What's good for art students ....

Never take the stylus or brush
in your hand if you have not first
constituted in your mind all that you have to do.

Leon Battista Alberti, On Painting, 1435-36

My source: 16 May 2010, Visit to The British Museum, Italian Renaissance drawings.

Is this my excuse for taking so long with a new website?

Curriculum design and the value of whitespace

The best websites are often variously described as clean, slick, easy to navigate and access. They are considered 'best' often as a consequence of appreciating the need for whitespace. This means of course that they are also minimalist, uncluttered, easier to style consistently and they often have plenty of free space. The Google site and resulting interface is a prime example, to the extent it has become a recognised brand characteristic.

The pressures on curricula almost preempts the phenomena of student cramming. Without careful planning and discipline curricula can be jammed so full that there is no slack, no whitespace.

As a result there is also no space to reflect (Clouder, 2009).

Reference:
Lynn Clouder (2009) Promotion of Reflective Learning, Teaching and Assessment through Curriculum Design, Occasional Paper 10, Connecting Reflective Learning, Teaching and Assessment, Edited by Helen Bulpitt and Mary Deane, Higher Education Academy. p.11.

Additional links:
Whitespace programming language

Drawing - the stage of conceptual design

The health career model
- drawing -
for health and social care professionals, et al.. ...

"The Italian word for drawing, disegno,
also encapsulates the stage of conceptual design.
The ability to imagine a design
and then develop it on paper was an increasingly valuable skill."

The Purpose of Drawing: The British Museum, May 2010.

Additional link:
Disegno: Italian Fine Art Drawing

My source: 16 May 2010, Visit to The British Museum, Italian Renaissance drawings.

63rd World Health Assembly unanimously adopts the WHO global Code of practice on the international recruitment of health personnel

Dear HIFA2015 colleagues,

Please find below a press release from the Global Health Workforce Alliance. In the words of Dr Mubashar Sheikh, GHWA Executive Director: "The world is now a significant step closer to ensuring health workers are available and accessible to all".

PRESS RELEASE: 'Sixty-third World Health Assembly unanimously adopts the WHO global Code of practice on the international recruitment of health personnel. Alliance members and partners applaud Member States. The Alliance 21/05/2010.

[Photo: WHO/Jess Hoffman. Dr Pierre François Unger, State Councillor of the Canton of Geneva, addresses delegates at the opening of the Sixty-third World Health Assembly.]

'Geneva, 21 May 2010 - In a historic move today, the Sixty-third World Health Assembly unanimously passed a resolution to adopt the voluntary WHO global Code of practice on the international recruitment of health personnel. With this step, the world's nations acknowledge the global dimension and complexities of the health workforce crisis and the interconnected nature of both the problems and the solutions.

'With this resolution, Member States commit themselves to the voluntary principles and practices for the ethical international recruitment of health personnel taking into account the responsibilities and rights of source and destination countries, other stakeholders, and those of the migrant health personnel themselves. The Code provides ethical principles applicable to the international recruitment of health personnel in a manner that strengthen the health systems of developing countries.

'A drafting committee was established on the first day of the Assembly and after three days of negotiations, stayed up till 4:30 am on Thursday, 20 May 2010 to seek consensus on a draft resolution that retained the principles and spirit of the Code while also representing a way forward for all countries.

'The draft was unanimously accepted at the tenth session of Committee A late evening on 20 May 2010 and brought long awaited joy and celebration to the many organizations and individuals, campaigners and professionals, institutions and Member States who had been working tirelessly since the last three years to see a meaningful and equitable resolution on the Code be adopted at the World Health Assembly.

'"The process was not always easy, but there was commitment from all Member States to see a resolution adopted. This helped to keep the process moving and the results are there to see" says Alliance Board member, Bjarne Garden, Assistant Director, Global Health and AIDS Department, NORAD, a member of the Norwegian delegation.

'"This brings to fruition the pioneering work seeded by the Alliance three years ago with the creation of the Health Worker Migration Initiative bringing together the Health Worker Migration Global Policy Advisory Council and WHO led team of technical experts. It is the result of the work of multiple stakeholders who have effectively rallied around together. The world is now a significant step closer to ensuring health workers are available and accessible to all", says Dr Mubashar Sheikh, Executive Director, Global Health Workforce Alliance.

'World Health Organization (WHO) has played a key role in coordinating the process. "The Code sets out a roadmap for implementation. Within 2 years WHO will provide guidance to countries on monitoring implementation of the Code, and then report to the Assembly on the progress against implementation. The Code is voluntary, but progress on implementation will be monitored and reviewed" explained Dr Manuel Dayrit, Director, WHO department of Human Resources for Health.

'Health personnel migration has been a clearly identified priority for the Alliance since its inception. During the First Global Forum on Human Resources for Health in March 2008, the Alliance endorsed the Kampala Declaration and Agenda for Global Action, which sparked broad interest in the creation of the Code.

'Progress on the code has been achieved as a result of consultations and discussions, particularly at all six WHO Regional Committees and national consultations, involving participation by a wide range of stakeholder groups. The UN ECOSOC meeting and the G8 Summit in July 2009, and the UN General Assembly in December 2009 had strongly supported and encouraged WHO to move forward in finalizing the draft code of practice. The 126th Session of the WHO Executive Board, January 2010, had discussed a revised draft of the Code and recommended that it be submitted to the 63rd World Health Assembly.

'At this momentous milestone, the Alliance and WHO call upon Member States and all its partners to reinforce its spirit of working together as they now gear up to implementing the code. The Alliance remains committed to facilitating the process and supporting sharing of information among Member States and all stakeholders.'

The Draft Resolution, dated 20 May 2010, is available here:
http://www.who.int/workforcealliance/knowledge/themes/migration/wha_A63_A_Confpaper_11.pdf

Key elements of the draft code (as described in The Lancet, 15 May) are:

• Establishment of voluntary global standards for ethical international recruitment of health personnel, balancing rights and obligations of source states, destination states, and health personnel.
• Promotion of coordination of national policies and international cooperation among states and their partners in health professions and civil society.
• Recommendation that states strive to meet their domestic needs for health services with their own human resources through planning, education, and training for health workforce.
• Recommendation that states ensure that international migration should have net positive effect on developing countries through technical assistance, support for health personnel training and retention, twinning of health facilities, and specialised technology and skills transfers.
• Recommendation that states establish voluntary financial mechanisms to support efforts of developing countries to strengthen health systems.
• Recommendation that states protect rights of migrant health workers through fair labour practices. In all terms of employment and conditions of work, migrant health personnel should enjoy same legal rights and responsibilities as domestically trained health workforce, without discrimination.
• Recognition that health personnel have ethical responsibilities to cooperate with local authorities in interests of patients, health systems, and society.
• Recommendation for national data collection and information exchange on health personnel migration, including establishment of national centre for information exchange, expansion and coordination of national research, and periodic reporting to WHO.
• Promotion of compliance through periodic state reporting to WHA of measures taken to implement the code; and recommendation that WHA periodically reviews the code's implementation with input from non-governmental sources.

Allyn L Taylor & Lawrence O Gostin. International recruitment of health personnel. The Lancet, 375(9727)1673-1675, 15 May 2010
http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2810%2960596-X/fulltext?_eventId=login&&version=printerFriendly
(free access after free registration)

My source: HIFA2015 with photo addition

The health career model, reflection, curriculum development

There are many new insights and remembrances available in the content of -

Occasional Paper No 10
Connecting Reflective Learning, Teaching and Assessment
October 2009 by Helen Bulpitt and Mary Deane

We tend to speak of reflection as if it is merely a case of being in the right place at the right time:
in front of a mirror or other reflective surface.

Among the issues raised in OP #10 (which I will expand and explore further) are:

• the need to embed reflection in learning, teaching and assessment at the curriculum design level;
• the existence of an optimal curriculum design that can foster effective critical reflection (Clouder, 2009);
• reflection to meet specific learning outcomes can be said to be 'reflection to order' (Dalley, Chap 2, 2009);

As this short list shows reflection is a complex and serious component and activity of learning. A central problem is in the assessment and marking of reflective writing (Deane, Chap 5, 2009; Dalley, Chap 6, 2009). Marking a piece of reflective writing what would we look for:

• Observation
• Structure
• Reasoning
• Critical review
• Argument
• Personal disclosure
• Writing?

There really is the basis for a paper here on the health career model, reflection and there on the horizon - curriculum development.

Image source:
http://www.reelcollectibles.co.nz

Nursing: Art and Science ... Fra Angelico to Leonardo

I arrived in London at noon in preparation for the Higher Education Academy mental health SIG meeting tomorrow at King's College, which includes a presentation on the health career model.

The afternoon was spent at The British Museum exhibition Fra Angelico to Leonardo: Italian Renaissance drawings

Early in the life of W2tQ visits to the Tate in London and Liverpool prompted a blog post or two.

Visiting this stunning exhibition even before I fastened and feasted on the first drawing, the subtitled walls announced the various exhibition themes and for me instantly suggested links to health care:

Drawing the father of our three arts -
architecture, sculpture and painting
Georgio Vasari. Lives of the Artists, 1568.

sculpture equates to medicine-surgery

painting to nursing

our care models provide the architecture and palette*

We all draw (model) individually in thought and reflection, these are then shared in our various collaborations and engagements, media forms and records.

Do we need a 21st century renaissance
in the study and appreciation of models of care?

*Red, Green, Blue, (Black & White)
There are a few more prospective posts arising from this museum visit - time - will draw them out.

Holistic bandwidth (and the dangers) of political care

The attack on MP Stephen Timms here in the UK highlights not only the ongoing importance of personal safety for public service personnel, but how much politicians value their constituency work. It is no accident that these sessions are called "surgeries".

The politician meets not just a citizen, but a political obligation and duty to care. In the media reports it was interesting to hear of how much satisfaction MPs get from their constituency work. Listening to the reporting and debate prompted me to realise that although politicians vary in how well they engage and empathise with their constituents the problems they are asked to deal with covers a broad holistic spectrum. Consider this listing written by Tony Wright MP:

• The education system
• The transport system
• The social services
• Health services
• Housing
• The environment
• Government bodies
• The justice system
• Immigration and asylum
• Finances and employment
• Trade unions
• The media

I am a community nurse five days a week.

Our MPs are community politicians one day a week with 'Constituency Friday'.

So to The Rt Hon. Stephen Timms (and his staff) I wish you a speedy recovery and congratulations on the extent of you and your peer's constituency work.

Holistic in a word and deed.

Congratulations also to the Green Party on the success of their leader Caroline Lucas MP.

Health, social care and personal map making

There have been two series running on BBC 4 in the UK over recent months and currently with a cartographic and historical focus:

see - The Beauty of Maps

This Vermeer - The Art of Painting - was featured in one programme and reveals the power and status of maps as Wikipedia also explains.

It is natural to see the health career model as a map, but this map is not just the preserve of the wealthy. Hodges' model can be used universally by all - a common framework.


Use of the term map and its synonyms is in turn common in medicine in many forms:

The map of medicine
The Malaria Atlas Project (MAP)
HealthMap

The above sites reveal how maps, charts and atlases relate the individual, geography and health.

In addition to its geographic connotation projection also has a psychological meaning. Hodges' model provides a substrate on which to project personalised, national and global health.

An individual; a people; a nation: for each a journey .... and for each a map ....

Image source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Painting_%28Vermeer%29