Statistics and Probability Commons^™

Access To A Regular Primary Care Physician Among Young People With Early Psychosis In Ontario, Canada, Rebecca Rodrigues, Jennifer N S Reid, Joshua C. Wiener, Suzanne Archie, Richard G Booth, Chiachen Cheng, Arlene G Macdougall, Lena Palaniyappan, Bridget L Ryan, Aristotle Voineskos, Paul Kurdyak, Saadia Hameed Jan, Kelly K. Anderson

Epidemiology and Biostatistics Publications

AIM: Access to a primary care physician in early psychosis facilitates help-seeking and engagement with psychiatric treatment. We examined access to a regular primary care physician in people with early psychosis, compared to the general population, and explored factors associated with access.

METHODS: Using linked health administrative data from Ontario (Canada), we identified people aged 14-35 years with a first diagnosis of nonaffective psychotic disorder (n = 39 449; 2005-2015). We matched cases to four randomly selected general population controls based on age, sex, neighbourhood, and index date (n = 157 796). We used modified Poisson regression to estimate prevalence …

Editorial: The Public Health Scholars As The Health Leaders, Al Asyary, Meita Veruswati, Putri Bungsu Machmud, Indri Hapsari Susilowati

Kesmas

1. Achmadi UF. Kesehatan Masyarakat: Teori dan Aplikasi. Jakarta: Rajawali Pers; 2014.

2. Asyary A. Editorial. Kesmas. 2023; 18 (Special Issue 1): 1-3. DOI: 10.21109/kesmas.v18isp1.7201

3. Badan Kebijakan Pembangunan Kesehatan. Pembangunan Kesehatan di Indonesia melalui Kesinambungan Finansial Jaminan Kesehatan serta Meningkatkan Kualitas Layanan dengan Integrasi Data. Jakarta: Kementerian Kesehatan Republik Indonesia; 2023.

Who Sleeps Well In Canada? The Social Determinants Of Sleep Health Among Middle-Aged And Older Adults In The Canadian Longitudinal Study On Aging., Rebecca Rodrigues, Amy Jing, Kelly K. Anderson, Rea Alonzo, Piotr Wilk, Graham J Reid, Jason Gilliland, Guangyong Zou, Kathryn Nicholson, Giuseppe Guaiana, Saverio Stranges

Epidemiology and Biostatistics Publications

OBJECTIVES: Sleep health inequities likely contribute to disparities in health outcomes. Our objective was to identify social determinants of sleep health among middle-aged/older adults in Canada, where prior evidence is limited.

METHODS: We analyzed cross-sectional data from the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging, a survey of over 30,000 community-dwelling adults aged 45-85years. Self-reported measures included sleep duration, sleep satisfaction, and sleep efficiency. We explored associations between sleep measures and social determinants of health. We used modified Poisson regression to estimate prevalence ratios for sleep satisfaction and sleep efficiency, and linear regression for sleep duration. Estimates were adjusted for all social, …

Geographic Differences In The Magnitude Of Black-White Disparities In Having Obesity, Steven A. Cohen, Monique J. Brown, Furong Xu, Caitlin C. Nash, Mary L. Greaney

Faculty Publications

Background

Obesity disparities in the United States are well documented, but the limited body of research suggests that geographic factors may alter the magnitude of these disparities. A growing body of evidence has identified a “rural mortality penalty” where morbidity and mortality rates are higher in rural than urban areas, even after controlling for other factors. Black-White differences in health and mortality are more pronounced in rural areas than in urban areas.

Objective

Therefore, the purpose of this study was to explore how rural-urban status and region moderate Black-White health disparities in obesity.

Methods

Data were abstracted from the 2012 …

Sugar-Sweetened Beverages And Artificially Sweetened Beverages Consumption And The Risk Of Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver (Nafld) And Nonalcoholic Steatohepatitis (Nash), Tung Sung Tseng, Wei Ting Lin, Peng Sheng Ting, Chiung Kuei Huang, Po Hung Chen, Gabrielle V. Gonzalez, Hui Yi Lin

School of Public Health Faculty Publications

Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) are fast becoming the most common chronic liver disease and are often preventable with healthy dietary habits and weight management. Sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) consumption is associated with obesity and NAFLD. However, the impact of different types of SSBs, including artificially sweetened beverages (ASBs), is not clear after controlling for total sugar intake and total caloric intake. The aim of this study was to examine the association between the consumption of different SSBs and the risk of NAFLD and NASH in US adults. The representativeness of 3739 US adults aged ≥20 years …

History And Current Status Of Mediterranean Spotted Fever (Msf) In The Crimean Peninsula And Neighboring Regions Along The Black Sea Coast, Muniver T. Gafarova, Marina E. Eremeeva

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

Mediterranean spotted fever (MSF) is a tick-borne rickettsiosis caused by Rickettsia conorii subspecies conorii and transmitted to humans by Rhipicephalus sanguineus ticks. The disease was first discovered in Tunisia in 1910 and was subsequently reported from other Mediterranean countries. The first cases of MSF in the former Soviet Union were detected in 1936 on the Crimean Peninsula. This review summarizes the historic information and main features of MSF in that region and contemporary surveillance and control efforts for this rickettsiosis. Current data pertinent to the epidemiology of the disease, circulation of the ticks and distribution of animal hosts are discussed …

The Public Health Impact Of Paxlovid Covid-19 Treatment In The United States, Yuan Bai, Zhanwei Du, Lin Wang, Eric H. Y. Lau, Isaac Fung, Petter Holme, Ben Cowling, Alison Galvani, Robert Krug, Lauren Ancel Meyers

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

The antiviral drug Paxlovid has been shown to rapidly reduce viral load. Coupled with vaccination, timely administration of safe and effective antivirals could provide a path towards managing COVID-19 without restrictive non-pharmaceutical measures. Here, we estimate the population-level impacts of expanding treatment with Paxlovid in the US using a multi-scale mathematical model of SARS-CoV-2 transmission that incorporates the within-host viral load dynamics of the Omicron variant. We find that, under a low transmission scenario (Re∼1.2) treating 20% of symptomatic cases would be life and cost saving, leading to an estimated 0.26 (95% CrI: 0.03, 0.59) million hospitalizations averted, 30.61 (95% …

Differences In Clinical Presentation At First Hospitalization And The Impact On Involuntary Admissions Among First-Generation Migrant Groups With Non-Affective Psychotic Disorders., Kelly K Anderson, Rebecca Rodrigues

Epidemiology and Biostatistics Publications

BACKGROUND: Some migrant and ethnic minority groups have a higher risk of coercive pathways to care; however, it is unclear whether differences in clinical presentation contribute to this risk. We sought to assess: (i) whether there were differences in clinician-rated symptoms and behaviours across first-generation immigrant and refugee groups at the first psychiatric hospitalization after psychosis diagnosis, and (ii) whether these differences accounted for disparities in involuntary admission.

METHODS: Using population-based health administrative data from Ontario, Canada, we constructed a sample (2009-2013) of incident cases of non-affective psychotic disorder followed for two years to identify first psychiatric hospitalization. We compared …

Characteristics And Source-Specific Health Risks Of Ambient Pm2.5-Bound Pahs In An Urban City Of Northern Taiwan, Yu-Chieh Ting, Chun-Hung Ku, Yu-Xuan Zou, Kai-Hsien Chi, Jhy-Charm Soo, Chin-Yu Hsu, Yu-Cheng Chen

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) with highly toxic compounds mainly exist in small-sized particles and can induce considerable human health risks. Studies on PM2.5-bound PAHs and their source-specific human health risks still remain scarce. Daily PM2.5 samples (n = 119) were collected every three days from 2016 to 2017 in Taipei city, Taiwan. Fifteen PAHs in PM2.5 were analyzed via gas chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (GC/MS-MS). We utilized a positive matrix factorization (PMF) model, diagnostic ratios, and potential source contribution function (PSCF) to identify the origins of PM2.5-bound PAHs. The annual concentration of total PAHs (TPAH) was 0.79 ± 0.67 ng …

Weighted Mean Difference Statistics For Paired Data In The Presence Of Missing Values, Yuntong Li, Brent J. Shelton, William St Clair, Heidi L. Weiss, John L. Villano, Arnold Stromberg, Chi Wang, Li Chen

Markey Cancer Center Faculty Publications

Missing data is a common issue in many biomedical studies. Under a paired design, some subjects may have missing values in either one or both of the conditions due to loss of follow-up, insufficient biological samples, etc. Such partially paired data complicate statistical comparison of the distribution of the variable of interest between the two conditions. In this article, we propose a general class of test statistics based on the difference in weighted sample means without imposing any distributional or model assumption. An optimal weight is derived from this class of tests. Simulation studies show that our proposed test with …

Polygenic Risk Score Development And Validation For Early Detection And Risk Stratification Of Rheumatoid Arthritis And Osteoarthritis In Postmenopausal Women, Yingke Xu

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Introduction: Around one in four adults worldwide suffer from arthritis. There are more than one hundred different forms of arthritis; the two most common forms of arthritis are rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and osteoarthritis (OA). RA is an autoimmune disease that can cause joint inflammation. Around 1.3 million adults in the US suffer from RA, representing 0.6%–1% of the population. The RA diagnosis in its early stages is difficult since its signs and symptoms are similar to other arthritis. OA is the most common form of arthritis. In the US, around 30.8 million people are affected by this disease. However, OA …

Editorial, Al Asyary

Kesmas

No abstract provided.

Exposure Levels Of Airborne Fungi, Bacteria, And Antibiotic Resistance Genes In Cotton Farms During Cotton Harvesting And Evaluations Of N95 Respirators Against These Bioaerosols, Atin Adhikari, Pratik Banerjee, Taylor Thornton, Daleniece Higgins, Caleb Adeoye, Sonam Sherpa

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

The USA is the third-leading cotton-producing country worldwide and cotton farming is common in the state of Georgia. Cotton harvest can be a significant contributor to airborne microbial exposures to farmers and nearby rural communities. The use of respirators or masks is one of the viable options for reducing organic dust and bioaerosol exposures among farmers. Unfortunately, the OSHA Respiratory Protection Standard (29 CFR Part 1910.134) does not apply to agricultural workplaces and the filtration efficiency of N95 respirators was never field-tested against airborne microorganisms and antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) during cotton harvesting. This study addressed these two information gaps. …

Childhood Asthma-Management Practices In Rural Nigeria: Exploring The Knowledge, Attitude, And Practice Of Caregivers In Oyo State, Oyindamola Akinso, Atin Adhikari, Jingjing Yin, Joanne Chopak-Foss, Gulzar H. Shah

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

Background: Caregivers of asthmatic children have a poor knowledge of proper asthma-management practices in Nigeria. This study examined the knowledge, attitudes, and practice behaviors of caregivers in the management of asthma in children under 5 years of age in Oyo State, Nigeria. Methods: While a mixed method was used in the original research, this brief describes the quantitative method used in this study to evaluate caregivers’ asthma-management practices. A 55-item questionnaire on childhood asthma knowledge, attitude, and practice was administered during child welfare-clinic visits to 118 caregivers. Data were analyzed using the IBM SPSS Version 25.0. Statistical significance was set …

Sex Differences In The Clinical Presentation Of Early Psychosis In A Primary Care Setting, Brooke Carter, Rebecca Rodrigues, Jennifer Reid, Suzanne Archie, Amanda L Terry, Lena Palaniyappan, Arlene G Macdougall, Aristotle Voineskos, Saadia Hameed Jan, Liisa Jaakkimainen, Branson Chen, Neo Sawh, Kelly K. Anderson

Epidemiology and Biostatistics Publications

Primary care is an important part of the help-seeking pathway for young people experiencing early psychosis, but sex differences in clinical presentation in these settings are unexplored. We aimed to identify sex differences in clinical presentation to primary care services in the 1-year period prior to a first diagnosis of psychotic disorder. We identified first-onset cases of non-affective psychotic disorder over a 10-year period (2005-2015) using health administrative data linked with electronic medical records (EMRs) from primary care (n = 465). Detailed information on encounters in the year prior to first diagnosis was abstracted, including psychiatric symptoms, other relevant behaviours, …

Extremely Hot Ambient Temperature And Injury-Related Mortality, Mien T N Nguyen, Man V M Nguyen, Huong V T Le, Hoai Viet Nguyen, Vu Anh Nguyen, Ngoan Tran Le

Kesmas

This pilot study aimed to evaluate the effects of extremely hot ambient temperatures on the total number of fatal injuries. Data were collected from a population-based mortality registry of Thanh Hoa, a province in the North Central region of Vietnam. This study qualified the distributed lag non-linear model and calculated the RR and 95% CI adjusted for long-term trend and absolute humidity. For the entire study population with 3,949 registered deaths due to injuries collected during 2005-2007, after the onset of extremely hot ambient temperatures, an increased risk of death was observed on the 9th day RR (95% CI) = …

Assessment Of Rabies Control Attitudes During The Covid-19 Pandemic Through Partial Least Square-Structural Equation Modeling, Sang Gede Purnama, Ni Wayan Arya Utami, Made Subrata, Putu Erma Pradnyani, Karang Agustina, Ibn Swacita

Kesmas

The COVID-19 pandemic disrupts rabies control activities in the community. A new approach is needed to control rabies during the COVID-19 pandemic through digital health interventions by conducting digital surveillance and education. This study aimed to determine key attitude indicators in controlling rabies during the COVID-19 pandemic. A cross-sectional study on 166 participants in Denpasar City with a total of 31 indicators measuring five variables: perceptions of the benefits of rabies control (6 indicators), perceptions of rabies risk (6 indicators), perceptions of obstacles to rabies control (5 indicators), perceptions of the need for technology (7 indicators), and attitudes toward rabies …

Ten‐Year Cardiovascular Disease Risk Score And Cognitive Function Among Older Adults: The National Health And Nutrition Examination Survey 2011 To 2014, Jingkai Wei, Hanzhang Xu, Angela D. Liese, Anwar T. Nerchant Sc.D, Mph, Dmd, Liang Wang, Chih-Hsiang Yang, Matthew C. Lohman, Monique J. Brown Ph.D., Mph, Tiansheng Wang, Daniela B. Friedman Ph.D.

Faculty Publications

BACKGROUND: The Framingham 10-year cardiovascular disease risk score, which is based on age, sex, smoking, total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein-cholesterol, blood pressure, and diabetes, has been found to be associated with cognitive health, but these findings have not been validated in a representative sample in the United States. We aimed to examine the associations of Framingham risk score with cognitive function among older adults in a nationally representative sample, as well as by race or ethnicity, education, and family income.

METHODS AND RESULTS: A total of 2254 older adults ≥60years (57% female, 79% non-Hispanic White) in the National Health and Nutrition …

Patterns Of Hiv Disclosure And Its Impact On The Hiv Care Continuum Among Black Men Who Have Sex With Men In South Carolina, Xueying Yang Ph.D., Titilayo A. James, Monique J. Brown Ph.D., Mph, Tony Brown, Sydney Zarsadias, Ran Zhang, Fanghui Shi, Xiaoming Li Ph.D.

Faculty Publications

Addressing the psychosocial concerns of Black men who have sex with men (MSM), such as HIV disclosure, is critical for effective HIV treatment efforts. Black MSM living with HIV experience multiple psychosocial challenges, such as “triple stigma” due to their sexual orientation, racial minority status, and HIV status, which hinder their HIV disclosure and subsequent HIV care-seeking behavior. Our study sought to examine the HIV disclosure patterns and their impact on the HIV care continuum among Black MSM using a qualitative approach. Semi-structured interviews were carried out among 28 Black MSM aged ≥18 years old living in South Carolina. A …

Analytical Approach For Monitoring The Behavior Of Patients With Pancreatic Adenocarcinoma At Different Stages As A Function Of Time, Aditya Chakaborty Dr, Chris P. Tsokos Dr

Biology and Medicine Through Mathematics Conference

No abstract provided.

Drug Ideologies Of The United States, Macy Montgomery

Helm's School of Government Conference - 2021-2024

The United States has been increasingly creating lenient drug policies. Seventeen states and Washington, the District of Columbia, legalized marijuana, and Oregon decriminalized certain drugs, including methamphetamine, heroin, and cocaine. The medical community has proven that drugs, including marijuana, have myriad adverse health side effects. This leads to two questions: Why does the United States government continue to create lenient drug policies, and what reasons do citizens give for legalizing drugs when the medical community has proven them harmful? The paper hypothesizes that the disadvantages of drug legalization outweigh its benefits because of the numerous harms it causes, such as …

Trends In Resources For Neonatal Intensive Care At Delivery Hospitals For Infants Born Younger Than 30 Weeks' Gestation, 2009-2020, Nansi S. Boghossian, Marco Geraci, Ciaran S. Phibbs, Scott A. Lorch, Erika M. Edwards, Jeffrey D. Horbar

Faculty Publications

Importance: In an ideal regionalized system, all infants born very preterm would be delivered at a large tertiary hospital capable of providing all necessary care. Objective: To examine whether the distribution of extremely preterm births changed between 2009 and 2020 based on neonatal intensive care resources at the delivery hospital. Design, Setting, and Participants: This retrospective cohort study was conducted at 822 Vermont Oxford Network (VON) centers in the US between 2009 and 2020. Participants included infants born at 22 to 29 weeks' gestation, delivered at or transferred to centers participating in the VON. Data were analyzed from February to …

On Cox Proportional Hazards Model Performance Under Different Sampling Schemes, Hani Samawi, Lili Yu, Jingjing Yin

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

Cox’s proportional hazards model (PH) is an acceptable model for survival data analysis. This work investigates PH models’ performance under different efficient sampling schemes for analyzing time to event data (survival data). We will compare a modified Extreme, and Double Extreme Ranked Set Sampling (ERSS, and DERSS) schemes with a simple random sampling scheme. Observations are assumed to be selected based on an easy-to-evaluate baseline available variable associated with the survival time. Through intensive simulations, we show that these modified approaches (ERSS and DERSS) provide more powerful testing procedures and more efficient estimates of hazard ratio than those based on …

A Pharmacoepidemiological Study Of Myocarditis And Pericarditis Following The First Dose Of Mrna Covid-19 Vaccine In Europe, Joana Tome, Logan Cowan, Isaac Fung

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

This study assessed the myocarditis and pericarditis reporting rate of the first dose of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines in Europe. Myocarditis and pericarditis data pertinent to mRNA COVID19 vaccines (1 January 2021–11 February 2022) from EudraVigilance database were combined with European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC)’s vaccination tracker data. The reporting rate was expressed as events (occurring within 28 days of the first dose) per 1 million individuals vaccinated. An observed-to-expected (OE) analysis quantified excess risk for myocarditis or pericarditis following the first mRNA COVID-19 vaccination. The reporting rate of myocarditis per 1 million individuals vaccinated was 17.27 (95% …

Knowledge, Attitude, And Behavioral Intention About Oral Cancer Among Public Health Students In Southeast Georgia, Ravneet Kaur, Gulzar H. Shah

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

Background: Oral cancer (OC) is a significant public health problem; however, the degree to which the future public health workforce is aware of this issue is not well researched. The purpose of this study is to explore the level of knowledge, attitudes, and behavioral intentions about OC among public health students.
Materials and Methods: A sequential exploratory mixed-method research design was employed for this study. Using quantitative and qualitative measures, a survey was administered to 129 public health students. Subsequently, to understand the quantitative findings, two follow-up focus groups were conducted with survey participants.
Results: We found …

Prevalence Of Sars-Cov-2 Antibodies In Liberty University Student Population, Emily Bonus

Senior Honors Theses

In 2020, the virus SARS-CoV-2 gained attention as it spread around the world. Its antibodies are poorly understood, and little research focuses on those with few COVID-19 complications yet large numbers of close contacts: university students. This longitudinal study recorded SARS-CoV-2 antibody presence in 107 undergraduate Liberty University students twice during early 2021. After extensive data cleaning and the application of various statistical tests and ANOVAs, the data seems to show that in the case of COVID-19 infections, SARS-CoV-2 IgM antibodies are immediately produced, and then IgG antibodies follow later. However, the COVID-19 vaccine causes the production of both IgM …

Patient And Physician Factors Associated With First Diagnosis Of Non-Affective Psychotic Disorder In Primary Care, Joshua C. Wiener, Rebecca Rodrigues, Jennifer N S Reid, Suzanne Archie, Richard G Booth, Chiachen Cheng, Saadia Hameed Jan, Paul Kurdyak, Arlene G Macdougall, Lena Palaniyappan, Bridget L Ryan, Kelly K. Anderson

Epidemiology and Biostatistics Publications

Primary care physicians play a central role in pathways to care for first-episode psychosis, and their increased involvement in early detection could improve service-related outcomes. The aim of this study was to estimate the proportion of psychosis first diagnosed in primary care, and identify associated patient and physician factors. We used linked health administrative data to construct a retrospective cohort of people aged 14-35 years with a first diagnosis of non-affective psychosis in Ontario, Canada between 2005-2015. We restricted the sample to patients with help-seeking contacts for mental health reasons in primary care in the six months prior to first …

Evaluating The Feasibility And Potential Impacts Of A Recovery-Oriented Psychosocial Rehabilitation Toolkit In A Health Care Setting In Kenya: A Mixed-Methods Study, Regina Casey, Joshua C. Wiener, Terry Krupa, Rosemary Lysaght, Marlene Janzen Le Ber, Ruth Ruhara, Elizabeth Price, Romaisa Pervez, Sean Kidd, Victoria Mutiso, David M Ndetei, Arlene G Macdougall

Epidemiology and Biostatistics Publications

OBJECTIVES: This pilot study evaluated the feasibility and potential impacts of delivering the Psychosocial Rehabilitation (PSR) Toolkit for people with serious mental illness within a health care setting in Kenya.

METHOD: This study used a convergent mixed-methods design. Participants were people with serious mental illness (n = 23), each with an accompanying family member, who were outpatients of a hospital or satellite clinic in semirural Kenya. The intervention consisted of 14 weekly group sessions of PSR cofacilitated by health care professionals and peers with mental illness. Quantitative data were collected from patients and family members using validated outcome measures before …

Presidential Vote Share And Covid-19 Vaccination Rate In Indonesia: A District-Level Cross-Sectional Ecological Study, Gede Benny Setia Wirawan, Ni Luh Zallila Gustina, Ivy Cerelia Valerie, I Gusti Ayu Indah Pradnyani Rs, Muchamad Zaenal Arifin, Pande Putu Januraga

Kesmas

Political affiliation has been reported as a determinant of COVID-19 vaccine acceptance in some countries, although few studies have examined the Asian context. This study aims to fill this gap by employing an ecological study design using Indonesian regions as data points. Political affiliation was represented by incumbent President Jokowi’s vote share in the 2019 presidential election. Potential confounders included population density, human development index, availability of hospitals and primary health care, 2019–2020 economic growth, COVID-19 mortality rate, and proportion of Muslims in the population. The final analysis included 201 out of 501 districts and cities in Indonesia. Controlling for …

Oxidative Stress Levels Of Fine Particulate Matter (Pm2.5) And Urinary Glutathione Of Microbus Drivers, Purnama Sidebang, Agustin Kusumayati, Budi Haryanto

Kesmas

Urinary glutathione levels are known to be an early indicator of oxidative stress in travelers. This study analyzed the association between particulate matter (PM2.5) exposure on the road and urine glutathione levels in Jakarta’s microbus drivers. This cross-sectional study involved 96 microbuses (one of Jakarta’s public transportations) drivers of nine routes in Kampung Melayu Bus Station, Jakarta, Indonesia. An anthropometric assessment and a structured questionnaire were employed. Along with the participants driving on the road, real-time personal equipment measuring PM2.5 exposure concentrations was used. Total glutathione levels were measured using a colorimetric method. A correlation test and linear regression analysis …