Public Health Commons^™

Dietary Inflammatory Index During Pregnancy And Changes Over Time: Associations With Post-Partum Sleep Duration And Quality And Depressive Symptoms., Nowrin Tamanna

Theses and Dissertations

STUDY OBJECTIVES: Sleep and mental health are two important factors for a new mother, as adequate sleep and a healthy mind help her prioritize self-care, seek support when needed, and create a nurturing environment for both her and her baby. Among various plausible theories exploring the etiology of sleep disturbances and depression, the concept of inflammation is gaining attention. This study examined the hypothesis that more pro-inflammatory diets during pregnancy are associated with a decrease in sleep quality and duration, abnormal sleep timing and higher Edinburg Postnatal depression score (EPDS) scores 6 months and 12 months post-partum.

METHODS: A secondary …

Social Network Attributes Associated With Conversations About Smoking And Cessation And Differences By Socioeconomic Status, Victoria Catherine Lambert

Theses and Dissertations

Conversations about smoking and cessation in response to cessation messages appear to encourage quit attempts, yet there is some evidence that smokers with lower income and education have these conversations less often than their counterparts with higher income and education. No research has investigated the social network characteristics that encourage smokers to have these conversations or the mechanisms for SES differences in these conversations. Because social factors play a role in SES disparities in smoking and cessation as well as other health behaviors and outcomes, social network characteristics likely explain some SES differences in conversations about smoking and cessation. The …

No More Loosies: A Mixed-Methods Study On The Implementation And Enforcement Of The Loose Cigarette And Bidi Sale Ban In India, Mayank Sakhuja

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Sale of loose cigarettes and bidis (loosies) is widely accepted as a key factor in promoting the tobacco epidemic in India. This mixed-methods study aimed to broaden understanding around the sale and purchase of loosies addressed three aims: 1) To determine the prevalence and correlates of loosies purchase in India; 2) To examine the association between purchase behavior and health warning labels (HWLs) exposure and responses, and 3) To conduct a stakeholder analysis regarding the ban on the sale of loosies in India. Methods: Data from the 2018-19 Tobacco Control Policy (TCP) India survey (643 current cigarette users and …

The Genetic Associations Of Circadian Rhythm And Sleep Disorder Traits With Risk Of Monoclonal Gammopathy Of Undetermined Significance And Multiple Myeloma, Brittany Crawford

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Circadian rhythm disruption and sleep have been widely studied for their roles in immunity and cancer development. Evidence for an association of circadian rhythm and sleep traits with multiple myeloma (MM) risk is inconclusive. No studies have investigated these traits in relation to monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS). Given that MGUS precedes almost all MM cases, investigating sleep and circadian rhythm in relation to both MM and MGUS is necessary. The purpose of this dissertation was to explore the genetic influences of circadian rhythm and sleep traits on the risk of MGUS and MM. Methods: Data were leveraged …

Correlates Of Immunization Timeliness In Three South Asian Countries: Secondary Analysis Of Demographic And Health Surveys, Tanzir Ahmed Shuvo

Theses and Dissertations

Despite the availability of effective vaccines, 1.5 million children under the age of 5 years die every year because of vaccine preventable diseases. Improvements in vaccine delivery infrastructure have resulted in relatively high coverage of vaccines, but many children are not receiving their vaccines on a timely basis. Timely administration of routine vaccines recommended by the Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) ensures maximum efficacy. It is vital to explore rates of vaccination timeliness and the correlates of timely vaccination among children to design targeted interventions for improving both coverage and timeliness. We conducted a secondary data analysis of the Demographic …

Phoneme Stability In Speech Production Of Cognate And Non-Cognate Nouns In A Bilingual With Aphasia, Katherine Vlach

Theses and Dissertations

With the growing bilingual population in the world comes a greater incidence of bilingual aphasia, a communication disorder characterized by expressive or receptive language impairment in one or both of a bilingual speaker’s languages. The cognate facilitation effect, which has greatly been explored in healthy bilingual studies, has shown that cognates are named faster and more accurately than non-cognates; as the cognate facilitation effect is also retained in bilingual speakers with aphasia, it is thought that cognates could potentially be used as a treatment tool to facilitate lexical access, particularly when a bilingual speaker with aphasia presents with one of …

Exploration Of The Association Between Obesogenic Environments And Childhood Overweight/Obesity Rates In Rural Counties In The United States, Kara Lea Ferguson Davis

Theses and Dissertations

Rising obesity rates, particularly among children, pose a significant public health concern. Of particular concern is the prevalence of childhood obesity in rural communities, with up to 38% of rural children classified as overweight or obese, compared to 30% of urban children. Rural communities often lack the typical built environment characteristics associated with increased physical activity rates and healthy eating behaviors. Further, research on obesogenic environments within rural areas is limited. This study aimed to address this research gap by examining the association between obesogenic environment features and childhood overweight/obesity rates across the urban-rural continuum.

Simple and multiple linear regression …

Prenatal Depression And Breastfeeding Practices Healthy Start Participants, 2019-2022, Peyton Ashleigh Mosher

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Breastfeeding has health benefits for both mother and child, but breastfeeding practices among Black and lower-income women are the poorest in the United States. Few studies have examined the associations between maternal prenatal depression and breastfeeding duration, even fewer among a predominantly low-income Black population. Objective: To explore the association between prenatal depression and breastfeeding practices among low-income Black women during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: Prospective cohort data from Midlands Healthy Start (MHS) was analyzed to examine women’s depression symptoms during pregnancy and their breastfeeding initiation and duration through two and six months. Perinatal depressive symptoms were identified using …

Bayesian Spatial And Spatio-Temporal Models For Complex Data Sets, Rongjie Huang

Theses and Dissertations

The cost of testing for infectious diseases can be high, and analyzing large amounts of historical data to forecast disease prevalence can be a time-consuming process. Group testing techniques offer a way to decrease the expenses associated with testing, but this comes at the cost of increased complexity of the data structure due to grouping and imperfect testing when compared to individual-level testing. In this dissertation research, we propose two Bayesian mixed effects spatial group testing regression models: one for areal data and the other for point process data. The former model utilizes a conditional autoregressive (CAR) prior for areal …

A Cross-Sectional Analysis Of Infectious Causes Of Congenital Morbidity And Mortality In Central America: Torch, El Salvador, Mary Katherine Lynn

Theses and Dissertations

The primary goal of this dissertation was to understand the prevalence of the most regionally salient TORCH pathogens among a group of perinatal women from a highly vulnerable region of El Salvador at the time of parturition. TORCH pathogens, that cause TORCH congenital syndromes, are classically defined as Toxoplasma gondii, other infectious causes of concern (Zika virus, malaria, human immunodeficiency virus, etc), Rubella virus, Cytomegalovirus(CMV), and Herpes Simplex Viruses. These infections can be passed from mother to fetus through the placenta or other perinatal routes and cause severe maternal and neonatal morbidity and mortality. This dissertation sought to understand perinatal …

Food Insecurity In Youth And Young Adults With Diabetes: Prevalence And Association With Health Behaviors, Lauren Helene Martini

Theses and Dissertations

Given the life-long impact of diabetes(1-5), it is important to engage in behaviors that promote health and wellness to delay or prevent negative health outcomes(3, 6-10). Despite this, youth and young adults with diabetes generally do not adhere to nutritional(11-17) or physical activity(18, 19) recommendations. In households experiencing financial difficulties, especially those who are having difficulty providing sufficient food to all of its members, adhering to recommendations may be even more difficult.

The purpose of this dissertation is to better understand and contextualize food insecurity among youth and young adults (YYA) with youth-onset T1DM and T2DM. The first aim addresses …

Multilevel Description Of Spotted Fever Group Rickettsia Among Humans, Animals, And The Environment In Miraflores, Colombia, And South Carolina, Usa, Lidia Gual Gonzalez

Theses and Dissertations

Tick-borne diseases are emerging worldwide due to environmental shifts caused by land fragmentation and climate change. Among the most important ones spotted fever group rickettsioses (SFGRs) are of particular interest due to their wide species variety and high pathogenicity. Given the global spotted fever group rickettsia (SFGR) distribution, evaluation and comparison of different populations is critical to better understand these pathogens' epidemiology and unravel the risk factors affecting disease occurrence. Consequently, this dissertation investigates SFGR highlighting the One Health framework, assessing animals, humans, and the environment. The first part includes an evaluation at the household level using human and canine …

Meta-Analysis Of Factors Impacting Reading Impairment Rates In Studies Of Children With Developmental Language Disorder (Dld), Kayla Dewey

Theses and Dissertations

Purpose - Developmental language disorder (DLD) is a common yet underdiagnosed disorder centered on difficulties with oral language, and often associated with word reading and reading comprehension difficulties. Numerous studies have documented high rates of reading impairment in children with DLD, but the specific rates vary widely across studies. The purpose of this meta-analysis was to help provide accurate prognostic information about this disorder by determining the average proportion of participants with DLD who also had reading impairment, and to determine whether variability in the rate of reading impairment was significantly influenced by studies’ methodological features, including recruitment method, type …

Marine And Human Environmental Factors Influence Vibrio Parahaemolyticus And Vibrio Vulnificus In Vitro Biofilm Processes On Plastics, Ryan Eric Leighton

Theses and Dissertations

Marine bacteria often exist in biofilms as communities attached to surfaces, like plastic. Growing concerns exist regarding marine plastics acting as potential vectors of pathogenic Vibrio, especially in a changing climate. It has been generalized that Vibrio vulnificus and Vibrio parahaemolyticus often attach to plastic surfaces. Different strains of these Vibrios exist having different growth and biofilm forming properties. This work evaluated how temperature and strain variability affect V. parahaemolyticus and V. vulnificus biofilm formation and characteristics on glass (GL), low-density polyethylene (LDPE), polypropylene (PP), and polystyrene (PS). This work also evaluated how human body related factors like temperature, …