Women's Feelings Research Articles

COVID-19, Lockdown, and Intimate Partner Violence: Some Data from an Italian Service and Suggestions for Future Approaches.

Intimate partner violence (IPV)-defined as physical, psychological, sexual, and/or economic violence typically experienced by women at home and perpetrated by their partners or expartners-is a pervasive form of violence that destroys women's feelings of love, trust, and self-esteem, with important negative consequences on physical and psychological health. Many reports from several countries have underlined a remarkable increase in the cases of IPV during the COVID-19 emergency. In this opinion article, we discussed the hypothesis that such an increase may be related to the restrictive measures enacted to contain the pandemic, including women's forced cohabitation with the abusive partner, as well as the exacerbation of partners' pre-existing psychological disorders during the lockdown. In addition, we retrospectively analyzed some data derived from our practice in a public Italian referral center for sexual and domestic violence (Service for Sexual and Domestic Violence [SVSeD]). These data interestingly revealed an opposite trend, that is, a decrease in the number of women who sought assistance since the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak. Such a reduction should be interpreted as a negative consequence of the pandemic-related restrictive measures. Although necessary, these measures reduced women's possibilities of seeking help from antiviolence centers and/or emergency services. Owing to the COVID-19 outbreak, there is an urgent need for developing and implementing alternative treatment options for IPV victims (such as online and phone counseling and telemedicine), as well as training programs for health care professionals, especially those employed in emergency departments, to facilitate early detection of IPV.

Same-Day Correlates and Prior-Day Predictors of Couples' Violent Behaviors Based upon Partners' Daily Reports.

Although previous research identified predictors of violent events within violent heterosexual couples, findings were limited to the woman's reports, to her perceptions; his assessments were not obtained. This exploratory study was conducted to gain understanding of proximal predictors of violence assessed in "real-time" from the perspective of both partners. Fifteen adult heterosexual couples in which the woman reported experiencing partner violence in the prior 30 days were enrolled in a primary care clinic. Each partner provided separate daily telephone reports for eight weeks via an automated Interactive Voice Response (IVR), concerning the previous day's violence, alcohol use, stressors, emotional reactions and concerns for children. Same-day correlates were determined by Pearson correlations while prior-day predictors were identified via vector autoregression. Same-day correlations show that men's violence was associated with almost every other variable while women's violence correlated with men's violence, men's drug use, women's alcohol use, anger, closeness, hassles, and all men's negative feelings. Using prior-day predictors, men's violence was related to feelings (primarily hers), but women's violence was more dependent upon feelings of both of them as well as women's prior-day violence and alcohol use. Men's violence was dependent upon their partners' prior-day feelings and the men's lack of concern about effects of violence on children. Women's violence was also dependent upon women's prior-day feelings, as well as women's violence, alcohol use, marital closeness, and men's concern for children. Although the co-occurrence of men's and women's violence has been seen before, in this study only women's violence was linked to alcohol use.

EXERCISE DURING PREGNANCY

Apply It!Summary•Pregnant women are recommended to engage in ≥150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity over three or more days per week.•This level of PA significantly reduces the odds of developing pregnancy complications (e.g., diabetes and hypertension) without increasing the odds of miscarriage, early delivery, or a small baby.•Engaging in physical activity during pregnancy reduces the odds of developing depression by 67% and reduces the severity of depressive symptoms.•Increasing the amount of weekly exercise concomitantly reduces the odds of developing pregnancy-related complications.As exercise and health professionals, it’s important to consider a woman’s physical, mental, social, and spiritual health when prescribing exercise. Health and fitness professionals can encourage women during this period to be active and to include other areas of wellness by inviting friends to be active with them, or practicing mindfulness during PA, or joining group exercise session for increased social interactions. During pregnancy, there will be days where a woman feels tired or unwell, encouraging adequate rest and sleep to ensure recovery is as important as encouraging a resumption of activity after recovery. Consider the individual’s goal, whether it be disease prevention, stress reduction, or mood enhancement, in the design of an exercise plan or in making recommendations regarding PA. Although prescribing exercise during pregnancy requires additional considerations beyond nonpregnant women, such as time constraints, fatigue, and caring for other children, it is possible to develop effective strategies that increase PA while at the same time improving different aspects of wellness, particularly socioemotional well-being. And all of these can occur with as little as 10 minutes a day of PA.

How Does Ambivalence Appear in Women's Relationship to Cosmetics?

Some studies have subtly demonstrated the existence of a tension of ambivalence in women's subjective feelings while wearing makeup. This paper consists in analyzing how feelings of ambivalence towards cosmetics appear in women, and how women feel when they remove or put on cosmetics. The study consists of an online survey and a walk-along experience. The survey included 261 women, among these 229 cosmetics users and 32 non-users. It used the double-blank method while asking the participants to express their feelings about various situations evoking their facial appearance, such as looking at their face when being in front of the mirror. A multiple case analysis of four selected survey respondents has also been done in order to compare 2 regular users and 2 non-users in regard to their way of dealing with tension. The walk-along experience included interviews and observations in the following conditions according to the groups: 1. Removing makeup (for regular users) / wearing makeup (for non-regular users) in front of a mirror; 2. Walking outside in public; 3. Wearing makeup again (for regular users) / removing makeup again (for non-regular users) in front of a mirror. Our findings showed that ambivalent tension (in most users and non-users) was mostly visible through a divergence going from positive feelings (such as feelings of satisfaction) to negative, contradictive feelings and that some similarities were present between users' and non-users' tensions despite the context differences. Ambivalence is shown not only toward the "masked" face (i.e. face with makeup on it), but also the natural face. Makeup is therefore not necessary to experience a tension of ambivalence towards one's own face. However, the tensions revealed themselves as being rather minimal, as the "mask" is minimal itself. An interesting possible direction in future research would be to explore the origin of this ambivalence about the natural (unmasked) face, especially with regard to the appearance of facial skin including the worry about facial flaws such as acne spots.

Perception of Women regarding Respectful Maternity Care during Facility-Based Childbirth.

Background Respectful care during childbirth has been described as “a universal human right that encompasses the principles of ethics and respect for women's feelings, dignity, choices, and preferences.” Many women experience a lack of respectful and abusive care during childbirth across the globe. Objective This study aimed to determine women's perception of respectful maternity care (RMC) during facility-based childbirth. Method A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among 150 mothers admitted to the maternity ward of Nepal Medical College and Teaching Hospital using a purposive sampling technique. Data were collected through an interview technique by using a validated tool containing 15 items each measured on a scale of 5. Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 16 was used for data analysis. Frequency, percentage, mean score, standard deviation, chi-square test, and binary logistic regression were used to analyze descriptive and inferential statistics. Results In total, 84.7% of the women reported that they have experienced overall RMC services with a mean score ± SD (61.70 ± 12.12). Though the majority of the women reported that they have experienced RMC services, they also revealed that they have experienced disrespectful care in various forms such as being shouted upon (30.0%), being slapped (18.7%), delayed service provision (22.7%), and not talking positively about pain and relief during childbirth (28.0%). Likewise, length of stay, parity, and time of delivery were found as factors that influenced friendly care (COR = 0.383, 95% CI: 0.157–0.934), abuse-free care (COR = 3.663, 95% CI: 1.607–8.349), and timely care (COR = 2.050, 95% CI: 1.031–4.076) dimensions of RMC, respectively. Conclusion Even though RMC emphasizes eliminating disrespectful and abusive environment from health facilities, 15.0% of participants perceived that they have not experienced overall RMC services. So, the health facility should focus on the interventions which ensure that every woman receives this basic human dignity during one of the most vulnerable times in their lives.

An Applied Approach to Women's Sense of security in Urban Parks Case study: Bojnord city

The present article aims to monitor the level of women's security in urban parks first and then identify the parameters affecting women's sense of security and its priorities. The research methodology is quantitative one and its method is a descriptive-analytic study with a specific application of environmental design approach (CPTED), among 400 women from the age 15 to 65 years in Bojnord, according to the cluster sampling method, a proportional and random systematic classification has been made. The results of the study, by verifying and validating the 360 questionnaires, showed that among all the indicators for the CPTED approach, only the social activity support indicator has no role in women's security. But readability, oversight and public perception of space among other indicators of lighting, maintenance management, isolation and population density, signs and overall design of space, which confirmed their significant relationship with women's sense of security, had the highest impact on Women's feelings of security. The isolation and population density also have an inverse relationship with the sense of security. Hence, the sense of women's security can be seen as the result of management and overall design of space that should not be neglected in the policies and urban development process; In other words, if women's presence in some of the city's public spaces is low, this is the result of management structures and its semantic systems in particular regarding the role of women in the development of the city and the physical formulation of it and, therefore, inducing low security feeling for them in these spaces

Participação paterna no pré-natal e a saúde da mulher

A gravidez é um processo biológico que envolve além do casal, os familiares, a comunidade e os profissionais de saúde, que tem atuam nesse período, acompanhando do pré-natal ao puerpério. Período importante para que todas as mudanças e decorrentes da gravidez ocorram de forma tranquila. Para o Ministério da Saúde a gravidez também é um assunto para homens, estimular a participação do pai durante esse processo, interagindo com a equipe de saúde, é fundamental para o bem estar biopsicossocial do binômio mãe-bebê e dele próprio, sendo o pré-natal momento oportuno para isso. O estudo objetiva identificar a participação paterna no pré-natal e a saúde da mulher evidenciados nas publicações científicas, analisando fatores que contribuem para essa participação, mostrados nas publicações científicas. Trata-se de uma revisão integrativa da literatura, a pesquisa foi feita mediante busca online nas bases: Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior, Literatura Latino-Americana e do caribe em ciências da saúde e Scientific Electronic Library Online com os descritores: Gravidez, Paternidade e Cuidado Pré-natal. Os estudos foram agrupados em duas categorias, de acordo com a similaridade dos mesmos: A participação do pai no pré-natal e a participação do pai no parto. Concluindo que a participação paterna no acompanhamento do pré-natal e parto é essencial para a mulher, por conta da segurança e confiança que a grávida sente para encarar todas as transformações físicas, podendo assim ser um colaborador na promoção da saúde da companheira quando grávida, e ajudando na aproximação dessa família trazendo assim qualidade de vida.

Iot Based Emergency Security System for Women

In today’s era, women are progressing and scaling the peaks of success. However, there’s a significant hike in the number of crimes against women like molestation, eve-teasing, trafficking, etc. Also, there have been numerous attempts to ensure the safety of women ranging from the infamous mobile apps to the hefty belts &safety jackets,etc. However, it is not practical to carry such bulky systems and the victim may not be able to reach the smartphone without being noticed by the assaulter.This increases the risk factor. Therefore, to ensure the security of women, in this paper we propose an IOT based Emergency security system. This system includes a gsm, gps, raspberry pi, fingerprint module, camera module and IR led blasters. It aims at providing a dual security to the women with the help of panic button and fingerprint scanning device. Whenever a woman feels like she is in danger, she can manually switch on the system which will require her to scan her fingerprint for every 1 min. Practically, if she is in distress situation she would fail to scan and the camera module which is embedded in the woman’s pendant will start capturing images and live video. The GPS module will trace the exact location & GSM module will send emergency text messages to the specified contacts and alert the nearby police station. An additional provision of improved vision during night time using IR led blasters is incorporated in this system.

Analysis Of The Factors That Influence The Achievement Of K1 In The Working Area at The Tirtoyudo Community Health Center

The problem of maternal death is still a major problem in the health sector. The health of a pregnant women is an important aspect to consider in a women’s life cycle because during her pregnancy there can be unexpected complications. Pregnancy checks should be done as early as possible, as soon as a woman feels she is pregnant. The purpose of the study was to determine the effect of partial and silmutan between the pregnant women’s knowledge, husbands support, and the role of cadres on the level of achievement of K1 in the work area at the health center of Tirtoyudo. The research design used is quantitative research using “explanatory research. The sampling technique used is “proportional sampling” of 105 respondents. This study uses a survey method using a questionnaire that contains statements and the collection of dats by interview and questionnaire, then in the measurement technique of research data using a Likert scale. Likert scale has a gradation from very positive to very negative to four levels. Instruments that both must meet two requirements is important is valid and reliable. Validity is the level of reliability and validity of the tool measuring are used, while the test of reliability is useful to establish whether the instrument, in terms of this questionnaire, can be used more than one time, at least not by the respondents are the same and will generate data consistent. Results The study showed that 1) the knowledge Ibu Hamil has the effect of the positive and signiikan against keputusanIbu Pregnant To do Visits First (K1) three months of the first period of pregnancy , 2) support of husband does not have the effect that is significant to the decision of the mother pregnant to do the visit first (K1) three months of the first period of pregnancy and 3) the role of the CadreHealth has the effect that a positive and significant to the decision of the mother pregnant to do the visit first (K1) three months of the first period of pregnancy

Enfrentamento de mulheres com câncer de mama

Este estudo teve como objetivo descrever os sentimentos de mulheres com câncer de mama; identificar formas de enfrentamento utilizadas por estas mulheres; e apontar as estratégias que a equipe multiprofissional de um centro oncológico utiliza para auxiliar estas pacientes. Para tal, foi realizado um estudo descritivo, exploratório de abordagem qualitativa, com 22 mulheres com diagnóstico de câncer de mama e 16 profissionais do setor oncológico de um Hospital Geral que responderam questionário sócio demográfico e entrevista semiestruturada. Percebeu-se que a maior taxa de incidência do câncer de mama está entre as mulheres na faixa etária dos 50 a 69 anos, casadas e com baixa escolaridade, sendo a trajetória do tratamento do câncer de mama marcada por incertezas quanto à cura, quanto a equipe multiprofissional destacou-se a importância de cada profissional na amenização do sofrimento. Diante da análise foi possível discutir que encarada pela maioria das mulheres como algo mutilante e desestruturador e que abalam totalmente a sua autoestima o câncer de mama merece atenção coletiva para o seu enfrentamento, onde cada profissional desempenha o seu papel amenizando o sofrimento. Ante ao exposto, foi possível concluir que, a participação da família, a religião, as terapias de grupo, o trabalho psicológico, acolhimento, explicação do tratamento, prescrição correta da equipe e até mesmo gestos simples como escutar o paciente, são decisivos para auxiliar as mulheres no enfrentamento da doença e a obterem uma melhor adaptação biopsicossocial.

Sentimentos vivenciados por mulheres climatéricas: percepções de usuárias da atenção primária em saúde

Objetivo: Conhecer os sentimentos de mulheres que vivenciam o climatério acerca desta fase da vida. Método: Pesquisa qualitativa com 18 mulheres que vivenciam o período do climatério realizada em uma Estratégia em Saúde da Família de um município da região sul do Brasil. Os dados foram coletados por meio de um roteiro de entrevista semiestruturada em setembro de 2016. A análise dos dados foi a partir da Análise de Conteúdo de Minayo. Resultados: Os sentimentos citados pelas depoentes com maior frequência foram a melancolia, a baixa autoestima e depressão, pois o climatério é percebido como um período desconhecido e misterioso, que remete ao envelhecimento, a perdas e a negação. Nesse sentido, o cuidado de enfermagem precisa consubstanciar-se nos aspectos emocionais, sociais, biológicos, sexuais, ambientais e culturais que perpassam o climatério. Conclusão: Nessa perspectiva, para uma atuação qualificada na área da assistência à saúde da mulher climatérica, é essencial práticas que valorizem o conhecimento prévio e sentimentos experienciados, facultando, assim, um espaço de construção de saberes e fazeres neste campo de conhecimento.

한중 여성교훈서 비교연구

The study refines the expressions of women's feelings through the traditional female education moral books “Yeopbeom” and “Yeopbeomchubrok” of Chosun and China Among the women’s edicts are “Yeopbeom,” written by Yeongbin of Joseon, and “Yeopbeomchubrok” written by Yu, a royal priest of the Qing dynasty. If the “Yeopbeomchubrok” classified the total number of subjects a woman should have into a broad system, “Yeopbeom” was a person-centered classification that highlighted the practical lesson. “Yeopbeom” is the story of more than half of Chinese virgin and virtuous woman compared to “Yeopbeomchubrok” in the Chinese Qing dynasty. Youngbin Lee could not have completely abandoned her maternal side, so she would have published a number of stories in her book in order to justify her actions, not her will. However, Mrs. Youngbin did not forget his role as king's wife. Mrs. Yu, the Incision woman of the Qing dynasty, also makes up the story of maternal instincts in the “Yeopbeomchubrok” with stories of the Queen’s internal dentistry, filial piety at the expense of oneself, which he hopes to keep in a painful and intense manner. However, Yoo also tried to bring women out of the world by forming a story about the country-conscious Chung. Both female moral books consisted of the story of life that conforms to the feminine image, or in the life of the times, that man wants in a patriarchal society, but it also shows the story as a woman in it.

A Mixed Methods Study Exploring Older Womens' Attitudes Toward Osteoporosis Medications: Adapting a Health Communication Framework.

Background: Bisphosphonates (BPs) can reduce fracture risk for adults with osteoporosis (OP), but they have rare risks, complicating decision making. Guided by an established health decision and communication framework, we explored older women's feelings and positions toward taking BPs.Materials and Methods: Using a mixed-methods design, we interviewed women >65 years of age who had never taken BPs. After learning about BPs, participants responded to items about their feelings toward medication benefits/risks. They then identified their overall position toward taking BPs (corresponding to Unquestioning Acceptors, Cautious Acceptors, Hesitants, Probable Refusers, and Definite Refusers). We analyzed data using qualitative content analysis and summarized quantitative data with descriptive statistics.Results: Thirty women participated. Acceptors (N = 17, 56.6%) worried about OP-related fractures. Hesitant participants (N = 12, 40%) worried about BP risks, yet expressed openness toward medications if given opportunities to gather information and talk to clinicians. One Refuser expressed distrust in clinicians and pharmaceuticals.Conclusions: Understanding women's positions toward BPs might improve decision-making processes for OP treatment. Clinicians could tailor communication based on patients' identified BP position. Acceptors might be comfortable with succinct conversations describing medications. Hesitant patients might need more information from resources such as decision aids. Building trust with patients questioning BPs can support future conversations.

Gender Differences in the Perception of Safety in Public Transport

SummaryConcerns over women's safety on public transport systems are commonly reported in the media. We develop statistical models to test for gender differences in the perception of safety and satisfaction on urban metros and buses by using large-scale unique customer satisfaction data for 28 world cities over the period 2009–2018. Results indicate a significant gender gap in the perception of safety, with women being 10% more likely than men to feel unsafe in metros (6% for buses). This gender gap is larger for safety than for overall satisfaction (3% in metros and 2.5% in buses), which is consistent with safety being one dimension of overall satisfaction. Results are stable across specifications and robust to inclusion of city level and time controls. We find heterogeneous responses by sociodemographic characteristics. Data indicate that 45% of women feel secure in trains and metro stations (and 55% in buses). Thus the gender gap encompasses more differences in transport perception between men and women rather than an intrinsic network fear. Additional models test for the influence of metro characteristics on perceived safety levels and find that more acts of violence, larger carriages and emptier vehicles decrease women's feeling of safety.

Associations between Physical Self-Concept and Anticipated Guilt and Shame: The Moderating Role of Gender

Body-related emotions have been identified as important predictors of mental and physical health. Evaluations of the physical self are inextricably linked with body-related emotions. However, little research has addressed how physical self-concept is associated with anticipated emotions and how associations may differ between men and women. The current study examined associations between physical self-concept and anticipated guilt and shame and examined gender as a moderator of these associations. The sample consisted of 353 Canadian undergraduate students (55% female; Mage = 21.94. range = 18–64). Participants read a hypothetical scenario commonly associated with guilt and shame experiences and were asked to anticipate their emotional experience when imagining themselves in the scenario. Participants also indicated their gender and completed a measure of physical self-concept. Gender moderated the relationship between physical self-concept and anticipated shame but not guilt. Specifically, there was a negative association between physical self-concept and anticipated shame for women but not for men. Findings are consistent with the notion that gender role socialization shapes the emotional experiences, specifically feelings of shame, of men and women differently. The results demonstrate that even imagining a situation that runs counter to societal ideals for women’s bodies as thin and toned coincides with the anticipation of shame among adult women with more negative physical self-concept.

Maternal Sense of Control During Childbirth and Infant Feeding Method.

To estimate whether maternal sense of control in labor is associated with breastfeeding at 4-8 weeks postpartum. This is a secondary analysis of data from a multicenter randomized controlled trial of elective induction of labor at 39 weeks of gestation in low-risk nulliparous women. In this trial, women completed the Labor Agentry Scale, a validated measure of women's feelings of control over the childbirth process, 6-96 hours after delivery. The Labor Agentry Scale score, which is higher with more perceived control during childbirth, was analyzed both as a continuous and a categorical variable (quintiles). Self-reported breastfeeding at 4-8 weeks postpartum was categorized as exclusive breastfeeding, breastfeeding and formula feeding, or exclusive formula feeding. Women were included in this analysis if they labored, filled out a Labor Agentry Scale questionnaire, had a neonate who survived until the postpartum visit, and provided information on infant feeding. Multinomial logistic regression was used to adjust for confounders. Of 5,185 women, 32.9% (n=1,705) were exclusively breastfeeding, 31.2% (n=1,620) were breastfeeding and formula feeding, and 35.9% (n=1,860) were exclusively formula feeding 4-8 weeks after delivery. Overall Labor Agentry Scale score ranged from 34 to 203 (median 167, interquartile range 145-182). The median Labor Agentry Scale score was 169 (interquartile range 151-183) for women exclusively breastfeeding, 166 (interquartile range 142-182) for women who were breastfeeding and formula feeding, and 164 (interquartile range 142-181) for women who were only formula feeding (P<.001). In the unadjusted multinomial model, women with Labor Agentry Scale scores in the lowest two quintiles (ie, those with lower perceived control during childbirth) were less likely to be exclusively breastfeeding (as compared with those exclusively formula feeding) than women in the highest Labor Agentry Scale quintile. When controlling for confounders, however, this association was no longer significant. After adjustment for confounders, perceived control during childbirth was not associated with breastfeeding at 4-8 weeks postpartum among nulliparous women. ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT01990612.

Gender and Pain in Nineteenth-Century Cancer Care.

Gender and Pain in Nineteenth-Century Cancer Care.

Qualitative investigation of the factors that generate ambivalent feelings in women who give birth after receiving negative results from non-invasive prenatal testing

BackgroundWomen who receive negative results from non-invasive prenatal genetic testing (NIPT) may find that they later have mixed or ambivalent feelings, for example, feelings of accepting NIPT and regretting undergoing the test. This study aimed to investigate the factors generating ambivalent feelings among women who gave birth after having received negative results from NIPT.MethodsA questionnaire was sent to women who received a negative NIPT result, and a contents analysis was conducted focusing on ambivalent expressions for those 1562 women who responded the questionnaire. The qualitative data gathered from the questionnaire were analyzed using the N-Vivo software package.ResultsEnvironmental factors, genetic counseling-related factors, and increased anticipatory anxiety, affected the feeling of ambivalence among pregnant women. Furthermore, pregnant women desired more information regarding the detailed prognosis for individuals with Down syndrome and living with them and/or termination, assuming the possibility that they were positive.ConclusionsThree major interrelated factors affected the feeling of ambivalence in women. Highlighting and discussing such factors during genetic counseling may resolve some of these ambivalences, thereby enhancing the quality of decisions made by pregnant women.

Promotion of Low-cost Package of Technologies for Drudgery Mitigation in Turmeric Production System

Major role of farm women in the turmeric production system in Marathwada region was found to be in planting rhizomes, weeding, harvesting and cleaning activities. Ploughing, forming ridges, irrigation are performed solely by male farmers. Whereas participation of farm women in earthing up activity was 85 per cent, it was followed by fertilizer application (83%). Majority of the activities such as planting, earthing up, harvesting in turmeric production system were performed manually. Data on time spent by the female workers in performing different activities in turmeric production system indicated that maximum time-consuming activity was hand weeding (84 man-days/ season) followed by earthing up (63 man-days/ season) and cutting, sorting and cleaning roots (56 days/ season). As per the work demand score, all the activities performed in turmeric production system were very time demanding and very exhaustive as per the psychological feeling of the farm women. Earthing up is an important intercultural operation which is normally carried out twice or thrice during the crop season, accompanied by weeding and side dressing the crop with fertilizers. No tool or implement is used by farmers for earthing up activity. All the farmers were unaware of the hand-operated machines available for earthing up activity. After performing these activities continuously for 6 h, major health problems of the farm women reported were burning sensation to the skin, skin peeling and allergy. Hence, earthing up tool (Sawdi) small digging tool (Ukari), set of five finger guards (Nakhalya) for planting rhizomes, drying tool (wooden rake) (for making upside down while drying turmeric fingers), sulbha bag for fertilizer application, mittens for cleaning and sorting and new khurpi for weeding were developed and tested. The ergonomic assessment revealed that the physiological cost of selected activities performed by farm women in existing and improved method was same but the perception of workload was found to be reduced (13-32%) in an improved method. All the developed technologies used by farm women in the turmeric production system for planting, earthing up, fertilizer application and drying were successful in increasing space of work. In all these activities, the output was significantly increased by 10-26 per cent due to the use of developed technologies.

Experiences of BRCA1/2 Gene Mutation-Positive Women With Cancer in Communicating Genetic Risk to Their Relatives.

When a woman is diagnosed with hereditary breast or ovarian cancer, family members may be at high risk of cancers associated with BRCA1/2 gene mutation and benefit from disclosure of the genetic test result. This duty of informing relatives may be distressing, or relatives may not be properly informed. To qualitatively describe breast cancer patients' experiences communicating genetic risk of cancer to their relatives. Probands with BRCA1/2 gene mutations were recruited from an oncology institute in Istanbul, Turkey, and interviewed by telephone. Qualitative content analysis was conducted to derive central elements of the 30 women's experiences communicating genetic risk to their relatives. Six themes were identified: response to genetic test results, reason for communication, feelings about communication, reflection after communication, results of communication, and needs. Women with cancer found to have BRCA1/2 gene mutations tended to share their genetic test results within the family. The main motives for sharing test results were the desire to encourage relatives to get tested and moral and ethical convictions. Women needed explicit information regarding cancer risk and risk-reducing strategies to act upon. The women's feelings and reflections about the communication process were varied and suggest that personalized genetic risk communication interventions may better support women with BRCA1/2 gene mutations during and after communication with relatives. Long-term follow-up of those women is essential because of the need for informed decision on risk-reducing strategies.