PubMed HealthSearch

Biomedical subjects

J G Bruhn

Publications and source records attributed to J G Bruhn.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Gynostemma pentaphyllum: identification of major sapogenins and differentiation from Panax species.

Four main dammarane-type aglycones of gypenosides, extracted from the aerial parts of Gynostemma pentaphyllum were identified by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. By detecting these aglycones as well as the aglycones of ginsenosides, a difference in sapogenin composition between Gynostemma pentaphyllum and Panax species was observed, which can be used in the differentiation of these plant drugs.

Cucurbitaceae

Managing crazy behavior in organizations.

Crazy behavior is an aspect of organizational life. This article examines the two sides of crazy behavior, positive and negative, and suggests guidelines for its management so that it does not become pathological or destructive to the competence of the organization. Crazy behavior is related to professional and ethical behavior, but the boundaries of craziness are often less clear than those for professional and ethical behavior. Therefore, crazy behavior is often tolerated, if not supported and encouraged, by the reactions of administrators.

Behavior

Rethinking the future of tenure in the health professions: new wine in old bottles.

The purpose and meaning of tenure and the tenets surrounding it are not likely to change. The uses of tenure and accountability on the part of the giver and holder of tenure are both under scrutiny. Tenure or the process for attaining it is not appropriate for health professionals who intend to be providers of health care. Not everyone needs to be tenure to perform a quality service. The constraints of tenure for today's practicing health professionals are discussed.

Academic Medical Centers

The organization zoo: a fable.

In the parable that follows, we have exaggerated animal behavior to show the importance of ego niches that people make for themselves in organizations. The parable illustrates the difficulty supervisors have in juggling individual egos, organizational needs, and change. We are all familiar with the moral of this fable: ¿The more things change, the more they stay the same.¿

Administrative Personnel

Creating an organizational climate for multiculturalism.

Multiculturism is an ideal goal for our society, its organizations, and its institutions, involving a continuous process of education and change within organizations. Multiculturalism begins with diversity and requires various steps to achieve changes in attitudes, behaviors, and values. The leadership of organizations must not only commit to diversification, but they must participate in it and reward its efforts. Diversification should be managed by creating a climate of open participation, feedback, and control at the lower organizational levels. To micromanage the process of becoming diverse increases resistance and paranoia and counters educational efforts.

Cultural Diversity

Management by intimidation: "cooling out" perceived competitors.

Management by intimidation is not healthy, either for its victims or an organization. Intimidation is the style some managers use to keep potential competitors at bay, reminding them who holds the power. Intimidation creates fear within an organization and arouses a need for self-protection among its employees. Unfortunately, management styles often are not known or explored prior to hiring a chief executive officer (CEO). Since employees must adapt to a leader's style, this may mean that some have to leave the organization.

Administrative Personnel

Finding heroes and heroines: fads, fantasies, and foibles of search and screen committees.

Search and screen committees have many agendas other than finding candidates for a job vacancy. They are essentially political processes whereby special interest groups inside and outside the organization can express opinions, monitor diversity, and review and fine-tune the organizational culture with respect to planned change. Search committees reflect the fads of the institutional culture, have fantasies about the kinds of persons they will attract to the position, and commit foibles that may affect the outcome of the search.

Contract Services

Organizational moles: information control and the acquisition of power and status.

All organizations have moles or informants who seek to acquire informal power and status within the organization by keeping supervisors and the chief executive officer informed about employees and their activities. If the leaders of an organization are insecure and distrustful, they value the information about the organization that moles provide. Moles survive organizational change because they are loyal first to themselves. Moles often are hardworking, productive people, but their net effect on the organization's moral is negative because they foster distrust and defensiveness among employees. Guidelines are offered to help identify possible moles so they can be avoided lest one become a victim to moles' methods.

Administrative Personnel

Was opium known in 18th dynasty ancient Egypt? An examination of materials from the tomb of the chief royal architect Kha.

Examination by microscopy, thin-layer chromatography, gas-liquid chromatography alone and combined with mass spectrometry, and radioimmunoassay methods of materials from the tomb of the ancient Egyptian chief royal architect Kha, who is believed to have died about 1405 BC, has shown that there is no morphine--and hence no opium--present. This finding casts doubt on the results of an earlier analysis. Tropane alkaloids are likewise absent. The significance of the present findings for the history of the opium poppy, Papaver somniferum L., in the eastern Mediterranean region is discussed. Evidence (chemical, botanical, artefactual, and linguistic) for the supposed presence of the opium poppy and opium in Egypt in the Late Bronze Age is briefly reviewed. These considerations and the negative outcome of the present analyses mean that the earlier reported finding can no longer be accepted as evidence.

Egypt, Ancient

Diagnosing the health of organizations.

The concept of a healthy organization is idealistic. Organizations are never fully stable, they never maximize their potential, and they never achieve complete harmony. It is a common myth that the leader determines an organization's health. It is how the psychodynamics of an organization are managed and the capacity of leaders and followers to repair broken relationships that influence an organization's health.

Evaluation Studies as Topic

Administrators who cannot let go: the super manager syndrome.

Super managers manage boundaries; leaders transcend boundaries. Super managers want to ensure their success and that of their organization by getting the various units in the organization to do their jobs well. They want to get the right individuals and groups together to get the job done. Leaders, on the other hand, tend to be more concerned with team development and total quality management, which is accomplished by crossing boundaries. The tasks of a leader are viewed as getting the right people together to get a job done, which might involve bringing people from different units together. As Hirschhorn has said, Today you want a different kind of team. As you supervise large numbers of people, and as rapid changes in product lines and technologies require you to rely on the initiatives of team members, you need to authorize individuals in the team to think for themselves, come up with new ideas, try alternative approaches--in other words be nonconformists. Perhaps the most important distinction between a leader and a super manager is that a leader can see the whole forest without becoming concerned with all the varieties of trees and their interaction at different points in time.

Adaptation, Psychological

The nemesis of allied health accreditation: the emperor needs new clothes.

Allied health programs need a new approach and direction to accreditation. The author proposes that individual program accreditation be abolished and accreditation of allied health programs, by regional bodies, become part of institutional accreditation. The allied health accreditation process would thus change from the traditional self-study to an outcome assessment with an emphasis on monitoring change and innovation. Data bases on allied health, established by regional accrediting agencies, would become part of a national data base, which would facilitate the assessment of manpower needs, the equitable distribution of manpower, and the establishment of new educational programs. The competencies and change strategies of the Pew Health Professions Commission are used to specify the outcomes of educating allied health practitioners for the year 2005.

Accreditation

Boundary fighting: territorial conflicts in health organizations.

If health institutions are to be healthy places to work and study, managers in these institutions will have to take the lead to revamp old tradition-based boundaries. Health problems now rarely require the exclusive care of one specialist. Health care and rehabilitation require that many health care specialists work together. And, prevention crosses all disciplinary boundaries. Similarly, our changing society requires a more flexible workplace with job sharing, teaming, multicompetent personnel, and an environment that is dedicated more to meeting the needs of consumers than those of health professionals. Boundaries in health institutions must change if these institutions are to meet the needs of a changing society and attract and retain health care professionals who want to experience the opportunities of new, more permeable boundaries without the ordeal of warfare.

Conflict, Psychological

Problem-based learning: an approach toward reforming allied health education.

Problem-based learning (PBL) is presented as a useful way to educate allied health practitioners for the future. The essential characteristics of problem-based learning include: curricular organization around problems rather than disciplines; an integrated curriculum rather than one separated into clinical and theoretical components; and an inherent emphasis on cognitive skills as well as on knowledge. Long-term advocates of PBL stress that it is the only known method for preparing future professionals to be able to adapt to change, learning how to reason critically, enabling a holistic approach to health, and attaining integrated, cumulative learning.

Allied Health Personnel

What to say to persons with HIV disease.

I believe that the circumstances in which one learns of being infected with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) can form a pattern that may either hasten or postpone the physical and psychologic progress of HIV to full-blown AIDS. The experience of learning about one's seropositivity from one's physician sets the stage for the patient to determine who else needs to be told. This paper discusses the steps in communicating the diagnosis of seropositivity.

Adolescent