OBJECTIVES To explore general practitioners' perceptions of effective health care and its application in their own practice; to examine how these perceptions relate to assumptions about clinicians' values and behaviour implicit in the evidence based medicine approach. DESIGN A qualitative study using semistructured interviews. SETTING Eight general practices in North Thames region that were...

BACKGROUND Health practitioners frequently encounter dying, death and suffering. While providing health care can be stressful, the literature on how different health practitioners cope with the emotional challenges associated with their work is sparse. Further, much of this literature is based on studies conducted in high-income countries. In this study, we explored emotional distress and assoc...

background: communications and information technology revolution has a remarkable effect on economic, social, politic and security of all the world. using of information technology in medicine has many advantages such as improve the quality and effectiveness of care, reduce medical errors, enhance the management of acute and chronic disease, access to updated information, and help to medical de...

This study explores adolescents’ accounts of self-harm with a view to elucidate the implications for health care practitioners seeking to administer care to teenagers in English. Drawing on a corpus of 1.6 million words from messages posted on a UK-hosted adolescent health Web site, analysis began by identifying a range of keywords relating to self-harm. The subsequent contextual examination of...

OBJECTIVE To determine the cost-effectiveness of nurse practitioners delivering primary and specialised ambulatory care. DESIGN A systematic review of randomised controlled trials reported since 1980. DATA SOURCES 10 electronic bibliographic databases, handsearches, contact with authors, bibliographies and websites. INCLUDED STUDIES Randomised controlled trials that evaluated nurse practi...

BACKGROUND Health outcomes for long-term conditions (LTCs) can be improved by lifestyle, dietary and condition management-related behaviour change. Primary care is an important setting for behaviour change work. Practitioners have identified barriers to this work, but there is little evidence examining practices of behaviour change in primary care consultations and how patients and practitioner...