Public health system

The air quality in the subway metro indoor microenvironment has been of particular public concern. With specific reference to the growing demand of green transportation and sustainable development, subway metro systems have been rapidly developed worldwide in last decades. The number of metro commuters has continuously increased over recent years in metropolitan cities. In some cities, metro system has become the primary public transportation mode. Although commuters typically spend only 30-40min in metros, the air pollutants emitted from various interior components of metro system as well as air pollutants carried by ventilation supply air are significant sources of harmful air pollutants that could lead to unhealthy human exposure...

STUDY DESIGN: Retrospective cohort. OBJECTIVE: Determine whether surgeon demographic factors influence postoperative complication rates after elective spine fusion procedures. BACKGROUND: Surgeon demographic factors have been shown to impact decision making in the management of degenerative disease of the lumbar spine. Complication rates are frequently reported outcome measurements used to evaluate surgical treatments, quality-of-care, and determine health care reimbursements...

AIM: The aim of the study was to investigate the health-related behaviours of pregnant women. Maternal health-related habits, use of psychoactive medicines, diet, prevention of neural tube defects, oral cavity hygiene, chronic diseases and physical activity were analysed in a group of pregnant women attending antenatal classes. METHODS: Hundred pregnant women recruited from various antenatal classes in Poznań, Poland, were investigated using a questionnaire based on the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System...

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: HIV prevention and care is changing rapidly; guideline revisions and programmatic scale-up require innovative approaches to in-service training and care extension to improve provider practice and care access. We assessed recent (≤12 months) peer-reviewed publications on electronic health (eHealth), telemedicine, and other innovative provider-targeted interventions for HIV-related care. RECENT FINDINGS: Key developments included systems merging electronic medical records (EMR) with provider clinical decision aids to prompt action, demonstration eHealth, and telemedicine projects, reviews or descriptions of technology to improve connectivity in lower resource settings, and a few trials on provider-centered interventions...

BACKGROUND: Although treatment for osteoporosis is recommended by U.S. clinical guidelines, a lack of diagnosis and treatment is common among patients with osteoporotic fractures. OBJECTIVE: To determine the rates of osteoporosis diagnosis and treatment before and after various types of fractures. METHODS: This was a retrospective claims analysis using data from the Humana Medicare Advantage claims (Medicare group) and Optum Insight Clinformatics Data Mart commercial claims (Commercial group)...

Central Nervous System inflammation has been implicated in neurodegenerative disorders including Parkinson's disease (Ransohoff, Science 353: 777-783, 2016; Kannarkat et al. J. Parkinsons Dis. 3: 493-514, 2013). Here, we examined if the H1N1 influenza virus (Studahl et al. Drugs 73: 131-158, 2013) could synergize with the parkinsonian toxin 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine (Jackson-Lewis et al. in Mark LeDoux (ed) Movement Disorders: Genetics and Models: 287-306, Elsevier, 2015) to induce a greater microglial activation and loss of substantia nigra pars compacta dopaminergic neurons than either insult alone...

Air pollution is a severe threat to public health globally, affecting everyone in developed and developing countries alike. Among different air pollutants, particulate matter (PM), particularly combustion-produced fine PM (PM2.5) has been shown to play a major role in inducing various adverse health effects. Strong associations have been demonstrated by epidemiological and toxicological studies between increases in PM2.5 concentrations and premature mortality, cardiopulmonary diseases, asthma and allergic sensitization, and lung cancer...

Salmonella serotyping remains the gold-standard tool for the classification of Salmonella isolates and forms the basis of Canada's national surveillance program for this priority foodborne pathogen. Public health officials have been increasingly looking toward whole genome sequencing (WGS) to provide a large set of data from which all the relevant information about an isolate can be mined. However, rigorous validation and careful consideration of potential implications in the replacement of traditional surveillance methodologies with WGS data analysis tools is needed...

Using data of 200, 522, 572, and 287 Chinese from Australia, China, Hong Kong and Taiwan respectively, this study aimed at comparing the mental health literacy of Chinese people from different communities, and between Chinese communities and the Australian general public. The participants were asked questions that assessed their recognition of depression and schizophrenia. Compared with the Australians, much lower percentages of Chinese in the four Chinese communities could correctly identify depression and early schizophrenia...

BACKGROUND: In 2013, the World Health Organization (WHO) and CIOMS introduced a revised Causality Assessment Protocol (CAP) for Adverse Events following Immunization (AEFI). India is one of the first countries to adopt the revised CAP. This study describes the application of the revised CAP in India. METHODS: We describe use of CAP by India's AEFI surveillance program to assess reported AEFIs. Using publicly available results of causality assessment for reported AEFIs, we describe the results by demographic characteristics and review the trends for the results of the causality assessment...

BACKGROUND: Warfarin requires individualized dosing and monitoring in the ambulatory setting for protection against thromboembolic disease. Yet in multiple settings, patients spend upwards of 30% of time outside the therapeutic range, subjecting them to an increased risk of adverse events. At an urban, publicly funded clinic, the electronic health record (EHR) would not support integration with extant warfarin management software, which led to the creation and implementation of an electronic patient registry and a complementary team-based work flow to provide real-time health-system-level data for warfarin patients...

Female sex workers (FSWs) are disproportionately affected by HIV, but there is limited research on their HIV care experiences. This study explored the experiences of 44 FSWs living with HIV in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic along the HIV care continuum using in-depth interviews and focus groups. Data were analysed through narrative and thematic analysis. Individual-level factors that facilitated engagement in HIV care were physical and mental health. At the interpersonal level, disclosure of HIV or sex work status and receipt of emotional and economic support were important influences on engagement...

Objective: To explore the key techniques used for surveillance and disposal of infectious diseases, food poisoning and hospital infection to improve the ability of surveillance and disposal on public health emergency. Methods: Framework on surveillance and disposal of infectious diseases, food poisoning and hospital infection was set up, based on literature review and expert group discussion. Delphi method and technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution comprehensive evaluation method were used for ordering preference by similarity, to screen key techniques set for surveillance and disposal of the above said events...

INTRODUCTION: The promotion of safe firearm practices, or firearms means restriction, is a promising but infrequently used suicide prevention strategy in the USA. Safety Check is an evidence-based practice for improving parental firearm safety behaviour in paediatric primary care. However, providers rarely discuss firearm safety during visits, suggesting the need to better understand barriers and facilitators to promoting this approach. This study, Adolescent Suicide Prevention In Routine clinical Encounters, aims to engender a better understanding of how to implement the three firearm components of Safety Check as a suicide prevention strategy in paediatric primary care...

BACKGROUND: On Nov 11, 2015, the Brazilian Ministry of Health declared a Public Health Emergency of National Concern in response to an increased number of microcephaly cases, possibly related to previous Zika virus outbreaks. We describe the course of the dual epidemics of the Zika virus infection during pregnancy and microcephaly in Brazil up to Nov 12, 2016, the first anniversary of this declaration. METHODS: We used secondary data for Zika virus and microcephaly cases obtained through the Brazilian Ministry of Health's surveillance systems from Jan 1, 2015, to Nov 12, 2016...

BACKGROUND: Mandatory notification of health care-associated (HA) infections, including influenza-like illness (ILI) outbreaks, has been implemented in France since 2001. In 2012, the system moved to online electronic notification of HA infections (e-SIN). The objectives of this study are to describe ILI outbreak notifications to Santé publique France (SPF), the French national public health agency, and to evaluate the impact of notification dematerialization. METHODS: All notifications of HA ILI outbreaks between July 2001 and June 2015 were included...

Sepsis in children is a complex syndrome that develops from various infections and results in 15-30% mortality in high-income countries and up to 50% or higher in low-income countries. Worldwide, this represents an annual burden of 30 million cases resulting in 8 million deaths. Not surprisingly, there is a significantly higher burden in low-income countries with children there being 18 times more likely to die before the age of 5 years compared to high-income countries. Factors such as commercial air travel, climate change, and unchecked population growth have contributed to the growing burden of infectious diseases and ensuing sepsis...

BACKGROUND: In 2010 a public sector cadre of community health workers called Community Health Assistants (CHAs) was created in Zambia through the National Community Health Worker Strategy to expand access to health services. This cadre continues to be scaled up to meet the growing demands of Zambia's rural population. We summarize factors that have facilitated the scale-up of the CHA program into a nationwide CHW cadre and the challenges of introducing and institutionalizing the cadre within the Zambian health system...

BACKGROUND: Missed evidence-based monitoring in high-risk conditions (e.g., cancer) leads to delayed diagnosis. Current technological solutions fail to close this safety gap. In response, we aim to demonstrate a novel method to identify common vulnerabilities across clinics and generate attributes for context-flexible population-level monitoring solutions for widespread implementation to improve quality. METHODS: Based on interviews with staff in otolaryngology, pulmonary, urology, breast, and gastroenterology clinics at a large urban publicly funded health system, we applied journey mapping to co-develop a visual representation of how patients are monitored for high-risk conditions...

BACKGROUND: Influenza A viruses (IAV) result in severe public health problems with worldwide each year. Over-response of immune system to IAV infection leads to complications, and ultimately causing morbidity and mortality. OBJECTIVE: Curcumin has been reported to have anti-inflammatory ability. However, its molecular mechanism in immune responses remains unclear. METHODS: We detected the pro-inflammatory cytokine secretion and nuclear factor kappa-light-chain-enhancer of activated B cells (NF-κB) related protein expression in human macrophages or mice infected by IAV with or without curcumin treatment...