Diseases among Elderly People Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Diseases among Elderly People - Essay Example thromboxane A2 that promotes a cascade of events leading ultimately to clot formation. Increased homocysteine levels affect the inner lining of the arterial wall, and thus have long been implicated in the causation of thrombosis (Scott, J. and Weir, D., 1996). In fact, increased homocysetine levels associated with syndrome of homocysteinuria are acknowledged to be a cause of intravascular thrombosis. It has been observed that plasma homocysteine is normally converted to methionine co-factored by folic acid correlates in the body. When this reaction is impaired due to deficiency of cobalamine; since cobalamine regulates folate metabolism, it is deranged leading to elevated homocysteine levels (Mayer, E.L., Jacobsen, D.W., and Robinson, K., 1996). High plasma homocysteine, thus, will predispose to increased thrombosis, although it is not yet known whether hyperhomocysteinaemia due to folic acid deficiency predisposes to thrombosis or alters its response to treatment (Welch, G.N. and Loscalzo, J., 1998). This proposal aims to study the effect of folic acid on the elderly in terms of risk of coronary artery disease as relevant to prevention of thrombosis in preexisting atherosclerotic heart disease in terms of incidence of myocardial infarction (Bots, M.L. et al., 1999).Increasingly, healthcare is focusing towards prevention of disease rather than treating it after the catastrophe happens. Coronary artery disease manifested by acute myocardial infraction is one of the most common diagnoses in developed countries throughout the world. The mortality rate of the disease is 30% with over half the patients expiring even before they are able to reach the hospital. Survival from a heart...Research nurses will screen the medical records and exclude patients who have a history of coronary heart diseases or patients who are taking drugs known to interfere with folic acid, or taking vitamin supplements containing folic acid. Patients will be eligible for inclusion if aged 65 years or more and if their medical histories include two or more of the following conditions: diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, obesity or smoking. All eligible individuals will receive a letter from the hospital explaining the study, followed by a telephone call inviting them to attend the first visit and instructing them to fast from midnight the night before the visit. At the first visit, all baseline measurements will be taken. Research nurses will take general information, such as, name, age, sex, phone number, address, smoking history, marital status, socioeconomic factors, and the names and phone numbers of two or three friends or relatives who always know how to reach the participants. Drugs history including aspirin or other anticoagulants, antihypertensive, anti-angina, and lipid-lowering drugs will be reviewed. Study procedures will be explained to all subjects. Subjects who are unlikely to complete follow-up due to plans to move or due to disease likely to be fatal within 4 years, or unwilling to participate will be excluded from the study. Ethics: All subjects will be explained the study protocol, and a written informed consent will

Motivation Profiles Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Motivation Profiles - Essay Example Maslow (In Huit, 2004) refers to these needs as physiological. Ella's needs may also include safety or security or the need to be out of danger, but it is not necessarily so. She has not strived very much to the higher levels of education but just enough to get her a job. She is contented to be paid enough for her family's daily needs for food and shelter. As her family's needs grow, she finds that she has to move for promotion which she looks at in terms of bigger take home pay, but not necessarily bigger responsibility. The fight for promotion is tight at Ella's workplace. To be promoted, she resorts to giving gifts to her supervisor or persons having to do with promotion in her place of work. Like her, she thinks people primarily find satisfaction in material gain and she may find favor from her superiors. Ella is submissive to authority and represses her own impulses. In fact, her own idea of a boss is authoritarian. The hostile boss is not a problem to her if she receives a promotion (bigger pay). She is willing to forego much personal freedom in favor of a promotion that would assure her of food and shelter every month. She defers from Marcelo and Masoko in that her needs are very basic - just of the existence level described by Alderfer (1972). Marcelo Marcelo's needs may be said to occupy the two second higher level needs described in Maslow's hierarchy: belongingness and love, and esteem needs (See Huit, 2004). Marcelo is therefore expected to easily affiliate with others and be accepted. At the same time, he sees the drive to achieve at his level, be competent, gain approval and attain recognition. There is a strong need to be liked which may not be good in terms of decision-making (See McClelland, 1987). Status is a prime motivator to Marcelo. There is greater personal satisfaction in receiving praise or recognition with Marcelo and a promotion would realize these things for him. (See McClelland, 1987). Marcelo believes that promotions are given in exchange for something given, not necessarily hard work. It is a give and take situation. So he tries to praise his supervisors, do as he is ordered without any complain that he may be liked. In exchange for pleasing his boss, he believes he is working for promotion. For all his investments in gaining approval and at the same time being affiliative with his supervisor, he expects that promotion is in store. Marcelo has been toeing every rule given in his workplace, conscious that every broken rule requires a punishment and farther away from attaining a promotion. Therefore, he keeps quiet and never questions whatever policies he disagrees with. His needs, however, are higher than that of Ella's. He needs affirmation and affiliation over and above mere biological needs. Marcelo may be said to be other-oriented in that his work life involves relationships with significant others. He is satisfied by mutually sharing thoughts and feelings, and that acceptance, confirmation, understanding, and influence are elements important to him (Alderfer, 1972). Masoko Masoko sees more freedom in thinking than Ella and Marcelo. His actions are governed by the interplay of possible