Inger Ahlstrand

Jönköping University · Department of Rehabilitation

Objective The aim was to explore whether occupational balance is associated with health, health-promoting resources, healthy lifestyle and social study factors among students during higher education within healthcare and social work. Design The study has a multicentre repeated cross-sectional design. Data were collected via a self-reported, web-ba...

Background Educational environments are considered important in strengthening students’ health status and knowledge, which are associated with good educational outcomes. It has been suggested to establish healthy universities based on a salutogenic approach – namely, health promotion. The aim of this study was to describe health-promoting resources...

Background: The World Health Organization has highlighted the importance of health promotion for health service providers in order to ensure sustainable working life for individuals involved in providing health services. Such sustainability begins when students are preparing to manage their own future health and welfare in working life. It has bee...

Introduction: Despite improved treatments and reduced disability, people with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) experience difficulties in daily life, which may negatively affect their balance of everyday life activities (occupational balance). The aim of this study was to describe occupational balance and its association with self-rated life satisfaction...

Background Experience of balance in everyday activities where work is an essential part is important to health and well-being,¹ as has also been observed in previous studies in people with rheumatoid arthritis (RA).² The Valued life activity scale (VLA-swe) is a questionnaire in which patient’s first report if the separate activities are valued or...

Background: Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic inflammatory disease often associated with disability. Despite new treatments, pain and activity limitations are still present. Objectives: To describe how persons with RA experience and manage pain in their daily life. Methods: Seven semi-structured focus groups (FGs) were conducted and analyzed u...

Objective: To study whether personal factors (self-efficacy and pain acceptance) mediate the relationship between pain and performance of valued life activities in persons with rheumatoid arthritis. Methods: Persons with rheumatoid arthritis for at least four years (n = 737; 73% women) answered a questionnaire measuring self-efficacy, pain accep...

Background The Valued Life Activities Scale (VLAs) is a measure of difficulties in participation and daily activities1. Originally developed in the USA, this measure was linguistically and culturally adopted for use in people with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) in the UK and Sweden2. According to the International Classification of Functioning3, partici...

To study differences regarding pain and activity limitations during the 3 years following diagnosis in women and men with contemporary treated early RA compared with their counterparts who were diagnosed 10 years earlier. This study was based on patients recruited to the Early Intervention in RA (TIRA) project. In the first cohort (TIRA-1) 320 pati...

This study aimed to examine the difficulties with performing valued life activities in relation to pain intensity in women and men with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). In total, 737 persons with RA (73 % women) from three rheumatology units in Sweden responded to a questionnaire measuring performance of 33 valued life activities and self-rated pain. The...

Background Over the last decades the RA-treatment strategies have changed considerably. Routines for early RA diagnosis and instituted disease modifying anti rheumatic drugs (DMARDs) have been established. In the early 2000s biologic agents also became available for treatment purposes. Despite these altered and improved strategies RA patients conti...

Background Despite early interventions, pain intensity is still moderate to high in the majority in rheumatoid arthritis (RA), leading to activity limitations and participation restrictions. The International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) is an overall conceptual model where disability and functioning are viewed as outc...

Background Disability in RA is more pronounced in women than in men and pain is strongly related to activity limitation and participation. The Valued life activity scale (VLA) is a questionnaire in which patient’s first report if the separate activities are valued or not to perform and secondly difficulties to perform these activities. To measure d...

The aim of this study was to describe experiences of pain and its relationship to daily activities in people with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Seven semi-structured focus group discussions were conducted with 33 men and women of different ages with RA. Data were analysed with content analysis. Pain affected everyday life and may be a barrier to perfo...

Objectives: (1) To elucidate the impact of long-term sick leave on activity patterns, life roles and life satisfaction in younger women; and (2) to deduce the locus of control orientation in these women. Study design: Twelve women aged 21-30 years were interviewed in their own home concerning activities in daily life, family and work situations....