Annenberg

This article examines how everyday media use and interpersonal communication for health information could influence health behaviors beyond intervention or campaign contexts. The authors argue that interpersonal communication works as an independent information channel and mediates the relation between media channels and health behaviors. In addition, the authors investigate whether interpersonal communication differently influences the relation between media connections and health behaviors for more and less educated individuals...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

There is increasing concern that the news media present conflicting health information on topics including cancer screening and nutrition, yet little is known about whether people notice such content. This study proposes four potential measures of media exposure to contradictory health information, using nutrition as an example (Measures I-IV). The measures varied on two dimensions: (1) content specificity, or whether specific nutrition topics and health consequences were mentioned in the question scripting, and (2) obtrusiveness, or whether "contradictory or conflicting information" was mentioned...

BACKGROUND: Ligation and division of the saphenofemoral junction (L/D SFJ) can protect against the danger of venous thromboembolism (VTE) associated with greater saphenous vein (GSV) radiofrequency ablation (RFA). Although this procedure is regarded as clean from an infection standpoint, surgical site infection (SSI) can offset its thromboembolic benefit. We questioned whether SSI associated with L/D SFJ could be minimized by a single preoperative dose of antibiotic. METHODS: A retrospective cohort study was performed on 902 ambulatory surgery patients who underwent 953 consecutive RFAs of the GSV in combination with L/D SFJ...

Using the Annenberg Perception of Tobacco Risk Survey 2, this paper finds that perceived risk deters smoking among persons aged 14-22 years who think that it is relatively difficult to quit smoking and that onset of deleterious health effects occurs relatively quickly. Perceived health risk, however, does not affect the smoking status of young people who hold the opposite beliefs. These results are consistent with predictions of rational addiction models and suggest that young people, who view smoking as more addictive and health effects as more immediate, may have greater incentive to consider long-term health effects in their decision to smoke...

OBJECTIVE: To experimentally test whether presenting logically equivalent, but differently valenced effectiveness information (i.e. attribute framing) affects perceived effectiveness of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, vaccine-related intentions and policy opinions. METHODS: A survey-based experiment (N=334) was fielded in August and September 2007 as part of a larger ongoing web-enabled monthly survey, the Annenberg National Health Communication Survey. Participants were randomly assigned to read a short passage about the HPV vaccine that framed vaccine effectiveness information in one of five ways...

A substantial proportion of American adults hold fatalistic beliefs about cancer prevention despite evidence that a large proportion of cancer deaths are preventable. Several scholars suggest that news media coverage is one source of these beliefs, but scant evidence has been brought to bear on this assertion. We report findings from two studies that assess the plausibility of the claim that local television (TV) news cultivates fatalistic beliefs about cancer prevention. Study 1 features a content analysis of an October 2002 national sample of local TV and newspaper coverage about cancer (n=122 television stations; n=60 newspapers)...

AIM: To investigate the impact of newspaper use in a year of increased coverage of litigation against the tobacco industry on youths' beliefs about the health risks of 'light' cigarettes, and examine relations between inaccurate beliefs about 'lights', perceptions of risk and intentions to quit smoking. PARTICIPANTS: The data come from the 2004 National Annenberg Survey of Youth, a representative random digit dial telephone survey of youths aged 14-22 years in the USA (n=1501; current smokers, n=305; 'lights' smokers, n=112)...

OBJECTIVES: We address whether smoking is related to suicidal ideation in teens and whether there is evidence of a causal pathway. METHODS: We use data from the 2002 National Annenberg Survey of Youth and employ multivariate logistic regression to model each teen's risk of suicidal ideation as a function of self-report of depressive symptoms, own smoking, parent smoking, and demographic and household income variables. RESULTS: Individuals reporting depressive symptoms have an increased risk of suicidal ideation (odds ratio [OR] = 13...

This study investigated the impact of exposure to prescription drug advertisements for antidepressants and antianxiety medications on public opinion regarding preferred treatment options for youth suffering from depression or anxiety. The study randomly recruited a nationally representative adult sample (N = 402) through the 2007 Annenberg National Health Communication Survey. The study examined the distribution of public support for the use of antidepressant drugs to treat depression and anxiety disorders in youth...

The association between adolescents' and young adults' attitudes toward suicide and their own suicidality across five racial-ethnic classifications was studied in a nationally representative sample of 3,301 youth ages 14 to 22 years from the National Annenberg Risk Survey of Youth. Results indicate that adolescents and young adults who most strongly believe that it is acceptable to end one's life are more than fourteen times more likely to make a plan to kill themselves as those who do not have such beliefs (p < ...

More than 2 million people undergo major orthopedic surgery each year, and this rate is expected to continue rising as our population ages. Our patients are at particularly high risk for deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and pulmonary embolism. The latest guidelines from the American College of Chest Physicians recommend thromboprophylaxis for high-risk orthopedic surgery patients. Although specific recommendations vary by type of surgery, low-molecular-weight heparin, fondaparinux, warfarin, and sometimes low-dose unfractionated heparin are effective alone or with mechanical prophylaxis...

There is minimal guidance for efforts to create effective public messages that increase awareness that suicide is preventable. To address this need, several agencies in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Annenberg Foundation convened a workshop consisting of suicide prevention advocates and persons with expertise in public health evaluation, suicide contagion, decision-making, and marketing. "Logic models" were used to define intended messages and audiences, assumed mechanisms of change, and outcomes...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

A 70-year-old woman underwent an elective sigmoid resection for chronic diverticulitis. On the third postoperative day she suddenly developed abdominal pain and hypotension after a coughing episode. Radiologic evaluation demonstrated the presence of a hemoperitoneum. A celiac arteriogram was obtained in an effort to determine the cause of the hemorrhage. Four aneurysms of the intrahepatic portions of the left and right hepatic arteries were found. These aneurysms were successfully treated using steel coil embolization...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

An 18-year-old man sought treatment for a pulsatile mass in the medial distal thigh four years after he had sustained blunt trauma during a wrestling match. Investigation, which included magnetic resonance imaging and arteriography, showed the mass to be a pseudoaneurysm, which should be considered in the differential diagnosis of masses resulting from direct, blunt trauma. At exploration, a pseudoaneurysmic thrombus in the superficial femoral artery was evacuated and the vessel was repaired with an interposition graft of reversed saphenous vein, followed by complete recovery of the patient...