ABSTRACT
With a long experience in evaluating public health measures in the fields of HIV and drug addiction at national level, the Evaluation and Expertise in Public Health sector (CEESAN, Unisanté, Switzerland) has also been monitoring the situation in the canton of Vaud for more than twenty years. In this article, we present two instruments developed for epidemiological monitoring purposes : the « Pointage annuel du profil des usager·ère·s des structures à bas-seuil d'accès ¼ (PAPU, annual measure of users of low-threshold facilities' profile) and the online platform for opioid agonist treatments. The data collected through these two instruments provide information on the main characteristics of precarious drug users in the canton and help to guide public policy in this field.
Fort d'une longue expérience dans l'évaluation des mesures de santé publique dans les domaines du VIH et de la toxicomanie au niveau national, le secteur Évaluation et expertise en santé publique du Centre universitaire de médecine générale et santé publique suit également la situation dans le canton de Vaud depuis plus de 20 ans. Nous présentons dans cet article deux outils développés à des fins de suivi épidémiologique : le pointage annuel du profil des usager·ère·s des structures à bas seuil d'accès et la plateforme en ligne des traitements agonistes opioïdes. Les données ainsi récoltées renseignent à la fois sur les principales caractéristiques des consommateur·trice·s précaires dans le canton et contribuent à l'orientation des politiques publiques dans le domaine.
Subject(s)
Drug Users , Substance-Related Disorders , Humans , Substance-Related Disorders/epidemiology , Switzerland/epidemiologyABSTRACT
The topic of social care for older people has gained increasing attention from the part of academics, professionals, policy makers and media. However, we know little about this topic from the perspectives of older persons, which hinders future developments in terms of theory, empirical research, professional practice and social policy. This article presents and discusses a systematic review of relevant qualitative research-based evidence on the older persons' experiences and perspectives of receiving social care published between 1990 and September 2014. This review aimed to obtain answers to the following questions: How is the reception of social care experienced by the older persons? What are the negative and positive aspects of these experiences? What are the factors which influence the experiences? The synthesis of the findings of reviewed papers identified six analytical themes: asking for care as a major challenge; ambivalences; (dis)engagement in decisions concerning care; multiple losses as outcomes of receiving social care; multiple strategies to deal with losses originated by the ageing process; and properties of 'good care'. These themes are discussed from the point of view of their implications for theory, care practice and social policy, and future research.
Subject(s)
Social Work , Aged , Attitude to Health , Humans , Qualitative Research , Social Work/standardsABSTRACT
This article assesses changes over 10 years in the role of pharmacies in the care of drug misusers--needle/syringe provision and methadone treatment supervision--in the Swiss French-speaking Canton of Vaud (636,000 inhabitants, 238 pharmacies). A review of data collected in four surveys (1991, 1994, 1996, 2003) on the provision of sterile material (and methadone treatment supervision in 2003) including all the pharmacists of the Canton of Vaud was conducted, as well as a review of data of the monitoring of needle exchange programmes introduced since 1996 in this canton, and of methadone treatment statistics. In 2003, interviews with pharmacists complemented the survey. Pharmacies play an important role in the 'frontline' services to drug misusers: the provision of needles/syringes to drug users by pharmacies remains important in spite of a decrease in the provision of sterile material by them since the advent of needle exchange programmes, and they are included in the supervision of two thirds of the methadone treatments. However, they do not feel integrated enough in the network of care to drug misusers and ask for more training and better recognition of their role.
