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College Of Public Health News, Georgia Southern University

College of Public Health: News & Publications

• SoTL Fellows

Philadelphia Healthier Generation Summit, Lauren Puzen Msw,Mph

Population Health Matters (Formerly Health Policy Newsletter)

No abstract provided.

Patient Engagement: The Missing Measure In The Patient-Centered Medical Home, Manisha Verma Md, Mph

Population Health Matters (Formerly Health Policy Newsletter)

No abstract provided.

Teaching Us Healthcare Organization And Delivery: Two Models Of Instruction, Juan Leon Phd, Laura T. Pizzi Pharmd, Mph, Deon Steele Mph

Population Health Matters (Formerly Health Policy Newsletter)

No abstract provided.

The Medical Reserve Corps: Volunteers Making A Difference, Mary Lou Manning Phd, Crnp, Cic, Faan, Neale Batra Ba

Population Health Matters (Formerly Health Policy Newsletter)

No abstract provided.

Resisting Pressure From Peers To Engage In Sexual Behavior: What Communication Strategies Do Early Adolescent Latino Girls Use?, Anne E. Norris, Jonathan Pettigrew, Michelle Miller-Day, Michael L. Hecht, Janet Hutchison, Kristi Campoe

Communication Faculty Articles and Research

A content analysis of early adolescent = 12.02 years) Latino girls’ (n = 44) responses to open-ended questions embedded in an electronic survey was conducted to explore strategies girls may use to resist peer pressure with respect to sexual behavior. Analysis yielded 341 codable response units, 74% of which were consistent with the REAL typology (i.e., refuse, explain, avoid, leave) previously identified in adolescent substance use research. However, strategies reflecting a lack of resistance (11%) and inconsistency with communication competence (e.g., aggression) were also noted (15%). Frequency of particular strategies varied depending on the situation described in the open-ended …

Incidence And Trends Of Blastomycosis-Associated Hospitalizations In The United States, Amy E. Seitz, Naji Younes, Claudia A. Steiner, Rebecca Prevots

Epidemiology Faculty Publications

We used the State Inpatient Databases from the United States Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality to provide state-specific age-adjusted blastomycosis-associated hospitalization incidence throughout the entire United States. Among the 46 states studied, states within the Mississippi and Ohio River valleys had the highest age-adjusted hospitalization incidence. Specifically, Wisconsin had the highest age-adjusted hospitalization incidence (2.9 hospitalizations per 100,000 person-years). Trends were studied in the five highest hospitalization incidence states. From 2000 to 2011, blastomycosis-associated hospitalizations increased significantly in Illinois and Kentucky with an average annual increase of 4.4% and 8.4%, respectively. Trends varied significantly by state. Overall, 64% of …

Sexual Education And Attitudes Toward Masturbation, Jannine Ray, Shelby Afflerbach

Journal of Undergraduate Research at Minnesota State University, Mankato

The long-standing social stigma surrounding masturbation has led to its prohibition from being included in public school curriculum as a healthy sexual practice. Furthermore, not only is masturbation a healthy sexual practice for the individual, research has demonstrated masturbation to be helpful in treating sexual dysfunctions for couples. Therefore, if the topic of masturbation is included in comprehensive sexual education as a healthy sexual practice, it may promote sexual health among individuals both intra- and interpersonally. The present study recruited from a convenient sample from a medium sized state university in the upper Midwest. Participants completed two surveys, administered through …

Mental Health Awareness Building Via Android Application, James Faraday, Joshua Martin

Journal of Undergraduate Research at Minnesota State University, Mankato

The goal of this project was to create a tool that provides students at Minnesota State University, Mankato with mental health information through a freely available smartphone application (App). Our approach used a software engineering design process that focused on who our customers are, what resources are available, and how we can best connect the two to improve student lives. We identified the stakeholders involved and worked with campus mental health professionals to help shape our App. While there is a broad range of mental health topics, we have focused on materials related to depression. The first process of the …

Women's Empowerment And Contraceptive Use: The Role Of Independent Versus Couples' Decision-Making, From A Lower Middle Income Country Perspective, Waqas Hameed, Syed Khurram Azmat, Moazzam Ali, Muhammad Ishaque Sheikh, Ghazunfer Abbas, Marleen Temmerman, Bilal Iqbal Avan

Community Health Sciences

Introduction: There is little available evidence of associations between the various dimensions of women's empowerment and contraceptive use having been examined--and of how these associations are mediated by women's socio-economic and demographic statuses. We assessed these phenomena in Pakistan using a structured-framework approach.
Methods: We analyzed data on 2,133 women who were either using any form of contraceptive or living with unmet need for contraception. The survey was conducted during May - June 2012, with married women of reproductive age (15-49 years) in three districts of Punjab. The dimensions of empowerment were categorized broadly into: economic decision-making, household decision-making, and …

Herd Immunity And The Necessity Of Vaccinations: Modeling The Effects Of Mmr Vaccinations, Caitlyn Cardetti, Katie Groskreutz, Melissa Zins

Journal of Undergraduate Research at Minnesota State University, Mankato

The MMR vaccination is a two dose vaccine given to children between the ages of 12 – 15 months and the second dose between the ages of 4 – 6 years to prevent measles, mumps, and rubella. The objective was to mathematically model the effects of the MMR vaccinations in a hypothetical school through multiple compartment and spatial models. These models were based on each disease individually with their respective vaccine effectiveness and disease infection rates. These models demonstrated the limits of herd immunity. Herd immunity occurs when a high enough percentage of the population is immune or vaccinated to …

Who Cares? Caregiver Well-Being In Europe, Leah Ruppanner, Georgiana Bostean

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

This paper analyzes a multi-national sample comparing self-reported well-being of those who provide dependent care to that of non-caregivers. We pair individual-level data from the 2004 European Social Survey (ESS) for respondents in 22 nations (n=41,000+) with country-level measures of attitudinal support for co-residential familial caregiving (2007 Eurobarometer), old age and family public transfers (OECD Social Expenditures Database, 2014) and economic development (GDP). Using multi-level modeling, we examine the association between country-level co-residential familial attitudes and public spending and individual-level caregiver well-being, comparing effects by gender. We find that: (1) caregiving is differentially associated with well-being for men and women; …

Role Of Allergic Sensitization, Filaggrin Variants, And Dna, Ali H. Ziyab

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Allergic disorders, including eczema, asthma, and rhinitis, have emerged as a global public health concern due to their elevated prevalence and the associated clinical morbidity. Environmental, immunologic, and genetic factors have been implicated in the pathogenesis of allergic disorders. Allergic sensitization (representing deviated immune responses) and filaggrin gene (FLG) variants (leading to dysfunctional epidermal barrier) have shown to be common predisposing factors in the development of allergic disorders. However, there is a lack of knowledge on their joint effects on the development of single and multiple (coexistence) allergic disorders. More recently, epigenetic mechanisms, such as DNA methylation, have emerged …

Role Of Chronic Inflammation On Liver Function During Cachexia Progression In The ApcMin/+ Mouse Model, Aditi Narsale

Theses and Dissertations

Cachexia is a multifactorial syndrome that manifests during the advanced stage of chronic diseases and is characterized by a progressive loss of body mass sustained by underlying inflammation. The ApcMin/+ mouse is an established model of cachexia that exhibits a gradual loss of body mass correlating with increasing tumor burden and plasma IL – 6 levels. Moreover it also mimics other secondary characteristics observed in cachectic patients like splenomegaly, elevated plasma endotoxin levels, gut barrier dysfunction, hypogonadism and an overall hypermetabolic state. Liver controls the energy metabolism in the body by regulating glucose and lipid metabolism, glycogen storage, filtration of …

Understanding The Relationship Between Health Locus Of Control And God Locus Of Health Control And Health Behaviors In College Students Through Mediation Analysis, Joni Deann Marr

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Similar to the general population, college students have high rates of overweight/obesity and low rates of physical activity (PA) and healthy nutrition habits. Internal health locus of control (LOC) and religiosity/spirituality have been associated with positive health behaviors in various populations, but the mechanisms explaining these associations are still unclear. Purpose: The goals of this study were to understand the relationship between both health LOC and God locus of health control (independent variables) and PA, fruit and vegetable intake (FVI) and dietary fat intake (dependent variables) of college students through mediation analysis. Self-efficacy, social support, congregational social support and …

The Development, Implementation, And Testing Of An Interactive Sexual Health Web-Based Application Intervention To Reduce Sexual Risk Behaviors Among College Students, Dawnyéa Dominique Jackson

Theses and Dissertations

College life is often regarded as a time for exploration and growth. One major area of exploration and growth for college students is sex and sexuality. Growth and exploration involves not only learning how to master these life situations, but also experiencing some negative consequences. Negative consequences for college students engaging in sexual risk-taking behaviors often lead to a high prevalence of sexually transmitted infections (STIs), unintended pregnancies, emotional distress, and large healthcare costs. Given the high prevalence of risky sexual behavior among young adults and the highly negative consequences of risky sexual behavior for this population, it is critical …

A Multiple Imputation Approach For Semiparametric Cure Model With Interval Censored Data, Jie Zhou

Theses and Dissertations

Interval censored survival data, where the exact event time is only known to lie in an observed time interval, is commonly encountered in practice. Such data analysis may be conducted under the setting where a fraction of patients can be considered as fully recovered and will not experience the event of interest in the future; while the other patients who did not recover totally will have the outcome of interest. We proposed a semiparametric estimation method for the proportional hazard mixture cure model, which is easy to implement and computationally efficient. A multiple imputation approach based on the asymptotic normal …

Longitudinal Evaluations Of Objectively Measured Physical Activity: Capturing The Full Spectrum Of Duration And Intensity, Amanda E. Paluch

Theses and Dissertations

Most physical activity research to date narrows its focus toward intensities and durations only encompassed in the Physical Activity Guidelines of moderate to vigorous intensity in at least 10 minute bouts (MVPA-10). Examining activity in this manner excludes light activity and shorter bouts, sometimes referred to as baseline physical activity (BPA) as it consists of the activity accumulated during daily life at durations and/or intensities below what is recommended. This dissertation provides an evaluation of the entire spectrum of physical activity (PA). Physical activity was studied in a unique way by looking at MVPA-10, then adding shorter bouts and light …

Association Of Serum Immunoglobulin G (Igg) Antibodies Against Periodontal Bacteria In Type 2 Diabetes And Pre-Diabetes And Cardiovascular Risk Factors, Deepika Shrestha

Theses and Dissertations

Periodontal disease is an inflammatory disease caused by polybacterial infection and inflammation plays key role that associates periodontal disease with different systemic diseases including diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. The main objective of this study is to evaluate and explore the association of serum IgG antibodies in four distinct clusters that were formed empirically from species specific 19 periodontal antibody titers with T2DM and pre-diabetes adjusting for known confounders such as age, sex, race-ethnicity, income to poverty ratio, education, smoking and drinking alcohol, BMI, WC, physical activity, missing teeth, dentist visits and other nutritional factors.

From the first aim, we formed …

Women’S Hiv Prevention Study (Whips): A Proposal To Pilot Test An Hiv Intervention For Older African American Women Living With Hiv, Charsey Cherry

Theses and Dissertations

Despite improvements in treatments over the past 30 years, HIV /AIDS continues to be a major public health threat, particularly among sub-populations such as African American women. Midlife and older adults (those aged 40 years and over) are fast becoming a growing concern for HIV/AIDS infections, particularly older African American women. There has been limited research targeting midlife and older African American women living with HIV that aimed to reduce their transmission of HIV and promote them becoming prevention advocates. In response to this gap in the literature, a culturally tailored intervention guided by the IMB Model of behavior change …

Prediction Of Coronary Heart Disease Within The Aerobics Center Longitudinal Study Population, Jennifer Carol Gander

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is a compilation of three studies that were conducted to better 1) Further validate a thoroughly tested Framingham Risk Score (FRS) on a unique cohort with comprehensive measures available, 2) Update and improve the predictability of the FRS through the addition of cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) while resolving limitations in previous studies, and 3) Assess the predictability of non-exercise estimated CRF (e-CRF) and FRS on CHD. A manuscript was generated for each study utilizing data from the Aerobics Center Longitudinal Study.

To validate the FRS, a multivariable Cox Proportional Hazard Model was used to determine the association between FRS …

A Study Of An Uncharacterized Penicillium Species Isolated From A Hypersaline Pond In San Salvador, Bahamas, Virginia Elizabeth Hopkins

Theses and Dissertations

A large number of facultative marine fungi are unexplored (Lai et al., 2007). They exist in the hypersaline environment with reduced growth and metabolism for an indeterminable period of time and are believed to have no ecological role. Here we report the discovery of one novel facultative Penicillium species that we named Penicillium virginium. We show that when transferred from its native ecosystem, a salt pond in San Salvador, Bahamas, to a laboratory fungal growth medium, Penicillium virginium demonstrates a higher growth rate in absence of salt than in presence of salt confirming that it is a facultative marine fungus. …

Dietary Inflammatory Index And Its Relationship With Inflammation, Metabolic Biomarkers And Mortality, Nitin Shivappa

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Diet and its components are known to play an important factor in the process of inflammation and in turn on the health effects that are related to inflammation like cancer, and cardiovascular diseases. Previous research so far has mainly looked at the effect of specific food or nutrients on inflammation and health outcomes. In this regard a new literature derived and population based dietary index called Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII) was developed after carefully screening around 6000 articles that looked at the association between 45 food parameters and 6 commonly studied inflammatory markers. The list of food parameters includes …

Longitudinal Changes In The Inflammatory Potential Of Diet And Risk Of Cancer In Women, Fred Kinyuytabung

Theses and Dissertations

Introduction: The dietary inflammatory index (DII) assesses an individual’s overall diet quality with regards to its inflammatory potential on a continuum from maximally anti-inflammatory (lower or healthier DII scores) to maximally pro-inflammatory (higher or unhealthy DII scores). The DII measured at one point in time has been associated with cancer risk in previous studies; however, data are lacking regarding the change in DII over time and how these changes impact cancer risk. We assessed changes in the DII, and evaluated associations between cumulative history, and changes over time in dietary inflammatory potential, and risk of colorectal cancer (CRC) and breast …

Two Studies Of Family-Centered Care Family-Centered Care And Shared Decision Making: Are They The Same Construct? And The Association Of Family-Centered Care And Shared Decision Making With Receipt Of All Needed Prescription Drugs And Emergency Department Visits In Children With Asthma, Barbara Lee Brumbaugh

Theses and Dissertations

Family-Centered Care (FCC) is considered the standard of care in pediatrics, being affirmed in 2003 by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). Family centered practices center around five specific provider actions: (1) did the provider spend enough time; (2) did the provider listen carefully; (3) was the provider sensitive to the needs of the family, including their values and customs; (4) did the provider provide information as needed; (5) did the provider make the caregiver feel like a partner in the care of the child. In addition to FCC practices, shared decision making (SDM) has been indicated as important in …

The Influence Of Race/Ethnicity And Place Of Service On Breast Reconstruction For Medicare Beneficiaries With Mastectomy, Tracy Onega, Julie Weiss, Karla Kerlikowske, Karen Wernli

Dartmouth Scholarship

Racial disparities in breast reconstruction for breast cancer are documented. Place of service has contributed to disparities in cancer care; but the interaction of race/ethnicity and place of service has not been explicitly examined. We examined whether place of service modified the effect of race/ethnicity on receipt of reconstruction. We included women with a mastectomy for incident breast cancer in SEER-Medicare from 2005-2009. Using Medicare claims, we determined breast reconstruction within 6 months. Facility characteristics included: rural/urban location, teaching status, NCI Cancer Center designation, cooperative oncology group membership, Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH) status, and breast surgery volume. Using multivariable logistic …

Fieldwork Summary Report-World Health Organization, Anna Cross

Master's Projects and Capstones

My fieldwork experience took place at the World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, where I completed over 420 hours of practical experience. My fieldwork focused in the field of mental health, working on disorders management (psychosis, depression and suicide) and evidence-based research, but more specifically focusing on schizophrenia, premature death in severe mental disorders, and maternal mental health. Although my fieldwork focused within these areas, for the purpose of this final report, I have opted to focus on my contributions to the research around schizophrenia and premature death within severe mental disorders. Specifically, I contributed to multiple fact/information sheets for …

College Of Public Health News, Georgia Southern University

College of Public Health: News & Publications

• ASPA's Peace Award

Constructing Representative Social Networks For Disease Simulation, Tao Yang, Mario Ventresca

The Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) Symposium

Diseases spread mechanisms have been questioned and studied for many years. The ability to make predictions about an epidemic could enable scientists to evaluate inoculation/ isolation plans, control the mortality rate, and prevent the future course of an outbreak. Accurate predictions, however, are extremely hard to make and requires interdisciplinary solutions from epidemiology, sociology, statistics, graph theory, and Computer Science. For making the prediction, currently few network analysis platforms written in C++ are designed and optimized. The research is aimed to address this gap by exploring methods of constructing social contact network, simulating disease spreading, and proposing mitigation strategies for …

Analyse D’Un Protocole D’Intervention Post-Traumatique Et De Mesures De Gestion Associées Au Centre Jeunesse De Montréal-Institut Universitaire, Henriette Bilodeau, André Marchand, Diane Berthelette, Stéphane Guay, Nicole Tremblay

Rapports de recherche scientifique

L’importance des états de stress post-traumatique (ÉSPT) en milieu de travail est indéniable. Les statistiques de la Commission de la santé et de la sécurité du travail (CSST) pour la période 2002 à 2004 indiquent que les travailleurs aux prises avec un ÉSPT ont entraîné des débours de 17 747 600 $ ce qui est considérablement supérieur à ceux relatifs au stress et à l’anxiété (7 724 669 $), aux états dépressifs (3 626 814 $) et à l’épuisement professionnel (797 165 $). Par ailleurs, l’ÉSPT entraîne des répercussions sur le fonctionnement psychosocial, le retour au travail et la qualité …