Studies have supported the effectiveness of the From Timid to a Tiger and Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions program in reducing childhood anxiety. This study is the first to compare the effectiveness of the two programs in the treatment of childhood anxiety disorder and reducing family accommodations levels. Parents of children aged 6 to 9 were randomly allocated to either FTTT or SPACE groups, and each attended ten online sessions following the manuals of the interventions. Throughout the study, 9 (...) participants dropped out, resulting in a total of 49 participants, and we performed statistical analyses based on data from these 49 participants. The assessment took place pre- and post-treatment and at a ten-week follow-up on parent-rated child anxiety and family accommodation measures. Analyses of variance and gain scores were conducted to examine the data. The results indicated that both treatments approaches produced significant reductions in outcome measures, and the post-treatment gains of both treatments were maintained at a ten-week follow-up, though when considering the mean differences and effect sizes across the assessment scores and between groups, overall, the FTTT was significantly more effective in reducing child anxiety scores and family accommodation levels. Our results demonstrated that FTTT significantly outperformed the SPACE program in reducing childhood anxiety problems and family accommodation levels. (shrink)

Background: Patient safety, which is a patient’s right, can be threatened by nursing errors. Furthermore, nurses’ feeling of “being a wrongdoer” in response to nursing errors can influence the quality of care they deliver. Research objectives: To explore the meaning of Iranian nurses’ experience of “being a wrongdoer.” Research design: A phenomenological approach was used to explore nurses’ lived experiences. Nurses were recruited purposively to take part in semistructured interviews, and the data collected from these interviews were analyzed using Van (...) Manen’s thematic analysis. Participants and research context: Eight nurses working in three private or governmental hospitals in Tehran, Iran. Ethical consideration: The research design was approved in each participating hospital, and all interviews were carried out at a predetermined time in a private place. Findings: Five themes were extracted from the data: “wandering in unpleasant feelings” (with two subthemes: “unpleasant physical feelings” and “unpleasant emotions”), “wandering in the conscience court” (with three subthemes: “being the accused,” “being the victim,” and “being the judge”), “being arrested in time,” “time for change” (with three subthemes: “promoting accountability,” “promoting learning,” and “strengthening supportive relationships”), and “spiritual exercise.” Discussion: Some of our results are supported by the model of self-reconciliation and the recovery trajectory of “second victims” theory. Conclusion: The meaning of “being a wrongdoer” has positive and negative aspects. Feelings of wandering provide nurses the opportunity to reflect on and re-embrace the professional and moral responsibility of nursing. Nursing managers can convert their “defeats” into a prelude to learning, increase their accountability, and improve the quality of nursing care. (shrink)

Introduction Errors are inevitable in medical practice and this issue has attracted the attention of healthcare systems worldwide. Therefore, it is of utmost importance to pay attention in educational systems. The present study aimed to investigate the frequency and cause of nursing students’ errors. Methods This descriptive study conducted based on a cross-sectional design. The researcher provided nursing students with a questionnaire. The participants were selected through a purposive sampling method. Eventually, the collected data were analyzed by SPSS17. Results The (...) mean value of errors in students was 32.83 ± 28.5 and the prevalence rate of the errors ranged from 0 to 175. In total, 2922 errors were reported by the students, the most frequent of which were wearing the same pair of gloves for the care of more than one patient, negligence to wash the hands and clean the thermometer before utilization. Moreover, errors in oxygen therapy and medication obtained the lowest frequency. Furthermore, most of the students’ errors were due to not having enough knowledge about medicines, lack of appropriate equipment, and poor clinical skills. Discussion and conclusion: The most frequent nursing students’ errors are related to hand hygiene and personal protection. In addition, the lack of enough skills and appropriate equipment are prevalent causes of nursing students’ errors. Authorities in this field should attend to these errors in nursing education, clinical practice, and nursing studies in order to promote this profession in all of these three dimensions. (shrink)

In order to build high-quality concrete, it is imperative to know the raw materials in advance. It is possible to accurately predict the quality of concrete and the amount of raw materials used using machine learning-enhanced methods. An automated process based on machine learning strategies is proposed in this paper for predicting the compressive strength of concrete. Fusion-learning-based optimization is used in the proposed approach to generate a strong learner by pooling support vector regression models. The SVR technique proposes an (...) optimization method for finding the kernel radial basis function parameters based on improving the innovative gunner algorithm. As a result of AIG's diverse solutions, local optima are effectively avoided. Therefore, the novelty of our research is that, in solving the uncertainty of predicted outputs based on integrated models, we use fusion-learning-based optimization to improve regression discrimination. We also collected a standard dataset to analyze the proposed algorithm, and subsequently, the dataset was designed from concrete laboratory tests on 244 samples, seven features, and three outputs. Different regression intensities are determined by correlation analysis of responses. Regression fusion is sufficiently accurate to estimate the number of desired outcomes examined based on the appropriate input data sample. The best quality concrete can be achieved with an error rate of less than 5%. (shrink)

Bilinguals have been shown to perform worse than monolinguals in a variety of verbal tasks. This study investigated this bilingual verbal cost in a large-scale picture-naming study conducted in Spanish. We explored how individual characteristics of the participants and the linguistic properties of the words being spoken influence this performance cost. In particular, we focused on the contributions of lexical frequency and phonological similarity across translations. The naming performance of Spanish-Catalan bilinguals speaking in their dominant and non-dominant language was compared (...) to that of Spanish monolinguals. Single trial naming latencies were analyzed by means of linear mixed models accounting for individual effects at the participant and item level. While decreasing lexical frequency was shown to increase naming latencies in all groups, this variable by itself did not account for the bilingual cost. In turn, our results showed that the bilingual cost disappeared when naming words with high phonological similarity across translations. In short, our results show that frequency of use can play a role in the emergence of the bilingual cost, but that phonological similarity across translations should be regarded as one of the most important variables that determine the bilingual cost in speech production. Low phonological similarity across translations yields worse performance in bilinguals and promotes the bilingual cost in naming performance. The implications of our results for the effect of phonological similarity across translations within the bilingual speech production system are discussed. (shrink)

IntroductionWhen professional nurses face an obstacle in their perfect purposes, they would experience moral distress which is a suffering situation. This study aims at exploring conditions which lead to high levels of moral distress for nursing personnel within a teaching hospital in Iran.MethodsAll nursing staffs worked in ICU, CCU, open heart surgery and emergency ward of a teaching hospital in Mashhad, Iran, were evaluated in a descriptive study by translated and modified moral distress questionnaire of Corley.ResultsAccording to the participants, the (...) mean age and work experience were 34.15 ± 4.17 and 10.77 ± 4.06, respectively. Almost 91.5% of nurses had a bachelor degree, and 51.1% of them were female. The most amount of moral distress was identified in contribution to physicians who have not enough skills, disregarding patients' right, and the inability for providing drugs.DiscussionPost-CCU and assistant nurses, especially female individuals had higher scores of moral distress compare with others... (shrink)

Introduction: Dignified care is one of the moral responsibilities of professional caregivers. However, in many cases the dignity of hospitalized patients, especially women in the delivery room, is not maintained. Dignity is an abstract concept and there has been no previous research exploring the dignity of pregnant women in the delivery room in Iran. Objectives: The objective of this study is to define and explain the concept of dignity for pregnant women in the delivery room from the perspectives of professional (...) caregivers. Research design: This is qualitative research. The data were collected through in-depth semi-structured individual interviews. The conventional content analysis method was used to analyze the data. In qualitative content analysis, participant narrative is examined in-depth and sorted into categories and themes. Participants and research context: Potential participants who met the entrance criteria for this study were approached between July 2016 and February 2017. In all, 20 professional caregivers working in the delivery room setting within Iranian general hospitals were invited to participate in the study. The sampling was done through targeted sampling until saturation was achieved. Ethical considerations: The research ethics committee of the Shiraz University of Medical Sciences has approved the study’s protocol and all commonly recognized ethical principles were followed throughout the study. Findings: The findings of this study were presented in three main themes, including “privacy,” “respecting patients’ preferences,” and “comprehensive attention” and eight categories. Discussions and conclusion: Women in the delivery room need to be taken care of in an environment where healthcare staff promote the preservation of dignity through maintaining privacy, by providing attentive care and through ensuring that patient preferences regarding care and treatment are respected. In such an environment, the dignity of these women would be maintained and desirable outcomes achieved. (shrink)

Background:Privacy is a complicated and obscure concept, which has special meanings in the healthcare environment; therefore, it is essential for healthcare providers to fully understand this conce...

This qualitative research study with a content analysis approach aimed to explore families’ experiences of an organ donation request after brain death. Data were collected through 38 unstructured and in-depth interviews with 14 consenting families and 12 who declined to donate organs. A purposeful sampling process began in October 2009 and ended in October 2010. Data analysis reached 10 categories and two major themes were listed as: 1) serenity in eternal freedom; and 2) resentful grief. The central themes were peace (...) and honor versus doubt and regret. The findings indicated that the families faced with an organ donation request of a brain-dead loved one experienced a lasting effect long after the patient's demise regardless of their decision to donate or refusal to donate. In conclusion, this study highlights the importance of family support and follow-up in an efficient healthcare system aimed at developing trust with the families and providing comfort during and after the final decision. (shrink)

Introduction Ethical climate in medical contexts is referred to the organizational environment consisting of medical staff interpersonal relationships regarding patient care. This element affects staff behavior in an organization. The investigation and comparison of the effects of the interventions promoting ethical climate are among important nursing challenges that should be considered by researchers. The present study was conducted to compare the effect of nurses’ ethical decision-making skills and interpersonal communication training on their ethical climate. Materials and methods This experimental study (...) was performed on 90 nurses working in the general teaching hospitals of Mashhad, Iran. The sampling process was conducted in two stages. Nurses were divided into three groups: intervention 1 (ethical decision-making skills group), intervention 2 (interpersonal communication skills group) and control group. The intervention was separate 12-h workshops for each of the intervention groups. The ethical climate questionnaire by Victor and Cullen was used to assess the score of ethical climate in the three groups both at the beginning and 4 weeks after the workshop. The data were analyzed in Statistical Package for Social Sciences software (version 16) using descriptive statistics, analysis of variance, Kruskal–Wallis, paired sample t-test, Wilcoxon test, and post hoc Tukey’s test. Ethical considerations were as follows: The study design was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Mashhad University of Medical Sciences. Informed consent was obtained from all subjects, and they were ensured about the confidentiality terms. Results The mean scores of the ethical climate test at the first stage were obtained as 66.0 ± 5.5, 67.8 ± 6.9, and 67.7 ± 7.2 in the ethical decision-making, interpersonal communication, and control groups, respectively. Accordingly, the three groups were not significantly different in terms of this variable (df = 87, f = 0.70, P = 0.005). However, after the intervention (i.e. second stage), a significant difference was observed among the three groups regarding the mean scores of the ethical climate test In this regard, the calculated mean scores in the ethical decision-making, interpersonal communication, and control groups were 99.3 ± 6.3, 90.4 ± 7.7, and 67.4 ± 7.9, respectively (df = 87, f = 152.00, P < 0.001). Conclusion Training workshops about ethical decision-making skills and interpersonal communication on the ethical professional climate of nurses was effective. Nonetheless, the effect of ethical decision-making skill training was found to be higher than interpersonal communication skill training. Therefore, it is recommended that nursing managers hold training workshops to improve the ethical climate for nurses. (shrink)

Publication date: 30 November 2016 Source: Author: Akram Sadat Hosseini, Esmaeil Zohdi Racism is a worldwide matter that is based on the physical characteristics of people's division into different categories on which some people become superior and some inferior. Racism and ethnicity are usually considered as the same concepts while in fact ethnicity is a sub-class of racism. In every nation, there are some ethnic groups with the same origin and similar customs that may or may not be judged (...) equally by the power-handler ethnic groups. An example of such country is Afghanistan which is severely an ethnic country. This study explores the social, cultural, and scientific investigations done on the people's races and ethnical characteristics by using Afghan types as examples. Racism is not the result of scientific observation, but it is due to the human differences that happened between 16th and 19th century when people began differentiating among themselves. This aspect of racism is well expressed by the American sociologist "Feagin". In his view, the natural superiority of some people over others is rejected. The novel The Kite Runner depicts the two major Afghan ethnical populations, Pashtun and Hazara, and their social, cultural, and religious conflicts. Accordingly, this article will try to examine the root of ethnic prejudices and oppression among the Afghan people in the novel and the reasons for their ethnic conducts are explained and analyzed based on the Feagin’s denial of human difference. Moreover, by providing some evidence it is proved that the biological difference is just some excuses for the powerful section to gain their egotistic goals. (shrink)

Background Equitable care is a fundamental value in the nursing profession. Healthcare workers have both a moral and professional duty to ensure that they do not discriminate. Aim This study aimed to explore how patients perceive equitable nursing care. Research design, participants, and research context This descriptive phenomenological qualitative research study used purposeful sampling to select 17 patients from various departments of a general hospital in southern Iran. The participants were then interviewed using a semi-structured in-depth interview format, which aimed (...) to delve into their experiences with equitable nursing care. The collected data were analyzed using Colaizzi's seven-step method and MAXQDA20 software. Ethical considerations Oral and written information about the study was provided before the participants gave their written consent. The transcribed interviews were de-identified. The study was approved by the Ethics Committee of Jiroft University of Medical Sciences. Findings The data analysis of the study identified three main themes and six subthemes that were related to the experiences of patients with equitable nursing care. The first theme, equitable care, encompassed subthemes such as nurses’ dedicated efforts to facilitate patient recovery and adherence to ethical behavior. The second theme, unconscious causes of inequitable nursing care, included subthemes such as unintentional discrimination stemming from organizational constraints and unconscious biases resulting from a lack of knowledge and skills. The third theme, discriminatory care, comprised subthemes such as deliberate discrimination based on personal traits and selective discrimination. Conclusion The study findings indicate that achieving equitable nursing care requires a multifaceted approach. This includes effective hospital management, organizational reforms, and regulatory enhancements. Additionally, it is crucial to pay close attention to the needs of patients, enhance nurses’ theoretical and practical skills in providing equitable care, fostering a culture of equality within healthcare settings, and consider the personality dimensions and moral characteristics of nurses. (shrink)

The present article analyzes and compares the idea of divine revelation to justify religious beliefs from the viewpoints of Paul Moser and Mulla Sadra. Moser suggests a kind of moral transformation experience that includes direct cognition and internal experience of self-revelation and God’s unselfish love while he considers mere theoretical reason to be inefficient and emphasizes God’s authority and His attributes and goals as well as the axis of divine revelation. Knowledge-by-presence and direct experience of God in Mulla Sadra’s philosophy (...) which is the only way to access true recognition of God is close to divine revelation. The present article shows that, considering the relationship between love and salvation, and knowledge-by-presence and the practical intellect, in Sadrian belief in God, Moser’s approach is close to Mulla Sadra’s even though the method of argumentation of these two philosophers in representing this type of cognition is not completely the same. Considering the commonalities and differences between Moser and Mulla Sadra in justifying belief in God, it seems possible to revise Moser’s approach with a Sadrian reading with a combination of innate nature arguments and self-knowledge. (shrink)

There are several models for delivering bad news, the most important and widely used being the SPIKES protocol. Cultural differences in breaking bad news in different societies with different cultures call for special attention. Muslim societies are examples of communities with special cultural and religious requirements. Then, when collecting information about a person's perception of the illness or the incident, consider his or her view of spirituality and the effect of calamities on human transcendence so as to assess the type (...) and amount of information the patient or the family needs. When preparing a suitable setting for delivering bad news, pay attention to the spiritual needs of Muslims such as the possibility of prostration, recitation of Qur'an, and talking to God in private or even aloud. Be aware of, pay attention to, and respect particular religious views of the patient, and if necessary, correctly exploit such views to deliver bad news. Although some Muslim patients may have no demands for transcendence and human growth at the first stage, but over time and after accepting the condition, they will have demands. Therefore, health care providers must provide the necessary facilities for Muslim patients in terms of the required information, setting, and people present in the setting and provide information appropriate to the culture of these patients so as to give an excellent and comprehensive care. (shrink)

Vaccines are responsible for many global public health successes, such as the eradication of smallpox and significant reductions in other serious infections like diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, polio and measles. However, mass vaccination has also been the subject of various ethical controversies for decades. Several factors need to be considered before any vaccine is deployed at national programme like the potential burden of disease in the country or region, the duration of the protection conferred, herd immunity in addition to individual protection, (...) vaccine-related risks, financing and the logistical feasibility of the large-scale vaccination. Moreover, several ethical dilemmas revolve around authority and mandates for vaccination, informed consent, benefits vs. risks, and disparities in access to vaccination. This review paper aims to elaborate the ethical issues involved in mass vaccination programme and present some additional challenges in the context of a resource-poor settings of public health in Bangladesh. (shrink)

Infertility is a prevalent worldwide health issue and is defined by the World Health Organization as a global health problem. Considering the importance of the psychological dimensions of infertility, various measurement tools have been used to measure the variables involved in infertility, of which the most widely used are the following: the Symptom Checklist 90, the Brief Symptom Inventory, the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory Form, and the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale. Therefore, given the problems of infertile people in terms of psychological (...) dimensions, the aim of this meta-analysis was to assess the psychological assessment score in infertility. Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses protocol, we applied an online database with no time restriction. Data were gathered using a random-effect model to estimate the standard mean difference for the evaluation of the strength of association analyses. Our data demonstrated a significant higher SCL90 score, and a non-significant higher DASS score. It is essential to seek for strategies to help infertile patients overcome their infertility-related psychological problems. (shrink)

Background: Forgiveness has the potential to resolve painful feelings arising from nurse–patient conflicts. It would be useful to evaluate direct and indirect important factors which are related to forgiveness in order to design interventions that try to facilitate forgiveness. Aim/objective: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the intermediating role of empathy in the cultural competence–forgiveness association among nurses using structural equation modeling. Research design: The research applied a cross-sectional correlational design. Participants and research context: The study included 380 (...) nurses eight hospitals in southern Iran. Ethical considerations: The Ethics and Research Committee of Birjand University of Medical Sciences approved the study protocol. The voluntary nature of participation was explained consent was obtained from participants, and anonymity was guaranteed. Findings: Most of the participants were married and female and fell in the 20- to 30-year-old category. Most of them (89.5%) had a working experience of 1–10 years. The proposed model showed that nurses’ empathy intermediated the association between nurses’ cultural competence and forgiveness which has fitted the data acceptably (root mean square error approximation = 0.070; comparative fit index = 0.993; goodness-of-fit index = 0.983; and χ2/df = 2.85). Conclusion: Empathy skills and cultural competence training were essential for interventions aimed at increasing the tendency to forgive patients. In such interventions, planners should aim at increasing nurses’ cultural competence in order to enhance their empathy toward patients, which can, in turn, lead to a greater wish to forgive patients. (shrink)

Biotechnology is the use of living systems and organisms to develop or make products, or any technological application that uses biological systems, living organisms or derivatives to make or modify products or processes for specific use. Biotechnology is a constantly evolving field of modern science. New tools and products developed by biotechnologists are useful in research, agriculture, industry and healthcare. Although it has many benefits including lowering our environmental footprint, and helping in diagnosis and treatment of diseases, it comes with (...) its all-possible disadvantages. The four main societal concerns revolve around are ethical, safety, bioterrorism and environmental issues. This paper aims to describe those societal concerns raised by applications of biotechnology and possible regulations related to biotech innovations and policy implementation. (shrink)

Background When nurses face ethical challenges, they attempt to accept responsibility for their actions and start moral reckoning. Moral reckoning is the personal evaluation of one’s behaviors or others’ behaviors during ethically challenging situations. Research Aim This study aimed at exploring the concept of moral reckoning and its stages among Iranian nurses using Nathaniel’s moral reckoning Theory. Research Design This descriptive qualitative study was conducted in 2022 using directed content analysis. Participants and Research context Eighteen nurses were purposively recruited from (...) three teaching hospitals affiliated to Golestan University of Medical Sciences, Gorgan, Iran. Data were collected via in-depth semi-structured interviews which lasted 50 minutes on average and were concurrently analyzed via the three-step directed content analysis method proposed by Elo and Kyngas. Ethical considerations This study earned the ethical approval of the Ethics Committee of Golestan University of Medical Sciences, Gorgan, Iran (code: IR.GOUMS.REC.1400.171). Findings During data analysis, 157 final codes were developed and categorized into 23 subcategories, 10 categories, and four themes. The themes of the study are ease (with the two categories of becoming and interacting), upset (with the two categories of mental upset and behavioral upset), resolution (with the two categories of making a stand and giving up), and reflection (with the four categories of remembering, telling the story, examining conflicts, and living with consequences). Conclusion Ethically challenging situations alter the ease stage of moral reckoning among nurses, cause them mental and behavioral upset, and thereby, require them to make stand or give up. Then, they continuously examine events in their mind and finally, live with the positive and negative consequences of the events. (shrink)

Background The principle of human dignity is woven into the ethical principles of the midwifery profession, noted as both an obligation and a human right. Research Objectives The aim of this study is to explore the experiences of midwifery students regarding threats to women's dignity during childbirth. Research Design This is a qualitative study with explorative design. Participants and Research Context: The research was carried out in 2022 at Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, involving 32 midwifery students in individual interviews (...) that lasted between 30 and 90 minutes. These participants aged 21 to 28 years, with an average age of 23.5 years, provided their perspectives on the matter. Results Four key themes described the threats to women’s dignity during childbirth: 1) professional incompetence, 2) abuse of power imbalance, 3) caring only for physical and not mental health, and 4) structural issues within the healthcare system. Professional incompetence was characterized by outdated practices and lack of adherence to evidence-based medicine. Abuse of power imbalance was demonstrated in instances where the authoritative position of healthcare providers was misused, thereby disrupting the respectful care that women are entitled to receive. The disproportionate emphasis on physical health over mental health was evidenced by the disregard for mothers' psychological well-being during childbirth. Lastly, systemic structural issues emerged as significant impediments, revealing the need for system-wide changes. Ethical considerations: This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Research Deputy at Kermanshah University. Participation was voluntary and the confidentiality were maintained. Conclusion The findings underscore the role that unprofessional behavior, ethical lapses in medical practices, and systemic challenges play in undermining maternal dignity during childbirth. These threats necessitate urgent attention and must be adequately addressed in policy development and program implementation to safeguard the dignity of mothers during childbirth. (shrink)

Research objectives Moral distress is a common phenomenon among nurses and can negatively affect their mental health and quality of the care. This study aimed to determine the effect of professional ethics workshop with virtual follow-up on the moral distress of nurses. Methods This experimental study was performed on 50 nurses in Ghaem Hospital, Mashhad, Iran. The intervention group received 8-hour professional ethics workshop and 4 weeks follow-up through social network. The moral distress was evaluated through the Moral Distress Scale-Revised (...) at the beginning of the study, two weeks after the workshop and at the end of follow-up. Data were analyzed using SPSS21 by descriptive and statistical analysis.This study approved by Mashhad university Medical Ethics Committee and publishing ethics were also observed. Results The changes in the mean value of the frequency of moral distress in the intervention group was not significant, while these changes were significant in the control group ( p < 0.001, df = 2, f = 26.41) and had an upward trend. About intensity changes in the intervention group were significant ( p < 0.01, df = 2, f = 8.52) and had a downward trend, while it was not significant in the control group. Changes in the mean value of level of moral distress in the intervention group were not significant, while these changes were significant in the control group ( p < 0.01, df = 1, f = 16.8). The mean value of moral distress level decreased in the intervention and increased in control group. Conclusion The level of moral distress was increased in the control group due to increase in its frequency. This could be due to awareness of nurses regarding the concept of moral distress which caused them to pay more attention to this issue. Professional ethics workshop did not have effect on the frequency of moral distress, while it reduced the intensity and level of moral distress. Moreover, follow-up through social network reduced the frequency, intensity and the level of moral distress among nurses. (shrink)

BackgroundOrganizational commitment is one of the most important elements in improving the quality of services provided by individuals and is more important in the nursing profession. Moral intelli...

This study examines the expanding field of medical tourism with an emphasis on strategies for marketing and entrepreneurship. The literature on the entrepreneurial components of medical tourism and the contribution of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhancing healthcare services and attracting medical tourists from across the world will be examined. Through the Web of Science database, a thorough literature analysis was carried out using keywords associated with marketing, entrepreneurship, medical tourism, and AI. In order to provide more comprehensive conclusions about the (...) sector, the research combines the results of many regional studies. The study identifies key elements that impact medical tourism, such as strategies for marketing, cultural aspects, and infrastructure. In order to improve healthcare services and bring in foreign patients, it points out successful case studies from nations like Malaysia, China, and Iran, highlighting the need for encouraging entrepreneurial ecosystems and productive government cooperation. The research comes to the conclusion that increasing healthcare access and quality requires the medical tourism business. In order to maximize patient experiences and eventually promote development in the medical tourism industry, it emphasizes the significance of customized marketing techniques and the use of AI technology. (shrink)

Background: Nursing errors endanger patient safety, and error reporting helps identify errors and system vulnerabilities. Nursing managers play a key role in preventing nursing errors by using leadership skills. One of the leadership approaches is ethical leadership. Aim: This study determined the level of ethical leadership from the nurses’ perspective and its effect on nursing error and error reporting in teaching hospitals affiliated to Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences, Yazd, Iran. Research design: This was a cross-sectional descriptive study. Participants (...) and research context: A total of 171 nurses working in medical-surgical wards were selected through random sampling. Data collection was carried out using “ethical leadership in nursing, nursing errors and error reporting” questionnaires. Data were analyzed with SPSS20 using descriptive and analytical statistics. Ethical considerations: This study was approved by the Ethics Committee for Medical Research. Ethical considerations such as completing informed consent form, ensuring confidentiality of information, explaining research objectives, and voluntary participation were observed in the present study. Findings: The results showed that the level of nursing managers’ ethical leadership was moderate from the nurses’ point of view. The highest and the lowest levels were related to the power-sharing and task-oriented dimensions, respectively. There was a significant relationship between nursing managers’ level of ethical leadership with error rates and error reporting. Conclusion: The development of ethical leadership approach in nursing managers reduces error rate and increases error reporting. Programs designed to promote such approach in nursing managers at all levels can help reduce the level of error rate and maintain patient safety. (shrink)

Background and aim Ethical sensitivity of nurses often plays an important role in their occupational commitment and moral decision-making. In some working conditions, nurses are affected by ethical distress and fail to pursue correct ethical actions despite having knowledge and a tendency for moral practice. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the correlation between sensitivity and ethical distress in the nurses of patients with spinal cord injuries. Materials and methods This descriptive-analytical study was performed on 160 of the nurses (...) of patients with spinal cord injuries. The participants were selected through the purposive sampling method out of the nurses in Khatamolanbia and Sasan hospitals, Tehran, Iran. Data collection tools included the Moral Sensitivity Questionnaire by Han and Corley’s Moral Distress Scale. Data were analyzed by the independent t-test and Pearson correlation coefficient using the SPSS software version 19. Results The mean values of ethical sensitivity was 80.48 ± 14.45 and ethical distress among the subjects was 62.39 ± 3.54. Moreover, a significant negative correlation was observed between moral sensitivityand moral distress (P<0.05, r = −0.37). Conclusion According to the results of this study, increased ethical sensitivity is associated with diminished moral distress among the nurses of patients with spinal cord injuries. On the other hand, moral sensitivity is of considerable importance in nurses, especially in taking care of patients with special conditions. Consequently, it is recommended to provide some conditions for maintaining and enhancing ethical sensitivity in nurses taking care of patients with spinal cord injuries. (shrink)

In MacIntyre’s view, the agent in order to have a consistent identity should be able to narrate a story about her life, which relates the different episodes of her life together. This story should explain the transition between these episodes. This story is based on the notion of the good of human beings. A notion of the good should be present in the agent’s life to give a direction to her life. This integrity forms an identity for the agent. We (...) intend to challenge this narrative view of identity in this paper. We will argue in this paper that though identity is formed in the eye of others, it does not need to be constituted in a unified narrative form, i.e., the agent does not need to place all episodes of her life in narrative order and have a consistent and unified account of her life, which includes her life from birth to death. Rather, shorter-term episodes of time suffice for identity formation. We will appeal to some findings of empirical psychology and neuroscience to support our claim. (shrink)

In his writings and theories, Kant refers to three imaginations, each of which has a clear definition and a recognized purpose, and which can be considered in their ability for general synthesis. three types of imagination are productive, reproductive, and creative.Based on the method of transcendental analysis, it is shown that there are necessary conditions in the relationship between imagination and ethics. In the first transcendental analysis, it was found that the necessary condition for the moral action of goodwill and (...) the necessary condition for the realization of goodwill is creative imagination. In the second analysis, it was concluded that the necessary condition for the realization of the absolute is the power of imaginative imagination, and in another statement, it was concluded that the necessary condition for the Categorical imperative is the imagination. In the third analysis, it was found that the Categorical imperative is the possibility of the absolute possibility of using the imagination by a thought experiment.Based on the Deductive method, three Deductives were obtained. In the first philosophical Deductive conclusion, it was concluded that for moral education, one must cultivate the imagination. In the second Deductive conclusion was reached that for empathy or any kind of moral education in the sense of the Categorical imperative, one must cultivate imagination. In the third Deductive conclusion, it was concluded that the method of thought experimentation should be used to cultivate the imagination for moral education (moral imagination). (shrink)

Introduction Respecting the Patients’ Rights Charter leads to the demands of patients for their rights and the response of rehabilitation therapists by increasing their compliance. The present study aimed to compare the views of patients and rehabilitation therapists about the importance and extent of compliance with the Patients’ Rights Charter. Methods This cross-sectional study was conducted for 3 months on 114 patients and 55 therapists who were selected using the convenience sampling method. The data collection tools included a demographic information (...) form and the Justification and Practice of Patient Rights Questionnaire. The collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, independent t-test, paired t-test, and Pearson correlation coefficient. Results Mean scores of the importance of compliance with the Patients’ Rights Charter were 2.21 ± 0.40 and 2.31 ± 0.43 in the group of patients and therapists, respectively. Moreover, the mean scores of compliance with the Patients’ Rights Charter were 1.45 ± 0.48 and 1.53 ± 0.61 from the perspective of patients and therapists, respectively. There was no statistically significant difference between the views of patients and therapists on the importance and extent of compliance with the Patients’ Rights Charter. Discussion and Conclusion The importance of respecting the Patients’ Rights Charter from the perspective of patients and therapists was at a desirable level while the level of compliance with it from the perspective of both groups was moderate. It seems that more research is needed to explain the causes of this discrepancy and increase compliance with the Patients’ Rights Charter in rehabilitation clinics. (shrink)

Social innovation has a great chance to overcome problems in complex environments. Individuals’ concern for environmental, social, and ethical issues has gradually grown, prompting the rise of new types of consumers, who shift their environmental concerns into action. Social entrepreneurship participants mostly act as beneficiaries and initiators in the process of social innovation. Social exchange theory explains the linkage between individual psychological factors and personal social cognitive perceptions that inspire social innovation intention. The current research framework is constructed to inspect (...) the individual mental process of psychological motivation associated with social innovation intention. The purpose is to understand the relationships between the psychological level of moral idealism, ecological concern, and prior experience on cognitive perceptions of social worth; subsequently, social worth, prosocial motivation, perspective-taking, and positive feelings are examined to discover their influence on social innovation behavioral intention. The transmitting role of social worth exercises a transformative function between participants’ psychological motivation, social cognition, and social innovation intention. The research is conducted using partial least squares analysis software. The research results reinforce our understanding of theories of individual psychological motivations on social innovation. The findings also offer some suggestions for sustainability education to social enterprise practitioners with respect to recruiting young people and continuing to generate new ideas. (shrink)

This article is an up-dated version of Gordon Brown's ontological approach to education. It tests the hypothesis that Roy Bhaskar's critical realism can successfully underpin education by applying...

BackgroundAfter the declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic, governments established national lockdowns and social distancing as an effective plan to control this disease. As a result of the lockdown policies, diabetic patients` access to food products, medication, and routine follow-ups is disrupted, making it difficult for them to control their disease.MethodsInternational databases, including PubMed/Medline, Web of Science, and Scopus, were searched until April 2022. All observational studies included assessing the impact of lockdown and social distancing on eating habits, and glycemic and (...) anthropometric indices of diabetic patients during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Newcastle-Ottawa Quality Scale was used to assess the quality rating of the studies.ResultsOverall, 22 studies were included in this systematic review, the results of which varied in different communities. In most studies, consumption of grains, fruits, and vegetables was reported to increase. On the other hand, consumption of snacks and sweets was reported to increase in other surveys. During the COVID-19 lockdown, most diabetic patients preferred to cook meals at home, using less takeout, fast foods, and alcoholic drinks. Although the patients mostly improved their eating habits, the glycemic and anthropometric indices were contradictory in different studies. Studies showed that the eating habits of diabetic patients vary from country to country, even in some cases and studies done in the same country showed different results. For example, all the studies done in Japan showed an increase in the consumption of snacks and sweets, leading to weight gain in the patients. However, conflicting results in eating habits have been observed in studies conducted in India.ConclusionThe lockdown policies have led to a beneficial change in the eating habits of diabetic patients to consume more fruits and vegetables and reduce the consumption of animal protein products and alcoholic beverages. While some diabetic patients have increased consumption of snacks and sweets, leading to a disturbance in their glycemic and anthropometric indices control. Understanding the consequences of lockdown and social distancing of the diabetic patient during the COVID-19 pandemic can help public health authorities make better recommendations to improve glycemic control. (shrink)

This article describes the UniversAAL platform, an open platform intended to facilitate the development, distribution, and deployment of technological solutions for Ambient assisted living. The platform is intended to benefit end users, authorities with responsibility for AAL, and organizations involved in the development and deployment of AAL services. It consists of an extensive set of resources aimed at these different groups. The resources are classified into three main groups: runtime support, development support, and community support. The article presents the benefits (...) that can be expected from the widespread adoption of the platform. The article also describes progress on prototype implementations of some of the software resources, and the results of initial evaluations of the platform. The work is partially based on results from earlier European Union-funded research projects in the area. (shrink)

Moral judgment is a complex cognitive process that partly depends upon social and individual cultural values. There have been various efforts to categorize different aspects of moral judgment, but most studies depend upon rare dilemmas. We recruited 25 subjects from Tehran, Iran, to rate 150 everyday moral scenarios developed by Knutson et al. Using exploratory factor analysis (EFA), we observed that the same moral dimensions (except socialness dimension) were driven by the same moral cognitive factors (norm violation, intention, and social (...) affect) in Iranian vs. American studies. However, there were minor differences in the factor loadings between the two cultures. Furthermore, based on the EFA results, we developed a short form of the questionnaire by removing eleven of the fifteen scenarios from each of the ten categories. These results could be used in further studies to better understand the similarities and differences in moral judgment in everyday interactions across different cultures. (shrink)

In MacIntyre’s view, the agent in order to have a consistent identity should be able to narrate a story about her life, which relates the different episodes of her life together. This story should explain the transition between these episodes. This story is based on the notion of the good of human beings. A notion of the good should be present in the agent’s life to give a direction to her life. This integrity forms an identity for the agent. We (...) intend to challenge this narrative view of identity in this paper. We will argue in this paper that though identity is formed in the eye of others, it does not need to be constituted in a unified narrative form, i.e., the agent does not need to place all episodes of her life in narrative order and have a consistent and unified account of her life, which includes her life from birth to death. Rather, shorter-term episodes of time suffice for identity formation. We will appeal to some findings of empirical psychology and neuroscience to support our claim. (shrink)

This article addresses the Egyptian women's movement of the 1950s–1970s through a recent film entitled Four Women of Egypt, which focuses on the lives of four prominent Egyptian women active in the movement during that period. Using the concept of political memory, the article traces some of the major debates within the women's movement throughout this era. By focusing on the ways in which these women conceptualize the geopolitical, I show that the twin concepts of imperialism and capitalism were central (...) to the ways in which they understood gender. The result was a complex understanding of how gender intersected with Egypt's position within a broader global system of imperial capitalism. Following the transition in the 1970s to an open-market economy, the women's movement shifted away from critiques of imperialism and capitalism. This shift can be understood Primarily in terms of geopolitics, specifically the rise of neoliberalism in Egypt. New neoliberal policies had dramatic effects on the women's movement, showing why both the rise and fall of the movement must be contextualized geopolitically and transnationally. (shrink)

Las llamadas manāqib (sg. manqaba) son un género literario bastante extendido en los últimos siglos. Algunas de estas manāqib han sido publicadas en ediciones críticas, y su circulación entre los estudiosos suele referirse a la historia norteafricana o a ciertos aspectos de la religiosidad popular. Sin embargo, este tipo de obras ha recibido una atención muy limitada desde el punto de vista lingüístico, a pesar de que presentan características propias de las variedades habladas del árabe. Por lo tanto, las manāqib (...) constituyen una de las pocas fuentes que pueden utilizarse para analizar el árabe hablado y escrito en el pasado. El objetivo de este artículo es estudiar la lengua de la obra titulada Rawḍat al-azhār wa-munyat al-sādāt al-abrār fī manāqib Sīdī ʿAbd al-Salām al-Asmar, una colección de manāqib relacionadas con el santo sufí libio ʿAbd al-Salām al-Asmar de la ciudad de Zlīten (siglo XV), escrita por Karīm al-Dīn al-Baramūnī al-Miṣrātī. (shrink)

Novel, as a literary genre, is described as the expression of events and emotions by using unconventional methods and techniques; beyond this, novek is also a subject of sociology. For this reason, writers have used the art of the novel as a way of expressing the pain experienced by the individual and its social dimensions. One of these writers is Mourid Barghouti (d. 2021), who was born in Palestine in 1944 and studied English Language and Literature at Cairo University. Banned (...) from entering Palestine in 1967 when he graduated from the university, and exiled from Egypt for criticizing Anwar al-Sādāt's (d. 1981) visit to Israel, Barghouti lived in exile for 17 years in various Arab and European countries away from his wife and child. Barghouti, who returned to Palestine 30 years after his departure, wrote a novel called I Saw Ramallah. This novel was first published in 1997, and he expressed his homesickness and the experiences of the Palestinian people after the occupation. Divided into nine chapters, consisting of 220 pages and translated into many languages, the novel shows the drama of many Palestinians who entered the British mandate after World War I, whose lands were occupied with the establishment of Israel in 1948, and who was forced to leave their homeland. In this sense, the novel I Saw Ramallah reflects both the expatriation of Palestine and the author. In this study, the work named I Saw Ramallah was elaborated in terms of technique in order to determine to what extent the author used the rules of the art of the novel, and thematically which subjects were handled in the novel. It is understood that the name of the novel was chosen to reflect the content by making use of the symbolic value of the place. This novel is seen as an autobiographical novel type, due to the author’s narrator technique used and the author tells his own life. The author's entry into Palestine is used as the objective tense of the novel; the author, with recollections and connotations in objective time, conveyed his experiences by using the flashback method. Events that contain enough sadness have been tried to be conveyed as they happened by mentioning time, place and individuals in order to awake the reader's feelings. Although the events in the novel are listed non-chronologically, when the whole novel is examined, it is seen that the author writes his experiences within the framework of the days he spent in Ramallah and the memories that they remind him of, and in the order in which they come to mind. In almost all of the novel, classical Arabic is preferred. The novel has avoided as much forced expressions and literary expressions that enlarge or reduce events as possible. Although it is impossible to claim that he is completely impartial as a Palestinian, it is seen that the author describes the events with the simplicity of a Palestinian citizen, away from political conflicts as much as possible and in a natural language. It is possible to say that the dominant use of critical style in the novel as the experiences of a writer suffered living abroad throughout his life, shaped his perspective on life and its reflection on the novel. The main topic of the novel is the absence from home. In addition, those killed far away from their homeland, Jewish settlement, the effect of Jewish occupation on the social life, the Oslo Agreement and the role of the phone in the life of the expat are handled as sub-themes. Although the novel named I Saw Ramallah is mostly close to daily or commemorative works and does not fully fit in the definitions of novel art as it emerged in the West, it includes the style of novel art at a certain level. It is seen that the novel has an important place in terms of raising awareness on the Palestinian issue in the Arab and Islamic world. The novel I Saw Ramallah, which was awarded The Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature by the American University in Cairo in 1997, is likely to have received this award because of its thematic aspect rather than its stylistic aspect. Considering this award that the novel won against its peers and the considerations we mentioned during the technical and stylistic analysis we made about the novel, it is seen that the art of the novel in Arabic literature is still in the development stage. (shrink)

The rise of Islamic activism in Egypt during the 1970s relied in large part on the production and mass dissemination of religiously oriented periodicals. Islamic social movement organizations ranging from the established al-Gamʿiyya al-Sharʿiyya to the revived Muslim Brotherhood utilized magazines to inform, orient, and mobilize Egyptians while engaging the state directly during Anwar al-Sadat’s ‘Infitah’. By comparing the framing processes within three of the most prominent Islamist periodicals of this period, this article investigates the process by which movement (...) leaders actively constructed the frames around which activists recruited and mobilized supporters. I argue that Islamist magazines attempted to offer historical continuity with prior movements, authenticity in their teaching of religious thought and practice, and a reframing of a political agenda that was traditionally dominated by state institutions. More significantly, by forging a message that attempted to unify all of these elements, these publications aided in the construction of new communities of believers that charted the course for the next era of Islamic activism in Egypt. (shrink)

The present study is a differential study that describes the nature of the relationship between cooperation and altruistic behavior in a sample of gifted adolescents in three universities in Egypt and Kuwait University. It also identified the differences between males/females, and senior students/junior students in both cooperation and altruism. A total of 237 gifted adolescents—with average age 21.3 ± SD 2.6 years—from three Egyptian universities: Alexandria University, Sadat Academy for Management Sciences, and Suez University, and Kuwait University, were involved (...) in this study. Measures used in the study include the Scales for Rating the Behavioral Characteristics of Superior Students, Generative Altruism Scale, and The Cooperative/Competitive Strategy Scale. Results revealed that there is a significant positive relationship between altruism and cooperation among gifted adolescents. Also, findings show that there are statistically significant differences between males and females in both altruism and cooperation. In addition, there are differences statistically significant between senior students and junior students in both altruism and cooperation in favor of senior students. It is recommended that altruism and cooperation intervention-based programs should be designed to increase the adaptive behaviors of adolescents. (shrink)

Two Members of BBS awarded Erasmus Mundus Master of Bioethics -/- Shamima Parvin Lasker, Professor and Head, Department of Anatomy, City Dental College, Dhaka & General Secretary of BBS and Dr Abu Sadat Mohammad Nurunnabi, Lecturer of Anatomy, Dhaka Medical College, Dhaka & Life member of BBS awarded Master of Bioethics in 2012. Both they are the scholars of Erasmus Mundus Master of Bioethics. Degree was awarded by K.U.Leuven, Belgium, Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen, Netherlands and Università degli Studi di Padova, (...) Italy. -/- Prof Shamima’s research was on “Attitudes Toward Surrogacy Around Muslim World” under supervision of Dr Marcello Ghilardi, University of padova , Italy whereas Dr Nurunnabi worked on Prospects and Problems of Stem Cell Research in Bangladesh: Can Equity and Justice be Maintained in Context of Public Health Demand? under supervision of Professor Evert van leeuwen, Chair of the Section Ethics, IQ healthcare, Philosophy and History of Medicine, Radboud University, Nijmegen Medical Centre, Netherlands. -/- Thanks and congratulations for them and for their outstanding achievements on behalf of all the Members of the Bangladesh Bioethics Society. -/- . (shrink)