Background:Chronic heart failure (CHF) is a complex clinical condition. The higher survival rate after heart attack and other heart diseases, plus aging population, has led to more CHF patients. Symptoms can have negative impact on exercise capacity, ability to perform activities of daily living and quality of life. Heart failure clinics have been established to help better quality of life. Helping to stabilize and maintain patients´ health can reduce the need of hospital admission.

Quality Assurance in Service Procurement --- Total Quality and Total Quality Management refer to popular management philosophies in organizations these days. The purchasing department has an important part in the strive for organizational quality as several studies show corporate spend is significant and increasing. In this master thesis I study the actions companies take to ensure quality in service procurement. I argue that managing quality when sourcing services is particularly tricky, because of the special characteristics that belong to services. The purpose of the study is to examine whether different actions are taken to ensure the quality of different kinds of services.

The care for the elderly in the municipalities has recently seen the need for a formalized system for quality assurance. Under increasing demands for monetary efficiency while bound by law to retain acceptable standards in health care, there is need for efficient and at the same time quality-assured management. The municipalities often solve this puzzle by introducing systems and standards influenced by theory-clusters such as NPM (New Public Management), TQM (Total Quality Management) or other quality management theories.This essay focuses on how the public administration in the municipalities defines quality and designs and implements system for formalized quality assurance. Our basic view of organizations is institutionalist and our theoretical framework includes theories about quality, NPM and TQM..

Introduction: More and more children and young people get the diagnosis celiac disease established. Celiac is a life-long disease, which means that the child during the rest of its life has to be on a strictly gluten-free diet. There are few studies so far, which have examined how children having a life-long disease with food treatment and increasing prevalence really experience their health related quality of life (HRQoL).Purpose: The purpose of the study was to examine how children (8 ? 18 years old) suffering from celiac valued their HRQoL and to illustrate as well whether the age of the child and its extent of disease when it was taken ill affected the child?s evaluation of HRQoL later in life. The purpose was also to compare whether the children?s parents valued the HRQoL of their children to the same extent as the children did.Method: 160 children, 54 boys and 102 girls were included in the study.

Systematic quality work in preschool ? How preschool teachers thinking and working with systematic quality work The purpose of this study was to investigate how Swedish preschool teachers thinking and working with systematic quality work. All Swedish preschools are required to work systematically with quality. This involves several steps that follow each other in a specific order. It includes following up, documenting and evaluating preschool activities.

The purpose of this study is to describe and analyze how auditors are affected by quality controls and if audit practice changes because of quality controls. To fulfill the purpose of this study there has been interviews made with five auditors. The conclusion by this study is that the interviewed auditors work practices are affected by quality controls and that the extent and effect depends on the auditor and the office that the auditor works in. The auditors who worked as quality reviewers at the agencies where they are employed at, we felt that they were more secured in the response towards quality controls. This may be because they are quality reviewers themselves and they know what the quality control requires and what must be met to be approved.

Methadone is frequently used as an analgesic drug for dogs although there are very few studies describing the pharmacokinetics of methadone in this species. In man methadone has a long half-life and there are considerable differences in pharmacokinetics between individuals. The dose interval is lengthened when the drug is used fore longer periods of time due to prolonged half-life. Therefore the drug dose must be adjusted individually. The purpose of this study was to study the fundamental pharmacokinetics of methadone in dogs, and to find an optimal drug dosage.

Background: There are many people waiting for a kidney transplant. To get a kidney from a living donor has many advantages. The gift is about giving and receiving. The decision is characterized by life-philosophy of the donor.Aim: To highlight the experiences of the kidney donation process.Methods: A systematic literature review in which 11 articles were included, seven qualitative and four quantitative. The articles are quality and ethically reviewed, the results are analyzed according Granskär & Höglund and Polit & Beck.Results: The results were gathered under two themes: the decision-process shows the path from idea to decision and implementation-process treats the donation and confirmation of the gift.

AbstractObjective: To investigate the occurrence of and the risk factors for falls and to  investigate level of fall-related self-efficacy and health-related quality of life in people living in community living, 75 years or older within Uppsala and Västmanlands county. A further aim was to identify predictive risk factors for falls. Design: A cross-section study with a descriptive, comparative and correlative design based on a questionnaire was used. Participants: The participants were recruited from Uppsala and Västmanlands county. A random selection on 525 individuals was done, from a population based sample, in the detailed municipalities.

Högskolestudenters upplevda livskvalitet har varit ett eftersatt forskningsområde. Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka hur studenter på grund- respektive forskarutbildningen vid Stockholms universitet upplevde sin livskvalitet och jämföra resultaten med tidigare insamlade data från en normalgrupp. För att mäta den upplevda livskvaliteten användes formuläret Quality of life inventory, QOLI. Totalt inkom 1300 enkäter från studenter på grundutbildningen och 115 enkäter från studenter på forskarutbildningen. Resultaten visar att både studenter på grund- respektive forskarutbildningen skattar sin upplevda livskvalitet som signifikant lägre än normalgruppen.

Atopiskt eksem kännetecknas av en torr hud med hudsprickor som ger en svår klåda. Behandlingen går ut på att identifiera, minimera och eliminera faktorer som är utlösande och försämrande. Mjukgörande medel används dagligen för att före-bygga uppkomsten av nytt eksem. Att leva med atopiskt eksem kan vara ett stort handikapp med personliga, sociala och ekonomiska inskränkningar som leder till en sämre livskvalitet. Syftet med litteraturstudien är att klargöra om patienter med atopiskt eksem kan förbättra sin livskvalitet genom att få utbildning om sin sjuk-dom.

This research study constitutes a critical stand, which departure from the increase in welfare, and decrease in quality of life, and is further directed to the sphere of consumption. Contemporary consumers appear to seek for components to construct their self with through consumption, consumerism has become a sphere of life, and has consequently also become a victimizing force steering the identity and self construction of consumers. The alarm bells however are echoing in Western society, and consumers are experiencing dilemmas such as fragmentation, powerlessness, uncertainty and meaninglessness.In this respect we have presented spiritualism as an applicable path of escape or alternative to the scheme of the material oriented consumption sphere. We intend to broaden the scope of the interplay between spiritualism and consumerism in the act of yoga, and we have therefore been researching: what yoga is doing to consumers, and what consumers are doing to yoga. The study is based on an existential epistemology paradigm, which emphasis on the meaning of the yoga experience attained from the subjects of research; the yoga practitioners, and therefore we have carried out three focus group discussions.

Palliative care is founded on a holistic attitude, with the goal to alleviate suffering when a cure is no longer possible. Palliative care affirms life and regards dying as a normal process, providing possibilities of a quality time for the patient and family. Studies show that an increasing number of people choose to live the final phase of their life in their own home. A requirement for end of life care is an effective team work, where the nurse is responsible for more advanced care, and the caregiver?s provides the immediate care.

Do youths know what life values their parents have? Does this knowledge have a connection with the youth?s attachment to their parents? Do the youth?s life values differ from their parents? And could the youth?s life values affect how they estimate their parent?s life values? To answer these questions data from a survey were used. The respondents were 13-15 years old youths and their parents. The results show that youths do not know what life values their parents have, irrespective of if the attachment to them is good or bad. The results also show that the youth?s own life values to a high extend affect how they estimate their parent?s life values.

Every year an avorage of 40 000 Swedes fall ill with different forms of cancer. Chemotheraphy has an effect on the tumour cells as well as the healthy cells in the body, this causes many side effects which can be very problematic for the patient. The study was carried out in order to indicate the care measures that are taken to deal with the side effects i. e stomatit, loss of hair and sickness/vomiting, that are connected with chemotheraphy so that the outpatients will experience a quality of life. The method used was a qualitative interview with six nurses from the South if Sweden, all of whom are working with chemotheraphy patients.