Search

Globally, foodborne illness is a significant public health challenge. Food safety inspection plays a crucial role in the regulation of food businesses to prevent foodborne illnesses. To be an effective health protection measure, however, food safety inspections must facilitate the thorough evaluation of food safety risks. Our research examined how food safety inspectors from Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, the UK, and the U.S. assessed food contamination control during food premise inspections. Data were collected via an online survey of environmental health practitioners who routinely conduct food safety inspections. The findings indicated that inspectors are generally aware of food safety hazards that can be present at food businesses and have deployed a variety of relevant data-gathering methods to inform their examination of the extent of contamination control. The findings also indicated a prevailing methodological incongruence stemming from the absence of a robust inspection methodology. We propose that these shortcomings be addressed by solutions that are formulated based on established hazard analysis critical control point (HACCP) principles and qualitative field research. The development of a clear and appropriate methodology will support food safety inspections to provide a robust and reliable means for evaluating food safety risk and ultimately reduce the incidence and burden of foodborne illness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: A woman and girl centred, rights-based approach to health care is critical to achieving sexual and reproductive health. However, women with female genital mutilation in high-income countries have been found to receive sub-optimal care. This study examined documents guiding clinicians in health and community service settings in English-speaking high-income countries to identify approaches to ensure quality women and girl-centred care for those with or at risk of female genital mutilation. Method: We undertook a scoping review using the integrative model of patient-centredness to identify principles, enablers, and activities to facilitate woman and girl-centred care interactions. We developed an inclusion criterion to identify documents such as guidance statements and tools and technical guidelines, procedural documents and clinical practice guidelines. We searched the databases and websites of health professional associations, ministries of health, hospitals, national, state and local government and non-government organisations working in female genital mutilation in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, The United States, New Zealand, and Australia. The Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation tool was used to appraise screened documents. Findings: One-hundred and twenty-four documents were included in this scoping review; 88 were developed in the United Kingdom, 20 in Australia, nine in the United States, three in Canada, two in New Zealand and two in Ireland. The focus of documents from the United Kingdom on multi-professional safeguarding (62), while those retrieved from Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand and the US focused on clinical practice. Twelve percent of the included documents contained references to all principles of patient-centred care, and only one document spoke to all principles, enablers and activities. Conclusion: This study demonstrates the need to improve the female genital mutilation-related guidance provided to professionals to care for and protect women and girls. Professionals need to involve women and girls with or at risk of female genital mutilation in the co-design of guidelines and tools and evaluation of them and the co-production of health care. Plain Language Summary: High-quality health care for women and girls should be provided by health workers who are respectful and caring. Health workers should also work with others as a team and help women and girls make their own decisions about their health care. This approach is called patient-centred care. Female genital mutilation (FGM) is a cultural practice associated with poor health outcomes. Women who have experienced FGM have not always received quality health care. We studied the guidance and tools to help health workers provide care to women and girls with or at risk of FGM. This study aimed to understand how health workers are supported to provide woman and girl-centred health care in these documents. We searched for these documents on the websites of health professional associations, government health departments and organisations working in FGM in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, The United States, New Zealand, and Australia. The documents were analysed using a tool that described all the important areas needed to provide patient-centred health care. Of the 124 documents, we found that only 12% contained information about all aspects of patient-centred care. Only one document had details about all the areas that are part of patient-centred care. This study shows that we need to improve the FGM-related guidance provided to health workers to care for and protect women and girls. There is a need for health workers to involve women and girls with or at risk of FGM in designing guidelines and tools and evaluating them to these documents best fit their needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The job description for legislators in western democracies includes constituency-focused activities such as casework and district visits. Unfortunately we have a limited theoretical and empirical understanding of the factors affecting legislators' constituency-oriented activities, in large part because most studies focus on single nations; even studies that are comparative do not span a variety of electoral systems. In this article we examine the constituency focus of MPs in six chambers that do provide such variance: the Australian House and Senate, Canadian House, Irish Dáil, New Zealand House, and the British House of Commons. We find that electoral considerations and incentives provided by different electoral systems, as well as other factors, affect the priority that MPs place on constituency service. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]