All mothers and newborns deserve competent care and continuous support during the intrapartum period (Tinker et al., 2006:269). According to the Saving Mothers: Fifth Report on Confidential Enquiries into Maternal Deaths in South Africa, 2008-2010 (SA, 2011:4), the maternal mortality rate (MMR) is 176.22/100 000 live births (SA, 2011:4). The majority of maternal deaths are preventable and have many common preventable factors which are mostly related to the knowledge and skills of the healthcare providers and the challenges within the health care system (SA, 2011:5). The research was conducted in an attempt to make a meaningful contribution to the body of knowledge, specifically knowledge related to the experiences of women regarding the quality intrapartum care in a public hospital in Gauteng Province, and to make recommendations to enhance the quality of intrapartum care. A qualitative study design was used and data collected with the use of individual in-depth interviews. Purposive sampling was used to select participants who represent the target population. The sample used for the study included all women who had given birth within 24 hours before the interviews by normal vaginal delivery. A pilot study was conducted and the interview schedule was finalised. Sixteen individual in-depth interviews were done until data saturation had been achieved. Trustworthiness was ensured according to the principles of credibility, transferability, dependability and confirmability. A digital voice recorder was used to capture data and the data were transcribed verbatim. Field notes were written down for each interview. Data analysis was done by means of content analysis by the researcher and an independent co-coder. Themes and sub-themes were identified. The findings indicated that most of the women‟s experiences were positive regarding the quality of intrapartum care while a lesser percentage had had negative experiences. Identified areas of concern are staff attitudes, communication and staff shortages. Conclusions drawn are that women‟s experiences of quality of intrapartum care were that it is not of the highest standard. There is a need for provision of continuous emotional support during labour, improvement of staff attitudes and promotion of rooming-in, and a need not to be separated from their babies for long periods of time The research concluded with the researcher‟s recommendations for policy, nursing practice, nursing research and nursing education, for the enhancement and adherence of midwives to recommendations in improving the quality of intrapartum care in public hospitals. / MCur, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

This thesis presents the notion that paid elder care work is often more involved with ordering individuals, than caring for them. It discusses this issue via ethnographic data about care assistant and nursing auxiliary work, which was collected in two elder care homes: Hazelford Lodge residential home and Bracken Court nursing home. The thesis uses care, control, and knowledge as the main themes for the discussion of work in both homes. The first chapter sites the thesis within the context of the academic literature on the discourses of the body, the nature of care work and residential care. It focuses especially upon care work as body labour. Chapter two presents the ethnographic methodological approach of the thesis, in two sections. Firstly, the use of the Foucauldian notion of discourse is explained, and secondly, the research process and research relationships are explored through a reflexive account. Chapters two and three present social, structural and spatial aspects of the two settings. They discuss the different ways in which the homes were organised, and that spaces were utilised and had different meanings, within the homes. Chapters four and five are based upon data from Hazelford Lodge residential home, and illustrate the care assistants' work as centred upon created order in the home, based upon the typification of residents and others. Chapters six and seven explore the auxiliaries' work in Bracken Court and present three control issues as central to their jobs. Firstly the overt ordering of patients around spaces in the home. Secondly, the normalisation of individuals into patient, and objects, of body work. Thirdly, the auxiliaries' resistance to heir role and status. Chapter eight compares the work of the assistants and auxiliaries in terms of resident and patient construction, the nature of the two forms of work, their knowledge, and lastly, their constructions of place and status. The thesis argues that both groups of workers are involved in ordering bodies that they perceive to be problematic and degenerating. In Hazelford Lodge order and discipline is practised as care and in Bracken Court the auxiliaries use more overt forms of control, but both 'caring' and controlling are effective methods of creating order. By introducing notions of body labour and ordering, the thesis presents a unique critique of paid care.

Dissertation (Ph.D.)--Auburn University, / Abstract. Vita. Includes bibliographic references (p.91-96).

Thesis (Ph. D. in Psychology)--University of Wisconsin--Milwaukee, 1999. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 1981.

Thesis (M.P.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.P.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 117-122).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 1981.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1993. / Typescript. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 36-38).

Thesis (M.P.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available in print.