Background: Stress is a common problem for nurses around the world. In Uganda, the enormous pressure on the healthcare in the country makes it no different. Aim: To describe stressors in nurses’ working-environment in one hospital, one clinic and one refugee-camp in central and western Uganda. Methods: A qualitative observational study with observations from three different health facilities. The data was analyzed using content analysis by Graneheim and Lundman. Results: The results showed that factors like lack of equipment, improper handling of needles, exposure to contagion, environmental factors and information were all contributing to stress. Discussions: The result was discussed from two themes: Lack of safety and Knowledge related to lack of equipment. The first theme described the environmental hazards the nurses were exposed to in their proffession. The second described the relationship between knowledge, lack of equipment and stress.

This project presents an overview of the social interactions that play a role in the development of a work culture that many nurses find hostile. strong evidence that many factors are related to the nursing shortage contributing role in creating a hostile nursing work culture. These factors include patient workload, a lack of consistent mentoring, gender inequality, stealing, and educational disparity among nurses. Some proposed achieving a more cohesive work culture and providing more effects may require providing veteran nurses with training in the latest me It could also be helpful to provide strong leadership training, emphasize team building, develop more team cohesion over individualism, and aggressively recruiting men to alleviate the nursing shortage. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

Investigation explored gender role stereotypes and the effect of stereotyping on the career adjustment of women. Occupational gender type ratings obtained from employed women were similar, although less extreme, than those observed in earlier studies (Shinar, 1975; White, Kruczek, Brown, White, 1989). Traditionally employed women provided more extremely stereotyped ratings than did their nontraditionally employed counterparts. All women were administered the Personality Attributes Questionnaire (PAQ) to assess the level of instrumental and expressive characteristics representative of their behavior. All women displayed a higher level of instrumental behaviors at work compared to home. Further, all women reported the level of instrumental behaviors they displayed at work surpassed the level that was characteristic of their overall personality orientation. Differences in gender role behaviors between traditionally and nontraditionally employed women were present across conditions: home, work, overall personality orientation. These two, groups differed with regard to the level of gender role behaviors they perceived as necessary for successful job performance. Job satisfaction (as measured by the Job Descriptive Index and Hoppock Satisfaction Questionnaire) was used as an index of career adjustment. Women employed nontraditionally expressed greater levels of dissastisfaction with their work, supervisors, and coworkers. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

In response to the rising prevalence of childhood overweight and obesity in Canada and around the world, the food environment has been recognized as one important determinant of health status. In order to fill some existing knowledge gaps in Canadian food environment research to better understand factors that may lead to health disparities, as well as to develop healthy public policies in response, this study characterized food environments in restaurants for children (10-13 years) living in Saskatoon, and examined their associations with neighbourhood socioeconomic characteristics. Specifically, using GIS-based techniques and a structured observation tool (NEMS-R), it examined community and consumer restaurant food environments by neighbourhoods categorized by distress level. The distribution of different restaurant types differs with respect to neighbourhood distress level. According to NEMS-R results, significant differences were found in the healthfulness of foods and beverages offered in restaurants by different categories. Restaurants within lower distress level neighbourhoods presented higher (more healthful) NEMS-R scores. However, the fast food environment for children was not significantly different according to their neighbourhood distress level.

An examination of the environmental policy process provides insight into the mechanisms of decision-making that create and implement policies, which in turn affect planning outcomes and development directions. Such in-depth scrutiny has rarely emerged in the East African context, with few studies providing an analysis of the entire policy process and the actor network involved. This study offers a thick, descriptive narrative of the environmental policy arena in Nairobi, where rampant environmental degradation due to unconstrained development is occurring despite the existence of an environmental regulatory framework. The effects of newly implemented constitutional and strategic development reforms in this rapidly evolving African metropolis are also interrogated. The study lens shifts from the macro-level perspective of the policy system and context, to the micro-level of the institutional and individual actors, examining their roles, authority, and the interconnections between them. A qualitative case study approach is utilized, consisting of 25 semi-structured interviews conducted with environmental policymaking leaders in Nairobi. Both deductive (themes are applied to the data) and inductive (themes are derived from the data) analyses are applied to examine the research data in detail. The primary data is supplemented with numerous secondary sources, which provide a practical grounding for the primary analysis. The narrative that coalesces around the data themes uncovers the underlying causes for poor environmental regulation thus far, prominent among them being a lack of institutional capacity in state agencies; corrupt and nepotistic governance; and the splintering of the environmental mandate among numerous state institutions, leading to competition and conflict among them. Adam and Kriesi’s Network Approach (2007) is then critically adapted and applied, revealing the concentration of power in state authorities and disproportionate distribution of influence among non-state actors in the environmental policy subsystem. This policy network analysis shows how these conditions create the potential for low to moderate incremental policy change going forward.

The fastest growing age group in Canada is seniors aged 65 years or older (Statistics Canada’s 2006 & 2007). The population of seniors is projected to increase to 6.7 million by 2021 and 9.2 million by 2041 (nearly one in every four Canadians) (Social Development Canada, 2006a; Statistics Canada, 2007b). Similarly, Population Estimates, Waterloo Region and Ontario, 2011 and Population Projections, Waterloo Region and Ontario, 2016, 2026 & 2036 (Region of Waterloo, 2012b, 2012c) indicate that the Region of Waterloo expects an increase in its senior population by 145.4% from year 2011 to 2036. Due to increased longevity and an increased percentage of older adults, this demographic shift poses challenges for communities, including increased healthcare costs and social isolation among seniors, which may threaten their active participation in the community. The research question ‘Do urban design guidelines of the Cities of Kitchener and Waterloo address the needs of an ageing population?’ motivates this study to examine the Urban Design Manuals of the Cities of Waterloo and Kitchener to determine the age-friendliness of the current urban design guidelines, and the role of the built environment in active ageing. The current urban design guidelines of the Cities of Kitchener and Waterloo are compared with the Design of Public Spaces Standards (Accessibility Standards for the Built Environment) by Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, 2005 (AODA); the Universal Design Principles; key findings based on the literature review (Levine, 2003; Story, Mueller, & Mace, 1998); and analysed with in-depth knowledge gained through semi-structured interviews with seniors, planners, and focus groups. The participation of the seniors provided information on the gaps between what already exists and what is required. The key finding of the report is that the urban design guidelines of the Cities of Waterloo and Kitchener are fairly comprehensive in addressing the needs of seniors, but there is inadequate implementation of these guidelines.

The clinical experience prepares nursing students to become competent and professional practitioners. Therefore, it is important to identify the key characteristics of a positive and constructive clinical learning environment. This cross-sectional study assessed undergraduate nursing students. (n=61; response rate of 38%) perceptions of their clinical learning environment and their suggestions to enhance it. The participants were fourth year nursing students enrolled in the Faculty of Nursing at the University of Manitoba who were doing their senior practicum (NURS 4290). Participants were invited to complete anonymously the actual and preferred versions of the Clinical Learning Environment Inventory (CLEI) (Chan, 2001). It was found that there were significant differences between students. perceptions of the actual and the preferred CLEI they desired. Participants also responded to two open-ended questions related to obstacles or things that would enhance their learning experience. Nine categories were identified that added to an understanding of the quantitative findings. The study indicated that there is still work to be done to provide a healthy clinical learning environment for nursing students and this task belongs to nursing researchers, educators, and health care organization preceptors and leaders.

This thesis includes two parts related to hydrogels as therapeutically useful constructs: a biomimetic hydrogel carrying stem cells for bone regeneration and an acid-sensitive hydrogel carrying drugs for cancer therapy. In tissue engineering, one of the biggest difficulties is the control of stem cell fate on scaffolds. A biodegradable and cell attachable cross-linker was synthesized by one-step Michael additional reaction, and was used to fabricate a novel hydrogel to control the stem cell fate. For anti-cancer therapy, releasing drug on tumor cells or organs while having low effects on health cells under physiological conditions is a critical requirement. Two nature polymers are modified to achieve loading anti-cancer drug while forming hydrogels which can selectively release the drug in tumor environment by acid-sensitive linkages.

This research traces the nature and impetus of agricultural landscape change from 1910 to 1990, within the northwestern transboundary plains of southern Alberta and Saskatchewan and northern Montana. Using information gleaned from aerial photographs, field survey reports and maps, government staff personal correspondence, agricultural statistics, land settlement records, and local histories, this dissertation describes an evolutionary and regionally-contextual process of landscape transformation. The temporal pattern of landscape change in the northwestern plains region was not linear. The greatest landscape changes took place between 1910 and 1930 when mixed grass prairie was converted to an agricultural landscape over a relatively short breaking-in period that followed initial agricultural settlement. After 1930, landscape changes were more evolutionary. Incrementally, more land was tilled, with little alteration in basic field arrangement and farming systems. Aerial photographic evidence suggests that a common declensionist historiographical narrative of Great Plains anthropogenic land degradation, culminating in the 1930s drought disaster, doesn’t apply to the northwestern plains. Rather, the timing of settlement, coinciding with widespread adoption of farm-based mechanization, and a pre-existing understanding of environmental limits to agricultural viability, impelled northwestern plains farmers to independently adopt scale economy and efficiency principles promoted by government agricultural economists from the 1920s to the 1980s. Furthermore, farmers adapted specifically to regional land and weather conditions using locally-derived soil management innovations. Farmers and in-the-field federal government staff cooperated on research that led to the spread of innovative and successful dryland farming techniques. Government agents of both Canada and the United States played an important role in testing and publicizing the local adaptations. This work establishes a new timeline for northern Great Plains history and reveals the importance of regional context in place history. In the northwestern plains region, the 1930s were not a turning point in the agricultural land use history, but rather a time marker coinciding with the maturing of a highly-mechanized, scaled-up, and responsive ‘modern’ agricultural system.

The Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) currently under negotiations between Canada and the European Union is one of the first next generation free trade agreements. In this respect, it seeks to go beyond where other free trade agreements went. CETA will not only reduce tariff barriers but will attempt to tackle issues such as internal barriers to trade, uneasy market access, government procurement. Many scholars have attempted to uncover the special relationship that the policy fields of trade and the environment maintain. As a way to add to this tradition, this study seeks to uncover the dynamics of this relationship when taken in the context of a next generation free trade agreement. Based on interviews with key observers and an analysis of the literature, this thesis suggests that due to the different parties’ current management of environmental protection, CETA could very well be one of the most environmentally friendly free trade agreement to date. / Graduate / 0615 / 0616 / alenoir@uvic.ca