Policy Shift: South Africa’s Old Age Pensions’ Influence on Perceived Quality of Life

Noncontributory pensions serve as an important resource for poverty-affected households in low- and middle-income countries. This study explores how a recent policy change to pension receipt influences perceived quality of life among older South Africans. We use survey data from the longitudinal World Health Organization Study on global AGEing and adult health and from the Agincourt Health and Socio-Demographic Surveillance System census. We find pension receipt to have a positive impact on both men’s and women’s perceived quality of life. These findings hold when controlling for prior well-being status. We find a significant moderating factor of physical limitations on the relationship between pension receipt and quality of life. Individuals reporting the highest levels of physical limitation report a larger increase in their quality of life upon pension receipt than those with less severe physical limitations. We conclude that despite the well-documented household income-pooling in this population, pension receipt still leads to a significant positive impact on pensioners’ perceived quality of life.     

Accident Prevention Among the Elderly

In 1980 the World Health Organization (WHO) published a set of health targets to guide the health policy of its member states as part of its "Health For All by the Year 2000" (HFA-2000) initiatives. However, the translation of health targets into health and social program guidelines is a complex process. This paper illustrates this process through an analysis related to accident prevention among the elderly as conducted by Israeli researchers. Several types of comparative data were used in the analysis. First, the health policy guidelines published by WHO, the United States, and Israel were compared along specific parameters. Then, mortality statistics on accidents among those aged 65 and over were compared for Israel, the United States, Sweden, and Ireland in order to examine the different components of mortaliiy and suggest different priorities for accident prevention. Specific health policy recommendations made to prevent accidents among Israeli elderly are noted; they are compared to those adopted by Israel's Ministry of Health. Finally, exemplary community accident prevention programs from several countries that can serve as models for translating general targets into specific social programs are described.     

Missing Teeth: Reviewing the Sociology of Oral Health and Healthcare

Both the US Surgeon General and the World Health Organization have called for further social scientific research on the social determinants of oral health. Oral disease can have detrimental effects on quality of life, having been linked with physical, mental, and social impairments. This article reviews the recent literature pertaining to the sociology of oral health and healthcare. The purpose of this review is to summarize and revive a necessary field. In order to maintain a focus on the United States and expand into other social science disciplines, relevant anthropological works were also included. The review discusses five key areas in both the sociology and anthropology of oral health. Of the 25 included articles, research maintained a focus on the dental profession, the construction of oral health, the mouth and the social self, social factors in dental care, and cultural assumptions of oral health. While the reviewed studies have aided in closing the gap, much of the research has been conducted outside of the United States, has used oral health as a case study for larger arguments, and has not considered the role of social inequality. Future research is necessary to more fully frame oral health and healthcare in society.     

What family dimensions are important for health-related quality of life in adolescence?

Adolescence is a relevant life stage in which to study a global well-being measure, health-related quality of life, in order to analyse the impact of important determinants in adolescents' health-related quality of life (e.g., the quality of family relationships). This study aimed to examine the impact of several family dimensions (parental affection, parental promotion of autonomy, family activities, adolescent disclosure, parental solicitation and parental knowledge) on adolescents' health-related quality of life. Additionally, this study investigated whether demographic variables (adolescents' gender and age) influenced health-related quality of life and moderated the relationship between family dimensions and health-related quality of life. The sample was composed of 14,825 adolescents, aged 13–14, 15–16, and 17–18, from the 2006 edition of Spain's Health Behaviour in School-aged Children study. The results showed that parental promotion of autonomy, family activities and especially parental affection were the most important dimensions influencing health-related quality of life. Boys reported higher health-related quality of life than girls, and younger adolescents reported higher health-related quality of life than older adolescents. The discussion explains how the aforementioned family dimensions encourage better health-related quality of life in adolescents.     

A Manifesto for the Age-Friendly Movement: Developing a New Urban Agenda

Developing age-friendly cities and communities has become a key part of policies aimed at improving the quality of life of older people in urban areas. The World Health Organization has been especially important in driving the “age-friendly” agenda, notably through its global network of age-friendly cities and communities. Despite the expansion and achievements of the network, challenges remain in responding to the growth of inequality and the impact of economic austerity on aging policies. Against the background of these limitations, this article sets out a “manifesto for the age-friendly movement” aimed at raising the aspirations of what is now a worldwide movement. The areas covered in the manifesto are challenging social inequality, widening participation, coproducing and codesigning age-friendly communities, encouraging multisectorial and multidisciplinary collaboration, and integrating research with policy. The article concludes with a discussion on developing age-friendly work as a contribution to a new agenda for urban aging.     

Process of precocious functional aging in workers of laundries

The World Health Organization (WHO), as well as researchers of the whole world, it has been demonstrating concern with the subject of the aging related to the work and it recognizes that modifications in the several systems of the human body take to the gradual decrease in the effectiveness of each one of them, because the aging caused by the work advances apprenticeships of the cycle of the man's life, not respecting the natural state of that process. In this sense, it was aimed at with this research to investigate the relative aspects to the capacity for the work and to the workers' with responsibility to realize the work in the laundries service, verifying if they present signs of precocious functional aging.     

Quality of Life of the Elderly Receiving Old Age Pension in Lesotho

The southern African country of Lesotho introduced an old age pension scheme in 2004 with the aim of enhancing the quality of life (QoL) of the nation’s elderly population. This study is the first to assess the physical, psychological, social, and environmental aspects of the health-related QoL of the elderly in Lesotho since the pension scheme was adopted. Data for this study were gathered using the World Health Organization QoL-BREF questionnaire. Mean QoL scores were compared across demographic, socioeconomic, and clinical variables using analysis of variance, t test, and regression analysis. Findings indicate that respondents were least satisfied with the environmental and physical domains of QoL. They also indicate that the overall QoL of the elderly in Lesotho was mainly affected by marital status, level of education, type of housing, source of income, and level of satisfaction with income. These factors should thus be taken into account when developing interventions aimed at improving the QoL of the elderly in Lesotho.     

The Power of Older Women and Men in Egyptian and Tunisian Families

We adapt resource theory to compare involvement in family decisions by older women and men in the more patriarchal setting of Egypt and the more egalitarian setting of Tunisia. Data from the World Health Organization Collaborative Study on Social and Health Aspects of Aging are analyzed. In Egypt, women participate less often than men in most decisions, whereas participation is more gender equitable in Tunisia. Increasing age and declining health are negatively associated with participation in daily and life course decisions, particularly for Egyptian women. Although women participate less often than men in life course decisions in Egypt, involvement is more frequent among widows and those owning their homes. Future research should examine the relationship of resources, support, and the family power of older adults across normative contexts.     

Medicaid Managed Care Programs for High-Risk Older People in Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts has undertaken a major initiative in the development of comprehensive managed health care programs for two sets of high-risk older people: those who are frail and homebound and those who reside in nursing homes. This effort has been coordinated by the state's Department of Public Welfare (DPW; Medical Assistance [Medicaid] Program) and Executive Office of Elder Affairs, and expedited ba a set of Health Care Financy Administration (HCFA) waivers and by the state's revised Nurse Practice Act (MGS Chapter 56). Than act allows nurse-practioners and physician assistants expanded roles as primary providers in home care and nursing home settings. The managed care initiatives have supplemented other efforts (1) to coordinate health and social services for older people, (2) to provide as broad a range as possible of community-based services for older people, and (3) to enroll as many older adults as possible in Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) "Senior Plans" and other similar "Competive Medical Plans."

Though there is still no evidence of the managed care programs' effects, this article summarizes some of the possible risks and benefits of managed care programs for those kinds of populations and presents an agenda of questions that evaluations of managed care programs must address.     

Table of Contents

The Recovery Movement Grows Up: Paid Peers and Health Reform CEO Sees Merger With MH Organization as Positive Step in Health Reform Era Health Reform Will Bring More Patients: CATG Initiative National Council Wins HRSA/SAMHSA Integration Training Grant Reauthorization of STOP Act Bill Introduced Briefly Noted In the States Coming up     

Comments on Willis,Wells and Picou

Most research relating objective indicators of the quality of environment to subjective indicators of the quality of life has failed to find a relationship between the two. This research, by using community data, establishes an association between the local environment and perceived life quality, and in doing so, provides empirical support for focusing on local as welt as national investigations of life quality.     

Marketing and the quality of life

This article explores the relationship between marketing and quality of life.The first part develops a conceptualization of quality of life based on the idea that citizens arc involved in exchanging resources to new resources or to ultimate satisfaction in a set of arenas of action. The so-called objective and subjective approaches to measuring quality of life address different aspects of the exchange relationships and their context.The article claims that marketing at least indirectly has contributed to a higher quality of life by rendering work life possible and by providing the goods and services entering the consuming life arena. At the same time, marketing has had a negative influence by giving priority to short-term, materialistic needs. Necessary institutional changes in marketing are indicated.     

Family Focused Care for Refugees and Displaced Populations: Global Opportunities for Family Therapists

Recent global crises have created a significant increase in the number of people leaving their countries. Distress experienced by these refugees often leads to posttraumatic stress disorder and depression and can also result in psychotic disorders, substance abuse, and interpersonal violence. The World Health Organization leads the organizing of refugee services as part of a larger initiative to provide mental health services to citizens in low‐ and middle‐income countries. The World Health Organization has identified challenges in providing care, including a provider shortage, issues with how refugees access and receive care and a lack of uniformity in mental health services. By applying the values and systemic orientation of the profession, family therapists can address some of the challenges in treating mental health concerns of these at‐risk populations.     

The non-monetary quality of city life in South Africa

In contrast to most research on the non-monetary quality of life, which relies on subjective indicators, we construct objective measures of the non-monetary quality of life using regression methods, for South Africa's cities. We also analyse the extent to which the various cities have been able to turn improvements in per capita incomes (monetary quality of life) into non-monetary quality of life – as reflected for instance in a better environment, higher literacy and longer lives. When monetary quality of life measures are used for South Africa's cities, the ranking in 2004 was led by Johannesburg, Tshwane, Ekurhuleni, Cape Town, Durban and Port Elizabeth. However when residuals from a regression of per capita income on (HDI) are used as a measure of non-monetary quality of life (i.e. the proportion of HDI not explained by variation in incomes), coastal cities tend to obtain generally higher rankings, with Cape Town ranked first, followed by Ekurhuleni, Durban, Port Elizabeth and then Johannesburg and Tshwane.     

Big sister is watching you! Gender interaction and the unwritten rules of the Amsterdam red-light district

It is generally accepted that in sexual interaction men are the hunters and women the gatherers. An expressly sexual environment such as a red-light district would be expected to only reinforce this image. Strikingly enough, however, it is precisely prostitutes who seem able to break with these established gender roles. This ethnographic study uses participant observation to demonstrate how assumptions about sexual interaction may be specious: female prostitutes are frequently not the passive victims and male clients not the active sex-hunters they are taken for. Both the communicative function and protection of privacy play an important role in these processes in a red-light district. In the red-light district, gender interaction is bound by social regulation and unwritten rules that greatly exceed the influence of formal institutions. In this paper, the case of the red-light district "De Wallen" in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, is discussed in the context of several disciplines including urban anthropology, social psychology, geography, gender studies, and urban sociology.     

Scenario planning,a tool for community psychology work with politicians: a case analysis

The term scenario is used to talk about a projected outline of political events and future developments. The objective of building scenarios is to deal with critical events, uncertain conditions, and create useful pro-actions. This paper attempts to outline the utility of scenario planning as a method for developing alternative visions of the future in community contexts. It describes its theoretical basis, uses, and steps. A case example is used to illustrate the application of the framework and its possible practical benefits in community psychology practice. To test this methodology with politicians, they have been asked to examine the resources and problems present in the areas administered by them and invited to imagine possible future scenarios and projects which might improve the quality of life of residents.     

The functional IME: A linkage of expertise across the disability continuum

Disability assessment remains a significant challenge especially in welfare systems like workers' compensation and disability insurance. Many of today's managed care strategies do not impact on the seminal issue of return to gainful employment. Employers, insurers, attorneys and case managers routinely request independent medical examinations (IMEs) as a means of determining degree of disability, functional limitations, work restrictions and "estimated" physical capacities. However, this approach is limited because physicians are not trained in the functional model of disability assessment. IMEs address pathology and impairments which represent a portion of the disability continuum described by the World Health Organization, Nagi, Guccione and others [e.g. pathology-impairment-disability-handicap]. Functional capacity evaluations or FCEs are often performed by physical and occupational therapists who are trained in a function-based model of disability assessment. Unlike an IME physician who completes "Estimated Physical Capacities", therapists measure actual physical functioning. The value of both IMEs and FCEs can be enhanced through a "functional IME" that combines both models; medical-based examination and a function-based disability evaluation. This combination enhances the assessment of the relationship of pathology to impairment and impairment to disability status especially, in musculoskeletal disorders which tend to drive costs in workers' compensation.     

“Sorting out” within a “troika”: Treatment of neurologically based learning disabilities in children

While most writers in the area of clinical treatment of children with learning disabilities mention the need to work with the family and the school, major emphasis is on work directly with the child. The thesis of this paper is that all three-family, child and school-must be worked withsimultaneously. In this simultaneous three pronged approach which is referred to as the troika, sorting out is the process through which the team arrives at synchronized short term and long term goals that each team member will address in his/her area of specialization. The sorting out process in psychotherapy is used to help the child order the various parts of any situation into a cohesive whole, thus enhancing the ability to functionally perceive a more objective reality.Ms. Taylor is in private clinical practice. She was formerly Head Social Worker, School Health Program, Stamford Health Department and consultant in psychotherapy, J.B.F.C.S., Cedar Knolls School.     

The mental health recovery movement and family therapy, part I: consumer-led reform of services to persons diagnosed with severe mental illness

In 2004, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issued a consensus statement on mental health recovery based on the New Freedom Commission's recommendation that public mental health organizations adopt a "recovery" approach to severe and persistent mental illness, including services to those dually diagnosed with mental health and substance abuse issues. By formally adopting and promoting a recovery orientation to severe mental illness, the United States followed suit with other first-world nations that have also adopted this approach based on two decades of research by the World Health Organization. This movement represents a significant paradigm shift in the treatment of severe mental health, a shift that is more closely aligned with the nonpathologizing and strength-based traditions in marriage and family therapy. Furthermore, the recovery movement is the first consumer-led movement to have a transformational effect on professional practice, thus a watershed moment for the field. Part I of this article introduces family therapists to the concept of mental health recovery, providing an overview of its history, key concepts, and practice implications. Part II of this article outlines a collaborative, appreciative approach for working in recovery-oriented contexts.