Local Organisers: Helena Serra and Tiago Correia
New directions in health care work and organisations
In contemporary societies, the social organisation of healthcare is
facing many challenges that may lead to fundamental transformations. Major
challenges emerge from global economic trends towards marketization and the
ways most States are restructuring the public sector. Side effects are already
taking place, in particular how work is structured and organizations compete in
the context of limited recourses. Consequences are set also on the side of users.
However, it must not undermined that some fields in healthcare and players may
face expansion and new opportunities in this context, namely those linked to
technologies and management. In sum, changing policies and governance result in
comprehensive challenges to the social organisation of healthcare that warrant
further attention, including different models of governance; greater
involvement of technologies; the emergency of new health professions and
competition for professional jurisdictions; the incentive of private healthcare
systems; possible implications for users in the access to and consumption of
healthcare. This new directions may vary within and among countries and
globally.
We invite papers that explore these developments in comparative
perspective or in a single country or professional group. Next to an open Call
for Papers, a number of thematic sessions are also proposed; please clearly
indicate your session preference and choose either the open call session(s)
or one of the thematic sessions (see the list below).
Please submit your abstract by email to:
abstracts-midlisbon@fcsh.unl.pt with a copy to helena.serra@fcsh.unl.pt;
Tiago.Correia@iscte.pt; deadline is 30 November 2015. Abstracts must be
submitted as an email attachment in the format of a word file and must be
prepared in the following style: preferred session; title of the paper; name of
author(s), institutional affiliation and email address; followed by an abstract
of no more than 200 words. Please note: abstracts that do not follow these
guidelines cannot be considered.
A decision on acceptance (or otherwise) will be made in close
consultation with the session organisers; authors will be informed on the
status of their abstract no later than 30 December 2015. 2
List of
Sessions
Session 1 – (Open Call) New directions in
health care work and organisations (see the Call for Papers for this Mid-Term Conference)
Organisers: Helena Serra and Tiago Correia
(Portugal)
Session 2 - Emerging and resurgent actors
in health contexts
Organisers: Brígida Riso (Portugal), Mário
Santos (Portugal) and Violeta Alarcão (Portugal)
Since the nineteenth century, Medicine has
occupied a central position in Western societies, namely in the provision of
healthcare, in research, and in social regulation, achieving new fields of
expertise and often winning social legitimacy over other forms of knowledge and
action. However, contemporary trends in healthcare have opened a window of
legitimacy for different actors to emerge or resurge, and conquer their own
fields of expertise. These actors compete with Medicine, proposing non-medical
rationalities and strategies. Notwithstanding, in particular cases, medical
practice depends on these new professionals, or the boundaries between medical
and non-medical professionals are diluted. How are these new actors challenging
existing models of care management and provision, and institutionalised
dynamics of knowledge and power? And to what extent are they re-shaping
concepts of health and illness? We welcome presentations addressing these and
other issues related with new and resurging professional actors in the
healthcare sector.
Session 3 – Working time arrangements,
work-life-balance and health of health care professionals
Organisers: Johanna Muckenhuber (Austria) and
Hannah Volk (Austria)
Working hours play an important role in the
life, health, and well-being of workers in contemporary Europe. On the one
hand, recent studies have demonstrated long working hours being negatively
associated with health and well-being, whereas for time autonomy positive
effects were assumed. Health care professionals are particularly affected by
this phenomenon.
On the other hand, long working hours,
shift and night work are often related to higher income. Therefore, an ongoing
discussion to which extent and under which conditions health care workers wish
to reduce their working hours exists.
This session invites contributors concerned
with health and wellbeing of health care professionals, focusing on the effects
of long working hours and time autonomy. It also welcomes research examining
how health care workers manage to maintain a balance between private and
working life.
We particularly invite empirical papers and
papers conducting international comparative research.
Session 4 - Labor of management in case of
management of labor: changing policies of maternity care in post-socialist
societies
Organisers: Anna Temkina (Russia) and
Anastasija Novkunskaya (Russia)
Maternity care causes special attention in
post-socialist societies where medical institutions undergo crucial
transformations under influence of state healthcare reforms and marketization.
Though, diverse and heterogeneous across the region, reforms of obstetric 3 systems
constitute a case of important changes and crucial challenges for labor of
management of maternity hospitals and birth centers. Managerial transformation
of reproductive health care on the level of medical institutions predetermines
influent institutional shifts in obstetric system, resources and position of
medical staff and patients/clients. In particular, management of labor becomes
dramatically dependent on both bureaucratic requirements of administration,
market demands and liberalized, consumer expectations of patients. This
ambivalent and contradictive character of institutional changing predetermines
different challenges for medical professionals, healthcare providers and care
receivers.
Session 5 - Maternity care in Europe: social changes and institutional challenges
Childbirth is a complex social phenomenon. While pregnancy and delivery can be seen as mere physiological events, in reality they are surrounded by an on-going debate on the power and legitimacy, in which women, families, professionals and institutions are involved. Maternity care is shaped by and developed through the interplay of social politics, market forces, professional powers and gender ideologies. Across Europe, differences in the organisation and provision of maternity care surpass plain physiological differences and reveal discrete mechanisms of social normalisation and control. This session explores policies, institutions and ideologies which regulate and shape maternity care, structuring experiences of inclusion/exclusion, recognition/marginalization,choice/constraint. It investigates contradictory trends in the consumption of medical services, such as the acceptance of new technologies vs. anti-technocratic calls for more “natural” childbirth. Its papers will address contemporary challenges brought up by the transformations in professional jurisdictions over childbirth, global shifts in public, occupational, and state initiatives, issues related to social inequalities etc.
Session 6 - The Challenges of the Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Gender, Medicalization, Inequalities
This proposal aims to critically analyse the development of ART (Assisted Reproductive Technologies) in Europe. More precisely, we would like to investigate their impact on social and family structure, gender relationships, parenting and parenthood, on legal and political approaches, as well as the medicalization of reproductive issues and healthcare policies.
This session addresses the issues of
organizational shifts which occur in obstetric health care services in post-socialist
societies and invites contributions that will explore transformations in
maternity homes and birth centers on the institutional and interactional
levels, their changes throughout recent state reforms and strategies of
collective and individual adaptation to the new bureaucratic and market formats
of birth care.
Session 5 - Maternity care in Europe: social changes and institutional challenges
Organisers: Ekaterina Borozdina (Russia),
Mário Santos (Portugal) and Ema Hrešanová (Czech Republic)
Childbirth is a complex social phenomenon. While pregnancy and delivery can be seen as mere physiological events, in reality they are surrounded by an on-going debate on the power and legitimacy, in which women, families, professionals and institutions are involved. Maternity care is shaped by and developed through the interplay of social politics, market forces, professional powers and gender ideologies. Across Europe, differences in the organisation and provision of maternity care surpass plain physiological differences and reveal discrete mechanisms of social normalisation and control. This session explores policies, institutions and ideologies which regulate and shape maternity care, structuring experiences of inclusion/exclusion, recognition/marginalization,choice/constraint. It investigates contradictory trends in the consumption of medical services, such as the acceptance of new technologies vs. anti-technocratic calls for more “natural” childbirth. Its papers will address contemporary challenges brought up by the transformations in professional jurisdictions over childbirth, global shifts in public, occupational, and state initiatives, issues related to social inequalities etc.
Session 6 - The Challenges of the Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Gender, Medicalization, Inequalities
Organisers: Lia Lombardi (Italy) and Alice
Sophie Sarcinelli (France)
This proposal aims to critically analyse the development of ART (Assisted Reproductive Technologies) in Europe. More precisely, we would like to investigate their impact on social and family structure, gender relationships, parenting and parenthood, on legal and political approaches, as well as the medicalization of reproductive issues and healthcare policies.
Therefore, we propose a reflection about
ART starting from sociology of health and medicine, medical Anthropology,
gender studies, public health and sociology of family.
According with these premises we invite
scholars interested in this session to propose theoretical and/or empirical
contributions dealing with the following themes:
• The medicalization of the reproductive
body
• Gender, medical technologies and power
• Health and reproductive rights: e.g.
contraception, abortion, pregnancy, ART
• Social and health inequalities in gender
perspective
• ART in European countries: comparative
analysis
• The impact of ART on gender relationships
and “new parenthood” (homoparenthood, monoparental families, etc.);
• Transnational reproduction and
Cross-border reproductive care 4
Session
7 - Patient-centered care and public involvement in health technologies
Organisers: Cláudia de Freitas (Portugal),
Alicia Renedo (UK) and Susana Silva (Portugal)
There is increasing emphasis in making
healthcare governance participatory. Pressure to develop more sustainable and
quality healthcare systems and innovative technologies is calling upon the
development of policies and services centred on patients’ values, needs and
preferences. As a result, efforts to implement patient-centred care have
spurred the creation of participatory spaces where lay people are invited to
have a voice on healthcare governance. This has implications for the social
organisation of healthcare: managers, professionals and staff must adjust to
working together with service users in planning, designing and implementing
changes in healthcare. However, there has been little reflection upon the
sociological conceptualisation of patient-centred care and on how public
involvement can contribute to its development, as well as to the implementation
of quality healthcare. This session invites contributions on these subjects,
with particular attention to the evolving field of health technologies.
Session 8 - Care at distance: telemedicine
and transformations of health-care settings
Organisers: Carlo Botrugno (Italy) and
Joana de Sousa Ribeiro (Portugal)
According to specialized literature in the
field, telemedicine services offer to reduce cost, whilst improving quality and
widening access of healthcare services. Nonetheless, a massive introduction of
these models in public health system could provoke striking effects on the
current organization of healthcare services delivery. Telemedicine is able to
profoundly restructure the social division of labour and professional jurisdiction
in medical setting, stimulating a redefinition of medical tasks that could
overweight the activities of paramedic professionals. Moreover, externalisation
of activities to off-shore specialised center in developing countries can led
to dismiss a quote of national health professionals. This panel intends to
debate the conditions, consequences and coalitions involved in the use of
telemedicine services for the healthcare access and provision. Papers dealing
with a comparative perspective, an interdisciplinary approach or a mixed
methods research are especially welcomed.
Session 9 - The active ageing policy
framework in Europe: challenges and potentialities for health care
organisations
Organisers: Angela Genova (Italy) and Micol
Pizzolati (Italy)
The ageing society calls for a
reorganisation of its health care system in accordance with the European
‘active ageing’ policy framework. The active ageing index was elaborated in
order to monitor and support active ageing policy at the national and subnational
levels on the basis of several indicators, some of which are strongly related
to organisations of the health care systems.
We invite contributions on the discussion
concerning the impact of the active ageing policy approach to local or national
health care work and organisations, focusing on the following aspects:
- Health promotion and the role of physical
exercise
- Unmet needs for health and dental care
- Independent living arrangements
- Mental health/well-being
- The use of ICT
- The role of social connectedness for
people’s health
The session invites internationally
comparative papers as well as national case studies focusing on the
implementation of active ageing policy and the related challenges and
potentialities for health care work and organisations. 5
Session
10 - Listening to the voices of children: how to bring them into the sociology
of health and illness
Organiser: Ana Patrícia Hilário (Portugal)
Children have been on the margin when
studying issues around health and illness within the field of sociology. There
is a need to bring children back to the mainstream and to integrate child’s
health into the agenda of medical sociologists. One might question: how
sociologists working in the field of health and illness may locate children at
the centre of the production of scientific knowledge? Which methodologies could
be employed to empower children? Which child health issues should be discussed
in order to avoid a taken-for-granted adult model? Regarding the theme of the conference
we might also ask: to what extent the voices of children have been neglected
within health care systems? How the provision of health care services to
children has been influenced by a taken-for-granted adult model? We invite
submissions whether theoretical, empirical or methodological that aims to
contribute to the development of a sociology of child’s health.
Session 11 - Emotions and the Qualitative
Health Researcher
Organisers: Ana Patricia Hilário
(Portugal), Ema Hresanova (Czeck Republic) and Kàtia Lurbe I Puerto (France)
There is a growing recognition within the
sociological literature of how emotions may influence the research process and
its results. Indeed the emotions of researchers might significantly affect and
inform the understanding of the phenomena being investigated which may
compromise the quality and validity of the research. This is particularly
relevant for researchers who conduct fieldwork in health care scenarios as most
of the time they have to deal with emotionally sensitive topics and/or work
with vulnerable populations. Nevertheless there is still little empirical
evidence that demonstrates the emotionality of the research process and gives
some insights on the best strategies that researchers might employ to manage their
own and others people’s emotions along the research process. Accordingly, this
session invites contributions which aim at addressing the role of emotions
within the process of doing qualitative research in the field of health, and on
the effects that emotional experiences might have on researchers.
Session 12 - Doing sociological research
with/within the “medical world”: research ethics and methodology
Organiser : Kàtia Lurbe I Puerto (France)
This session invites contributions that
will explore the ways sociological research is produced in a dialogical work
with medical and paramedical professionals. In particular, it seeks to bring
together researchers doing fieldwork within clinical settings (hospitals,
medical consultation, hospitals, nursing home, etc.) to discuss on the
methodological and ethical issues that arise in the different phases of the
research process.
As sociologists engaged in
multidisciplinary research team, what specific challenges do we face? Is there
any compromises or arrangement do we need to make? How does working within the
clinical settings influence the methodology of research? What are the cautions
to be taken in order to do a genuine sociological work?
Moreover, the session aims to interrogate
the ethical dimensions of doing sociology in interdisciplinary context. How is
confidentiality (i.e. either medical and research confidentiality) addressed
during the whole process? What is the role played by the ethical committees? 6
Session
13 - What new direction in oral healthcare?
Elena Spina (Italy) and Giovanna Vicarelli
(Italy)
Sociological literature shows the existence
of a very limited number of contributions related to the study of oral health
and dental healthcare.
Instead, this field of
study appears to be of particular interest, especially in the current
historical phase in which, on the one hand, there is a reduction of public and
private economic resources and, on the other, a massive development of dental
technology and treatment techniques is taking place. The aim of the session is
to understand if a reorganization of professional clinics (and their
organizational models) is taking place (from solo-practice model to group
practice, network, cooperatives, etc.) and if new forms of management are being
adopted in European countries, where there are different oral healthcare
system. The session welcomes contributions (even empirical and / or
comparative) that address this topic.
