Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Information Feedback Delays Within Epidemic Models And Their Effect On Model Dynamics., Maria K. Bouka, Christopher Strickland Dr

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

Analytical Approach For Monitoring The Behavior Of Patients With Pancreatic Adenocarcinoma At Different Stages As A Function Of Time, Aditya Chakaborty Dr, Chris P. Tsokos Dr

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

Generalized Differential Equation Models For Disease Interventions: A Novel Approach For Predicting Sexually Transmitted Disease Outbreaks, Scott Greenhalgh

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

Modeling The Dynamics Of Alcohol-Marijuana Co-Abuse In Virginia, Ana L. Vivas-Barber, James Tipton, Sujan Pant, Anne Fernando

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

Relative Efficacy Of Resource Constrained Forward And Backward Contact Tracing In An Open Population, Nicholas Roberts

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

Association Between The Health Belief Model, Exercise, And Nutrition Behaviors During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Keagan Kiely, Bill Mase, Andrew R. Hansen, Jessica S. Schwind

Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Environmental Health Sciences Faculty Publications

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has affected our nation’s health further than the infection it causes. Physical activity levels and dietary intake have suffered while individuals grapple with the changes in behavior to reduce viral transmission. With unique nuances regarding the access to physical activity and nutrition during the pandemic, the constructs of Health Belief Model (HBM) may present themselves differently in nutrition and exercise behaviors compared to precautions implemented to reduce viral transmission studied in previous research. The purpose of this study was to investigate the extent of exercise and nutritional behavior change during the COVID-19 pandemic and explain the …

A Review Of Risk Concepts And Models For Predicting The Risk Of Primary Stroke, Elizabeth Hunter, John D. Kelleher

Articles

Predicting an individual's risk of primary stroke is an important tool that can help to lower the burden of stroke for both the individual and society. There are a number of risk models and risk scores in existence but no review or classification designed to help the reader better understand how models differ and the reasoning behind these differences. In this paper we review the existing literature on primary stroke risk prediction models. From our literature review we identify key similarities and differences in the existing models. We find that models can differ in a number of ways, including the …

Quantifying The Relationship Between Sub-Population Wastewater Samples And Community-Wide Sars-Cov-2 Seroprevalence, Ted Smith, Rochelle H. Holm, Rachel J. Keith, Alok R. Amraotkar, Chance R. Alvarado, Krzysztof Banecki, Boseung Choi, Ian Santisteban, Adrienne M. Bushau-Sprinkle, Kathleen T. Kitterman, Joshua Fuqua, Krystal T. Hamorsky, Kenneth E. Palmer, J. Michael Brick, Aruni Bhatnagar, Grzegorz A. Rempala

Faculty Scholarship

Robust epidemiological models relating wastewater to community disease prevalence are lacking. Assessments of SARS-CoV-2 infection rates have relied primarily on convenience sampling, which does not provide reliable estimates of community disease prevalence due to inherent biases. This study conducted serial stratified randomized samplings to estimate the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in 3717 participants and obtained weekly samples of community wastewater for SARS-CoV-2 concentrations in Jefferson County, KY (USA) from August 2020 to February 2021. Using an expanded Susceptible-Infected-Recovered model, the longitudinal estimates of the disease prevalence were obtained and compared with the wastewater concentrations using regression analysis. The model analysis …

Statistical Analysis Methods Applied To Early Outpatient Covid-19 Treatment Case Series Data, Eleftherios Gkioulekas, Peter A. Mccullough, Vladimir Zelenko

School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

When confronted with a public health emergency, significant innovative treatment protocols can sometimes be discovered by medical doctors at the front lines based on repurposed medications. We propose a statistical framework for analyzing the case series of patients treated with such new protocols, that enables a comparison with our prior knowledge of expected outcomes, in the absence of treatment. The goal of the proposed methodology is not to provide a precise measurement of treatment efficacy, but to establish the existence of treatment efficacy, in order to facilitate the binary decision of whether the treatment protocol should be adopted on an …

Epidemiological Assessment Of Wolbachia-Based Biocontrol For Reduction Of Dengue Morbidity, Olga Vasilieva, Oscar E. Escobar, Hector J. Martinez, Pierre-Alexandre Bliman, Yves Dumont

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

An Odd-Protocol For Agent-Based Model For The Spread Of Covid-19 In Ireland, Elizabeth Hunter, John D. Kelleher

Reports

No abstract provided.

Modeling The Heterogeneous Temporal Dynamics Of Epidemics On Networks, Andrea Joan Allen

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Mathematical models of infectious disease are important tools for understanding large-scale patterns of how a disease spreads through a population. Predictions of trends from disease models help guide public health prevention and mitigation measures. Most simple disease models assume that the population is randomly mixed, but real-world populations exhibit heterogeneous patterns in the way people interact. These differences in population structure can be represented by networks. Networks can then be incorporated into disease models by using various interdisciplinary concepts and tools. Yet even network disease models often overlook that populations change over time. In this thesis, two models of infectious …

Reinvigorating A Technical Countering Weapons Of Mass Destruction Distance Learning Graduate Certificate Program, James C. Petrosky, Gaiven Varshney, Jeremy Slagley, Sara Shaghaghi

Faculty Publications

Current Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction (CWMD) demands can be divided broadly into policy and science. The science of chemical, biological, and radiological/nuclear weapons informs the limits of development, production, employment, operation, detection, risk characterization, human and material protection, and medical intervention. In short, the science of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) should precede and inform the development of policy. It is to this end that the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) CWMD program was re-established, providing a technical educational option for practitioners to understand the science behind a very technically challenging subject.

Adapting An Agent-Based Model Of Infectious Disease Spread In An Irish County To Covid-19, Elizabeth Hunter, John D. Kelleher

Articles

The dynamics that lead to the spread of an infectious disease through a population can be characterized as a complex system. One way to model such a system, in order to improve preparedness, and learn more about how an infectious disease, such as COVID-19, might spread through a population, is agent-based epidemiological modelling. When a pandemic is caused by an emerging disease, it takes time to develop a completely new model that captures the complexity of the system. In this paper, we discuss adapting an existing agent-based model for the spread of measles in Ireland to simulate the spread of …

The Effects Of Differences In Vaccination Rates Across Socioeconomic Groups On The Size Of Measles Outbreaks, Elizabeth Hunter, John D. Kelleher

Conference papers

Vaccination rates are often presented at the level of a country or region. However, within those areas there might be geographic or demographic pockets that have higher or lower vaccination rates. We use an agent-based model designed to simulate the spread of measles in Irish towns to examine if the effectiveness of vaccination rates to reduce disease at a population level is sensitive to the uniformity of vaccinations across socioeconomic groups. We find that when vaccinations are not applied evenly across socioeconomic groups we see more outbreaks and outbreaks with larger magnitudes.

Sars-Cov-2 Transmission In Alberta, British Columbia, And Ontario, Canada, December 25, 2019, To December 1, 2020, Isaac Chun-Hai Fung, Yuen Wai Hung, Sylvia Ofori, Kamalich Muniz-Rodriguez, Po-Ying Lai, Gerardo Chowell

Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Environmental Health Sciences Faculty Publications

Objective:

This study aimed to investigate coronavirus disease (COVID-19) epidemiology in Alberta, British Columbia, and Ontario, Canada.

Methods:

Using data through December 1, 2020, we estimated time-varying reproduction number, R t , using EpiEstim package in R, and calculated incidence rate ratios (IRR) across the 3 provinces.

Results:

In Ontario, 76% (92 745/121 745) of cases were in Toronto, Peel, York, Ottawa, and Durham; in Alberta, 82% (49 878/61 169) in Calgary and Edmonton; in British Columbia, 90% (31 142/34 699) in Fraser and Vancouver Coastal. Across 3 provinces, R t dropped to ≤ 1 after April. …

Using A Hybrid Agent-Based And Equation Based Model To Test School Closure Policies During A Measles Outbreak, Elizabeth Hunter, John D. Kelleher

Articles

Background

In order to be prepared for an infectious disease outbreak it is important to know what interventions will or will not have an impact on reducing the outbreak. While some interventions might have a greater effect in mitigating an outbreak, others might only have a minor effect but all interventions will have a cost in implementation. Estimating the effectiveness of an intervention can be done using computational modelling. In particular, comparing the results of model runs with an intervention in place to control runs where no interventions were used can help to determine what interventions will have the greatest …

A Hybrid Agent-Based And Equation Based Model For The Spread Of Infectious Diseases, Elizabeth Hunter, Brian Mac Namee, John D. Kelleher

Articles

Both agent-based models and equation-based models can be used to model the spread of an infectious disease. Equation-based models have been shown to capture the overall dynamics of a disease outbreak while agent-based models are able to capture heterogeneous characteristics of agents that drive the spread of an outbreak. However, agent-based models are computationally intensive. To capture the advantages of both the equation-based and agent-based models, we create a hybrid model where the disease component of the hybrid model switches between agent-based and equation-based. The switch is determined using the number of agents infected. We first test the model at …

Epidemiology Of Cancers In Men Who Have Sex With Men (Msm): A Protocol For Umbrella Review Of Systematic Reviews, Manoj Kumar Honaryar, Yelena Tarasenko, Maribel Almonte, Vitaly Smelov

Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Environmental Health Sciences Faculty Publications

While earlier studies on men having sex with men (MSM) tended to examine infection-related cancers, an increasing number of studies have been focusing on effects of sexual orientation on other cancers and social and cultural causes for cancer disparities. As a type of tertiary research, this umbrella review (UR) aims to synthesize findings from existing review studies on the effects of sexual orientation on cancer. Relevant peer-reviewed systematic reviews (SRs) will be identified without date or language restrictions using MEDLINE, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, and the International Prospective Register for Systematic Reviews, among others. The research team members will …

A Model For The Spread Of Infectious Diseases In A Region, Elizabeth Hunter, Brian Mac Namee, John D. Kelleher

Articles

In understanding the dynamics of the spread of an infectious disease, it is important to understand how a town’s place in a network of towns within a region will impact how the disease spreads to that town and from that town. In this article, we take a model for the spread of an infectious disease in a single town and scale it up to simulate a region containing multiple towns. The model is validated by looking at how adding additional towns and commuters influences the outbreak in a single town. We then look at how the centrality of a town …

Concordance Between Health Administrative Data And Survey-Derived Diagnoses For Mood And Anxiety Disorders, J. Edwards, A. Thind, S. Stranges, M. Chiu, Kelly K. Anderson

Epidemiology and Biostatistics Publications

Objective: To assess whether estimates of survey structured interview diagnoses of mood and anxiety disorders were concordant with diagnoses of these disorders obtained from health administrative data.

Methods: All Ontario respondents to the 2012 Canadian Community Health Survey-Mental Health (CCHS-MH) were linked to health administrative databases at ICES (formerly known as the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences). Survey structured interview diagnoses were compared with health administrative data diagnoses obtained using a standardized algorithm. We used modified Poisson regression analyses to assess whether socio-demographic factors were associated with concordance between the two measures.

Results: Of the 4157 Ontarians included in our …

Rickettsialpox – A Rare But Not Extinct Disease: A Review Of The Literature And New Directions, Marina Eremeeva, Kamalich Muniz-Rodriguez

Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Environmental Health Sciences Faculty Publications

Smallpox rickettsia is an urban zoonosis caused by Rickettsia akari. To date, R. akari is the only characterized representative of the group of spotted fevers transmitted by the gamasid mite Liponyssoides sanguineus, which is common among peridomic rodents. This disease was first described in New York in 1946, and a few years later a similar outbreak occurred in the Ukrainian SSR. Numerous serological studies and diagnostics of sporadic cases of smallpox rickettsiosis suggest its widespread occurrence on the planet; however, the current geography and incidence of smallpox rickettsiosis is unknown. Smallpox rickettsiosis is characterized by the classic clinical triad of …

On The Dynamics And Structure Of Multiple Strain Epidemic Models And Genotype Networks, Blake Joseph Mitchell Williams

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Mathematical disease modeling has long operated under the assumption that any one infectious disease is caused by one transmissible pathogen. This paradigm has been useful in simplifying the biological reality of epidemics and has allowed the modeling community to focus on the complexity of other factors such as contact structure and interventions. However, there is an increasing amount of evidence that the strain diversity of pathogens, and their interplay with the host immune system, can play a large role in shaping the dynamics of epidemics.

This body of work first explores the role of strain-transcending immunity in mathematical disease models, …

Coccidioidomycosis: Medical And Spatio-Temporal Perspectives, Nikias Sarafoglou, Rafael Laniado-Laborin, Menas Kafatos

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

Coccidioidomycosis (CM) is a disease of major public health importance due to the challenges in its diagnosis and treatment. To understand CM requires the attributes of a multidisciplinary network analysis to appreciate the complexity of the medical, the environmental and the social issues involved: public health, public policy, geology, atmospheric science, agronomy, social sciences and finally humanities, all which provide insight into this population transformation.

In section 1 of this paper, we describe the CM-epidemiology, the clinical features, the diagnosis and finally the treatment.

In section 2, we highlight the most important contributions and controversies in the history of the …

Factors Associated With Eosinophilic Esophagitis In Nevada, Julia Lorraine Anderson

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) is a rare immune-mediated illness with symptoms that range from difficulty swallowing to food impaction of the esophagus. Most published studies have been documented among patients residing in cool regions with significant annual rainfall. No published studies to our knowledge have been performed examining the healthcare utilization trends of EoE in Nevada. Utilizing two unique databases, the factors associated with EoE healthcare utilization patterns in Nevada were examined. All analyses were performed in R version 3.5.1. This study included a demographic and regional analysis identifying risk factors associated with having an EoE healthcare visit in Nevada. Several …

Designing The Arriving Refugee Informatics Surveillance And Epidemiology (Arive) System: A Web-Based Electronic Database For Epidemiological Surveillance, William A. Mattingly, Ruth M. Carrico, Timothy L. Wiemken, Robert R. Kelley, Rebecca A. Ford, Rahel Bosson, Kimberley A. Buckner, Julio A. Ramirez

Journal of Refugee & Global Health

Objectives: We design and implement the Arriving Refugee Informatics surVeillance and Epidemiology (ARIVE) system to improve the health of refugees undergoing resettlement and enhance existing health surveillance networks.

Materials and Methods: Using the REDCap electronic data capture software as a basis we create a refugee health database incorporating data from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Electronic Disease Notification (EDN) system and domestic screening data from refugee health care providers.

Results: Domestic screening and EDN refugee health data have been integrated for 13,824 refugees resettled from 35 different countries into the state of Kentucky from the years 2013-2016.

Discussion: …

Investigating Drivers Of Dengue Emergence In Cordoba, Argentina, Michael Andrew Robert, Rachel Sippy, Anna M. Stewart-Ibarra, Rebecca C. Christofferson, Helen J. Wearing, Elizabet L. Estallo

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

Parameter Identification For A Stochastic Seirs Epidemic Model: Case Study Influenza, Olusegun M. Otunuga, Anna Mummert

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

Ebola: Impact Of Hospital's Admission Policy In An Overwhelmed Scenario, Mondal H. Zahid

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

A Study Of Pair Formation Disease Models With A Two Phase Infection, Berlinda Rosa Batista

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.