No abstract

Music is a social technology of enormous potential for improving community health. This paper reports on a series of applied ethnomusicological interventions, enacted as a participatory action research project in northern Ghana, for health promotion. Initial interventions, performed by local professional urban artists, proved effective. But as they were not sustainable, we followed up by training village-based amateur youth groups, rooted in the local community, to perform a similar repertoire. These methods can be transposed to other societies maintaining participatory musical traditions, leading to improved community health whenever

Findings: Process mapping identified barriers of the inner setting (frequent nursing turnover, ineffective communication between OT staff and administration, inconsistency in standards for both autoclave use and scrubbing practices, and unclarified responsibility for antibiotic administration); outer setting (increasing social unrest); and resources (lack of running water and adequate skin prep in obstetrics, lack of distilled water for autoclave use, and lack of sterilization certification methods).Interpretation: Many perioperative infection prevention norms are complex and challenging to measure; in particular, sterile processing, skin decontamination, and antibiotic administration. Process mapping identified resource constraints and communication factors associated with inefficient processes. Implementation science, especially process mapping of complex perioperative processes, is a valuable tool for surgical safety quality improvement. Source of Funding: GE Foundation.Abstract #: 1.046_HHR

Objectives: The study investigated respondents’ attitudes toward people living with mental, illness the relationship between attitude toward those individuals and socio-demographic characteristics, and factors influencing attitude toward those individuals among urban residents of North-western Nigeria. Methods and Material: An analytic cross-sectional design adopted to interview 407 respondents recruited using multistage sampling technique. A structured interviewer-guided questionnaire was used to obtain data, organized and analyzed with SPSS version 20. The data were summarized using frequency distribution tables and percentages. Chi-square was used to test the relationship between attitude scores on people with mental health issues and socio-demographic characteristics at 5% level of significance, within a 95% confidence interval. Results: Half (50.8%) of respondents had a positive attitude toward people living with mental illness. Statistically, significant association was found between attitude toward those individuals and age (χ2=403.026, p=<0.0001), gender (χ2=158.303, p=<0.0001), religion (χ2=65.527, p=<0.0001), ethnicity (χ2=230.851, p=<0.0001), educational status (χ2=268.044, p=<0.0001) and occupation (χ2=293.922, p=<0.0001) of the respondents. Factors influencing attitude to people with mental health issues were gender (84.7%), literacy level (72.0%), age (76.4%) and severity of illness (76.4%), previous encounters with individuals living with mental illness (77.6%) as well as fear of individuals with mental illness (86.0%). Conclusions: Approximately half of the respondents indicated negative attitude towards people with mental health issues. Thus, advocacy for, and educating community members toward individuals with mental illness might improve positive attitudes toward mental health issues. Further exploring cultural perspectives will aid in improving positive attitudes towards people with mental health issues.