Improving the Public Health Information Network through Semantic Modeling

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) created the Public Health Information Network to advance fully capable, interoperable information systems in public health organizations. PHIN prioritizes public health information systems' functional requirements, capabilities, performance measures, and operational characteristics while letting the architects of those systems choose enabling approaches, methods, and concepts to meet the requirements. PHIN also provides a certification process for public health administrators to evaluate their information infrastructure's quality. The certification process is important because affected organizations often depend on certification for continued funding.     

Is the Promissory Note of Personality as Vulnerability to Depression in Default? Reply to Zuroff, Mongrain, and Santor (2004).

In contrast to D. C. Zuroff, M. Mongrain, and D. A. Santor (2004), the current authors find the promissory note of dependency-sociotropy (DEP-SOC) and self-criticism-autonomy (SC-AUT) as a model of risk for depression to be in default. The authors propose reorganizing what has been cast as unitary effort into 3 distinct endeavors: a psychoanalytic clinical theory, development of a refined empirical model of risk for clinical depression, and research examining the effects of DEP-SOC and SC-AUT on interpersonal relationships in nonclinical samples. The authors identify some issues that need to be accommodated regardless of whether the assessment of Zuroff et al. (2004) or their own is accepted. DEP-SOC and SC-AUT are best construed as correlated, continuous dimensions. Future work also needs to accommodate depression as chronic recurrent condition, advances in developmental psychopathology, and more stringent criteria for positing a risk factor for clinical disorder. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Beyond the "Self in Self-Efficacy: Spouse Confidence Predicts Patient Survival Following Heart Failure.

Ratings of patient efficacy to manage illness, made by 191 congestive heart failure patients and their spouses, were examined as predictors of patients' survival over the next 4 years. When considered alone, both the patient's self-efficacy and the spouse's confidence ratings predicted survival, but only spouse confidence remained significant when both partners" efficacy ratings were included in the same Cox regression model. The overlapping prognostic significance of spouse confidence and a global, multicomponent measure of marital quality positioned the former as a proxy for the latter, reflecting a fundamentally social protective factor in patient survival. Successful adaptation to heart failure appears to involve more than the patient's personal agency, and psychosocial data from spouses can improve prediction of patient outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Paper and plastic in daily diary research: Comment on Green, Rafaeli, Bolger, Shrout, and Reis (2006).

The authors applaud A. S. Green, E. Rafaeli, N. Bolger, P. E. Shrout, and H. T. Reis's (2006) response to one-sided comparisons of paper versus electronic (plastic) diary methods (see record 2006-03820-006) and hope that it will stimulate more balanced considerations of the issues involved. The authors begin by highlighting areas of agreement and disagreement with Green et al. The authors review briefly the broader literature that has compared paper and plastic diaries, noting how recent comparisons have relied on study designs and methods that favor investigators' allegiances. The authors note some sorely needed data for the evaluation of the implications of paper versus plastic for the internal and external validity of research. To facilitate evaluation of the existing literature and assist in the design of future studies, the authors offer a balanced comparison of paper and electronic diary methods across a range of applications. Finally, the authors propose 2 study designs that offer fair comparisons of paper and plastic diary methods. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The place of informed consent in ethical dilemmas

Considers ethical questions raised by the psychotherapeutic treatment of a highly religious person to be specific instances of general issues in the conduct of psychotherapy. It is stressed that the therapist has a responsibility to insure that the consent of the client is obtained under conditions of full information. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cyclic stress response and deformation behaviour of precipitation-hardened aluminium-lithium alloys

The cyclic stress response of two lithium-containing aluminium alloys aged to contain ordered precipitates was studied in different environments over a range of plastic strains. The specimens were cycled using tension-compression loading under total strain control. The peak-aged Al---Li---Mn alloy cyclically hardened to failure, whereas the peak-aged Al---Li---Cu alloy displayed softening for most of the fatigue life. The presence of shearable softening for most of the fatigue life. The presence of shearable precipitates in the two alloys results in a local decrease in resistance to dislocation movement, leading to a progressive loss of ordering contributions to hardening and slip concentration. This, coupled with the presence of precipitate free zones, promotes strain localization in intense slip bands and results in early crack nucleation. Transmission electron microscopy observations revealed homogeneous deformation in specimens cycled at high plastic strain amplitudes. However, at lower plastic strain amplitudes, deformation was inhomogeneous in the two alloy systems with the formation of intense planar slip bands. Results of this study reveal that the initial hardening observed is due to dislocation-dislocation and dislocation-precipitate interaction and that the softening observed in the Al---Li---Cu alloy is a mechanical and not an environmental effect.     

Living with a depressed spouse.

The depressed mood and specific burdens experienced by spouses of patients in treatment for depression were examined. Forty-nine wife-depressed couples and 30 husband-depressed couples were administered the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV (M. B. First, R. L. Spitzer, A Gibbon, & J. B. W. Williams, 1995), and spouses completed measures of depressed mood and burden. Overall, spouses living with a depressed patient reported significantly more depressed mood than general population norms and numerous specific burdens. Regression analyses showed that these burdens as well as gender of the spouse accounted for the spouses' depressed mood that would otherwise be attributed to mood contagion. It is suggested that as an alternative to an exclusive therapeutic focus on patient outcomes, attention might profitably be directed to the distress and burden experienced by spouses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Couples coping with congestive heart failure: Role and gender differences in psychological distress.

Psychological distress and marital quality were assessed with male (n=128) and female (n=49) congestive-heart-failure (CHF) patients and their spouses. Hopkins Symptom Check List-25 scores were in the distressed range for 57% of patients and 40% of spouses. This role difference was greater for men than for women, and a gender difference (more distress in women than men) was greater for spouses than for patients. The patient's distress, but not the spouse's, reflected the severity of the patient's illness, and distress for both partners correlated negatively with ratings of marital quality. Female-patient couples reported better relationship quality than male-patient couples, however, and a mediation analysis indicated that the gender difference in spouse distress could be explained by marital quality. Results highlight the contextual nature of CHF distress and suggest that role differences in distress vary by gender. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional and physical intimacy in coping with lupus: Women's dilemmas of disclosure and approach.

This study examined whether self-rated physical and emotional intimacy of 74 women with their heterosexual partner, during an illness episode of lupus, was related to their affect and relationship satisfaction. It was predicted that greater intimacy would be related to better psychosocial adjustment. Women who engaged in physically intimate behavior with their partner more often reported greater relationship satisfaction. Women who frequently avoided or who were often the initiators of physical intimacy, however, reported greater negative affect. Concerning emotional intimacy, women who disclosed more information about illness symptoms and women who concealed more information about their symptoms and feelings experienced the highest levels of negative affect. Results identify dilemmas that women with recurrent illness may face when trying to maintain intimacy during illness periods. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)