Public Health Commons^™

Engagement Of Latino/Hispanic Msm In Hiv Prevention, Natividad Hernandez

UNO Student Research and Creative Activity Fair

Nationally, men who have sex with men (MSM) continue to be significantly affected by HIV compared to other populations. Surveillance data indicates that in Nebraska, between 2011 and 2015, over 55% of new HIV cases were MSM.¹ More specifically, the majority of new HIV cases in the state of Nebraska are reported in Douglas County.² The rate of Hispanic Latino males living with an HIV diagnosis is 2.3 times of white males.³ Similarly, the rate of Hispanic/Latina women living with HIV diagnosis is 3.4 times that white females.³ It is important to identify culturally appropriate messages …

Postpartum Physical Activity And Sleep Levels In Overweight And Normal Weight Mothers, Shane Warehime

UNO Student Research and Creative Activity Fair

Objective: Objectively examine postpartum mothers’ physical activity (PA) and sleep. Compare PA and sleep of overweight/obese and normal weight postpartum mothers. Setting: A mid-sized city in the Midwestern United States. Participants: Twenty-one mothers who had an infant at least three months old. Participants were classified as normal weight (n = 8) or overweight (n = 13). Methods: PA and sleep levels were gathered for four days at three time intervals in the six months following childbirth. Wrist-worn Actigraph accelerometers were used to collect data. Results: All participants increased PA over time, especially from visit two to visit three. When separated …

Environmental Health News, Georgia Southern University

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: News & Publications (2011-2018)

• Georgia Southern Receives Grant to Survey Mosquito Control Capacity

Epidemiology News, Georgia Southern University

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: News & Publications (2011-2018)

• Georgia Southern Examines Sleep in Families with Children

College Of Public Health News, Georgia Southern University

College of Public Health: News & Publications

• Georgia Southern Examines Sleep in Families with Children
• Georgia Southern Receives Grant to Survey Mosquito Control Capacity

Smoking Trends Among U.S. Latinos, 1998–2013: The Impact Of Immigrant Arrival Cohort, Georgiana Bostean, Annie Ro, Nancy L. Fleischer

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

Few studies examine nativity disparities in smoking in the U.S., thus a major gap remains in understanding whether immigrant Latinos’ smoking prevalence is stable, converging, or diverging, compared with U.S.-born Latinos. This study aimed to disentangle the roles of period changes, duration of U.S. residence, and immigrant arrival cohort in explaining the gap in smoking prevalence between foreign-born and U.S.-born Latinos. Using repeated cross-sectional data spanning 1998–2013 (U.S. National Health Interview Survey), regressions predicted current smoking among foreign-born and U.S.-born Latino men and women (n = 12,492). We contrasted findings from conventional regression analyses that simply include period and duration …

Cpt1a Methylation Is Associated With Plasma Adiponectin, S. Aslibekyan, A. N. Do, H. Xu, S. Li, M. R. Irvin, D Zhi, H. K. Tiwari, D. M. Absher, A. R. Shuldiner, T. Zhang, W. Chen, K. Tanner, C. Hong, B. D. Mitchell, G. Berenson, Donna K. Arnett

Epidemiology and Environmental Health Faculty Publications

Background and Aims—Adiponectin, an adipose-secreted protein that has been linked to insulin sensitivity, plasma lipids, and inflammatory patterns, is an established biomarker for metabolic health. Despite clinical relevance and high heritability, the determinants of plasma adiponectin levels remain poorly understood.

Methods and Results—We conducted the first epigenome-wide cross-sectional study of adiponectin levels using methylation data on 368,051 cytosine-phosphate-guanine (CpG) sites in CD4+ T-cells from the Genetics of Lipid Lowering Drugs and Diet Network (GOLDN, n= 991). We fit linear mixed models, adjusting for age, sex, study site, T-cell purity, and family. We have identified a positive association (regression …

Health Care Standards For Incarcerated Women In Massachusetts, Beth Williams-Breault

Community of Scholars Day—Posters

The general health care disparities among incarcerated women are vast, although when women are imprisoned, they gain a constitutional right to health care that doesn’t exist outside of prison. However, no federal government body has established national standards for medical care in prisons. This research project serves as a public health policy memo to the Bureau of Child, Adolescent, and Family Health of the Boston Public Health Commission (BPHC) recommending accreditation standards for county and state correctional facilities for women.

The ‘Pumpgate’ Incident: Stigma Against Lactating Mothers In The U.S. Workplace, Mary Bresnahan, Jie Zhuang, Jennifer Anderson, Yi Zhu, Joshua Nelson, Xiaodi Yan

Communication Studies Publications

Studies conclude that breastfeeding for six months is associated with better lifelong health for mother and child. Mothers in the U.S. returning to work after maternity leave report difficulty with the need to take frequent breaks to pump breastmilk so many stop breastfeeding. Factors discouraging pumping breastmilk in the workplace motivated a content analysis of public comments posted in response to a legal deposition that occurred in January of 2011 in which an attorney who was a new mother was challenged about taking a break to pump breastmilk. A total of 899 public comments posted on Yahoo in 2015-2016 in …

A Place-Based Community Health Worker Program: Feasibility And Early Outcomes, New York City, 2015, Priscilla M. Lopez, Nadia Islam, Alexis Feinberg, Christa Myers, Lois Seidl, Elizabeth Drackett, Lindsay Riley, Andreas Mata, Juan Pinzon, Elisabeth Benjamin, Katarzyna Wyka, Rachel Dannefer, Javier Lopez, Chau Trinh-Shevrin, Karen Aletha Maybank, Lorna E. Thorpe

Publications and Research

Introduction: This study examined feasibility of a place-based community health worker (CHW) and health advocate (HA) initiative in five public housing developments selected for high chronic disease burden and described early outcomes.

Methods: This intervention was informed by a mixed-method needs assessment performed December 2014–January 2015 (representative telephone survey, n¼1,663; six focus groups, n¼55). Evaluation design was a non-randomized, controlled quasi-experiment. Intake and 3-month follow-up data were collected February–December 2015 (follow-up response rate, 93%) on 224 intervention and 176 comparison participants, and analyzed in 2016. All participants self-reported diagnoses of hypertension, diabetes, or asthma. The intervention consisted of chronic disease …

Cues To Cervical Cancer Screening Among U.S.-Hispanic Women, Arelis Moore De Peralta, Bonnie Holaday, Ida Mikisa Hadoto

Publications

Introduction: Hispanic women’s cervical cancer rates are disproportionately high. Cues to cervical cancer screening (Cues to Action) are strategies to activate the decision-making process to get screened for cervical cancer. This study used the health belief model to examine which cues prompt Hispanic women to undergo cervical cancer screening and how perceptions could be potentiated by cues to cervical cancer screening.

Method: A cross-sectional survey was conducted among Hispanic women 18 to 65 years old (n = 220). Generalized linear modeling was used.

Results: Spanish media and reminders by mother and doctors were relevant cues. Generalized linear modeling showed …

Waiting 2 Minutes After Sucrose Administration—Unnecessary?, Naomi Meesters, Sinno Simons, Joost Van Rosmalen, Irwin Reiss, John Van Den Anker, Monique Van Dijk

Pediatrics Faculty Publications

Background Worldwide, oral sucrose is standard of care in many neonatal intensive care units to relieve procedural pain in neonates. This study aims to determine if time interval between sucrose administration and heelstick correlates with pain scores.

Methods Neonates were prospectively studied with variable time intervals and assessed with the Premature Infant Pain Profile-Revised (PIPP-R).

Results 150 neonates were included with a median gestational age of 30⁺⁶ (IQR 27⁺⁶–33⁺²) weeks and a median time interval of 72 (IQR 39–115) seconds between sucrose administration and heelstick. In multiple regression analysis, this time interval was not significantly …

Population-Based Pertussis Incidence And Risk Factors In Infants Less Than 6 Months In Nepal., Michelle M Hughes, Janet A Englund, Jane Kuypers, James M Tielsch, Subarna K Khatry, Laxman Shrestha, Steven C Leclerq, Mark Steinhoff, Joanne Katz

Global Health Faculty Publications

Background.

Pertussis is estimated to cause 2 percent of childhood deaths globally and is a growing public health problem in developed countries despite high vaccination coverage. Infants are at greatest risk of morbidity and mortality. Maternal vaccination during pregnancy may be effective to prevent pertussis in young infants, but population-based estimates of disease burden in infants are lacking, particularly in low-income countries. The objective of this study was to estimate the incidence of pertussis in infants less than 6 months of age in Sarlahi District, Nepal.

Methods.

Nested within a population-based randomized controlled trial of influenza vaccination during pregnancy, infants …

Individual And Store Characteristics Associated With Brand Choices In Select Food Category Redemptions Among Wic Participants In Virginia, Qi Zhang, Chuanyi Tang, Patrick W. Mclaughlin, Leigh Diggs

Community & Environmental Health Faculty Publications

The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) often allows participants to redeem food benefits for various brands at different costs. To aid the program’s food cost containment efforts, it is important to understand the individual and store characteristics associated with brand choices. This study used the WIC Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) data for 239,062 Virginia WIC participants’ brand choices in infant fruits and vegetables (F&Vs) and whole grain bread in May 2014–February 2015, one of the first such data sets available in the U.S. for research purposes. Mixed effects logistic regression models were used to analyze …

A Statistical Method For The Conservative Adjustment Of False Discovery Rate (Q-Value), Yinglei Lai

Epidemiology Faculty Publications

Background

q-value is a widely used statistical method for estimating false discovery rate (FDR), which is a conventional significance measure in the analysis of genome-wide expression data. q-value is a random variable and it may underestimate FDR in practice. An underestimated FDR can lead to unexpected false discoveries in the follow-up validation experiments. This issue has not been well addressed in literature, especially in the situation when the permutation procedure is necessary for p-value calculation.

Results

We proposed a statistical method for the conservative adjustment of q-value. In practice, it is usually necessary to calculate p …

The Cost Of Cost-Sharing: The Impact Of Medicaid Benefit Design On Influenza Vaccination Uptake, Charles Stoecker, Alexandra M Stewart, Megan Lindley

Health Policy and Management Faculty Publications

ncome persons. State Medicaid policy may affect the uptake of recommended adult vaccinations. We examined the impact of three aspects of Medicaid benefit design (coverage for vaccines, prohibiting cost-sharing, and copayment amounts) on vaccine uptake in the fee-for-service Medicaid population 19–64 years old. We combined previously published reports to obtain state Medicaid policy information from 2003 and 2012. Data on influenza vaccination uptake were taken from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. We used a differences-in-differences framework, controlling for national trends and state differences, to estimate the effect of each benefit design factor on vaccination uptake in different Medicaid-eligible populations. …

Learning In Motion: Teachers‟ Perspectives On The Impact Of Stationary Bike Use In The Classroom, Julie Lynn Mueller, Amanda Wudarzewski, Yoad Avitzur

Education Faculty Publications

The potential of physical activity to support self-regulated learning in the classroom has encouraged the implementation of stationary bicycles across Canada and the United States. Positive testimonials suggest that their use by students has positive outcomes, but there is limited empirical evidence supporting the efficacy of this pedagogical practice. The current study analyzes teachers‟ perceptions of the use and impact of stationary exercise bicycles in classrooms as part of a community running program initiative through a nationwide survey of 107 participants. Key findings identify teacher perceptions of positive outcomes in students‟ social, emotional, and cognitive development, as well as to …

Exploring Individual And Structural Factors Associated With Employment Among Young Transgender Women Of Color Using A No-Cost Transgender Legal Resource Center, Brandon J. Hill, Kris Rosentel, Trevor Bak, Michael Silverman, Richard A. Crosby, Laura Salazar, Michele Kipke

Health, Behavior & Society Faculty Publications

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore individual and structural factors associated with employment among young transgender women (TW) of color.

Methods: Sixty-five trans women of color were recruited from the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund to complete a 30-min interviewer-assisted survey assessing sociodemographics, housing, workplace discrimination, job-seeking self-efficacy, self-esteem, perceived public passability, and transactional sex work.

Results: Logistic regression models revealed that stable housing (structural factor) and job-seeking self-efficacy (individual factor) were significantly associated with currently being employed.

Conclusion: Our findings underscore the need for multilevel approaches to assist TW of color gain employment.

Sensemaking, Stakeholder Discord, And Long-Term Risk Communication At A Us Superfund Site, Anna Goodman Hoover

Preventive Medicine and Environmental Health Faculty Publications

Introduction: Risk communication can help reduce exposures to environmental contaminants, mitigate negative health outcomes, and inform community-based decisions about hazardous waste sites. While communication best practices have long guided such efforts, little research has examined unintended consequences arising from such guidelines. As rhetoric informs stakeholder sensemaking, the language used in and reinforced by these guidelines can challenge relationships and exacerbate stakeholder tensions.

Objectives: This study evaluates risk communication at a U.S. Superfund site to identify unintended consequences arising from current risk communication practices.

Methods: This qualitative case study crystallizes data spanning 6 years from three sources: 1) local newspaper coverage …

Each Medium Tells A Different Story: The Effect Of Message Channel On Narrative Persuasion, Nathan Walter, Sheila T. Murphy, Lauren B. Frank, Lourdes Baezconde-Garbanati

Communication Faculty Publications and Presentations

Limited attention has been given to the medium of story presentation in this process of narrative persuasion. The present study (N = 243) fills this gap by directly comparing narrative involvement across print and audiovisual versions of the same cervical cancer-related story. The mediation analysis revealed that exposure to an audiovisual narrative was associated with higher levels of cognitive and emotional involvement than exposure to the exact same narrative in its printed form. Yet the higher levels of transportation in the audiovisual condition came at a price of enhancing psychological reactance, eliminating the relative advantage of the film narrative.

National Health Insurance Scheme (Nhis) Implementation In Nigeria: Issues, Challenges And Way Forward, Bandele A. G. Amoo, Adedapo T. Adenekan, Halima U. Nagado

Bullion

The paper discussed the National Health lnsurance Scheme (NHIS) adopted by Nigeria for improved access to healthcare, especially to the low income earners. The objective of the study is to review developments ln the implementation of the Nigerian NHIS and determine whether its achieving its objectives. Specifically, the study focused on key issues and challenges confronting the NHIS, with a bid to proffer appropriate recommendations towards sustainability, effectiveness and efficiency. The study adopted a descriptive qualitative analysis methodology and found limited coverage, religious and cultural limitations, in-extensive prescriptions, conflict of interests (NHIS and HMOs), low participants' coverage, issues of mistrust, …

Patients' Perspective Of Disease And Medication Adherence For Type 2 Diabetes In An Urban Area In Bangladesh: A Qualitative Study, Sheikh Mohammed Shariful Islam, Tuhin Biswas, Faiz A. Bhuiyan, Kamrun Mustafa, Anwar Islam

Faculty Publications

Background: Patients’ perspective of diabetes and adherence to its prescribed medications is a significant predictor of glycemic control and overall management of the disease. However, there is a paucity of such information in Bangladesh. This study aimed to explore patients’ perspective of diabetes, their experience of taking oral hypoglycemic medications and explore factors that contribute to medication adherence in patients with type 2 diabetes in Bangladesh.

Methods: We conducted in-depth face-to-face interviews with 12 type 2 diabetes patients attending a tertiary hospital in Dhaka city between February and March, 2014. Participants were purposively sampled representing different age groups, …

"We Need Help In The Delta": Barriers To Health Promotion Among Older African-American Men In The Mississippi Delta, Sherry C. Wang, Lashaundrea Crook, Carol Connell, Kathleen Yadrick

Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study was to better understand the barriers to health promotion among African American older men living in the rural Mississippi Delta. A qualitative, intrinsic case study approach was used to explore the phenomenon of health and the barriers to promoting men’s health within the unique context of the Delta. Data included one key informant interview and two focus group interviews with 14 men, with the majority between the ages of 41 and 55 years. Focus group participants were lay community members as well as members of a volunteer community health advisors men’s group. Findings underscore the …

Changes In Underlying Determinants Explain Rapid Increases In Child Linear Growth In Alive & Thrive Study Areas Between 2010 And 2014 In Bangladesh And Vietnam, Phuong Hong Nguyen, Derek Headey, Edward A. Frongillo Jr., Lan Mai Tran, Rahul Rawat, Marie T. Ruel, Purnima Menon

Faculty Publications

Background: Child linear growth sometimes improves in both intervention and comparison groups in evaluations of nutrition interventions, possibly because of spillover intervention effects to nonintervention areas or improvements in underlying determinants of nutritional change in both areas.

Objective: We aimed to understand what changes in underlying socioeconomic characteristics and behavioral factors are important in explaining improvements in child linear growth.

Methods: Baseline (2010) and endline (2014) surveys from the Alive & Thrive impact evaluation were used to identify the underlying determinants of height-for-age z scores (HAZs) among children aged 24–48 mo in Bangladesh (n = 4311) and 24–59 mo …

{Ace}Ing Early Childhood In Minnesota, Bailey Alston, Casie Devos, Alisha Field, Renee Gasner

Master of Social Work Student Policy Advocacy Briefs

Too many young children are facing ACEs that are detrimentally impacting their development and contributing to negative outcomes that persist into adulthood. There are no current policies using the ACE questions to drive mental health interventions. The Governor’s Task Force on Mental Health made nine recommendations that, if implemented, will greatly improve the mental health and well-being of children and their parents. Improving early childhood prevention and intervention programs helps ALL Minnesota’s families build healthy and rich experiences for their children.

1. Expand the Early Childhood Mental Health Grant program statewide to increase early childhood mental health specialists.
2. Create a Governor’s …

Time To Stand Up For Female Vets: Improving Access To Vegerans Administration Health Services For Female Veterans Who Experience Military Sexual Trauma, Rhonda Haugstad, Dana Miller, Michelle Remold

Master of Social Work Student Policy Advocacy Briefs

Military Sexual Trauma (MST), is defined as sexual assault and/or sexual harassment experienced while serving in the United States military. The process of obtaining Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) benefits are difficult for individuals that suffer from MST. MST survivors are faced with delays and numerous barriers in accessing services, including discrimination in seeking compensation. Statistical data from the Department of Defense (DOD) is reviewed highlighting the high rates of sexual assault in the military and addresses concerns about the long-term implications for survivors of MST.

Many female veteran survivors of MST are struggling to access needed services covered by …

Proposed New York State Health Regulation Contains Troubling Exemption: The Public Rights/Private Conscience Project Responds To A Proposal On Abortion Access, Public Rights/Private Conscience Project

Center for Gender & Sexuality Law

A proposed New York State regulation requiring insurance plans to cover “medically necessary” abortions contains a broad religious exemption that would undermine the state’s longstanding commitment to reproductive health. The exemption — which is not required by New York’s Constitution or laws — defines the term “religious employers” to include large nonprofits and even some for-profit companies. In the face of a national movement to enact anti-LGBTQ and anti-choice religious exemptions, the regulation would set a harmful precedent by accommodating religion at the expense of other fundamental liberty and equality rights.

The Juvenile Justice Behavioral Health Services Cascade: A New Framework For Measuring Unmet Substance Use Treatment Services Needs Among Adolescent Offenders, Steven Belenko, Danica Knight, Gail A. Wasserman, Michael L. Dennis, Tisha Wiley, Faye S. Taxman, Carrie B. Oser, Richard Dembo, Angela A. Robertson, Jessica Sales

Sociology Faculty Publications

Overview—Substance use and substance use disorders are highly prevalent among youth under juvenile justice (JJ) supervision, and related to delinquency, psychopathology, social problems, risky sex and sexually transmitted infections, and health problems. However, numerous gaps exist in the identification of behavioral health (BH) problems and in the subsequent referral, initiation and retention in treatment for youth in community justice settings. This reflects both organizational and systems factors, including coordination between justice and BH agencies.

Methods and Results—This paper presents a new framework, the Juvenile Justice Behavioral Health Services Cascade (“Cascade”), for measuring unmet substance use treatment needs to …

Ohs Risks: Strategies Used By Adolescent Trainees In Semiskilled Trades During Unforeseen Events, Marie Laberge, Aurélie Tondoux, Bénédicte Calvet, Dolores Bayard, Curtis Breslin

Rapports de recherche scientifique

Plusieurs études ont montré qu’une faible expérience en emploi, souvent caractéristique des très jeunes travailleurs, était associée à une augmentation du risque de subir une lésion professionnelle. Parmi les jeunes travailleurs, les plus susceptibles de se blesser au travail sont ceux qui ont quitté l’école sans diplôme d’études secondaires, ceux qui occupent des emplois manuels ainsi que ceux qui éprouvent des difficultés d’apprentissage objectivées. Le ministère de l’Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport (MELS) a mis sur pied en 2007-2008 la Formation menant à l’exercice d’un métier semi-spécialisé (FMS), qui s’adresse justement à ces jeunes considérés plus à …

Motivating And Demotivating Factors For Community Health Workers Engaged In Maternal, Newborn And Child Health Programs In Low And Middle-Income Countries: A Systematic Review., Leah Shipton, Aysha Zahidie, F. Rabbani

Community Health Sciences

This systematic review aimed to synthesize primary research on motivating factors of community health workers (CHWs) for maternal, neonatal, and child health (MNCH) in low and middle-income countries (LMICs). Peer-reviewed literatures were systematically searched in five databases. Identified studies were then screened and selected for inclusion. The eligibility criteria were reported primary qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods research, with participants being CHWs in LMICs who address MNCH, which investigated motivation or related concepts of retention, attrition, and performance. A thematic synthesis process was used to analyze findings of motivating factors, reported by included studies. Seventeen qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods …