Feature Channels: Public Health

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For the first time in history, the next generation of Americans will not live as long or longer than their parents due to complications from obesity.

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How well are Americans with medical disabilities or chronic illness prepared for natural disasters like hurricanes or tropical storms?

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Less than 7 percent of U.S. seniors chose to receive a shingles vaccination as of 2008, finds a new CDC study.

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On Jan. 12, 2010, Lora Iannotti, PhD, nutrition and public health expert at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, was in Leogane, a seaside town 18 miles west of Port au Prince, Haiti, working with local officials on improving the health of Haitian children. That’s when a catastrophic earthquake struck the poverty-stricken country.

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“Men’s concepts of what it means to be a ‘real’ man are generally shaped by traditional masculine role norms, which encourage men to be extremely self-reliant and these norms often affect their health behavior,” said Wizdom Powell Hammond, Ph.D., assistant professor of health behavior and health education at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health and a member of UNC’s Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center. “We’ve seen in other studies that men with strong commitment to traditional masculine role norms delay health care because they don’t want to seem weak.

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Humanitarian and medical aid workers traveling to remote or resource-limited areas of the world need to take appropriate precautions and risk-mitigation efforts to prevent the transmission of disease while abroad.

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Although the 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic infected an estimated 60 million people and hospitalized more than 250,000 in the United States, it also brought one significant benefit—clues about how to make a vaccine that could protect against multiple strains of influenza.

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A family physician and faculty member at the UMDNJ-School of Osteopathic Medicine offers practical advice for coping with - and avoiding - a virus that is sending a crush of patients to physician offices and hospital ERs.

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Despite the decrease in birth rates in the last 20 years, the latest National Poll on Children's Health shows Americans want a change in how the nation deals with teen pregnancy. Programs may include community service child care, paternity testing and other programs aimed at increasing the responsibility of teen fathers.

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For every four to five reported cases of mesothelioma worldwide, at least one case goes unreported, according to estimates published online January 6 ahead of print in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP). This study is the first to provide a global estimate of unreported mesothelioma cases based on the collective experience of countries with available data on asbestos use and the disease.

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Hospitalizing teen girls with pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) costs six times as much as treating them in the emergency room, and up to 12 times more than treating them in an outpatient clinic, according to a small study conducted at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center.

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Men are more willing to receive human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine when they learn the vaccine can prevent cancer, according to a recent University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill study.

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Depression and diabetes appear to be associated with a significantly increased risk of death from heart disease and risk of death from all causes over a six-year period for women, according to a report in the January issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

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The smoking cessation medications bupropion and varenicline may both be associated with changes in the way the brain reacts to smoking cues, making it easier for patients to resist cravings, according to two reports posted online today that will appear in the May print issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

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Even after young women reach adulthood, their mothers can play a key role in convincing them to receive the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, new research suggests.

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Children who live in areas with fewer pediatricians are more likely to suffer life-threatening ruptures of the appendix than those in areas with more pediatricians, even when accounting for other factors such as the number of hospitals, imaging technology, insurance coverage and the number of surgeons in an area, according to a study from the Johns Hopkins Children's Center.

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Eating a Southern staple, fried fish, could be one reason people in Alabama and across the “stroke belt” states are more likely than other Americans to die of a stroke, according to a study published in the December 22, 2010, online issue of Neurology.

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Prenatal iron-folic acid supplementation increased offspring intellectual and motor functioning.

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Motivational interviewing, a popular counseling technique for many addictive behaviors, might not be the ideal treatment choice for those who smoke cigarettes. A University of Alabama at Birmingham researcher says the reason might be, well — motivation. In findings published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, Peter S. Hendricks, Ph.D., says that motivational interviewing produced only modest improvement for people in treatment for smoking-cessation. The results were surprising because the technique has been effective for other addictive substances.

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The language that doctors use with low-income, rural patients can help determine whether these patients agree to participate in clinical trials testing new cancer treatments, a new study found.

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A survey conducted by Johns Hopkins faculty found strong support among their peers for working more closely with the minority, inner-city community that surrounds the institution. Overall, 91 percent of faculty responders said closer ties make research more relevant to those it ultimately serves, and 87 percent said it improves the quality of research.

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1) Gaps in the system: Addressing the need for ongoing coverage among uninsured working-aged adults with chronic health care needs; 2) Higher minimum wages do not hinder access to health care for low-skilled U.S. workers; 3) Drug arrests not found to deter hard drug users over time.

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With the publication of the nation's first comprehensive, federally funded guide to hospital emergency preparedness exercise development, Dr. Nathaniel Hupert at Weill Cornell Medical College and his collaborators have provided a new toolset for strengthening hospitals' ability to protect communities nationwide against public health disasters, such as creating care centers during an influenza pandemic or treating casualties in the wake of a bioterrorism attack.

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Living in an area where amenities of daily life – groceries, playgrounds, post offices, libraries and restaurants – are within walking distance is linked to higher levels of social capital, such as trust among neighbors and participation in community events, new research finds.

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An evaluation by UNC researchers concluded that fewer N.C. youths are taking up smoking, more public places have become smoke-free and more adults that smoke are quitting, thanks to tobacco prevention programs funded by the North Carolina Health and Wellness Trust Fund.

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Elvis sang of a blue Christmas, but a 'flu Christmas' would be even worse. The dean of UMDNJ-SOM says there is still time to get a vaccine to make sure you don't give or get the gift of flu this year.

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The American Association for Cancer Research commends the U.S. Office of the Surgeon General for its continued focus on tobacco, one of most pressing public health issues of our time. The Surgeon General today released a new report, How Tobacco Smoke Causes Disease, that details the scientific evidence on how smoking causes cancer and numerous other diseases.

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New data shows that people exposed to the mineral erionite found in the gravel of road materials in North Dakota may be at significantly increased risk of developing mesothelioma, a type of lung cancer most often associated with asbestos exposure, according to research presented at the 2010 Chicago Multidisciplinary Symposium in Thoracic Oncology. This symposium is sponsored by the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO), the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (ISLAC) and The University of Chicago.

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Parents are often believed to have a strong influence on children’s eating behaviors however, findings on parent-child resemblance in dietary intakes are mixed.

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A new study by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Research and Policy finds that youth generally perceive community street outreach workers positively, regardless of whether they have personally worked with one. This study, available online in advance of publication in the Journal of Community Health, is the first peer-reviewed study to include the perceptions of youth who are not former or current clients of community street workers.

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The number of people admitted to the hospital because of dog bites increased by 86 percent – from 5,100 to 9,500 hospital stays – between 1993 and 2008.

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Among smokers with military-related posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), integrating smoking cessation treatment with mental health care for PTSD resulted in higher rates of prolonged smoking abstinence, compared to referral for assistance with quitting smoking, according to a study in the December 8 issue of JAMA.

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Four years after the LouseBuster prototype made headlines when research showed the chemical-free, warm-air device wiped out head lice on children, a new study reveals that a revamped, government-cleared model is highly effective.

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A wide-scale study of the effectiveness of flu vaccine in children is needed in Europe to fully assess the benefits, not only in keeping the kids from getting sick, but limiting the spread of flu to adults. That is the conclusion of a doctor at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, writing in the December issue of The Lancet Infectious Disease journal based in London.

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West Virginia University researcher Ian Rockett, PhD, says the latest suicide data is misleading and most likely under-reported, since many deaths by drug overdose are not counted as suicide.

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Two teams of researchers at UC San Diego and other U.S. and African universities and the World Bank have documented significant spillover benefits of a drug therapy to combat AIDS symptoms and a novel prevention strategy that focuses on girls in Sub-Saharan Africa, an area with two-thirds of the world’s HIV infections.

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James E. Klaunig, a toxicologist at Indiana U. who has served on numerous EPA panels, discusses research challenges facing the EPA. James Barnes, professor and former dean at IU, shares an insider's perspective of the earliest days of the EPA.

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It’s now possible to treat the severe form of the flu virus more effectively, according to a Ryerson University researcher.

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Study in mice suggests maintaining a healthy diet is “prudent” for men.

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Research claiming that young people are “overexposed” to antibacterial soap doesn’t reflect real-world usage of a proven, beneficial product used safely and effectively on a daily basis, according to the American Cleaning Institute.

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The well-reported arsenic contamination of drinking water in Bangladesh – called the “largest mass poisoning of a population in history” by the World Health Organization and known to be responsible for a host of slow-developing diseases – has now been shown to have an immediate and toxic effect on the struggling nation’s economy.

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Researchers at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ), following 10 years of studying tobacco use among smokers with mental illness, have developed a comprehensive strategy for recovery from smoking addiction that could serve as a nationwide model.

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Place matters when it comes to health; zip code may be as important a number to physical health as blood pressure or glucose level.

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Dr. Daniel Lieberman from The George Washington University is available to comment on alcohol abuse as it relates to alcoholic energy drinks such as Four Loko.

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1) Primary disease prevention is not only good for our health, but also our budgets; 2) Connections exist between neighborhoods and the risk of chronic disease onset in later life; 3) Urban areas with smaller food markets may be bad for your waistline.

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Used clothes and furniture are potential “hot beds” for the blood-sucking pests

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GW's Dr. Peter Hotez can comment on the cholera outbreak in Haiti and confirmed cases in the Dominican Republic and Florida.

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There is growing evidence that exposure to a group of chemicals known as type-2 alkenes -- which are found in the smoke inhaled from cigarettes, the exhaust of automobiles and even in French fries – can increase the chances of developing Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological conditions such as Parkinson’s disease. Can Curry, Wine and Apple Skins Offer an Antidote?

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Five tips to quit smoking and innovative hospital offers free one month fitness membership for every pack of cigarettes from employees.

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Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center emergency physician Mary Claire O’Brien, M.D., who conducted groundbreaking research into the dangers of manufactured alcoholic energy drinks, is hopeful the FDA will take action.