic

The authors operated in professional roles related to preparations for Tokyo 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic changed the world. The purpose of this article is to share applied experiences and reflections from different parts of the world of psychological challenges and support strategies adopted in elite sports during the first phase of the pandemic (i.e., March to August 2020). Common themes included motivational issues, stress and anxiety, loss of routine, life-balance challenges among athletes, but also benefits of extended preparation time and recovery. Variations in support strategies and consequences from the effects of COVID-19 occurred across countries. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)

'I have enough pressure as it is, without the worry of doing something wrong because of ignorance': The impact of Covid-19 on people who employ social care personal assistants

People with care and support needs were often badly affected by Covid-19, although the impact on people employing Personal Assistants (PAs) has not been addressed. We aimed to explore the experiences of people employing PAs during the pandemic to inform care systems and social work practice. Remote qualitative interviews were conducted with seventy PA employers across England in 2021–2022. Data were analysed thematically to explore salient themes. The Covid-19 pandemic elucidated role tensions of PA employers: Navigating care arrangements during a time of unprecedented uncertainty reinforced participants' role as an employer, but exposed some aspects of employment responsibilities and legal obligations that participants felt ill-equipped to manage. Reports of contact with or by social workers were few and not perceived as helpful. The often-informal nature of PA arrangements and its blurred relational boundaries affected participants' expectations of their PAs. PA employers would welcome support from social workers in their employment role and flexibility with care plans, albeit with greater autonomy over their Direct Payment (DP) budget to enhance the potential of this arrangement. In the context of declining DP uptake in England, our study offers some potential explanations for this, with suggestions for systemic change and social work practice.

New spaces-New roles? Uncertainty in the context of the temporary organization

This paper in the journal "Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation. (GIO)" discusses the impact of uncertainty and new operational space on the role and identity construction of employees. Uncertainty has not only been one of the central challenges in terms of the development of working conditions and organizations since the emergence of the Corona pandemic. Digitization and virtualization, knowledge work and project organization are trends in the world of work that raise questions about how social identity and role behavior develop in temporary organizations under the influence of uncertainty. For this purpose, this article examines the relationship between temporary spatial representation and identity as well as new roles in temporary organizations, with special attention to project structures. It becomes clear due to that the spatial repositioning of the temporary organization and the associated change in the employee roles employography as an approach to identity work based on one's own employment biography is becoming increasingly important. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved) (German) Dieser Beitrag in der Zeitschrift Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation. (GIO)" diskutiert die Auswirkung von Ungewissheitserleben und neuen betrieblichen Handlungsraumen auf die Rollen- und Identitatskonstruktion von Mitarbeitern und Mitarbeiterinnen. Ungewissheit ist nicht erst seit Auftreten der Corona-Pandemie eine der zentralen Herausforderungen hinsichtlich der Entwicklung von Arbeitsbedingungen in Organisationen. Digitalisierung und Virtualisierung, Wissensarbeit und Projektorganisation sind Trends in der Arbeitswelt, die fragen lassen, wie sich soziale Identitat und Rollenverhalten in Temporaren Organisationen unter dem Einfluss von Ungewissheit entwickeln. Hierzu wird im vorliegenden Artikel das Verhaltnis von temporaren Reprasentationsraumen und Identitat sowie neuen Rollen in Temporaren Organisationen, unter besonderer Berucksichtigung von Projektstrukturen, untersucht. Es wird deutlich, dass durch die raumliche Neupositionierung der Temporaren Organisation und dem damit verbundenen Wandel der Mitarbeiterrollen der Identitatsarbeit auf Basis der eigenen Erwerbsbiographie eine immer grosere Bedeutung zukommt. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Job Stress during the COVID-19 Pandemic amongst Social Workers: A Comparison between Chinese Mainland and Macao

The COVID-19 pandemic may have resulted in front line social workers experiencing job stress, burnout and other psychological distress. Little is known about the work-related stress experienced by Chinese social workers during the pandemic. This study focused on the job stress of social workers from Mainland and Macao. The research aims of this study included: (1) testing whether there is a difference in job stress between social workers from Mainland and Macao during the pandemic and (2) identifying mediating factors that helped explain such regional differences. An online survey collected data from 292 social workers in Mainland China and 108 from Macao in 2020. Mainland participants reported significantly higher job stress than Macao participants. Regional differences in job stress amongst Mainland and Macao social workers were partially attributed to their age and professional role identity. More attention needs to be paid to social workers in Mainland China as they experience higher job stress than their counterparts from Macao. Future research is needed to examine other factors (e.g. job demand and financial compensation) that may contribute to such regional differences.

Emergent organizing in crisis: US nurses' sensemaking and job crafting during COVID-19

Crisis situations may render some roles meaningless or modify the meanings of existing roles. In general, employees participate in job crafting to alter or redefine their tasks and relationships to enhance their meaningfulness. Drawing on Weick's sensemaking theory, this article explores how nurses working directly with COVID-19 patients participate in job crafting amid a pandemic crisis. It proposes an iterative conceptual framework in which sensemaking via the cycle of enactment, selection, and retention informs job crafting, thus contributing to emergent organizing. This enactment of emergent organizing provides fodder for further sensemaking, which highlights the symbiotic relationship between sensemaking and job crafting. Practically speaking, in order to facilitate sensemaking, job crafting, and organizing, management must acknowledge and impart flexibility, and must be open to impromptu thinking by nurses. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)

New Research on School Librarians during Pandemic

The article reports on the publication of research from the American Association of School Librarians journal "School Library Research," which investigates the role of school librarians in the transition to online teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Physicians Can Suffer Moral Injury if Oath to Patients Is Broken

The article offers information on how physicians can suffer moral injury if oath to patients is broken. Topics include information on role of corporate mentality to the physician;how physicians are bound by their ethical standards to put patients first;and how use of the electronic medical record (EMR) is increasing.

Neurocognitive disorders

There are many reasons why patients are admitted to, and treated in, the intensive care unit (ICU), including individuals who require close monitoring and support for critical organ systems such as the cardiovascular, respiratory, neurologic, and renal system. The increasing prevalence of critical illness, coupled with improvements in its treatment, has resulted in a substantial increase in the number of ICU survivors. Some survivors will recover and return to their pre-illness baseline level of function;however, one third to one half of all survivors are not so fortunate and will develop postintensive care syndrome. This chapter focuses on cognitive outcomes of critical illness survivors treated in the ICU for acute respiratory failure, sepsis, and other medical or surgical conditions. It discusses the prevalence, characteristics, risk factors, assessment, management, and the short- and long-term neurologic outcomes for survivors of critical illness and critically ill survivors of COVID-19 including neurocognitive disorders. The chapter explores the psychologist's role in caring for survivors of critical illness and covers integrative concepts that require collaboration among members of the interdisciplinary team. The chapter also discusses Interventions to improve outcomes, including environmental management, tracking mental status, pharmacologic interventions, family intervention and support, and rehabilitation interventions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Physicians Can Suffer Moral Injury if Oath to Patients Is Broken

The article offers information on how physicians can suffer moral injury if oath to patients is broken. Topics include information on role of corporate mentality to the physician;how physicians are bound by their ethical standards to put patients first;and how use of the electronic medical record (EMR) is increasing.