A New Measure of Health Numeracy: Brief Medical Numbers Test (BMNT).

BACKGROUND: Approximately half of Americans have inadequate health literacy, which leads to poorer health outcomes. Health numeracy is an important component of literacy, which reflects one's ability to understand and manipulate numbers. This is especially important for transplant candidates, as adherence to medical recommendations is essential for posttransplant care. Although validated measures of numeracy exist, they can be inconvenient and time consuming to administer. OBJECTIVE: The Brief Medical Numbers Test (BMNT) was created in 2011 to quickly assess the health numeracy of a patient during presurgical psychiatric transplant evaluations. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the reliability and validity of the BMNT for this use via retrospective chart review. METHODS: There were 293 patients referred over a 2-year period for a presurgical psychiatric evaluation. The evaluation consisted of a semistructured interview and completion of several measures, including the BMNT, a measure of health literacy, and a brief test of cognitive functioning. RESULTS: The BMNT had acceptable internal consistency (α = .71), convergent validity with health literacy and cognitive functioning, and predictive validity with surgical outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: Preliminary data suggests the BMNT is a reliable and valid measure of health numeracy in patients being evaluated for transplant.

Listening to a patient: An exploratory experimental investigation into the effects of vocalization and therapist gender on interpreting clinical material.

Carefully listening to the patient is of paramount importance for psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy. The present study explored whether patient vocalization as well as the gender of the analyst play significant roles in clinical listening. Fifty-one psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic therapists were randomly assigned to listen to one of two dramatized psychoanalytic sessions. The content of the sessions was the same for both versions, but the sessions were dramatized differently. Some differences emerged between the versions, especially on ratings of reality testing, impulse control, pressured speech, patient was confusing, and awareness of imagery. Furthermore, differences emerged between male and female analysts in terms of ratings of intervention strategies and countertransference reactions to the patient material. Session version and gender affect different ratings. Implications of the findings are discussed as is the utility of using more ecologically valid material in conducting empirical research into clinical judgment.

The use of the Nursing Interventions Classification (NIC) with cardiac patients receiving home health care.

PURPOSE: To identify Nursing Interventions Classification interventions (NICs) commonly provided to cardiac home care patients and to explore differences among patients with coronary artery disease, congestive heart failure, and patients with other cardiac disorders. METHODS: The NICs provided to cardiac home care patients were recorded and analyzed to determine differences in frequencies across cardiac diagnoses. FINDINGS: Frequent NICs provided in cardiac home care are similar across diagnoses, and include tissue perfusion management and patient education NICs. Variations can be detected and involve fluid monitoring/management, exercise promotion/teaching, and cardiac care NICs. CONCLUSIONS: Differences in nursing care among patients with similar medical diagnoses can be detected using NIC. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING PRACTICE: Relevant knowledge of nursing care can be gleaned from analyzing NIC data generated in practice and can be used to plan, evaluate, and determine the effectiveness of nursing care.