Month: April 2024

Abstract

The archival memory of the Caribbean is built on the documentary legacies of colonialism. From slave registers to plantation deeds, the shelves of Caribbean Archives are filled with the records of colonial conquest, enslavement and suppression. Yet within these former Caribbean colonies—now small independent nations—is the evidence of human triumph over adversity, pride in self-sufficiency and a fierce and persistence dedication to political and social independence. That evidence is manifest through political movements, oral narratives, heroic legends and through alternate, different readings of the colonial records. These alternate readings are among the issues considered in this essay as it addresses the rethinking of a history that foregrounds the marginalized and highlights a dignity that has been suppressed. A case study of a website from the small island-nation of St. Kitts and Nevis demonstrates how the web is proving its agility in responding to complex understandings of history by enabling the uniting of both tangible and intangible community knowledge and heritage as it also eases access to official archival collections.

Abstract

This bibliometric study examined three aspects of geodiversity of research, namely the geographical topic focus of the study, author location, and international collaboration dynamics. The publication dataset comprised 60,000 papers from the Dimensions database that have been associated with hunger research using Digital Science’s machine learning algorithm that enhances expert led search strategies. As the research was related to hunger, papers were mapped on to the Global Hunger Index country categories as convenient classification. Only 41% of hunger-related publications that focus on countries most affected by hunger feature authors affiliated to institutions in those countries. Even fewer of those publications feature locally based authors in first or last position. These numbers gradually reverse as the level of hunger declines. We analyse sample papers in an attempt to understand the reasons for these trends. These included differences in research infrastructure, sub-authorship recognition such as acknowledgements, and limitations of the relationship between country mention and real topical focus. We did not find evidence of widespread differences between senior and overall authorship and consequently urge caution before judging international collaborations as ‘helicopter’ research based only on author country affiliations and authorship position.

Abstract

In this theoretical article, we argue that the imminent collapse of earth systems that sustain life forms calls for mathematics education as a field to reflect on and re-evaluate its priorities and thus practices. We consider both what ecological collapse means for mathematics education and whether mathematics education might offer meaningful gestures in response. We explore how the relationship between the social and the ecological is conceptualised in mathematics education (and other relevant) research and what this implies for mathematics education. We read, in this scholarship, a growing focus on the ecological and conceptualisations of socio-ecological relations between existing entities that are dialectical, or mutually dependent. More rarely, are they seen as entangled and monist, and it is in this thought that we locate our contribution of multi-layered gestures of mathematics education. We describe these, in terms of three broad practices: listening for socio-ecological entanglement; attending to the scales of socio-ecological entanglements; and living entanglement as mathematics educators. We exemplify these gestures through examples of curriculum innovation. This article, a socio-ecological gesture in itself, is written in the spirit of opening a conversation into which we invite others.

Abstract

Background

Homelessness is associated with significant health disparities. Conventional health services often fail to address the unique needs and lived experience of homeless individuals and fail to include participatory design when planning health services. This scoping review aimed to examine areas of patient experience that are most frequently reported by people experiencing homelessness when seeking and receiving healthcare, and to identify existing surveys used to measure patient experience for this cohort.

Methods

A scoping review was undertaken reported according to the PRISMA-ScR 2020 Statement. Databases were searched on 1 December 2022: MEDLINE, EMBASE, APA PsychINFO and CINAHL. Included studies focused on people experiencing homelessness, healthcare services and patient experience, primary research, published in English from 2010. Qualitative papers and findings were extracted and synthesized against a modified framework based on the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines for care for people experiencing homelessness, the Institute of Medicine Framework and Lachman’s multidimensional quality model. People with lived experience of homelessness were employed as part of the research team.

Results

Thirty-two studies were included. Of these, 22 were qualitative, seven quantitative and three mixed methods, from the United States of America (n = 17), United Kingdom (n = 5), Australia (n = 5) and Canada (n = 4). Health services ranged from primary healthcare to outpatient management, acute care, emergency care and hospital based healthcare. In qualitative papers, the domains of ‘accessible and timely’, ‘person-centred’, and values of ‘dignity and respect’ and ‘kindness with compassion’ were most prevalent. Among the three patient experience surveys identified, ‘accessible and timely’ and ‘person-centred’ were the most frequent domains. The least frequently highlighted domains and values were ‘equitable’ and ‘holistic’. No questions addressed the ‘safety’ domain.

Conclusions

The Primary Care Quality-Homeless questionnaire best reflected the priorities for healthcare provision that were highlighted in the qualitative studies of people experiencing homelessness. The most frequently cited domains and values that people experiencing homelessness expressed as important when seeking healthcare were reflected in each of the three survey tools to varying degrees. Findings suggest that the principles of ‘Kindness and compassion’ require further emphasis when seeking feedback on healthcare experiences and the domains of ‘safety’, ‘equitable’, and ‘efficiency’ are not adequately represented in existing patient experience surveys.