BACKGROUND Invariant item ordering (IIO) is defined as the extent to which items have the same ordering (in terms of item difficulty/severity - i.e. demonstrating whether items are difficult [rare] or less difficult [common]) for each respondent who completes a scale. IIO is therefore crucial for establishing a scale hierarchy that is replicable across samples, but no research has demonstrated ...

BACKGROUND this study aimed to compare mental health of mothers of children with spina bifida with mothers of able-bodied controls. METHODS eighty-one mothers of children with spina bifida aged 1-18 years completed the General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12) and Parenting Stress Index Short Form (PSI/SF). The controls were 69 mothers of children with acute, non-disabling illnesses. Each chil...

OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was (1) to explore in detail the working load of teachers, (2) to analyse the extent of negative or threatening school-related events teachers are confronted with, and (3) to evaluate mental health strain by applying the general health questionnaire (GHQ). METHODS A sample of 949 teachers in 10 grammar schools (German: Gymnasien) and 79 secondary modern school...

OBJECTIVES The association of volunteering with well-being has been found in previous research, but mostly among older people. The aim of this study was to examine the association of volunteering with mental well-being among the British population across the life course. DESIGN British Household Panel Survey, a population-based longitudinal study. SETTING UK. PARTICIPANTS 66 343 observati...

AIM The purposes of our study were to determine the level of total social support, informational support, instrumental support, appraisal support and emotional support received by patients of primary care as well as factors related to this level with reference to health status and sociodemographic variables. METHOD The sample for current analysis included 516 patients of primary care clinics ...

BACKGROUND Many intervention-based studies aiming to improve mental health do not include a multi-attribute utility instrument (MAUI) that produces quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) and it limits the applicability of the health economic analyses. This study aims to develop 'crosswalk' transformation algorithm between a measure for psychological distress General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) a...

BACKGROUND The purpose of this study was to test the reliability, validity and factor structure of GHQ-12 questionnaire on male tannery workers of India. We have tested three different factor models of the GHQ-12. METHODS This paper used primary data obtained from a cross-sectional household study of tannery workers from Jajmau area of the city of Kanpur in northern India, which was conducted...

OBJECTIVE To examine risk factors for onset of low back pain (LBP) in healthcare workers. METHODS Nursing students, during their 3 year training period, and 1 year after training were studied in a prospective cohort study, with repeated self reported measurements of determinants of LBP at 6 monthly intervals for 3 years during training, and after a 12 month interval there was an additional fi...

BACKGROUND The associations between psychiatric caseness, denial, and self reported measures of handicap and morbidity due to asthma in patients suffering a near fatal attack of asthma have not been fully explored. METHODS Seventy seven consecutive subjects who presented to Adelaide teaching hospitals with a near fatal attack of asthma were assessed with a validated semi-structured interview ...