Title:Looking behind the scenes.-A qualitative perspective on barriers to evidence-based practice in patient counseling and advocacy in Germany.

This article explores how human rights education in the health professions can build knowledge, change culture, and empower advocacy. Through a study of educational initiatives in the field, the article analyzes different methods by which health professionals come to see the relevance of human rights norms for their work, to habituate these norms in everyday practice, and to espouse these norms...

Current research into patient advocacy focuses on attempts of patient groups to mobilise resources and to influence researchers, pharmaceutical companies and policy-makers. This paper adopts a 'framing political opportunities' approach to draw attention to other kinds of advocacy strategies. In a case study of breast cancer patient advocacy of Herceptin reimbursement, it is shown how patient gr...

Objective: We explored the influence of patients’ proactivity in communication, their age, and co-morbidities on physician recommendations of breast and colorectal cancer screening. We focused on mammogram and colonoscopy/sigmoidoscopy, as the recommended screening tests for these prevalent late life cancers. Methods: Data are based on interviews with 414 independent community dwelling elderly ...

I often paint pictures of patients facing away from the viewer with their johnny gowns open in the back. Nurses who watch me paint at conferences chuckle at this well-known reality of patient life; physicians often ask why I painted it that way. “Isn’t that disempowering? Why do you paint patients like that?” They ask me this with a furrowed brow and quizzical frown. I glance up from my current...