Digital Commons Network^™

Comparative Analysis Of Zoning Of Food Retail And Urban Agriculture For Richmond, Virginia, Hannah Quigley Mph, Meghan Dinofrio, Sarah Shaughnessy Mph, Aicp, John C. Jones Mpa, Phd

Environmental Studies Publications

This research partnership between local public health practitioners and urban food systems scholars suggests improvements to City of Richmond, Virginia’s zoning code related to food retail and urban agriculture by drawing inspiration from other American central cities. The authors created an empirical process to identify potential sister cities to Richmond as a source for high quality comparative examples. Next, the authors then engaged in a non-empirical, purposive process of identifying potential zoning code improvements from both identified sister cities, as well as other communities. Time and capacity constraints dictated the non-empirical nature of this search. Recommendations for improvement to Richmond’s …

Vision, Advocacy, Narrative, Outreach: Strategic Communication For New Library Buildings, John E. Ulmschneider

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Publications

The scholarly and practice literature on communication strategies reveals the importance of both strategically crafted message content and a multilevel messaging process that reaches all stakeholders and potential supporters. This chapter describes how Virginia Commonwealth University Libraries developed and implemented a visioning, advocacy, and communications strategy in support of a major library construction initiative. The successful effort led VCU Libraries’ disparate communities to embrace and support a distinctive, award-winning library design that departed both from architectural practice at the university and from initial expectations for library buildings among stakeholder communities.

Healthy Communities: Flooded With Injustice?, Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute, Virginia Commonwealth University, Mel Borja, Krystle Dorsey, Tiffany Garner, Edgar Greer, Denise Harrington, Paula Robinson, Jalesha Smith, Dominique Thaxton, Jeffery Wilson Phd

The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute Publications

"HB1276 Comprehensive plan; Healthy Communities Strategy" authorizes defined localities to incorporate a healthy communities strategy into the next iteration of their local comprehensive plan and to engage the public in the process. In the absence of a predetermined definition, this report adopts the American Planning Association (APA) guidance as a standard, that a healthy community is a place where “all individuals have access to healthy built, social, economic, and natural environments that give them the opportunity to live their fullest potential regardless of their race, ethnicity, gender, income, age, abilities, or other socially defined circumstance.”1 This report will discuss how …

Virginia Dental Journal (Vol. 99, No. 2, 2022)

Virginia Dental Journal

No abstract provided.

Virginia Dental Journal (Vol. 99, No. 3, 2022)

Virginia Dental Journal

No abstract provided.

Violence Prevention Task Force: A Health System’S Journey Towards Zero, Lisa Davis, Denise Holyoak

VCU Health Nursing

VCU Health's mission is to be the safest most caring hospital with zero events of preventable harm to patients, team members, and visitors. Our goal cannot be achieved if our staff suffer from workplace violence injuries thus, our executive leaders sponsored a Violence Task Force in 2017 comprised of leaders and bedside staff from all disciplines to implement evidence-informed strategies to aid in the prevention, response or recovery to a violent event. Review of data and measures of our outcomes are based on our worker's compensation, behavioral rapid response, and safety culture surveys. Event drill-downs are achieved by our post-assault …

Hb 804 - Virginia Residential Landlord Tenant Act, Nonrefundable Application Fee, The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute At Virginia Commonwealth University, Sharika Bivens, Robin Buskey, Deadrian Carver Edd, Phyllis Haynes Phd, Ravynn Sikes, Satara Woodson, Percy Wyatt

The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute Publications

House Bill 804 limits when a landlord may charge a nonrefundable application fee in addition to a refundable application deposit. The bill prohibits a landlord with more than four rental dwelling units or more than a 10 percent interest in more than four rental dwelling units from charging prospective tenants any nonrefundable application fee above the amount necessary to reimburse the landlord for any actual out-of-pocket expenses paid by the landlord to a third party performing a number of pre-occupancies checks on the applicant. The originally proposed bill would have allowed an applicant to choose to provide relevant personal information …

Whistles Against Street Harassment (Wash), Rami Ammoun, The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute At Virginia Commonwealth University, Amita Goyal Chin, Dwayne Cooper, Margaret Turman Kidd, Hannah Miller, Melyatta Powers, Angela Reynolds

The Grace E. Harris Leadership Institute Publications

As an urban university nestled in a bustling city, VCU is committed to having all members of the community feel safe in public spaces. The Whistles Against Street Harassment (WASH) initiative aims to improve the safety of our VCU community by (1) providing a whistle, a practical and easyto- use tool that the target or bystanders can use to disrupt street harassment, and (2) raising awareness and dialogue related to street harassment and public safety. RAINN defines street harassment as “unwanted comments, gestures, or acts directed at someone in a public space without their consent.”1 Street harassment is not …

Influence Of Extracellular Volume Fraction On Peak Exercise Oxygen Pulse Following Thoracic Radiotherapy, Justin M. Canada, Elisabeth Weiss, John D. Grizzard, Cory R. Trankle, Leila Rezai Gharai, Franklin Dana, Leo F. Buckley, Salvatore Carbone, Dinesh Kadariya, Anthony Ricco, Jennifer H. Jordan, Ronald K. Evans, Ryan S. Garten, Benjamin W. Van Tassell, W. Gregory Hundley, Antonio Abbate

Internal Medicine Publications

Background

Radiation-induced myocardial fibrosis increases heart failure (HF) risk and is associated with a restrictive cardiomyopathy phenotype. The myocardial extracellular volume fraction (ECVF) using contrast-enhanced cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) quantifies the extent of fibrosis which, in severe cases, results in a noncompliant left ventricle (LV) with an inability to augment exercise stroke volume (SV). The peak exercise oxygen pulse (O2Pulse), a noninvasive surrogate for exercise SV, may provide mechanistic insight into cardiac reserve. The relationship between LV ECVF and O2Pulse following thoracic radiotherapy has not been explored.

Methods

Patients who underwent thoracic radiotherapy for chest malignancies with significant incidental heart …

Free, Fair, And Fabulous: Five Data Tools To Support Open And Reproducible Research At Your Institution, Christine Nieman, Katie Pierce-Farrier, Sean Corning, Elizabeth Roth

Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the Medical Library Association (MAC- MLA) Annual Meeting Posters/Presentations

Background

With more publishers and funders requiring data management and sharing plans, it is important for librarians, researchers, and support staff to be aware of the tools available to help them skillfully manage research data. There are a wide variety of tools available, both free and paid, that can work with data but selecting an affordable, accessible tool can be a barrier to use.

Description

This poster seeks to promote awareness of freely available tools for data management, wrangling, and sharing for use in daily work and research projects. The poster will review five data tools (DMPTool, NIH Common Data …

Choose Environmental Health And Justice As Your Next Adventure, April Wright, Faith Steele, Tiffany Chavis, Christine Nieman

Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the Medical Library Association (MAC- MLA) Annual Meeting Posters/Presentations

Background

With health outcomes and disparities being linked to environmental degradation, libraries and librarians have an opportunity to empower their communities with information. Librarians, public health practitioners and community scientists can benefit from learning about environmental health and justice, specifically about how these topics can have an impact on heath literacy and rural health.

Description

Environmental conditions as a social determinant of health was identified by Healthy People 2030 as one of its priority areas. Our lightning talk will discuss the importance of understanding environmental health and justice issues related to medically underserved communities. Environmental justice issues are known to …

Resources For Osteopathic Medicine, Elaine Powers, Jessica Muller

Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the Medical Library Association (MAC- MLA) Annual Meeting Posters/Presentations

Background

Collection development for Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine (COMs) has been a challenge since strictly osteopathic resources are somewhat specialized in regard to content and acquisition.

Description

This poster will present a list of textbooks and journals needed to develop an osteopathic library collection. Organizations and publishers with osteopathic resources will also be described.

Conclusions

A “top ten” list of osteopathic titles as well as a comprehensive list of osteopathic books and resources provide collection development guidelines for Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine as well as for librarians in other types of medical facilities. Creation of a QR code will provide …

Healthcare Utilization And Costs Among High-Need And Frail Mexican American Medicare Beneficiaries, Maricruz Rivera-Hernandez, Amit Kumar, Lin-Na Chou, Tamra Keeney, Nasim Ferdows, Amol Karmarkar, Kyriakos S. Markides, Kenneth Ottenbacher

Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Publications

Objectives
To examine Medicare health care spending and health services utilization among high-need population segments in older Mexican Americans, and to examine the association of frailty on health care spending and utilization.

Methods
Retrospective cohort study of the innovative linkage of Medicare data with the Hispanic Established Populations for the Epidemiologic Study of the Elderly (H-EPESE) were used. There were 863 participants, which contributed 1,629 person years of information. Frailty, cognition, and social risk factors were identified from the H-EPESE, and chronic conditions were identified from the Medicare file. The Cost and Use file was used to calculate four categories …

Perspectives On Primary Blast Injury Of The Brain: Translational Insights Into Non-Inertial Low-Intensity Blast Injury, Heather R. Siedhoff, Shanyan Chen, Hailong Song, Jiankun Cui, Ibolja Cernak, David X. Cifu, Ralph G. Depalma, Zezong Gu

Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Publications

Most traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) during military deployment or training are clinically “mild” and frequently caused by non-impact blast exposures. Experimental models were developed to reproduce the biological consequences of high-intensity blasts causing moderate to severe brain injuries. However, the pathophysiological mechanisms of low-intensity blast (LIB)-induced neurological deficits have been understudied. This review provides perspectives on primary blast-induced mild TBI models and discusses translational aspects of LIB exposures as defined by standardized physical parameters including overpressure, impulse, and shock wave velocity. Our mouse LIB-exposure model, which reproduces deployment-related scenarios of open-field blast (OFB), caused neurobehavioral changes, including reduced exploratory activities, …

Factors Associated With Patient-Reported Experiences And Outcomes Of Substance Use Disorder Treatment In Cape Town, South Africa, Bronwyn Myers, J. Randy Koch, Kim Johnson, Nadine Harker

Psychology Publications

Background

Interventions are needed to improve the quality of South Africa’s substance use disorder (SUD) treatment system. This study aimed to identify factors associated with patient-reported suboptimal access, quality, and outcomes of SUD treatment to guide the design of targeted quality improvement initiatives.

Method

We analysed clinical record and patient survey data routinely collected by SUD services in the Western Cape Province, South Africa. The sample included 1097 treatment episodes, representing 32% of all episodes in 2019. Using multivariate logistic regression, we modelled socio-demographic, substance use and treatment correlates of patient-reported suboptimal access to, quality and outcomes of SUD treatment. …

To Vax Or Not To Vax: Predictors Of Anti-Vax Attitudes And Covid-19 Vaccine Hesitancy Prior To Widespread Vaccine Availability, Hannah A. Roberts, D. Angus Clark, Claire Kalina, Carter Sherman, Sarah Brislin, Mary M. Heitzeg, Brian M. Hick

Psychology Publications

The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) is a highly contagious disease responsible for millions of deaths worldwide. Effective vaccines against COVID-19 are now available, however, an extreme form of vaccine hesitancy known as anti-vax attitudes challenge vaccine acceptance and distribution efforts. To understand these anti-vax attitudes and their associated psychological characteristics, we examined several predictors of vaccine hesitancy for COVID-19 and anti-vax attitudes generally. We surveyed 1004 adults (M = 47.0 years, SD = 17.1 years, range 18–98 years) in September-October 2020 across the United States (51% female, 49% male; 76.5% White, 23.5% non-White), prior to widespread availability of the COVID-19 vaccines. …

Impact Of Telelactation Services On Breastfeeding Outcomes Among Black And Latinx Parents: Protocol For The Tele-Milc Randomized Controlled Trial, Lori Uscher-Pines, Jill Demirci, Molly Waymouth, Rebecca Lawrence, Amanda Parks, Ateev Mehrotra, Kristin Ray, Maria Deyoreo, Kandice Kapinos

Psychology Publications

Background: Breastfeeding offers many medical and neurodevelopmental advantages for birthing parents and infants; however, the majority of parents stop breastfeeding before it is recommended. Professional lactation support by the International Board Certified Lactation Consultants (IBCLCs) increases breastfeeding rates; however, many communities lack access to IBCLCs. Black and Latinx parents have lower breastfeeding rates, and limited access to professional lactation support may contribute to this disparity. Virtual “telelactation” consults that use twoway video have the potential to increase access to IBCLCs among disadvantaged populations. We present a protocol for the digital Tele-MILC trial, which uses mixed methods to evaluate the …

Age-Related Changes And Longitudinal Stability Of Individual Differences In Abcd Neurocognition Measures, Andrey P. Anokhin, Monica Luciana, Marie Banich, Deanna M. Barch, James M. Bjork, Marybel R. Gonzalez, Raul Gonzalez, Frank Haist, Joanna Jacobus, Krista Lisdahl, Erin Mcglade, Bruce Mccandliss, Bonnie Nagel, Sara J. Nixon, Susan Tapert, James T. Kennedy, Wesley K. Thompson

Psychiatry Publications

Temporal stability of individual differences is an important prerequisite for accurate tracking of prospective relationships between neurocognition and real-world behavioral outcomes such as substance abuse and psychopathology. Here we report age-related changes and longitudinal test-retest stability (TRS) for the Neurocognition battery of the Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development (ABCD) study, which included the NIH Toolbox (TB) Cognitive Domain and additional memory and visuospatial processing tests administered at baseline (ages 9–11) and two-year follow-up. As expected, performance improved significantly with age, but the effect size varied broadly, with Pattern Comparison and the Crystallized Cognition Composite showing the largest age-related gain (Cohen’s …

Ramerican Political Science Review (Vol. 7, 2022)

Ramerican Political Science Review

Learning from Late Night / Jordan Hancock -- State Government Responses to Cross-State Air Pollution: The Effect of Problem Severity / Hayley Schier -- The Proxy Goes Both Ways: Digital Propaganda of Yemen’s Houthi Movement / Charlie Blomberg -- Book Review: The Consequences of Humiliation: Anger and Status in World Politics by Joslyn Barnhart / Alyssa Santoro-Adajian

Covid-19 Pandemic Impact On Us Childhood Caries And Potential Mitigation, Christina Scherrer, Shillpa Naavaal, Susan O. Griffin, Mei Lin

Dental Public Health and Policy Publications

Non-Hispanic Black (NHB) and Hispanic and low-income US children have a higher prevalence of untreated caries than their higher-income and non-Hispanic White (NHW) counterparts. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many dental offices and school sealant programs closed beginning March 2020. We examine the effect of reduced access to restorative care and sealants on the oral health of children from low-income households overall and by race/ethnicity and how increased sealant delivery in September 2022 could mitigate these effects. We used Markov chain Monte Carlo simulation to model COVID-19’s impact on first permanent molar (1M) caries incidence and loss in quality of …

Comprehensive Pregnancy Dental Benefits Improved Dental Coverage And Increased Dental Care Utilization Among Medicaid-Enrolled Pregnant Women In Virginia, Shillpa Naavaal, David W. Harless

Dental Public Health and Policy Publications

Objectives: To evaluate the changes in dental insurance and utilization among pregnant women before and after the pregnancy Medicaid dental benefit policy implementation in 2015 in Virginia.

Methods: We used pooled cross-sectional data from six cycles of the Virginia Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System on women aged ≥21 years. Using logistic regression models and a difference-in-difference design, we compared the effects of policy implementation on dental insurance and utilization between pre-policy (2013-2014) and post-policy period (2016-2019) among women enrolled in Medicaid (treatment, N = 1,105) vs. those with private insurance (control, N = 2,575). A p-value of 0.05 was …

Managing Hypertension, Diabetes, And Cardiovascular Disease Risk Via Short-Term Medical Trips: A Retrospective Longitudinal Study In Santo Domingo, Rose Baumann, Reuben P. Retnam, Carlos M. Hernandez, Victoria Edwards, Mark Ryan

Biostatistics Publications

Background: Short-term medical trips (STMTs) from high-resource countries frequently provide care in low and middle-income countries. Little existing literature objectively tracks the long-term outcomes of these interventions on the receiving populations over time to assess potential benefits and to ensure no harm is being done.

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to objectively analyze the outcomes of a biannual STMT to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic on hypertension (HTN), diabetes mellitus type 2 (DM2), and cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk over a five-year period (2015-2019).

Methods: Data from 1655 patients was extracted from the electronic medical record. In …

Long-Read Sequencing Of The Zebrafish Genome Reorganizes Genomic Architecture, Yelena Chernyavskaya, Xiaofei Zhang, Jinze Liu, Jessica Blackburn

Biostatistics Publications

Background

Nanopore sequencing technology has revolutionized the field of genome biology with its ability to generate extra-long reads that can resolve regions of the genome that were previously inaccessible to short-read sequencing platforms. Over 50% of the zebrafish genome consists of difficult to map, highly repetitive, low complexity elements that pose inherent problems for short-read sequencers and assemblers.

Results

We used long-read nanopore sequencing to generate a de novo assembly of the zebrafish genome and compared our assembly to the current reference genome, GRCz11. The new assembly identified 1697 novel insertions and deletions over one kilobase in length and placed …

Social Cognitive Outcomes Are Associated With Improvements In Mobility Performance Following Lifestyle Intervention In Prostate Cancer Patients Undergoing Androgen Deprivation Therapy, Zachary L. Chaplow, Alexander R. Lucas, Elizabeth Grainger, Christina Simpson, Ciaran M. Fairman, Victoria R. Descenza, Jessica Bowman, Steven K. Clinton, Brian C. Focht

Health Policy Publications

Objective
To compare the effects of an exercise and dietary intervention with those of standard-of-care management upon change in lift and carry performance and mobility-related self-efficacy beliefs and explore associations in prostate cancer patients undergoing androgen deprivation therapy.

Methods
32 prostate cancer patients (M age = 66.2 years; SD = 7.8) undergoing androgen deprivation therapy were randomly assigned to a 3-month exercise and dietary lifestyle intervention (n = 16) or standard-of-care management (n = 16). Outcome assessments were obtained at baseline, 2- and 3-month follow-up.

Results
The lifestyle intervention resulted in significantly greater improvements in lift and …

Association Between Periodontal Disease And Oral Cancer Screening Among Us Adults: Nhanes 2011-2014, Shillpa Naavaal, Dina T. Garcia, Xiaoyan Deng, Dipankar Bandyopadhya

Dental Public Health and Policy Publications

Objectives:

To examine oral cancer screening rates and associated factors among adults with periodontal disease (PD). We hypothesized that adults with severe PD will be less likely to report receipt of any type of oral cancer screening than adults with no PD.

Materials and Methods:

We used 2011-2014 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data on adults ≥ 30 years. PD status was classified as no PD, mild/moderate PD, and severe PD. Survey-adjusted logistic regression analysis was used to examine the model adjusted risk ratio (RR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) for the outcome of not receiving intraoral, extraoral …

Virginia Dental Journal (Vol. 99, No. 4, 2022)

Virginia Dental Journal

No abstract provided.

Dermatologic Manifestations Of Rheumatic Disease: Cutaneous Manifestations Of Sarcoidosis, Sarah Shapiro, Sindhuja Koppu, Mavra Masood, Beth Rubinstein, Huzaefah Syed

Open and Affordable Course Content at VCU

No abstract provided.

Sorafenib, Rapamycin, And Venetoclax Attenuate Doxorubicin-Induced Senescence And Promote Apoptosis In Hct116 Cells, Homood M. As Sobeai, Munirah Alohaydib, Ali R. Alhoshani, Khalid Alhazzani, Mashal M. Almutairi, Tareq Saleh, David A. Gewirtz, Moureq R. Alotiabi

Pharmacology and Toxicology Publications

Emerging evidence has shown that the therapy-induced senescent growth arrest in cancer cells is of durable nature whereby a subset of cells can reinstate proliferative capacity. Promising new drugs named senolytics selectively target senescent cells and commit them into apoptosis. Accordingly, senolytics have been proposed as adjuvant cancer treatment to cull senescent tumor cells, and thus, screening for agents that exhibit senolytic properties is highly warranted. Our study aimed to investigate three agents, sorafenib, rapamycin, and venetoclax for their senolytic potential in doxorubicin-induced senescence in HCT116 cells. HCT116 cells were treated with one of the three agents, sorafenib …

Researching Factors Influencing Faculty Engagement With Open Practices, Jessica Kirschner

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

“Researching factors influencing faculty engagement with open practices” provides an overview of a current research project at VCU which is attempting to identify which factors influence faculty engagement with open practices (for this project, publishing an open access article or book or creating or customizing OER), focusing on the VCU School of Education. An initial quantitative survey has been completed and the project will soon move to a qualitative data collection phase of interviews and focus groups. This presentation provides an overview on the current project status, initial results, how the team hopes to apply our findings, and next steps. …

Cellular Activation Following Acute And Chronic Ethanol In Glutamatergic Projection Neurons, Annalise Hassan, Sam Gottlieb, Michael F. Miles Md, Phd

IRBEH/Spit for Science Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.