Epidemiology Commons^™

Online Dashboards For Sars-Cov-2 Wastewater Data Need Standard Best Practices: An Environmental Health Communication Agenda., Colleen C. Naughton, Rochelle H. Holm, Nancy J. Lin, Brooklyn P. James, Ted Smith

Faculty and Staff Scholarship

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the benefits of wastewater surveillance to supplement clinical data. Numerous online information dashboards have been rapidly, and typically independently, developed to communicate environmental surveillance data to public health officials and the public. In this study, we review dashboards presenting SARS-CoV-2 wastewater data and propose a path toward harmonization and improved risk communication. A list of 127 dashboards representing 27 countries was compiled. The variability was high and encompassed aspects including the graphics used for data presentation (e.g., line/bar graphs, maps, and tables), log versus linear scale, and 96 separate ways of labeling SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations. …

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 …

Communicating Health: Misinformation And Mistrust In The Age Of Coronavirus, Chris Anstead

Undergraduate Theses

With one of the most advanced medical systems in the world, the Untied States still experienced an exceedingly high COVID-19 death rate per capita. Because biomedical therapies for COVID-19 were available, the focus of this review is on the social aspects of the COVID-19 response. By observing how Americans reacted to vaccination, masking, and social distancing guidelines, as well as how those guidelines were communicated to the general population from the public and private sectors, this thesis argues that the social and political aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic played a significant role in the outcome of the pandemic response. Additionally, …

Covid-19 Severity Scale For Claims Data Research, Trudy Millard Krause, Raymond Greenberg, Lopita Ghosh, Joseph S Wozny, Regina M Hansen, Caroline Schaefer

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

OBJECTIVE: to create and validate a methodology to assign a severity level to an episode of COVID-19 for retrospective analysis in claims data.

DATA SOURCE: Secondary data obtained by license agreement from Optum provided claims records nationally for 19,761,754 persons, of which, 692,094 persons had COVID-19 in 2020.

STUDY DESIGN: The World Health Organization (WHO) COVID-19 Progression Scale was used as a model to identify endpoints as measures of episode severity within claims data. Endpoints used included symptoms, respiratory status, progression to levels of treatment and mortality.

DATA COLLECTION/EXTRACTION METHODS: The strategy for identification of cases relied upon the February …

Comparing The Health Care Resource Utilization And Medication Adherence Of People With Epilepsy And People With Diabetes By Insurance Status, Nikole Hoffman, Gerald Shoultz, Sarah Nechuta

Masters Projects

Background: Epilepsy is one of the most common neurological diseases worldwide; diabetes is a chronic metabolic disease that affects how the body produces and uses insulin. Prescribed medications are vital for controlling these and other chronic diseases by minimizing severe health issues, which can be affected by insurance type and status. Consequences of non-adherence include uncontrolled blood glucose in people with diabetes and uncontrolled seizures in people with epilepsy. We aimed to compare the healthcare resource utilization and medication adherence of people with epilepsy and people with diabetes by insurance status. Methods: Data was from the 2021 National …

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% …

Environmental And Social Factors Associated With High Chronic Kidney Disease Mortality Rates In Municipalities Of Guatemala: An Ecological Study Of Municipal-Level Mortality Data, Alejandro Cerón

Anthropology: Faculty Scholarship

The purpose of this study was to determine the association between social and environmental indicators and high mortality rates from chronic kidney disease (CKD) in municipalities of Guatemala. An ecological study of municipal-level factors associated with CKD mortality in Guatemala was conducted. Crude mortality rates were calculated for the 2009–2019 period for each of the country’s 340 municipalities, by gender and age groups. Municipal-level social and environmental indicators were used as independent variables. Linear regression was used for bivariate and multivariate analysis. A total of 28,723 deaths from CKD were documented for the 2009–2019 period. Average crude mortality rate for …

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 …

Ethnic Disparities In Childhood Leukemia Survival By Border Residence: A Texas Population-Based Analysis, Maria I Castellanos, Abiodun O Oluyomi, Tiffany M Chambers, Maria M Gramatges, Lena E Winestone, Philip J Lupo, Michael E Scheurer

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Background: The US-Mexico border is a medically underserved region where survival disparities have been observed in adults diagnosed and treated for various malignancies. Studies examining survival disparities among children living in this region and diagnosed with cancer are lacking. The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact of border residence on survival among children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), acute myeloid leukemia (AML), and living near the Texas-Mexico border at the time of their diagnosis. The authors hypothesized that this group experiences inferior survival compared with patients with childhood leukemia living in nonborder areas.

Methods: The authors conducted …

Precision Medicine, Ancestry, Genetics And Race, Lucio Miele

School of Medicine Faculty Publications

DiscoverBMB, March 25 - 28, 2023, Seattle, WA

Clustering Of Pediatric Brain Tumors In Texas, 2000-2017, Thanh T Hoang, Omar Rosales, Elyse Burgess, Philip J Lupo, Michael E Scheurer, Abiodun O Oluyomi

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Risk factors for pediatric brain tumors are largely unknown. Identifying spatial clusters of these rare tumors on the basis of residential address may provide insights into childhood socio-environmental factors that increase susceptibility. From 2000-2017, the Texas Cancer Registry recorded 4305 primary brain tumors diagnosed among children (≤19 years old). We performed a spatial analysis in SaTScan to identify neighborhoods (census tracts) where the observed number of pediatric brain tumors was higher than expected. Within each census tract, the number of pediatric brain tumors was summed on the basis of residential address at diagnosis. The population estimate from the 2007-2011 American …

Metabolic Dysregulation Impairs Lymphocyte Function During Severe Sars-Cov-2 Infection, Sanjeev Gurshaney, Anamaria Morales-Alvarez, Kevin Ezhakunnel, Andrew Manalo, Thien-Huong Huynh, Jun-Ichi Abe, Nhat-Tu Le, Daniela Weiskopf, Alessandro Sette, Daniel S Lupu, Stephen J Gardell, Hung Nguyen

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Cellular metabolic dysregulation is a consequence of SARS-CoV-2 infection that is a key determinant of disease severity. However, how metabolic perturbations influence immunological function during COVID-19 remains unclear. Here, using a combination of high-dimensional flow cytometry, cutting-edge single-cell metabolomics, and re-analysis of single-cell transcriptomic data, we demonstrate a global hypoxia-linked metabolic switch from fatty acid oxidation and mitochondrial respiration towards anaerobic, glucose-dependent metabolism in CD8+Tc, NKT, and epithelial cells. Consequently, we found that a strong dysregulation in immunometabolism was tied to increased cellular exhaustion, attenuated effector function, and impaired memory differentiation. Pharmacological inhibition of mitophagy with mdivi-1 reduced excess glucose …

Beyond The Bmi: Expanding Quantitative Methods To Study Health For All Bodies, Kieran Chase, Daniel Oron

OHSU-PSU School of Public Health Annual Conference

The public health field is beginning to reckon with its role in perpetuating and reinforcing systemic anti-fatness. Emerging evidence for the devastating health impacts of stigma call into question decades of research and policy that labels the size of people’s bodies as diseased. However, even as we acknowledge the harmful effects of stigma, the field is materially and institutionally invested in a health paradigm that centers weight loss and size-related proxies for health, such as the BMI. Public health scholars interested in questions related to nutrition, chronic disease, and exercise must begin to expand their research focus to imagine non-stigmatizing …

Coarse-Grained Molecular Simulations And Ensemble-Based Mutational Profiling Of Protein Stability In The Different Functional Forms Of The Sars-Cov-2 Spike Trimers: Balancing Stability And Adaptability In Ba.1, Ba.2 And Ba.2.75 Variants, Gennady M. Verkhivker, Mohammed Alshahrani, Grace Gupta

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

Evolutionary and functional studies have suggested that the emergence of Omicron variants can be determined by multiple fitness tradeoffs including immune escape, binding affinity, conformational plasticity, protein stability, and allosteric modulation. In this study, we embarked on a systematic comparative analysis of the conformational dynamics, electrostatics, protein stability, and allostery in the different functional states of spike trimers for BA.1, BA.2, and BA.2.75 variants. Using efficient and accurate coarse-grained simulations and atomistic reconstruction of the ensembles, we examined the conformational dynamics of the spike trimers that agree with the recent functional studies, suggesting that BA.2.75 trimers are the most stable …

Autism Awareness Month 2023, Raquel Estrada, William Flores

Library Display Posters

Collection of posters created for Autism Awareness Month. Poster topics include: General Books, Popular Titles, Juvenile Titles, Streaming Films, and Research Resources. Book and video covers are hyperlinked.

Intergenerational Change In Hiv/Aids-Related Stigma In Cato Manor, Mijin Cho

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

In South Africa, the world’s epicenter of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, HIV-related stigma and stigma-enforcing stereotypes continue to serve as major health barriers to receiving adequate HIV prevention and treatment. While there continues to be a rise in research and advocacy, there is a need to study HIV stigma through a multigenerational lens that addresses the changing HIV/AIDS stigma in the post-apartheid era. Using qualitative methodology, this study aims to explore the generational differences in perceived HIV stigma between females in their 20s and above 50 years of age (as denoted by “50s+”) living in Cato Manor, South Africa. The study …

Discrepancies In The Estimation Of Vaping Rates Among College Students, Cameron J. Klug

Honors Thesis

The use of nicotine inhalation products among college students is an imminent public health issue, with young-adult populations being particularly likely to take up nicotine use during their college years (American College Health Association, 2021). Even with elevated levels of nicotine vapor product use in college populations, existing surveys may still underestimate the prevalence of nicotine use among this population. This study aimed to address this issue by conducting a survey of college students at the University of South Dakota, using a peer-to-peer approach to reduce social desirability bias. The study’s survey directly stated it was being issued and analyzed …

Institutional Strategies To Maintain And Grow Imaging Research During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Mai-Lan Ho, Corey W Arnold, Summer J Decker, John D Hazle, Elizabeth A Krupinski, David A Mankoff

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Understanding imaging research experiences, challenges, and strategies for academic radiology departments during and after COVID-19 is critical to prepare for future disruptive events. We summarize key insights and programmatic initiatives at major academic hospitals across the world, based on literature review and meetings of the Radiological Society of North America Vice Chairs of Research (RSNA VCR) group. Through expert discussion and case studies, we provide suggested guidelines to maintain and grow radiology research in the postpandemic era.

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 …