The University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing (Penn Nursing) has been awarded a $3.2 million, 5-year grant from the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) to scale out an evidence-based secure firearm storage intervention at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). Firearms are now the leading cause of death for U.S. children and teens, driving the largest spike in children’s mortality in more than 50 years. The study aims to keep children safer from firearm injury and mortality by promoting secure firearm storage.
Tag: Intervention
Digital Self-Harm Surges Among U.S. Teens from 2016 to 2021
Digital self-harm, where individuals anonymously post or share hurtful content about themselves online, has increased more than 88% since 2016. Between 2019 and 2021, about 9 to 12% of 13 to 17 year olds in the U.S. engaged in digital self-harm. The study also explored whether teens who experienced cyberbullying were more likely to engage in digital self-harm.
There’s no ‘one size fits all’ when it comes to addressing men’s health issues globally
At a time when health resources are at a premium and need to be wisely allocated, health professionals must find points within men’s lives when it makes the most sense to intervene and advocate for preventive care for promoting better health outcomes.
Recovery Checkups in Primary Care Settings Linked to Increased Substance Use Treatment and Reduced Alcohol and Cannabis Use in Patients with Complex Needs
Highly vulnerable patients with alcohol use disorder (AUD) or substance use disorder (SUD) who received regular assessments after their initial intervention had substantially better outcomes a year later than those who did not receive the same follow-up, according to a new study. Fewer than one in ten people with SUD receive any form of treatment in a given year; among those who do, relapse and treatment reentry are common. A Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) protocol is intended to facilitate treatment referrals, especially among patients with more severe SUDs, but research has shown it to be relatively ineffective in that regard. Adding a Recovery Management Checkup (RMC) intervention can improve treatment rates; RMC conceptualizes AUD and SUD as chronic conditions requiring longer-term monitoring via regular check-ins, early re-intervention in cases of relapse, and treatment retention strategies. For the study in Alcohol: Clinical & Experimental Resear
Improved Accuracy of Screening Tools for Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder May Lead to Faster Diagnosis and More Timely Intervention
A new screening instrument has the potential to more accurately identify fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD), reducing missed and erroneous diagnoses in affected children and facilitating treatment and support, a new study suggests. Prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) is a known cause of birth and growth defects and neurobehavioral issues.
Preparing for Coming RSV, Influenza Epidemics
Nonpharmaceutical interventions slowed the spread of COVID-19 and other infectious diseases but now, as NPIs are lifted, countries are seeing a resurgence in several respiratory diseases. In Chaos, scientists, using data from Hong Kong to develop their model, describe a threshold control method that can be used to predict the best time to lift NPIs without overwhelming the hospital systems when these other respiratory diseases inevitably surge back. They found that reintroducing NPI measures when a threshold of 600 severe cases is reached could ensure that the hospital system in Hong Kong is not overwhelmed by severely infected patients.
Five Key Factors Affect Physical Activity in Multi-ethnic Older Adults
A study is the first to use a large range of instruments/ tools and include older adults from many ethnic groups to determine factors affecting their physical activity. Results showed that age, education, social network, pain and depression accounted for a statistically significant proportion of unique variance in physical activity in this diverse older population living independently. Those who reported lower physical activity tended to be older, have less years of education and reported lower social engagement, networking, resilience, mental health, self-health rating, and higher levels of depression, anxiety, pain, and body mass index compared to the moderate to high physical activity groups.
Situational Motives: Reasons for Forgoing Drinking or Cannabis Use Among College Students
A study has revealed college students’ reasons for abstaining from alcohol or cannabis, including on days when they had initially planned to use one or both substances. The analysis, reported in Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, extends research into the so-called “intention-behavior gap” by being the first study to examine reasons for non-use following an intention to drink or to use cannabis. The findings could inform strategies for alcohol and substance use prevention and intervention on college campuses.
Cat’s Meow: Robotic Pet Boosts Mood, Behavior and Cognition in Adults with Dementia
Researchers tested the effectiveness of affordable, interactive robotic pet cats to improve mood, behavior and cognition in older adults with mild to moderate dementia.
Low-cost 3D Method Rapidly Measures Disease Impacts on Florida’s Coral Reefs
A low-cost and rapid 3D technique is helping scientists to gain insight into the colony- and community-level dynamics of the poorly understood stony coral tissue loss disease responsible for widespread coral death throughout the Tropical Western Atlantic. They adapted Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry to generate 3D models for tracking lesion progression and impacts on diseased coral colonies. They combined traditional diver surveys with 3D colony fate-tracking to determine the impacts of disease on coral colonies throughout Southeast Florida.
Low-cost 3D Method Rapidly Measures Disease Impacts on Florida’s Coral Reefs
A low-cost and rapid 3D technique is helping scientists to gain insight into the colony- and community-level dynamics of the poorly understood stony coral tissue loss disease responsible for widespread coral death throughout the Tropical Western Atlantic. They adapted Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry to generate 3D models for tracking lesion progression and impacts on diseased coral colonies. They combined traditional diver surveys with 3D colony fate-tracking to determine the impacts of disease on coral colonies throughout Southeast Florida.
Saving Lives in Black Barbershops
A new look at data from a landmark Cedars-Sinai study of health interventions in Black barbershops, and a new study that looks at barbershop patrons’ virtual visits with pharmacists, have added to the evidence that convenient, community-based health programs can cost-effectively control high blood pressure and prevent heart attack and stroke.
LifeBridge Health Launches Innovative New Center for Hope, Comprehensive Violence Intervention and Prevention Services Integrated Together Under One Roof
LifeBridge Health launched the Center for Hope, the first comprehensive violence intervention and prevention center in the nation that is part of a large regional health system. The Center for Hope brings together LifeBridge Health services around child abuse, domestic abuse and elder abuse along with community violence prevention programs, including a new Safe Streets site. The building design, which will be revealed at groundbreaking event, was created to welcome children, youth and adults into a space that fosters hope, safety and wellness, including an outdoor area for therapeutic play. The purpose of the Center for Hope is to advance hope, healing and resilience for those impacted by trauma, abuse and violence through comprehensive response, treatment, education and prevention.
New Software Focuses On Better Targeting Mental Health Resources
Researchers have developed a prototype software system that aims to help policymakers and healthcare providers better address mental health challenges facing Hispanic populations across the United States.
Robotic Trunk Support Trainer Improves Upper Body Control of Children with Cerebral Palsy
Columbia Engineering researchers report their innovative robotic Trunk Support Trainer, when combined with active practice of postural movements, improves trunk and reaching control in CP children with impaired sitting control. TruST helps physical therapists to not only support the children in the region of the trunk where they suffer from weakness and incoordination but also challenge them to perform rehabilitation tasks outside their base of support to improve their movement and coordination.
Covid-19 Interventions Can Cut Virus Infections, Severe Outcomes, and Healthcare Needs
Non-pharmaceutical interventions such as voluntary shelter-in-place, quarantines, and other steps taken to control the SARS-CoV-2 virus can reduce the peak number of infections, daily infection rates, cumulative infections, and overall deaths, a new study published in the journal PLOS ONE has found.
For toddlers with autism, more intervention hours are not necessarily better
Two prominent early intervention models for toddlers with autism show a very similar impact, whether delivered at 15-hours or 25-hours per week intensities, a study led by UC Davis MIND Institute researchers has found.
One size does not fit all for young-adult binge-drinkers: Research reveals high-risk clusters that may inform future trajectories and treatment interventions
Young adults who binge drink can be categorized within distinct subgroups based on substance use and mental health symptoms, according to research reported in Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. Binge drinking in young people is very common and linked to adverse outcomes including academic underachievement, risky behaviors, alcohol poisoning, other substance use, and harm to the brain. While some ‘age out’ of binge-drinking in their mid-to-late 20s, others continue with harmful patterns of alcohol use. Previous research has shown that other substance use and mental health indicators vary widely among binge-drinking youth, and could help explain the differences in trajectories. It is also important to understand young people’s motivation for drinking alcohol to inform why some people naturally reduce and others persist or worsen. In the new study, researchers sought to identify distinct patterns of drinking, drug use, and mental health symptoms among young binge drinkers, an
Vets Walking Pets: Strolls with Shelter Dogs May Reduce PTSD Symptoms in Military Veterans
About 6 to 8 million dogs end up in shelters in the U.S. each year. Researchers worked with two no-kill shelters on a study examining the effects of walking with a shelter dog on psychological and physiological stress indicators in military veterans. Results confirm the importance of the human-animal bond and provide evidence that walking with a shelter dog may affect psychological and physiological stress indicators in veterans – with particular potential benefits for those with an increase in PTSD symptom severity.
Students Who Up Their Cannabis Use Face Increased Risk of Alcohol Problems
Cannabis use can worsen some consequences of alcohol use among young adult drinkers over time, according to a new study which tracked the frequency of cannabis use and negative drinking outcomes among college students over three years. More than one in five young drinkers use cannabis, often (but not always) at the same time as drinking alcohol. This is a concern because the effects of cannabis might combine with those of alcohol to increase negative outcomes of drinking, such as impaired driving or developing an alcohol use disorder Although previous research has suggested a link between cannabis use and alcohol consequences, there have been few long-term evaluations of the impact of fluctuations in cannabis use on alcohol consequences over time. The latest study, published in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, was conducted by researchers in Toronto, Ontario, and Buffalo, New York.
Severity and symptoms: Study links alcohol use disorder to other psychiatric conditions
Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is more common among people who have another, co-occuring psychiatric condition (e.g., depression or ADHD), and vice versa. These links are well established, and are based on meeting diagnostic criteria for one or other disorder. However, investigating associations based on strict ‘yes/no’ diagnoses does not account for people who may have a range of psychiatric symptoms and yet do not meet the threshold for a diagnosis of any single disorder.
Starting drinking young predicts hospital admission for acute intoxication
In studies, younger age at first alcohol use has been associated with later alcohol problems in adult life, including heavy drinking and alcohol use disorder. That is the reason why around the world, as in the Netherlands, a key aim of alcohol policy is to postpone the age at first alcohol use. In a report published in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, researchers from the Netherlands have investigated whether age of drinking onset is a risk factor for alcohol intoxication among adolescents aged under 18 years.