<p> The purpose of this project was to locate a potential funding source and write a grant to provide home-based mental health services to Latino older adults for Beach Cities Health District, in Redondo Beach, California, the host agency for this program. An extensive literature review was conducted to investigate the best way to provide non-traditional therapeutic services to older adults. The Archstone Foundation was chosen as the most appropriate funding source. </p><p> The population of Latino older adults is expected to grow significantly in the coming years. Many in this population suffer from depression but fail to access services due to language barriers and other obstacles. This program was developed to improve knowledge of depression and improve coping skills, as well as reduce symptoms of depression. </p><p> If funded, this program could provide social workers an opportunity to bridge the gap the need for and the receipt of mental health services among older Latinos. Submission of the grant was not a requirement for the thesis project.</p>

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of California, San Francisco, 2007. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-04, Section: A, page: 1683. Adviser: Charlene Harrington.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--UCLA, 2008. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 119-122).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 2000. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Northeastern University, 2008. / Title from title page (viewed June 25, 2009). Graduate School of Engineering, Dept. of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering. Includes bibliographical references (p. 158-160).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1989. / Also available in print.

This research explores popular constructions of “healthiness” as individual lifestyle choices in the context of contemporary South African consumer culture, and how these constructions relate to formations of subjectivity. This is a qualitative study conducted within a social constructionist, theoretical framework. Data was collected using in-depth, semi structured interviews and are analysed using a Foucauldian inspired version of discourse analysis. A critical stance is taken towards the assumption in these discourses that their version of healthiness is always and unquestionably positive. Special attention is paid to the lifestyle and marketing media discourses appropriated in understandings of personal health through self-management, and of the optimization of health in the pursuit of well-being. The ways in which different discourses of healthiness facilitate the construction of specific identities are considered in order to untangle some of the problems created by the moralism underpinning popular consumer health discourse. How constructions of healthiness and aspirant healthy lifestyles support, and are supported by, the ideologies and practices of neoliberal capitalism are also explored. From this perspective, healthiness as lifestyle consumption choices can be seen as an ideological apparatus that produces the subjects necessary to reproduce the social order (Althusser, 2001), functioning not only positively amongst the social classes with the leisure and economic resources to pursue these options, but also negatively as victim-blaming of those who are excluded. The argument here is not that health is bad or that people should not be bothered with activities aimed at promoting good health, but that in a context where the concept of health is idealised as always positive and beneficial, the potentially harmful consequences of some of the health discourses we make use of may be occluded. This idealisation of health or ‘healthism’ may also function to divert attention away from some of the challenges to health that are not the direct result of personal behaviours and are unlikely to be remedied through individually focussed interventions, for example, inequality and inadequate access to basic resources. Six discourses which were used to construct understandings of health are analysed. These include Happiness, Freedom, Control, Care, Balance and Goodness. The ways in which these discourses played a role in constructing the kinds of subject positions which were made available to participants, and the possible implications this has, are explored in depth.

Research currently indicates patient perceptions of the doctor-patient relationship are central to health outcomes. Theoretically, the current study is grounded in two literatures: the placebo effect and the broader literature examining empirically tested predictors of the doctor-patient relationship. Two factors not yet studied relative to patient perceptions of the doctor-patient relationship include the direct effect of medical gatekeeper characteristics along with the interaction between gatekeeper characteristics and existing healthcare attitudes/behaviors. This quantitative archival study utilized a MultiCare Survey dataset of 10, 579 participants who were general practitioner patients in northwestern United States. This study first examined the individual impact of healthcare attitudes/behaviors as measured by the Health Matters scale and gatekeeper characteristics as measured by the Front Office scale on patient perceptions of the doctor-patient relationship assessed by the Provider and Education scales. Second, this study assessed the interaction of these variables in predicting doctor-patient perceptions. Regression analyses revealed that both healthcare attitudes/behaviors and gatekeeper characteristics individually predicted and interacted to predict doctor-patient perceptions. Findings from the study contribute to social change by identifying the importance of training those individuals who first engage the patient as part of establishing a holistic approach to positive patient relationships.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 1989.