Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Deep-Coverage Whole Genome Sequences And Blood Lipids Among 16,324 Individuals, Pradeep Natarajan, Gina M. Peloso, Seyedeh M. Zekavat, May Montasser, Andrea Ganna, Mark Chaffin, Amit V. Khera, John Blangero, Joanne E. Curran, Michael C. Mahaney

School of Medicine Publications

Large-scale deep-coverage whole-genome sequencing (WGS) is now feasible and offers potential advantages for locus discovery. We perform WGS in 16,324 participants from four ancestries at mean depth >29X and analyze genotypes with four quantitative traits—plasma total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and triglycerides. Common variant association yields known loci except for few variants previously poorly imputed. Rare coding variant association yields known Mendelian dyslipidemia genes but rare non-coding variant association detects no signals. A high 2M-SNP LDL-C polygenic score (top 5th percentile) confers similar effect size to a monogenic mutation (~30 mg/dl higher for each); however, among …

Non-Mumps Viral Parotitis During The 2014-2015 Influenza Season In The United States., Lina I. Elbadawi, Pamela Talley, Melissa A. Rolfes, Alexander J. Millman, Erik Reisdorf, Natalie A. Kramer, John R. Barnes, Lenee Blanton, Jaime Christensen, Stefanie Cole, Tonya Danz, John J. Dreisig, Rebecca Garten, Thomas Haupt, Beth M. Isaac, Mary Anne Jackson, Anna Kocharian, Daniel Leifer, Karen Martin, Lisa Mchugh, Rebecca J. Mcnall, Jennifer Palm, Kay W. Radford, Sara Robinson, Jennifer B. Rosen, Senthilkumar K. Sakthivel, Peter Shult, Anna K. Strain, George Turabelidze, Lori A. Webber, Meghan Pearce Weinberg, David E. Wentworth, Brett L. Whitaker, Lyn Finelli, Michael A. Jhung, Ruth Lynfield, Jeffrey P. Davis

Manuscripts, Articles, Book Chapters and Other Papers

Background: During the 2014-2015 US influenza season, 320 cases of non-mumps parotitis (NMP) among residents of 21 states were reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). We conducted an epidemiologic and laboratory investigation to determine viral etiologies and clinical features of NMP during this unusually large occurrence.

Methods: NMP was defined as acute parotitis or other salivary gland swelling of >2 days duration in a person with a mumps- negative laboratory result. Using a standardized questionnaire, we collected demographic and clinical information. Buccal samples were tested at the CDC for selected viruses, including mumps, influenza, human parainfluenza …

J Mich Dent Assoc Aug 2018

The Journal of the Michigan Dental Association

Archival issues of the Journal of the Michigan Dental Association may include reports on the activities of the association and its members, clinical articles, information on legal and ethical practice considerations, and perspectives of interest to MDA members and those in the oral health profession.

The Privilege Of Membership, Michael G. Maihofer Dds

The Journal of the Michigan Dental Association

Regular column featuring ethical guidance and consideration for practicing dentists.

Beta-Testing Of An Interactive Multimedia Computer Program Of Exposure Therapy For Ptsd, Marie C. Barrett

Dissertations

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) results in significant impairment for the individual and substantial costs to society. Research indicates that cognitive behavioral psychotherapy (CBT) is the most effective treatment for PTSD and that among CBT treatments, exposure therapy is the treatment technique with the strongest evidence to recommend it for PTSD treatment. Computerized programs that deliver evidenced-based treatments offer a potential solution to barriers that prevent individuals from accessing and completing treatment. The present study evaluates the clinical and practical functionality of a computer-based program designed for the treatment of PTSD. Results indicate that completion of the program is associated with …

Primary Care Physician Delivered Brief Behavioral Intervention For Adult Obesity And Associated Health Conditions, Julia C. Huston

Dissertations

Obesity is a chronic health condition with prevalence rates that have continued to rise steadily over the past 30 years to the point that it has now been declared a global epidemic and a serious public health concern. Obesity is associated with significant physical and economic costs, primarily resulting from co-occurring health conditions that increase the risk of morbidity including type II diabetes, hypertension, dyslipidemia, stroke, coronary heart disease, and respiratory problems. Despite the dissemination of several obesity treatments, including pharmacotherapy, lifestyle modification, and bariatric surgery, the prevalence and severity of obesity continues to rise. Federal guidelines recommend the use …

Demonstrating Functional Analytic Psychotherapy As An Independent Variable In Efficacy Research: A New Measure Of Treatment Fidelity, Lindsey E. Knott

Dissertations

Functional Analytic Psychotherapy (FAP) is a contextual behavior therapy that takes an in session, in vivo focus to improve client outcomes. This in vivo (IV) focus is distinctive of FAP and involves the therapist utilization of contingencies in session to decrease problematic response classes and increase more adaptive response classes (i.e., a differential reinforcement procedure). This contingent responding is proposed to be FAP’s mechanism of action leading to client change. FAP efficacy research mainly consists of small n single-case studies or group designs combing FAP with another CBT intervention. Maitland & Gaynor (2012) offered recommendations for increasing FAP efficacy research, …

Assessment Of A Nutritional Rehabilitation Model In Two Modern Broilers And Their Jungle Fowl Ancestor: A Model For Better Understanding Childhood Undernutrition, Mikayla Baxter

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The World Health Organization, estimated that 22.9% of children under the age of 5 are stunted. The etiology of stunting is multifactorial and is associated with poor linear growth, villous atrophy, dysbiosis, and increased intestinal permeability. Inclusion of rye in poultry diets induces nutrient deficiencies and increases intestinal permeability, dysbiosis and decreases growth rates. The objective of this dissertation was to determine if chickens consuming a rye based diet exhibited a similar pathophysiology of stunted children to develop a relevant animal model. Therefore, early or late phase malnutrition was induced determine the effects of malnutrition on performance, bone mineralization, intestinal …

Bringing Packed Red Blood Cells To The Point Of Combat Injury: Are We There Yet?, Aytekin Unlu, Soner Yilmaz, Ozlem Yalcin, Metin Uyanik, Patrizio Petrone, Riza Aytac Cetinkaya, Ali Cenk Aksu

NYMC Faculty Publications

INTRODUCTION: Hemorrhage is the leading cause of injury related pre-hospital mortality. We investigated worst case scenarios and possible requirements of Turkish Military. As we plan to use blood resources during casualty transport, the impact of transport related mechanical stress on PRBC (packed red blood cell) were analyzed. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The in vitro experiment was performed in the environmental test laboratories of ASELSAN(R). Operational vibrations of potential casualty transport mediums such as Sikorsky Helicopters, Kirpi(R) Armoured Vehicle and NATO vibration standardsoftware MIL-STD-810G were recorded. The most powerful mechanical stress, which was created by the NATO standard, was applied to 15 …

Delayed Spontaneous Recanalization Of Chronic Total Occlusion Of Left Anterior Descending Artery After Attempted But Failed Revascularization During Percutaneous Coronary Intervention, Nirmal Guragai, Upamanyu Rampal, Rahul Vasudev, Hiten Patel, Mahesh Bikkina, Fayez Shamoon, Hartaj Virk

NYMC Faculty Publications

Chronic total occlusion (CTO) of coronary artery remains the Achilles heel of the interventional cardiologist and is present in a significant proportion of referrals for coronary artery bypass graft surgery (CABG); however, with the development and standardization of modern CTO recanalization techniques, it has been able to achieve excellent success while coping with lesions of increasing complexity. Nevertheless, failure to recanalize despite the development of new techniques still remains one of the challenges in the field of interventional cardiology. Spontaneous recanalization has been described in nonocclusive coronary artery dissections in detail; none has addressed the possibility of spontaneous recanalization after …

Phosphorylation Alters The Properties Of Pol Eta: Implications For Translesion Synthesis, Chandana Peddu, Sufang Zhang, Hong Zhao, Agnes Wong, Ernest Y. C. Lee, Marietta Y. W. T. Lee, Zhongtao Zhang

NYMC Faculty Publications

There are significant ambiguities regarding how DNA polymerase eta is recruited to DNA lesion sites in stressed cells while avoiding normal replication forks in non-stressed cells. Even less is known about the mechanisms responsible for Pol eta-induced mutations in cancer genomes. We show that there are two safeguards to prevent Pol eta from adventitious participation in normal DNA replication. These include sequestration by a partner protein and low basal activity. Upon cellular UV irradiation, phosphorylation enables Pol eta to be released from sequestration by PDIP38 and activates its polymerase function through increased affinity toward monoubiquitinated proliferating cell nuclear antigen (Ub-PCNA). …

Molecular Survey For The Honey Bee Trypanosome Parasites Crithidia Mellificae And Lotmaria Passim, Mary-Kate Williams

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Honey bee populations have been fluctuating within recent years. No one cause has been attributed to colony fluctuations due to the theory that multiple stressors interact with one another to impact colony health. Consequently, microorganisms such as internal parasites of honey bees have been understudied as a contributor to colony health decline.

Molecular diagnostics were utilized to detect the presence of two honey bee trypanosome parasites, Crithidia mellificae and Lotmaria passim, in managed and feral honey bee populations from eight states in the United States (USA). Because studies on trypanosome infections are lacking in the USA, it is important to …

Percutaneous Pleural Drainage In Patients Taking Clopidogrel: Real Danger Or Phantom Fear?, Katherine Linder, Oleg Epelbaum

NYMC Faculty Publications

Despite being categorized as a procedure associated with a low risk of iatrogenic hemorrhage, percutaneous pleural drainage in patients taking the ubiquitous antiplatelet agent clopidogrel is still commonly perceived as a risky proposition. There is mounting evidence, however, in support of the safety of percutaneous needle procedures in persons receiving this medication. Establishing that these pleural interventions can be performed safely without clopidogrel interruption would be of great clinical significance, especially in those taking it for recent cardiac stenting and therefore in danger of stent thrombosis should antiplatelet therapy (APT) be withheld. The purpose of the present review is to …

Dissecting The Mechanism Of Action Of A Novel Antifungal Peptide, Cody Bullock

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There is an urgent need for novel treatments for Candida infections. The utility of antimicrobial peptides for antifungal therapy has garnered interest in recent years. One promising family of peptides is the Histatins, a family of naturally-occurring peptides secreted into the oral cavity that display antimicrobial activity. Histatin 5 is a twenty-four amino acid peptide with strong antifungal activity. Studies from our laboratory have identified a small histatin-derived peptide, KM29, that yields fungicidal activity 10-fold greater than Histatin 5 against multiple Candida species. Our laboratory has focused on understanding the mechanism of action of KM29 to further develop it as …

Changing Neighborhoods And Residents’ Health Perceptions: The Heart Healthy Hoods Qualitative Study, Paloma Conde, Marta Gutiérrez, Maria Sandin, Julia Díez, Luisa N. Borrell, Jesús Rivera-Navarro, Manuel Franco

Publications and Research

Cities, and therefore neighborhoods, are under constant change. Neighborhood changes may affect residents’ health in multiple ways. The Heart Healthy Hoods (HHH) project studies the association between neighborhood and residents’ health. Focusing on a middle–low-socioeconomic neighborhood in Madrid (Spain), our aim was to describe qualitatively its residents’ perceptions on the urban changes and their impacts on health. We designed a qualitative study using 16 semi-structured interviews including adult residents and professionals living or working in the area. Firstly, we described the perceived main social and neighborhood changes. Secondly, we studied how these neighborhood changes connected to residents’ health perceptions. Perceived …

A Novel Fas-Binding Outer Membrane Protein And Lipopolysaccharide Of Leptospira Interrogans Induce Macrophage Apoptosis Through The Fas/Fasl-Caspase-8/-3 Pathway., Peng Du, Shi-Jun Li, David M. Ojcius, Kai-Xuan Li, Wei-Lin Hu, Xu'ai Lin, Ai-Hua Sun, Jie Yan

All Dugoni School of Dentistry Faculty Articles

Leptospira interrogans is the major causative agent of leptospirosis, an emerging, globally spreading zoonotic infectious disease. The pathogen induces macrophage apoptosis, but the molecular basis and mechanism remain unknown. In the present study, we found that L. interrogans caused apoptosis of phagocytosis-inhibited macrophages, and the product of the L. interrogans LB047 gene (Lep-OMP047) was the unique protein captured by mouse and human Fas proteins. The recombinant expressed Lep-OMP047 (rLep-OMP047) strongly bound mouse and human Fas proteins with equilibrium association constant (K

The Tentorium Cerebelli: A Comprehensive Review Including Its Anatomy, Embryology, And Surgical Techniques., Rabjot Rai, Joe Iwanaga, Gaffar Shokouhi, Rod J Oskouian, R Shane Tubbs

Articles, Abstracts, and Reports

The tentorium cerebelli functions as a partition, dispelling the burden of weight from supratentorial structures upon inferior brain matter. Clinicians and neurosurgeons, when assessing pathological findings, should have knowledge regarding the tentorium cerebelli anatomy. This work of literature is a comprehensive review of the tentorium cerebelli, including its anatomy, embryology, and clinical and surgical implications. The evolutionary pattern demonstrates sequential stages to higher mammalian lineage. An understanding of the complexity of the neurovascular structures and the anatomy of the tentorium cerebelli is crucial for surgical procedures by neurosurgeons.

Very Low-Carbohydrate, High-Fat, Weight Reduction Diet Decreases Hepatic Gene Response To Glucose In Obese Rats, Kathleen V. Axen, Marianna A. Harper, Yu Fu Kuo, Kenneth Axen

Publications and Research

Background: Very low carbohydrate (VLC) diets are used to promote weight loss and improve insulin resistance (IR) in obesity. Since the high fat content of VLC diets may predispose to hepatic steatosis and hepatic insulin resistance, we investigated the effect of a VLC weight-reduction diet on measures of hepatic and whole body insulin resistance in obese rats.

Methods: In Phase 1, adult male Sprague-Dawley rats were made obese by ad libitum consumption of a high-fat (HF1, 60% of energy) diet; control rats ate a lower-fat (LF, 15%) diet for 10 weeks. In Phase 2, obese rats were fed energy-restricted amounts …

Dental Hygeinists Clinical Assessment Of Dental Cervical Lesions, Shyanne Padilla

Dental Hygiene ETDs

Dental hygiene is among one of the fastest growing career fields in the healthcare system. With dental hygienists spending a considerable amount of time with their patients during periodic recall appointments, it is important for dental hygienists to be calibrated with one another in how they recognize and aid in recommending treatment options for certain dental conditions. Dental cervical lesions is one of the most commonly seen oral implications in the dental office, many times being associated with tooth sensitivity. With the array of etiologies and treatment options for dental cervical lesions it is important to see if this same …

Comparison Of The Acute Effects Of Traditional Versus High Velocity Resistance Training On Metabolic, Cardiovascular, And Psychophysiological Responses In Elderly Hypertensive Women, Vânia Silva Macedo Orsano, Wilson Max Almeida Monteiro De Moraes, Nuno Manuel Frade De Sousa, Felipe Carmo De Moura, Ramires Alsamir Tibana, Alessandro De Oliveira Silva, Silvana Schwerz Funghetto, Brad J. Schoenfeld, Jonato Prestes

Publications and Research

Objectives: The aim of the present study was to compare the acute effects of traditional resistance training (RT) versus high velocity RT (HVRT) on metabolic, cardiovascular, and psychophysiological responses in elderly hypertensive women.

Methods: Fifteen elderly women (mean age ± standard deviation, 67.1±6.9 years) classified as having hypertension stage 1 or 2 were randomly allocated to complete traditional RT or HVRT; 1 week later, subjects allocated to RT completed the HVRT session and vice-versa. Heart rate, blood pressure, affective response, perceived effort, and blood samples analyzing lactate, nitrate, nitrite, oxidative damage (thiobarbituric acid reactive substances [TBARS]), and 6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8- tetramethylchroman-2-carboxylic acid …

Identification Of Micrornas In Response To Aluminum Stress In The Roots Of Tibetan Wild Barley And Cultivated Barley, Liyuan Wu, Jiahua Yu, Qiufang Shen, Lu Huang, Dezhi Wu, Guoping Zhang

Publications

BACKGROUND: Barley is relatively sensitive to Aluminum (Al) toxicity among cereal crops, but shows a wide genotypic difference in Al tolerance. The well-known Al-tolerant mechanism in barley is related to Al exclusion mediated by a citrate transporter HvAACT1 (Al-activated citrate transporter 1). A 1-kb insertion in the promoter region of HvAACT1 gene results in a dramatic increase of its expression level, which only occurs in some Al-tolerant cultivars. However, Al-tolerant Tibetan wild barley accession XZ29 did not have the 1-kb insertion. RESULTS: We confirmed that the expression of HvAACT1 and secretion of citrate and other organic acids did not explain …

Health Information Technology And Language Barriers In Pre-Admission Clinics, Sandra M. Coffey

Applied Research Projects

LEP or Limited English Proficiency patients across the United States are at higher risk for decreased quality of care because of their inability to communicate effectively with healthcare providers. Interpreters are not offered in a consistent manner due to many variables such as cost, availability of qualified interpreters, the time spent with patients due to an increased work-overload and clinician lack of knowledge into technologies available to use. Healthcare information technology such as video and telephone interpretation can bridge the gap between patients and medical personnel when a language barrier is present. At the pre-admission clinic, the Nursing personnel interviews …

Flipping The Flipped: The Co-Creational Classroom, Vuk Uskoković

Pharmacy Faculty Articles and Research

The flip teaching model is being increasingly adopted by higher education institutions as an active learning alternative to traditional lecturing. However, the flip model shares a number of critical premises with the classical didactics. The further flips of the flip are thus advocated and the fear of returning the method to its initial state, prior to the flip, via such flips of the flipped dispelled. Proposed here is a seminal variation to the flip model based on the active involvement of students in searching, finding, selecting, and assembling knowledge from various literature sources into the learning material for the entire …

Obesity Inequalities According To Place Of Birth: The Role Of Education, Elena Rodriguez-Alvarez, Nerea Lanborena, Luisa N. Borrell

Publications and Research

This study examined obesity inequalities according to place of birth and educational attainment in men and in women in Spain. A cross-sectional study was conducted using data from the Spanish National Health Survey 2011–2012 and from the European Health Survey in Spain 2014. We used data for 27,720 adults aged 18–64 years of whom 2431 were immigrants. We used log-binomial regression to quantify the association of place of birth with obesity before and after adjusting for the selected characteristics in women and in men. We found a greater probability of obesity in immigrant women (PR: 1.42; 95% CI: 1.22–1.64) and …

Investigation Of Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy Delivery Accuracy On An Elekta Linear Accelerator, Addie Barron

LSU Master's Theses

Purpose: This work investigated the delivery accuracy of high-dose lung and spine stereotactic treatments delivered with the Elekta Infinity and Versa HD platforms. The accuracy of these platforms will be used for consideration in implementing a spine stereotactic radiosurgery (SSRS) program at Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center.

Methods: A geometric phantom was used to perform Winston-Lutz type tests that assessed the relevant degrees of freedom (gantry, collimator, and couch) of the delivery system. A lung stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) and spine SRS treatment plan were generated for use in end-to-end testing. Delivery accuracy was tested using a novel diode …

“Do We Know Jack” About Jak? A Closer Look At Jak/Stat Signaling Pathway, Emira Bousoik, Hamidreza Montazeri Aliabadi

Pharmacy Faculty Articles and Research

Janus tyrosine kinase (JAK) family of proteins have been identified as crucial proteins in signal transduction initiated by a wide range of membrane receptors. Among the proteins in this family JAK2 has been associated with important downstream proteins, including signal transducers and activators of transcription (STATs), which in turn regulate the expression of a variety of proteins involved in induction or prevention of apoptosis. Therefore, the JAK/STAT signaling axis plays a major role in the proliferation and survival of different cancer cells, and may even be involved in resistance mechanisms against molecularly targeted drugs. Despite extensive research focused on the …

College Of Public Health News, Georgia Southern University

College of Public Health: News & Publications

• Georgia Southern reports on weight loss trends in overweight adolescents
• Georgia Southern Examines Health Departments' Activities to Address Health Disparities

Apoptosis Signal-Regulating Kinase 1 Inhibition Attenuates Human Airway Smooth Muscle Growth And Migration In Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease., Mathew S. Eapen, Anudeep Kota, Howard Vindin, Kielan D. Mcalinden, Dia Xenaki, Brian G. Oliver, Deepak A. Deshpande, Sukhwinder Singh Sohal, Pawan Sharma

Center for Translational Medicine Faculty Papers

Increased airway smooth muscle (ASM) mass is observed in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which is correlated with disease severity and negatively affects lung function in these patients. Thus, there is clear unmet clinical need for finding new therapies which can target airway remodeling and disease progression in COPD. Apoptosis signal-regulating kinase 1 (ASK1) is a ubiquitously expressed mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) kinase kinase (MAP3K) activated by various stress stimuli, including reactive oxygen species (ROS), tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α, and lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and is known to regulate cell proliferation. ASM cells from COPD patients are hyperproliferative to mitogens in vitro. …

Epigenetics In Ovarian Cancer: Premise, Properties, And Perspectives., Qilian Yang, Yuqing Yang, Nianxin Zhou, Kexin Tang, Wayne Bond Lau, Bonnie Lau, Wei Wang, Lian Xu, Zhengnan Yang, Shuang Huang, Xin Wang, Tao Yi, Xia Zhao, Yuquan Wei, Hongjing Wang, Linjie Zhao, Shengtao Zhou

Department of Emergency Medicine Faculty Papers

Malignant ovarian tumors bear the highest mortality rate among all gynecological cancers. Both late tumor diagnosis and tolerance to available chemical therapy increase patient mortality. Therefore, it is both urgent and important to identify biomarkers facilitating early identification and novel agents preventing recurrence. Accumulating evidence demonstrates that epigenetic aberrations (particularly histone modifications) are crucial in tumor initiation and development. Histone acetylation and methylation are respectively regulated by acetyltransferases-deacetylases and methyltransferases-demethylases, both of which are implicated in ovarian cancer pathogenesis. In this review, we summarize the most recent discoveries pertaining to ovarian cancer development arising from the imbalance of histone acetylation …

A Markov Approach For Increasing Precision In The Assessment Of Data-Intensive Behavioral Interventions, Vincent Berardi, Ricardo Carretero-González, John Belletierre, Marc A. Adams, Suzanne C. Hughes, Melbourne Hovell

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Health interventions using real-time sensing technology are characterized by intensive longitudinal data, which has the potential to enable nuanced evaluations of individuals’ responses to treatment. Existing analytic tools were not developed to capitalize on this opportunity as they typically focus on first-order findings such as changes in the level and/or slope of outcome variables over different intervention phases. This paper introduces an exploratory, Markov-based empirical transition method that offers a more comprehensive assessment of behavioral responses when intensive longitudinal data are available. The procedure projects a univariate time-series into discrete states and empirically determines the probability of transitioning from one …