Publications by authors named "Black M"

Background And Aim: Dysmenorrhea affects the majority of young women worldwide, but geographical and cultural differences can influence the reporting, impact and management of symptoms. Aotearoa New Zealand is a culturally diverse country, with a high proportion of Māori and Pacific peoples. The aim of this scoping review was to assess the current literature on the prevalence, impact and management strategies for dysmenorrhea in Aotearoa New Zealand.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Childhood adversities, such as exposure to parental mental illness, domestic violence and abuse, substance use, and family poverty, have been linked to involvement in violence in early adulthood. However, evidence on the cumulative impact of multiple adversities throughout childhood on violence and crime in adolescence remains scarce. This study investigates the associations between trajectories of family adversity and poverty during childhood, and the risk of involvement in violence and contact with police in adolescence.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Growing evidence shows parents' exposure to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and lifetime experiences of racial discrimination (EOD) negatively impacts not only their own health, but also their children's health. ACEs and EOD can be conceptualized as a reflection of shared underlying adversities and structural injustices that manifest in inequitable educational and employment opportunities and differential treatment by public policies and programs that impede parents' capacity to support their families. Therefore, a potentially important, but underexplored, mechanism of effects of parent ACEs and EOD on the next generation is through effects on household material hardships.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Since their inception, electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) have gained increasing popularity, sparking a vaping epidemic among adolescents in the US and globally. Several ENDS safety concerns have emerged as device features and formats that contribute to heavy metal exposure and toxicity continue to evolve and outpace regulatory efforts.

Objectives: Our objective was to integrate ENDS emission profiles with salivary proteome and metabolome data to characterize exposure factors that may influence adverse vaping-mediated health outcomes.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Type 2 diabetes (T2D) is a metabolic disease associated with cardiovascular dysfunction. The myocardium preferentially uses ketones over free fatty acids as a more energy efficient substrate. The primary aim was to assess the effects of ketone monoester (K) ingestion on cardiac output index ().

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Overly broad recalls following an FDA advisory occur when the source of an outbreak is originally misidentified or cannot be promptly identified. In this situation, an entire product category might be recalled (e.g.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Post-traumatic osteoarthritis (PTOA) often follows anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction (ACLR), leading to early cartilage degradation. Change in mean T fails to capture subject-specific spatial-temporal variations, highlighting the need for robust quantitative methods for early PTOA detection and monitoring.

Purpose/hypothesis: Develop and apply 3D T cluster analysis to ACLR and healthy knees over 2.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Around one in three pregnant women undergoes induction of labour in the United Kingdom, usually preceded by in-hospital cervical ripening to soften and open the cervix.

Objectives: This study set out to determine whether cervical ripening at home is within an acceptable safety margin of cervical ripening in hospital, is effective, acceptable and cost-effective from both National Health Service and service user perspectives.

Design: The CHOICE study comprised a prospective multicentre observational cohort study using routinely collected data (CHOICE cohort), a process evaluation comprising a survey and nested case studies (qCHOICE) and a cost-effectiveness analysis.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Mental health measures used with autistic adults are often only evaluated for use with non-autistic adults, which may cause inaccurate measurement. This is important when measuring social anxiety disorder as some features overlap with social characteristics of autism. This study evaluated one self-report questionnaire measure of social anxiety disorder, the Severity Measure for Social Anxiety Disorder.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background/objectives: In sub-Saharan Africa, there is paucity of data regarding non-tuberculous mycobacterial (NTM) infections, leading to underappreciation of disease burden. Consequently, fewer resources are allocated, leading to potential adverse outcomes. This study examines long-term mortality and risk factors of South African patients with positive NTM samples.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Food packaging significantly contributes to environmental pollution, leading consumers to seek biodegradable alternatives made from agricultural waste.
  • Research developed and tested plastic-alternative films using chicken skin gelatin combined with antimicrobial agents to improve mechanical properties and food safety.
  • The study found that these biopolymer films effectively reduced Listeria monocytogenes and spoilage microorganisms in stored, fully cooked beef bologna, demonstrating their potential for market acceptance in sustainable packaging solutions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Biofouling communities were studied at two salmon farms in British Columbia, examining various organisms like mollusks, arthropods, and hydroids from April to October 2020.
  • Water quality parameters and jellyfish numbers were also measured, revealing different correlations with biofouling counts and jellyfish at the two sites.
  • Understanding these correlations can help in creating better strategies to manage biofouling and jellyfish populations in aquaculture settings.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Cross-sectional research has suggested associations between diet, sleep and obesity, with sparse longitudinal research.

Objectives: To identify longitudinal mechanistic associations between sleep, diet and obesity.

Methods: We used longitudinal data from a sample of Black adolescent girls.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Although autistic individuals are interested in interacting with peers, they express a need for social skills programs that could support them in navigating their daily social world, which is governed by neurotypical social norms.

Aim: This study investigated the feasibility and adaptability of the manualised and evidence-based program KONTAKT™ Social Skills Toolbox Group Program in supporting autistic children aged 8 to 12 years in navigating their everyday social worlds.

Material And Methods: KONTAKT™ was delivered to 15 autistic children (Mage=10.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Food insecurity is associated with poor health and development among young children, with inconsistent findings related to longitudinal growth.

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate associations between household and child food insecurity and young children's weight trajectory during ages 0 to 2 years.

Design: Longitudinal survey data were analyzed for years 2009 to 2018.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Advancing research and support for neurologically diverse populations requires novel data harmonisation methods that are capable of aligning with contemporary approaches to understanding health and disability.

Objectives: We present the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) as a conceptual framework to support harmonisation of mental health data and present a proof of principle within the Risk and Resilience in Developmental Diversity and Mental Health (R2D2-MH) consortium.

Method: 138 measures from various mental health datasets were linked to the ICF following the WHO's established linking rules.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The burden on the individual, society and healthcare providers of low back pain in the western world is well documented. Globalisation and urbanisation, it has been reported, has led to an increase in low back pain in developing countries such as those situated in Sub-Saharan Africa. Low back pain determinants are framed, according to the individual, social and cultural context.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Radium-223 dichloride (radium-223) is a bone-targeting radioisotope therapy that aids in the survival of patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) to bones. This study aimed to describe the clinical characteristics and outcomes of patients with mCRPC treated with radium-223 in a real-world setting. This was a retrospective study of patients with mCRPC treated with radium-223 between 2016 and 2020 at the London Health Sciences Centre in London, Canada.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The recent mixed-methods review by Nimbley et al. (2024) raises important and concerning, yet not unexpected, insights into the usefulness of eating disorder (ED) treatment for autistic populations. In their review, Nimbley et al.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Parental feeding practices are associated with children's eating, but little is known about how childcare staff feeding practices relate to children's eating. The study examined the associations between childcare staff feeding practices and children's willingness-to-try-new-foods. Participants included children (n = 460), ages 3-5 years, and childcare staff (n = 91) recruited from 51 childcare centers in 10 Maryland counties.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

After conceiving through assisted reproductive technologies (ART), parents may present to their pediatrician with concerns related to their child's neurodevelopment, including whether their child's health may be related to their use of ART. Pediatricians may be unfamiliar with the ART process and what the families endured up to this point, resulting in difficulty counseling parents through these discussions. Before presentation to the pediatrician, parents have undergone extensive evaluation with reproductive endocrinologists.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Purpose: The primary aim of this study was to develop an open-source Python-based software for the automated analysis of dynamic cell behaviors in microphysiological models using non-confocal microscopy. This research seeks to address the existing gap in accessible tools for high-throughput analysis of endothelial tube formation and cell invasion in vitro, facilitating the rapid assessment of drug sensitivity.

Methods: Our approach involved annotating over 1000 2 mm Z-stacks of cancer and endothelial cell co-culture model and training machine learning models to automatically calculate cell coverage, cancer invasion depth, and microvessel dynamics.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Lead halide perovskites have emerged as platforms for exciton-polaritonic studies at room temperature, thanks to their excellent photoluminescence efficiency and synthetic versatility. In this work, we find proof of strong exciton-photon coupling in cavities formed by the layered crystals themselves, a phenomenon known as the self-hybridization effect. We use multilayers of high-quality Ruddlesden-Popper perovskites in their 2D crystalline form, benefiting from their quantum-well excitonic resonances and the strong Fabry-Pérot cavity modes resulting from the total internal reflection at their smooth surfaces.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Dietary nitrate (NO) supplementation has been shown to reduce blood pressure (BP), improve exercise performance, and alter the oral microbiome. Following a "control" diet (CON), we manipulated dietary NO intake to examine the effect of a short-term (7-day) low NO diet (LOW) followed by a 3-day high NO diet (HIGH), compared to a 7-day standard (STD) NO diet followed by HIGH, on saliva, plasma, and muscle [NO] and nitrite ([NO]), BP, and cycling exercise performance in healthy young adults. We also examined the effect of LOW on the oral microbiome.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF