Digital Commons Network^™

A Critical Policy Analysis Of Texas’ Closing The Gaps 2015, Katherine Cumings Mansfield, Stefani Thachik

Educational Leadership Publications

This critical policy analysis uses critical race theory to provide a counter narrative to the P-16 initiative in Texas known as Closing the Gaps 2015. Findings indicate that while these reforms aim to increase educational access and achievement for people of color, they fall short of addressing systemic inequities such as enduring segregation and unconstitutional school finance policy. Using Texas as a case study illumines the ways the growing number of P-16 councils throughout the US might adapt and improve policy development and implementation to more adequately address educational inequities across racial, ethnic, and linguistic groups. The article closes …

Core Competencies For Undergraduate Community-Engaged Researchers, Grant Wolfe

Community-Engaged Research Resources

Undergraduate community-engaged research (UCEnR) is a growing trend which VCU has proactively pursued by providing grants for UCEnR projects and assimilating UCEnR into interdisciplinary curricula. However, a definitive sense of core competencies for undergraduate community-engaged researchers has not yet been established. To that end, this literature review answers the question, "What skills should UCEnR students have?"

Safety And Protection Of Minors: Developing Policy And Best Practices To Protect Youth On Campus, Catherine Howard, Christina Carter, Meghan Resler, Jaqueline Kniska

Division of Community Engagement Resources

This presentation was given at the 2016 Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Conference in Washington, D.C.

Professional Development For Community-Engaged Research And Teaching: An Integrated Model For Administrators, Instructors, Researchers And Community Partners, Lynn E. Pelco, Jennifer Early

Division of Community Engagement Resources

This presentation was given at the 2016 Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities Conference in Washington, D.C.

A Neighborhood Team Approach To Strengthening University-Neighborhood Relations, Tito Luna

Division of Community Engagement Resources

At an urban university like Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), people and programs often blend into the cultural fabric of its surrounding neighborhoods. Opportunities and challenges inevitably arise. How can a university partner with contiguous communities to develop mutually-beneficial relationships? This presentation describes how a neighborhood outreach director works closely with neighborhoods, a neighborhood liaison group, university police and the City of Richmond. Learn how various university units came together to form the VCU Neighborhood Team.

Academic Health Centers: Improving The Health Of Our Communities Through Community Engagement, Jennifer Early, Valerie Holton

Division of Community Engagement Resources

This conference proceeding was presented at the International Association for Research on Service Learning and Community Engagement held September 2016.

Into The Weeds: Using Institutional Data To Support Program Improvement Across The University, Lynn E. Pelco, Scott Oates, Erin Marie Burke Brown, Janice Baab, James Gahagan, Gokhan Yucel, Chris Rillstone

Division of Community Engagement Resources

This presentation was given at the 2016 Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities Conference in Washington, D.C.

Are Your Findings 'Finding' Their Way To The Community? A Faculty Learning Community Approach To Broad Dissemination, Jennifer Early, Valerie Holton

Division of Community Engagement Resources

Presented at the International Association for Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement Conference on September 27, 2016 in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Getting To The Core Of Undergraduate Community-Engaged Research: A Case For Implementing Core Competencies In Ucenr, Tessa Mckenzie, Grant Wolfe, Herb Hill

Division of Community Engagement Resources

This conference proceeding was presented at the International Association on Service Learning and Community Engagement Conference held September 2016.

The Role Of Partnerships In Achieving The Vision: Tracking And Assessing Community Engagement, Valerie Holton, Kathleen Shaw

Division of Community Engagement Resources

This presentation was given at the Virginia Association for Management Analysis and Planning in Richmond, Virginia on October 20, 2016.

Art And Medicine: A Collaborative Project Between Virginia Commonwealth University In Qatar And Weill Cornell Medicine In Qatar, Amy J. Andres, Thomas R. Himsworth, Alan Weber, Stephen Scott

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Publications

Four faculty researchers, two from Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar, and two from Weill Cornell Medicine in Qatar developed a one semester workshop-based course in Qatar exploring the connections between art and medicine in a contemporary context. Students (6 art / 6 medicine) were enrolled in the course. The course included presentations by clinicians, medical engineers, artists, computing engineers, an art historian, a graphic designer, a painter, and other experts from the fields of art, design, and medicine. To measure the student experience of interdisciplinarity, the faculty researchers employed a mixed methods approach involving psychometric tests and observational ethnography. Data …

Saudi Scd Patients’ Symptoms And Quality Of Life Relative To The Number Of Ed Visits, Anwar E. Ahmed, Ahmed S. Alaskar, Donna K. Mcclish, Yosra Z. Ali, Mohammed H. Aldughither, Ahmad M. Al-Suliman, Hafiz M. Malhan

Biostatistics Publications

Background

Individuals living with sickle cell disease (SCD) have significantly increased emergency department (ED) use compared to the general population. In Saudi Arabia, health care is free for all individuals and therefore has no bearing on increased ED visits. However, little is known about the relationship between quality of life (QoL) and frequency of acute care utilization in this patient population.

Methods

A cross-sectional study was conducted on 366 patients with SCD who attended the outpatient department at King Fahad Hospital, Hofuf, Saudi Arabia. Data were collected through self-administered surveys, which included: demographics, SCD-related ED visits, clinical issues, and QoL …

Methods For Evaluating Respondent Attrition In Web-Based Surveys, Camille J. Hochheimer, Roy T. Sabo, Alex H. Krist, Teresa Day, John Cyrus, Steven H. Woolf

Biostatistics Publications

Background: Electronic surveys are convenient, cost effective, and increasingly popular tools for collecting information. While the online platform allows researchers to recruit and enroll more participants, there is an increased risk of participant dropout in Web-based research. Often, these dropout trends are simply reported, adjusted for, or ignored altogether.

Objective: To propose a conceptual framework that analyzes respondent attrition and demonstrates the utility of these methods with existing survey data.

Methods: First, we suggest visualization of attrition trends using bar charts and survival curves. Next, we propose a generalized linear mixed model (GLMM) to detect or confirm …

Proton Pump Inhibitors Are Associated With Increased Risk Of Development Of Chronic Kidney Disease, Pradeep Arora, Anu Gupta, Mojgan Golzy, Nilang Patel, Randolph L. Carter, Kabir Jalal, James W. Lohr

Biostatistics Publications

Background

Acute interstitial nephritis secondary to proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) frequently goes undiagnosed due to its subacute clinical presentation, which may later present as chronic kidney disease (CKD). We investigated the association of PPI use with the development of CKD and death.

Methods

Two separate retrospective case–control study designs were employed with a prospective logistic regression analysis of data to evaluate the association of development of CKD and death with PPI use. The population included 99,269 patients who were seen in primary care VISN2 clinics from 4/2001 until 4/2008. For evaluation of the CKD outcome, 22,807 with preexisting CKD at …

Improving Sensitivity Of Linear Regression-Based Cell Type-Specific Differential Expression Deconvolution With Per-Gene Vs. Global Significance Threshold, Edmund R. Glass, Mikhail G. Dozmorov

Biostatistics Publications

Background

The goal of many human disease-oriented studies is to detect molecular mechanisms different between healthy controls and patients. Yet, commonly used gene expression measurements from blood samples suffer from variability of cell composition. This variability hinders the detection of differentially expressed genes and is often ignored. Combined with cell counts, heterogeneous gene expression may provide deeper insights into the gene expression differences on the cell type-specific level.

Published computational methods use linear regression to estimate cell type-specific differential expression, and a global cutoff to judge significance, such as False Discovery Rate (FDR). Yet, they do not consider many artifacts …

African-American Patients With Cancer Talking About Clinical Trials (Tact) With Oncologists During Consultations: Evaluating The Efficacy Of Tailored Health Messages In A Randomised Controlled Trial—The Tact Study Protocol, R F. Brown, R Davis, M Wilson Genderson, S Grant, D Cadet, M Lessard, J Alpert, J Ward, G Ginder

Health Policy Publications

Introduction Low rates of accrual of African-American (AA) patients with cancer to therapeutic clinical trials (CTs) represent a serious and modifiable racial disparity in healthcare that impedes the development of promising cancer therapies. Suboptimal physician–patient consultation communication is a barrier to the accrual of patients with cancer of any race, but communication difficulties are compounded with AA patients. Providing tailored health messages (THM) to AA patients and their physician about CTs has the potential to improve communication, lower barriers to accrual and ameliorate health disparities.

Objective (1) Demonstrate the efficacy of THM to increase patient activation as measured by direct …

Dna Methylation Of Regulatory Regions Of Imprinted Genes At Birth And Its Relation To Infant Temperament, Bernard F. Fuemmeler, Chien-Ti Lee, Adelheid Soubry, Edwin S. Iversen, Zhiqing Huang, Amy P. Murtha, Joellen M. Schildkraut, Randy L. Jirtle, Susan K. Murphy, Cathrine Hoyo

Health Policy Publications

Background: DNA methylation of the differentially methylated regions (DMRs) of imprinted genes is relevant to neurodevelopment.

Methods: DNA methylation status of the DMRs of nine imprinted genes in umbilical cord blood leukocytes was analyzed in relation to infant behaviors and temperament (n = 158).

Results: MEG3 DMR levels were positively associated with internalizing (β = 0.15, P = 0.044) and surgency (β = 0.19, P = 0.018) behaviors, after adjusting for birth weight, gender, gestational age at birth, maternal age at delivery, race/ethnicity, education level, smoking status, parity, and a history of anxiety or depression. Higher methylation levels at the …

News Stories Of Intimate Partner Violence: An Experimental Examination Of Participant Sex, Perpetrator Sex, And Violence Severity On Seriousness, Sympathy, And Punishment Preferences, Matthew W. Savage, Jennifer A. Scarduzio, Kate Lockwood Harris, Kellie E. Carlyle, Sarah E. Sheff

Health Policy Publications

This study experimentally examines the effects of participant sex, perpetrator sex, and severity of violence on perceptions of intimate partner violence (IPV) seriousness, sympathy toward the victim, and punishment preferences for the perpetrator. Participants (N = 449) were randomly assigned to a condition, exposed to a composite news story, and then completed a survey. Ratings of seriousness of IPV for stories with male perpetrators were significantly higher than ratings of seriousness for stories with female perpetrators. Men had significantly higher sympathy for female victims in any condition than for male victims in the weak or strong severity of violence …

School-Based Dental Sealant Programs Prevent Cavities And Are Cost-Effective, Susan Griffin, Shillpa Naavaal, Christina Scherrer, Paul M. Griffin, Kate Harris, Sajal Chattopadhyay

Dental Public Health and Policy Publications

Untreated cavities can have far-reaching negative consequences for people's ability to eat, speak, and learn. By adolescence, 27 percent of low-income children in the United States will have untreated cavities. School-based sealant programs typically provide dental sealants (a protective coating that adheres to the surface of molars) at little or no cost to students attending schools in areas with low socioeconomic status. These programs have been shown to increase the number of students receiving sealants and to prevent cavities. We analyzed the cost-effectiveness of school sealant programs using data (from school programs in fourteen states between 2013 and 2014) on …

Providing Hands-On Training With Bioinformatics Databases: A Collaboration Between Vcu Libraries & Wright Center For Clinical And Translational Research, Karen H. Gau, Julie A. Arendt, Amy Olex, Aaron R. Wolen

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Background
With the goal of increasing specialized services for researchers, Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Libraries sent its basic science librarians to an intensive training on bioinformatics databases, “A Librarian’s Guide to NCBI.” VCU’s Wright Center for Clinical and Translational Research (Wright CCTR) was expanding the educational component of its bioinformatics support around the same time. This year, the librarians partnered with the Wright CCTR to offer an introductory bioinformatics database workshop introducing researchers to genetic/genomic databases.

Methods
For one week in June, sessions were conducted introducing up to 30 faculty and staff to The Cancer Genome Atlas and NCBI’s Gene, …

Virginia Dental Journal (Vol. 93, No. 3, 2016)

Virginia Dental Journal

No abstract provided.

Virginia Dental Journal (Vol. 93, No. 1, 2016)

Virginia Dental Journal

No abstract provided.

Effects Of 7-Day Repeated Treatment With The 5-Ht2a Inverse Agonist/Antagonist Pimavanserin On Methamphetamine Vs. Food Choice In Male Rhesus Monkeys, Matthew L. Banks L. Banks

Pharmacology and Toxicology Publications

Background

Preclinical drug vs. food choice is an emerging group of drug self-administration procedures that have shown predictive validity to clinical drug addiction. Emerging data suggest that serotonin (5-HT)_2A receptors modulate mesolimbic dopamine function, such that 5-HT_2A antagonists blunt the abuse-related neurochemical effects of monoamine transporter substrates, such as amphetamine or methamphetamine. Whether subchronic 5-HT_2A antagonist treatment attenuates methamphetamine reinforcement in any preclinical drug self-administration procedure is unknown. The study aim was therefore to determine 7-day treatment effects with the 5-HT_2A inverse agonist/antagonist pimavanserin on methamphetamine vs. food choice in monkeys.

Methods …

Identification Of The Metabolic Enzyme Involved Morusin Metabolism And Characterization Of Its Metabolites By Ultraperformance Liquid Chromatogaphy Quadrupole Time-Of-Flight Mass Spectrometry (Uplc/Q-Tof-Ms/Ms), Xianbao Shi, Brianna Mackie, Gang Zhang, Shuman Yang, Yonggui Song, Dan Su, Yali Liu, Lina Shan

Pharmacology and Toxicology Publications

Morusin, the important active component of a traditional Chinese medicine, Morus alba L., has been shown to exhibit many vital pharmacological activities. In this study, six recombinant CYP450 supersomes and liver microsomes were used to perform metabolic studies. Chemical inhibition studies and screening assays with recombinant human cytochrome P450s were also used to characterize the CYP450 isoforms involved in morusin metabolism. The morusin metabolites identified varied greatly among different species. Eight metabolites of morusin were detected in the liver microsomes from pigs (PLMs), rats (RLMs), and monkeys (MLMs) by LC-MS/MS and six metabolites were detected in the liver microsomes from …

Assessing The Unpredictable, Margaret E. Henderson

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

No abstract provided.

Sustaining Research Data Services, Margaret E. Henderson

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

No abstract provided.

Examining The Pieces: Usability Testing To Improve Outreach To Unaffiliated Health Professionals, Emily J. Hurst, Irene Lubker, Barbara A. Wright

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Objectives: In order to better address the information needs of unaffiliated public health and primary care professionals, librarians undertook a project to strengthen usability and refine the content of a freely available website maintained by the library. Collaboration with an advisory committee of local and state health care professionals allowed librarians to schedule focus groups and usability testing with diverse groups.

Methods: While a freely available, library maintained website had a long history, usability testing had not been done after a platform upgrade. Outside funding provided library staff with resources to engage with community groups focused on supporting public health …

Providing Support For An Interdisciplinary Research Group With A Multidisciplinary Informationist Team: Is It Effective?, Margaret Henderson, Karen Gau, Julie A. Arendt, Martha Roseberry, John Cyrus

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Background

Three subject librarians and a data librarian, representing three departments and two libraries at a university, were awarded an NLM Informationist Supplement to support an interdisciplinary Research Group with an NIH grant. The Informationist Team developed a model to utilize the skills of multiple librarians to support the increasing number of interdisciplinary and interprofessional research groups at the university. Librarians routinely attended lab meetings and shared notes with each other to monitor researcher needs.

Methods

The Informationist Team regularly provided support for literature searches, creating search alerts, bibliographic citation management and sharing, and data management to an interdisciplinary Research …

Ready, Set, Network! Research Speed Networking For Clinicians, Scientists And Engineers, Pamela M. Dillon, Karen H. Gau

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Objectives: A 2013 Institute of Medicine report urged researchers to “engage in additional substantive and productive collaborations” to address important clinical/translational science questions. To encourage team science among our researchers, Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences and Center for Clinical and Translational Research hosted a speed networking event, specifically targeting engineers, clinicians, and basic scientists; an analysis of the event is below.

Methods: Invitations were distributed to clinicians, engineers, and basic scientists. To maximize interactions without increasing time spent at the event, researchers were divided into three groups. The event was planned such that each group would meet everyone from …

Project Tracks Veterans’ Brain Injuries, Riley Murtagh

The Scope

About 20 percent of veterans who fought in the Iraq War sustained concussions. Of soldiers who received head trauma, about 8 percent continue to have symptoms, says Dr. David Cifu, chair of the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation in the VCU School of Medicine. “We need to understand how they’re going to do in terms of those symptoms.”