Description:
The Australian Fitness Industry Risk Management (AFIRM) Project was set up to explore the operation of rules and regulations for the delivery of safe fitness services. This article summarises the results of recent focus group research and a national survey of risk management practices by the AFIRM Project. Our focus group research in four States identified the following most important concerns: (1) the competency of fitness professionals; (2) the effectiveness of pre-exercise screening and the management of de-conditioned clients; (3) poor supervision of fitness service users and incorrect use of equipment; (4) fitness trainers failing to remain within their scope of practice; (5) equipment misuse (as distinct from incorrect use); and (6) poor fitness training environments. This information was then used to develop 45 specific items for a questionnaire that was disseminated throughout the fitness industry. The survey, which is the largest ever conducted in the Australian fitness industry (n = 1,178), identified similar concerns. Our research indicates that efforts to improve risk management in the fitness industry should focus, first and foremost, on the development and monitoring of safety policy, and improvements in the education and training of fitness instructors to ensure that they can incorporate risk management practices.
Anxiety online-A virtual clinic: Preliminary outcomes following completion of five fully automated treatment programs for anxiety disorders and symptoms
Description:
A clinical placement evaluation form for undergraduate nursing students was developed to address the need for evaluating success in clinical teaching support and provide a feedback loop to the University, clinical educators and clinical venues. A 21-item, with five domains, (orientation, clinical educator/teacher, ward staff and environment, clinical hurdles, and university) Clinical Evaluation Form (CEF) was developed. The form was live tested with 178 year 1 and 2 undergraduate nursing students. The CEF scale was reliable (alpha = 0.90) and has good face and content validity approved by an expert panel. Further research is recommended to validate the CEF for use multi-professionally and across all year levels.
Description:
Aims and objectives: The aim of this study was to explore perceptions of qualified nurses on the abilities of newly registered nursing graduates to perform a variety of clinical skills. Background: Evidence from the literature suggests that undergraduate nursing programmes do not adequately prepare nursing students to be practice-ready on completion of their nursing courses. Design: A descriptive quantitative design was used. Methods: Participants were recruited through the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation, Victorian branch. A brief explanation of the study and a link to the survey were promoted in their monthly e-newsletter. A total of 245 qualified nurses in the state of Victoria, Australia participated in this study. A survey tool of 51 clinical skills and open-ended questions was used, whereby participants were asked to rate new nursing graduates' abilities using a 5-point Likert scale. Results: Overall participants rated new nursing graduates' abilities for undertaking clinical skills as good or very good in 35·3% of skills, 33·3% were rated as adequate and 31·4% rated as being performed poorly or very poorly. Of concern, essential clinical skills, such as critical thinking and problem solving, working independently and assessment procedures, were found to be poorly executed and affecting new registered nurses graduates' competence. Conclusion: The findings from this study can further serve as a reference for nursing education providers to enhance nursing curricula and work collaboratively with healthcare settings in preparing nurses to be competent, safe practitioners on completion of their studies. Relevance to clinical practice: Identifying key areas in which new nursing graduates are not yet competent means that educational providers and educators from healthcare settings can focus on these skills in better preparing our nurses to be work ready.
Description:
This study uses confirmatory factor analysis procedures to examine the factor structure of the mother and father versions of the Parental AcceptanceRejection Questionnaire (PARQ) and their measurement invariance across ratings provided by 314 Australian adults and 509 adults in the United States. The adult version of the PARQ is a 60-item self-report instrument designed to measure adults’ perceptions of maternal and paternal acceptance-rejection during childhood. The questionnaire contains four scales measuring warmth/ affection, hostility/aggression, indifference/neglect, and undifferentiated rejection. Results of analyses support the proposed four-factor model. All but six items in the father version and all items in the mother version show invariance across the two national groups. Overall, the results indicate support for the factorial model of the PARQ, as well as measurement equivalence across the national groups tested