Digital Commons Network^™

A Comparative Spatial And Climate Analysis Of Human Granulocytic Anaplasmosis And Human Babesiosis In New York State (2013-2018), Collin J. O'Connor

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Human granulocytic anaplasmosis (HGA) and human babesiosis are tick-borne diseases spread by Ixodes scapularis (the blacklegged or deer tick) and are the result of infection with Anaplasma phagocytophilum and Babesia microti, respectively. In New York State (NYS), incidence rates of these diseases increased concordantly until around 2013, when rates of HGA began to increase more rapidly than human babesiosis, and the spatial extent of the diseases diverged. Surveillance data of tick-borne pathogens (2007 to 2018) and reported human cases of HGA (n=4,297) and human babesiosis (n=2,986) (2013 to 2018) from the New York State Department of Health (NYSDOH) showed a …

Implementing A Police Assisted Addiction Recovery Initiative In Rural New York : How Police-Provided Transportation May Reduce Barriers To Treatment Uptake, Emily Mae Bruce

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Background:

Faith, Medication Adherence, And Cardiovascular Disease Among African American Churchgoers, Linett Lorain Brice

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Getting African Americans to adhere to medical management strategies to reduce negative health outcomes of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and CVD risk factors may be challenging. The purpose of this cross-sectional quantitative study was to examine whether levels of faith in God's healing, when it comes to taking medications, was associated with medication adherence to hypertension and/or diabetes mellitus type 2 (DMII) medications, and whether those factors were associated with prevalence of CVD and uncontrolled symptoms of CVD risk factors, namely hypertension and DMII. Social cognitive theory provided the framework for the study. Data were collected from surveys completed by 102 …

Impact Of Different Factors On Premature Deaths In Rural And Urban Virginian Counties, Christian Randazzo

Scholarship in Medicine - All Papers

The goal of this investigation is to analyze data that influences premature death rates in Virginian counties. Specifically, I am looking at how the rates compare between rural and urban Virginian counties in 2020. In addition, I am analyzing how the premature death rates correlates with low birthweights, with air pollution, with preventable hospital stays, and with children in poverty and see how these variables predict the variance in premature death rates by county. I am using data from the County Health Rankings website. They gathered their data via surveys, the National Vital Statistics System, the CDC health tracking network, …

Against The "Safety Net", Matthew B. Lawrence

Faculty Articles

Then-Representative Jack Kemp and President Ronald Reagan originated the “safety net” conception of U.S. health and welfare laws in the late 1970s and early 1980s, defending proposed cuts to New Deal and Great Society programs by asserting that such cuts would not take away the “social safety net of programs” for those with “true need.” Legal scholars have adopted their metaphor widely and uncritically. This Article deconstructs the safety net metaphor and counsels against its use in understanding health and welfare laws. The metaphor is descriptively confusing because it means different things to different audiences. Some understand the safety net …

Reconciling Environmental Justice With Climate Change Mitigation: A Case Study Of Nc Swine Cafos, D. Lee Miller, Ryke Longest

Faculty Scholarship

For thirty years, the swine industry has externalized severe environmental and health harms onto poor communities of color in Eastern North Carolina. This “Big Pig” problem is caused by the confinement, consolidation, and concentration of industrial hog operations within the low, flat, and economically marginalized Coastal Plain. Big Pig’s rise was not inevitable. As recently as 1982, more than 11,000 small swine farms freckled nearly all of North Carolina’s 100 counties. Then came the “boom” of consolidation and industrialization that transformed hog production into a highly consolidated and vertically integrated industry.

State Park Selection As Determined By User Health, Connor Phelan

Master's Theses or Doctor of Nursing Practice

The purpose of this study was to determine whether state park difficulty affected location of travel. This study was conducted at three state park locations within the United States. Surveys and on-site examinations were made at the following locations; Wilson State Park, Kansas, Petit Jean State Park, Arkansas, and Kiholo State Park, Hawaii. Park locations were chosen by varying levels of terrain difficulty, as well as a rating from the Recreation Opportunity Spectrum. Participants were asked to report data via iPads on exercise habits, mobility limiting impairments, and frequency of exercise so a ranking of the healthiest participants could be …

Contaminants Of Emerging Concern: Reconsidering Our Paradigm Of Water Pollution, Jonathan Gunasti

Pomona Senior Theses

In this senior thesis, I explore contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) and endocrine disrupting compounds (EDCs) and discuss the ways in which these novel contaminants defy traditional notions of pollution. I discuss the history and “emergence” of CECs and EDCs in scientific and public spheres and outline ongoing challenges to recognizing, prioritizing, and understanding the action of these contaminants. I position EDCs within the framework of environmental injustice and health disparities and suggest that these compounds could reinforce multigenerational health inequities. Finally, I perform a pilot analysis of the EDC bisphenol A (BPA) in Mt. Baldy Creek, the Los Angeles …

Novel Hepatitis C Virus (Hcv) Community Viral Load Measures, Hcv Incidence And Prevalence, And Hcv Prevention By Methadone Maintenance, Ashly E. Jordan

Dissertations and Theses

Abstract

Introduction

The incidence of Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection has increased in the current opioid epidemic in the United States; current estimates are that 2-3 million Americans have HCV infection. The ongoing and increasing HCV epidemic among people who use drugs (PWUD) is occurring in the context of known HCV prevention and highly efficacious and well-tolerated curative HCV treatment. The development of direct acting antivirals (DAAs) with cure rates approaching 100% dramatically changed the treatment landscape. This provides both the potential for improved individual- and population-level treatment effectiveness, and also the potential for population-level HCV ‘cure as prevention' (CasP) …

An Ecological Approach To Understanding Lethal Violence In The Us Using Stream Analogy, Jacqueline Seals

Theses and Dissertations--Public Health (M.P.H. & Dr.P.H.)

ABSTRACT OF CAPSTONE

Background: Lethal violence, homicides and suicides, is a growing issue in the US. Historically homicides and suicides have been studied separately, but with stream analogy of lethal violence homicides and suicides are both currents of lethal violence, just branching in opposite directions. The purpose of this study is to understand which county-level factors increase risk of lethal violence.

Methods: This ecological study combined open-source datasets to create one dataset of socioeconomic risk factors of lethal violence. Counties with 10 or more lethal violent deaths were included (n=2751). Negative Binomial models examined the relationship between risk factors and …

Predictors Of Kidney Transplant Receipt And Medicare Costs For Patients, Parisa Asgarisabet

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Background: The objectives of this study were to first understand whether a dialysis center’s ownership status modified the association between informing end-stage renal disease (ESRD) patients about transplantation options and patients’ transplantation status; and second, to understand whether Medicare’s Prospective Payment System (PPS) implementation affected the cost of care for ESRD patients from Medicare’s perspective.

Method: This study used the United States Renal Data System (USRDS) data containing information on all ESRD patients in the US, linked to Medicare claims. To address the first objective, a multi-level analysis using mixed effect multinomial logistic regression model was conducted with …

Sex Bias In The Diagnosis Of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, Olga Ivan Belitchenko Ryan

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a leading cause of morbidity, mortality, disability, and cost globally and in the United States. Various sources point to women experiencing greater morbidity, increased health care resource use and higher incidence of mortality resultant from COPD. While exact causality is not fully understood, it is possible that social bias towards COPD in women impacting screening and timely diagnosis may be a contributing factor. This current investigation involved the social ecological model. In this cross-sectional secondary analysis of Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, 2017 data, differences in screening through use of breathing testing among 6334 …

A Multi-Stage Machine Learning Approach To Predict Dengue Incidence: A Case Study In Mexico, Annalisa Appice, Yulia R. Gel, Iliyan Iliev, Vyacheslav Lyubchich, Donato Malerba

Faculty Publications

© 2013 IEEE. The mosquito-borne dengue fever is a major public health problem in tropical countries, where it is strongly conditioned by climate factors such as temperature. In this paper, we formulate a holistic machine learning strategy to analyze the temporal dynamics of temperature and dengue data and use this knowledge to produce accurate predictions of dengue, based on temperature on an annual scale. The temporal dynamics are extracted from historical data by utilizing a novel multi-stage combination of auto-encoding, window-based data representation and trend-based temporal clustering. The prediction is performed with a trend association-based nearest neighbour predictor. The effectiveness …

The Path To Pregnancy: Fertility Services And Assisted Reproductive Technologies, Olivia H. Gilbert

Scripps Senior Theses

The emergence of reproductive assistance like fertility treatments and assisted reproductive technologies (ART) in recent decades have provided new paths to pregnancy for many individuals. However, certain demographics in the US like low-income women and women of color are often excluded from utilizing these services on the basis of race, geography, and socioeconomic status. This in turn leads to significant disparities in access to and usage rates of such services. This research points out the perceived shortcomings in the current academic discussion surrounding fertility service disparities with the ultimate goal of expanding access to fertility assistance services for those who …

Exploring The Physical And Mental Health Disparities In The Transgender Male Community In A Southern Community-Based Medical Lgbtq Organization, Karen E. Musgrove

All ETDs from UAB

This dissertation examined the physical and mental health disparities in the transgender male community in a Southern community-based medical LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer) organization via a convergent mixed methods study design. There is a paucity of research on the transgender male community in terms of their physical and mental health care needs, services, and disparities. Quantitative data were col-lected via a chart review of 130 transgender male medical charts at the Magic City Well-ness Center (MCWC). The MCWC transgender male medical chart data were compared to three groups separately of the 2018 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) …

Obesity And Cardiovascular Health Differences Between Urban And Suburban Philadelphia High School Athletes, Kyle W. Prochno, Peri Levey, Prashant Rao, Md, David M. Shipon, Md, Facc, Facp, Jeremy D. Close, Md

Phase 1

Introduction: Limited data exist regarding hypertension and obesity levels of Philadelphia-area high school student-athletes. We aim to assess their prevalence in an urban population, investigate whether they are correlated with demographic factors, and determine whether urban student-athletes differ in these outcomes compared to their suburban/non-urban counterparts.

Methods: Demographic and physical data were extracted from Athlete Health Organization (AHO) 2018 pre-participation physical exams. Adiposity classifications were made from body mass index (BMI) calculations applied to appropriate Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) growth charts, while systolic/diastolic measurements were used to classify students’ blood pressure according to current American Academy of …

Why Does The Importance Of Education For Health Differ Across The United States?, Blakelee R. Kemp, Jennifer Karas Montez

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

The positive association between educational attainment and adult health (“the gradient”) is stronger in some areas of the United States than in others. Explanations for the geographic pattern have not been rigorously investigated. Grounded in a contextual and life-course perspective, the aim of this study is to assess childhood circumstances (e.g., childhood health, compulsory schooling laws) and adult circumstances (e.g., wealth, lifestyles, economic policies) as potential explanations. Using data on U.S.-born adults aged 50 to 59 years at baseline (n = 13,095) and followed for up to 16 years across the 1998 to 2014 waves of the Health and Retirement …

Coproid Predicts The Source Of Coprolites And Paleofeces Using Microbiome Composition And Host Dna Content, Maxime Borry, Bryan Cordova, Angela Perri, Marsha Wibowo, Tanvi Prasad Honap, Jada Ko, Kate Britton, Linus Girdland-Flink, Robert C. Power, Ingelise Stuijts, Domingo C. Salazar-García, Courtney Hofman, Richard Hagan, Thérèse Samdapawindé Kagoné, Nicolas Meda, Helene Carabin, David Jacobson, Karl Reinhard, Cecil Lewis, Aleksandar Kostic, Choongwon Jeong, Alexander Herbig, Alexander Hübner, Christina Warinner

Karl Reinhard Publications

Shotgun metagenomics applied to archaeological feces (paleofeces) can bring new insights into the composition and functions of human and animal gut microbiota from the past. However, paleofeces often undergo physical distortions in archaeological sediments, making their source species difficult to identify on the basis of fecal morphology or microscopic features alone. Here we present a reproducible and scalable pipeline using both host and microbial DNA to infer the host source of fecal material. We apply this pipeline to newly sequenced archaeological specimens and show that we are able to distinguish morphologically similar human and canine paleofeces, as well as non-fecal …

Distribution Of Healthcare Resources In Peninsular Malaysia : An Examination Of Equity With Respect To Geography And Allocative Processes, Saw Chien Gan

Student Works (2020-2029)

On a country’s pathway to Universal Health Coverage, it is important to ensure equitable healthcare provision and financing. There was a lack of evidence in equity of healthcare provision and financing across geographic areas in Peninsular Malaysia. This was despite the evidence that geographic factors directly and indirectly affect population health and healthcare services are mostly delivered at immobile healthcare facilities. In Malaysia’s mixed public-private healthcare system, Ministry of Health Malaysia (MOH) has a geographically comprehensive provision network and the MOH resources are distributed through geographic-bound MOH administrative structures. The private sector, which concentrated on more affluent geographic areas, also …

Covid-19 Risk Among Temporary Protected Status Beneficiaries, Diana Estefania Estrada Alamo

Public Health Theses

The current federal response of the United States to the COVID-19 pandemic has created conditions and resulted in unintended consequences that may be disproportionately increasing the risk of COVID-19 infection and sequelae for immigrant populations. This investigative thesis explores whether states with a greater percentage of Temporary Protected Status beneficiaries experience more COVID-19 related deaths as compared to the rest of the United States. Using a multiple linear regression model for statistical analysis, covariates under consideration include the number of COVID-19 confirmed cases, tests performed, hospitalizations reported, as well as the population density of each state and the proportion of …

You Win Some, You Lose Some: An Analysis Of Medicare For All’S Differential Impact On Hospital Finances, Leah Sussman

Public Health Theses

Background: High health care costs have led to an unprecedented number of policy proposals to reform the United States health care system. Proponents of Medicare For All (M4A) argue that a single-payer system would reduce costs by allowing the government to obtain better prices from providers. M4A would have varying effects on sources of hospital revenue, increasing some payment while decreasing others. This paper explores the differential effects of M4A on hospital income.

Methods: This paper uses data from CMS’s Healthcare Cost Report Information System (HCRIS) to create a baseline model reflecting hospital revenues and costs under current hospital payment …

Accuracy Of Death Certificate Data In Reporting Suicide In The United States, Miland Ned Palmer

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death in the United States. Death certificates are currently being used by public health professionals and policy makers as a main source of public health surveillance data on suicide. The accuracy of death certificates in tracking and reporting suicides has not been well quantified or evaluated in the United States. Death certificates from other countries have been found to under-report suicide. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the accuracy of death certificates in reporting suicides in the United States. The National Violence Death Reporting System (NVDRS) collects information on all …

Assessing School-Based Telehealth Utilization In Medically Underserved Communities, Danielle Wesley

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Medically underserved communities face challenges accessing health care services, and millions of Americans have no access to primary care. In many areas of the United States, the supply of primary care providers cannot keep up with the demand for health services. Newer healthcare delivery models are needed to address the issue. Using telehealth can augment the physician workforce shortages. The purpose of this quantitative dissertation is to examine the associations of telehealth utilization using a pediatric school-based telehealth model in Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSAs) in North Texas. Texas has many counties without a primary care provider, making them medically …

Relationship Between Pm2.5 Levels And Cancer Incidences In Interior Alaska, Sandra G. Lewis

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Exposure to high levels of ambient air particulates < 2.5 microns in diameter (PM2.5) in the Fairbanks North Star Borough (FNSB) and the resulting impact on cancer incidence is the focus of this study. Climate, geography, and culture influence PM2.5 levels, particularly during the long cold season. While this study considers lung cancer incidences from PM2.5 exposure, the primary focus of the study is the incidences of all other types of cancers from exposure to PM2.5, because of the limited research done on this topic. This quantitative, retrospective, cohort study considered the incidences of new cancer diagnoses in the population during a 10-year period (January 1, 2008-December 31, 2017). The 2 FNSB Zip Codes, designated “hot spots,” frequently see spikes in PM2.5 during the long cold season. These areas are densely populated and contain the EPA-regulated air quality monitors. Cancer diagnoses in the hot spot Zip Codes were compared to cancer diagnoses in outlying Zip Codes (non-hot spots) that experience less PM2.5 and are more consistently within the EPA air quality guidelines. EPA monitors are not yet located in the non-hot spots. Cancer patient data were obtained from the Fairbanks Memorial Hospital Cancer Center. The results demonstrated that a strong association was found between PM2.5 exposure and non-lung cancers (OR = 1.37; RR = 1.36; p < 0.001); and between PM2.5 exposure and lung cancer (OR = 1.87; RR = 1.88; p < 0.001). These findings may be used to promote an increased awareness among FNSB residents of the potential impact on cancer diagnoses from inhaling high levels of PM2.5, so residents may change their behavior in favor of alternatives to biomass burning to improve air quality.

Ailing In Place: Environmental Inequities And Health Disparities In Appalachia, Michele Morrone

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

In Ailing in Place, Michele Morrone explores the relationship between environmental conditions in Appalachia and health outcomes that are too often ascribed to individual choices only. She applies quantitative data to observations from environmental health professionals to frame the ways in which the environment, as a social determinant of health, leads to health disparities in Appalachian communities. These examples—these stories of place—trace the impacts of water quality, waste disposal, and natural resource extraction on the health and quality of life of Appalachian people.

Public health is inextricably linked to place. Environmental conditions such as contaminated water, unsafe food, and polluted …

Reinventing Privatization, Fabiana Turino, Jonathan Filippon, Francis Sodré, Carlos Eduardo Siqueira

Gastón Institute Publications

The Brazilian state apparatus was reformed throughout the 1990s, influenced by New Public Management (NPM). NPM was embodied in the health care sector by the creation of Social Health Organizations (Organizacões Sociais de Saúde or OSS), private non-profit entities to provide welfare services. We performed a systematic review of the literature outlining the origins and role of OSS in Brazil. Our selected articles (peer-reviewed) cover the origins/performance of OSS and their services provision between 1998 and 2018, in English or Portuguese. Databases used were Lilacs, Bireme, Medline, Pubmed, and SciELO. We identified 4,732 articles applying a pre-defined set of descriptors, …

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

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & 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 …

Factors Associated With Hiv Testing In Liberia: Findings From The 2013 Demographic Health Survey, Miatta M.E. Dennis

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is among the world’s most serious challenges. The African region is severely affected with nearly one in 25 adults being HIV infected –accounting for over two-thirds of HIV infected people worldwide. In 2013, approximately three in four men and half of women aged 15-49 had never been HIV tested. In 2018, over 7,000 Liberians were HIV positive. Increasing HIV testing rates is the primary step to reducing HIV infection rates. This study examines factors associated with HIV testing behavior among Liberians using the Knowledge Attitude Behavior (KAB) model as a conceptual framework. The 2013 Liberia Demographic …

Racial Segregation As A Social Determinant Of Health: Evidence From The State Of Georgia, Simon Medcalfe, Catherine P. Slade, Divesia Lee

Journal of the Georgia Public Health Association

Background: Despite decades of research, determining the causes of racial disparities in health remains a pernicious problem in the public health arena. Challenges include further refining definitions of health as well as expanding frameworks for social determinants of health to include relevant and related predictors. Racial segregation as a social determinant of health is understudied but of growing interest in the discourse on health disparities. This paper explores empirically the relationship between racial segregation and other predictors of social determinants of health and their collective impact on health outcomes defined in both objective and subjective terms.

Methods: Ordinary least squares …

Utilization Of A Community-Based Participatory Approach To Design And Implement A Peer-Led Parenting Pilot Intervention To Influence Child Nutritional And Physical Activity Behaviors, Tabia K. Henry Akintobi, Phd, Mph, David Satcher, Victor Ede, Mbbs, Glenda Wrenn, Md, Cassandra Bolar, Phd, Aneeqah Ferguson, Evonne Perdue, Martha Okafor, Kisha Holden, Leroy Reese, Phd

Journal of the Georgia Public Health Association

Parents and primary child guardians within the household play critical roles in shaping their children’s nutritional and physical activity behaviors, which are among the individual-level determinants of childhood obesity and other chronic conditions. There are well-established correlations between race, socioeconomic status and the risk for obesity calling for both contextually- and individual-centered interventions that are community-driven. The Using Quality Parenting (UQP) pilot intervention was a peer-led, parenting education intervention developed in collaboration with community residents in Atlanta, Georgia to influence child nutritional and physical activity behaviors in African American low socioeconomic status communities. A community-based participatory research (CBPR) framework was …