Introduction and Aim: Associations between climate change and health have consistently been shown in scientific literature. Despite this, knowledge regarding health adaption policies and inclusion of health implications in climate change policies remain scarce. This thesis aimed to fill the knowledge gap by exploring the extent to which health implications were included in climate change policies of Tonga, Niue and the Cook Islands. Methods: The data used in this thesis consisted of National Climate Change Adaption plans for each country. The plans were analysed using qualitative content analysis. Findings: Three themes were found. The first theme discovered was the exclusion of health sector from development of climate change policies. The second theme showed that health was not a top priority, instead sectors contributing more to the economy were addressed with higher concern. Lastly, it was found that health issues are still poorly included in climate change policies, and health implications were not always recognized by policymakers. The study found that the overall recognition of health impacts was quite low, although there were noteworthy differences between plans. Conclusion: The overall recognition of health implications in the plans was low. However, one plan which included health representatives in the early planning stages had a considerably higher recognition of possible health impacts. This suggests that collaboration between all government sectors in climate change policies is important to ensure important aspects are not being missed. Further research is needed regarding climate change adaption and its links to health, to support policymakers in decision-making.

Abstract Background: Unaccompanied refugee minors are a diverse and critically significant group. This group is often vulnerable with mental and physical health needs, which can take a long time to be met in the host country. There are numerous obstacles to providing health care to this group, originating with not only the refugees’ country of origin but also long dangerous journeys and lack of cultural insensitive service provision. Aim: To explore the experiences and perceptions of unaccompanied young adults in the asylum-seeking process in relation to their health. Method: Five unaccompanied young adults were interviewed, and thematic analysis was used to explore relevant issues. Results: In relation to asylum process and minors’ health and wellbeing, four major themes emerged: Descriptions of terrible journeys, mental health associated with asylum seeking, experience of stress and trauma, coping strategies. Discussion: Their views reflected a wide range of opinions on the asylum process, their wellbeing and how they dealt with it, but many held negative perceptions toward asylum-seeking process and had great uncertainty whether their applications would be rejected or accepted which significantly affected their wellbeing. This could be explained by their descriptions of their experiences within various countries they passed through, their experiences of being a refugee/asylum-seeker or cultural differences. Conclusion: It is arguably it is important to engage this group in the development of policy and practice in child mental health, and in developing services for them. / Abstract Background: Unaccompanied refugee minors are a diverse and critically significant group. This group is often vulnerable with mental and physical health needs, which can take a long time to be met in the host country. There are numerous obstacles to providing health care to this group, originating with not only the refugees’ country of origin but also long dangerous journeys and lack of cultural insensitive service provision. Aim: To explore the experiences and perceptions of unaccompanied young adults in the asylum-seeking process in relation to their health. Method: Five unaccompanied young adults were interviewed, and thematic analysis was used to explore relevant issues. Results: In relation to asylum process and minors’ health and wellbeing, four major themes emerged: Descriptions of terrible journeys, mental health associated with asylum seeking, experience of stress and trauma, coping strategies. Discussion: Their views reflected a wide range of opinions on the asylum process, their wellbeing and how they dealt with it, but many held negative perceptions toward asylum-seeking process and had great uncertainty whether their applications would be rejected or accepted which significantly affected their wellbeing. This could be explained by their descriptions of their experiences within various countries they passed through, their experiences of being a refugee/asylum-seeker or cultural differences. Conclusion: It is arguably it is important to engage this group in the development of policy and practice in child mental health, and in developing services for them. / Abstract Background: Unaccompanied refugee minors are a diverse and critically significant group. This group is often vulnerable with mental and physical health needs, which can take a long time to be met in the host country. There are numerous obstacles to providing health care to this group, originating with not only the refugees’ country of origin but also long dangerous journeys and lack of cultural insensitive service provision. Aim: To explore the experiences and perceptions of unaccompanied young adults in the asylum-seeking process in relation to their health. Method: Five unaccompanied young adults were interviewed, and thematic analysis was used to explore relevant issues. Results: In relation to asylum process and minors’ health and wellbeing, four major themes emerged: Descriptions of terrible journeys, mental health associated with asylum seeking, experience of stress and trauma, coping strategies. Discussion: Their views reflected a wide range of opinions on the asylum process, their wellbeing and how they dealt with it, but many held negative perceptions toward asylum-seeking process and had great uncertainty whether their applications would be rejected or accepted which significantly affected their wellbeing. This could be explained by their descriptions of their experiences within various countries they passed through, their experiences of being a refugee/asylum-seeker or cultural differences. Conclusion: It is arguably it is important to engage this group in the development of policy and practice in child mental health, and in developing services for them.

No description available.

Background: Growing concerns about the value and effectiveness of short-term volunteer trips intending to improve health in underserved Global South communities has driven the development of guidelines by multiple organizations and individuals. These are intended to mitigate potential harms and maximize benefits associated with such efforts. Method: This paper analyzes 27 guidelines derived from a scoping review of the literature available in early 2017, describing their authorship, intended audiences, the aspects of short term medical missions (STMMs) they address, and their attention to guideline implementation. It further considers how these guidelines relate to the desires of host communities, as seen in studies of host country staff who work with volunteers. Results: Existing guidelines are almost entirely written by and addressed to educators and practitioners in the Global North. There is broad consensus on key principles for responsible, effective, and ethical programs-need for host partners, proper preparation and supervision of visitors, needs assessment and evaluation, sustainability, and adherence to pertinent legal and ethical standards. Host country staff studies suggest agreement with the main elements of this guideline consensus, but they add the importance of mutual learning and respect for hosts. Conclusions: Guidelines must be informed by research and policy directives from host countries that is now mostly absent. Also, a comprehensive strategy to support adherence to best practice guidelines is needed, given limited regulation and enforcement capacity in host country contexts and strong incentives for involved stakeholders to undertake or host STMMs that do not respect key principles.

<p>2017-05-31</p>

This study is about how lending activities with leisure equipment can have a positive impact on the individual. The problem area during the course of the study is that too many are exclusion in a multicultural country, more people feel inclusion in society as well as exclusion should not occur. The purpose of the study is to illustrate which view business managers and the central actors has within how a venture on lending activities can contribute to more involvement in society. The method that this study leans on was conducted by a qualitative interview study consisting of five interviews. Those interviews were conducted with five different stakeholders who have a relationship with the lending activities being studied. The theoretical reference framework contains health promotion, health determinants, and acculturation in which the pedagogical part deals with integration with other individuals and different learning environments. The result resulted in three categories; Participation and community, physical activity as well as opportunities and challenges that proved to have a positive impact on individuals and that there are different health benefits on the way. The conclusion of the results showed that the primary objective of lending activities is not about physical activity, but instead of the side effects that physical activity can contribute to.

Background: The importance of the social environment and human life conditions for public health was early recognized in community medicine. Despite major reductions in recent decades, cardiovascular diseases (CVD) is one of the leading causes of mortality and morbidity for both genders in all European countries.  Aim: The overall aim of this thesis was to increase our knowledge of factors in the social environment and of individual psychosocial factors that could explain why some women in working ages are affected by cardiovascular diseases. Methods: The Swedish sample comes from the urban population in two major cities in a region in the south-east of Sweden, the Twin cities. According to their social history they could be labelled a “blue-collar” and a “white-collar” city. Cardiovascular morbidity data in all papers for the Twin cities was derived from a computerized population-based administrative Health Care Register (HCR). In Paper IV, we made a comparative study between Sweden and Scotland, the Scottish data comes from the Scottish Health Survey. Results: In Paper I, the cumulative incidence of different cardiovascular diagnoses for younger and also elderly men and women were significantly higher in the population of the blue collar city in all ages and for both sexes. The qualitative interviews of women after an MI, in Paper II, the findings revealed a broad picture of social factors, life circumstances, personalities and, not least, psychosocial factors that are important to middle-aged women who have suffered an MI. Paper III demonstrated that women with a high level of the personality trait “being a Good Girl” reported significantly more psychosocial risk factors for CVD and more commonly report chest pain without seeking medical care, no increased incidence for various CVD-diagnoses were found. The comparative study (Paper IV) clearly showed that Scottish middle-aged women are – relative to Swedish women - particularly affected by a worse profile of CVD risks, even after adjustment for education.   Conclusions: The social environment is of importance for cardiovascular risks and cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. This has been shown in Swedish Twin cities context and also in comparative studies between Swedish and Scottish women. The thesis gives strong implications for an upstream public health approach initiating long-term community intervention program in the blue collar city and among Scottish middle-aged women.

No description available.

I Sverige har Systembolaget försäljningsmonopol på alkoholhaltiga drycker över 3,5 procent, vilket gör att dessa drycker endast finns tillgängliga under Systembolagets öppnande samt att tillgängligheten är begränsad till ungdomar under 20 år till följd av åldersgränsen. Tillgänglighet är en viktig bestämningsfaktor vad gäller alkoholkonsumtion. Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka vad som hänt med alkoholvanorna i en kommun efter det att Systembolaget etablerades där 1 mars år 2000. En avgränsning har gjorts och arbetet kommer därmed specifikt belysa ungdomar i årskurs nio och deras alkoholvanor. Flickor och pojkar kommer att analyseras var för sig. En kvantitativ ansats har valts där aggregerad data använts. Informationen som använts kommer från drogvaneundersökningar gjorda 1999, 2002 samt Liv &amp; hälsa ung 2005. Resultatet visade på att andelen ungdomar som konsumerar alkohol har minskat i kommunen. Det har mellan åren blivit vanligare att eleverna i årskurs nio skaffar vin och starksprit från ”annan vuxen”. Ett nyöppnande av ett Systembolag, med ökad tillgänglighet av alkohol som följd, har inte lett till att andelen konsumerande ungdomar av alkohol i årskurs nio i kommunen ökat, däremot ses en signifikant minskning bland flickorna.

No description available.