Serum Dioxin Levels in a Subset of Participants of the East Palestine, Ohio Train Derailment Health Tracking Study.

A February 3, 2023 train derailment and subsequent burn released hazardous chemicals into East Palestine, Ohio. One potential exposure was polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins, dibenzofurans, and coplanar polychlorinated biphenyls (cPCBs), collectively referred to as dioxins. Many studies have linked dioxins to numerous health effects.

Communities That HEAL Intervention and Mortality Including Polysubstance Overdose Deaths: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: The HEALing Communities Study (HCS) evaluated the effectiveness of the Communities That HEAL (CTH) intervention in preventing fatal overdoses amidst the US opioid epidemic.

Objective: To evaluate the impact of the CTH intervention on total drug overdose deaths and overdose deaths involving combinations of opioids with psychostimulants or benzodiazepines.

Design, Setting, And Participants: This randomized clinical trial was a parallel-arm, multisite, community-randomized, open, and waitlisted controlled comparison trial of communities in 4 US states between 2020 and 2023.

Characteristics of K-12 Teachers Considering Leaving Due to COVID-19 and for Other Reasons.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has had drastic effects on K-12 teachers. Researchers partnered with a teacher advisory board to identify factors associated with K-12 teachers' consideration of leaving teaching during Fall 2020.

Methods: A web-based survey focused on teachers' working experiences was emailed to school union membership listservs in Indiana, Kentucky, and Ohio.

Effectiveness of a Bystander Intervention Program to Increase Bystander Behaviors Across Latent Risk Groups of High Schoolers.

Bystander intervention programs have established efficacy to increase bystander behaviors to prevent interpersonal violence (IPV). Little research has investigated intervention efficacy among latent risk classes among high school students. Data from a five-year randomized control trial were used to conduct multigroup path analyses to assess the association between type of training received and bystander outcomes moderated by risk groups identified via latent profile analysis (LPA).

Bystander Program to Reduce Sexual Violence by Witnessing Parental Intimate Partner Violence Status.

Introduction: Youth who witness parental intimate partner violence are at increased risk for sexual violence. Existing data from a cluster RCT were used to determine the effectiveness of Green Dot bystander intervention to reduce sexual violence among high-school students who did and did not witness parental intimate partner violence.

Study Design: A secondary analysis was conducted in 2021 of extant data from a 5-year cluster RCT.

Changing Trends in Drug Overdose Mortality in Kentucky: An Examination of Race and Ethnicity, Age, and Contributing Drugs, 2016-2020.

Objectives: Increased drug overdose mortality among non-Hispanic Black people in the United States in the past 5 years highlights the need for better tailored programs and services. We evaluated (1) changes in drug overdose mortality for various racial and ethnic groups and (2) drug involvement to inform drug overdose prevention efforts in Kentucky.

Methods: We used Kentucky death certificates and postmortem toxicology reports from 2016-2020 (provisional data) to estimate changes in age-adjusted drug overdose death rates per 100 000 standard population.

Bystander Intervention Efficacy to Reduce Teen Dating Violence Among High School Youth Who Did and Did Not Witness Parental Partner Violence: A Path Analysis of A Cluster RCT.

Youth who witness parental intimate partner violence (IPV) are at increased risk of teen dating violence (DV). This analysis of secondary data investigated whether a bystander intervention program, was effective at reducing physical and psychological DV victimization and perpetration among youth who had and had not previously witnessed parental IPV. The parent RCT assigned 13 schools to control and 13 schools to the intervention.

Disinfectant use by K-12 school staff to combat SARS-CoV-2.

K-12 school staff from Indiana, Kentucky and Ohio were asked about their use of disinfectants to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 in schools. Survey participants (n = 1,555) reported frequent use of disinfectants, often using unknown products, and were provided little to no training on safe and effective use. Participant concerns included student involvement in disinfection, inadequate ventilation, surface contact time, and potential health effects.

Trends in Drug Overdose Mortality Rates in Kentucky, 2019-2020.

This cross-sectional study evaluates the changes in drug overdose mortality rates for Kentucky residents between 2019 and 2020.

How Does Bystander Training in High School and Beyond Impact Attitudes Toward Violence and Sexism in a Prospective Cohort?

Bystander interventions are recognized as "promising" programming to reduce sexual violence. Gaps in current evaluations include limited follow-up post-training (beyond 24 months) and knowledge of additional bystander training during follow-up.In this prospective cohort study, nested in a cluster randomized controlled trial (RCT), three cohorts of high school (HS) seniors were recruited (Fall 2013-2015) and followed through Spring 2018 ( = 1,831).

A Methodology Report for the Cohort Study to Investigate the Long-Term Efficacy of a Violence Intervention.

Engaged bystander interventions are recognized as "promising" programming to reduce sexual violence (SV), yet little is known of the long-term (>12-month) impact of programming on SV and related forms of gender-based violence. Funded by NIH as a prospective cohort study, recruited and followed three waves of high school seniors who had participated in a large high-school cluster-randomized controlled trial to evaluate the effectiveness of the bystander intervention. This report provides the study design, recruitment methodology, recruitment and retention rates, survey items, and psychometric properties of measures included in the initial and annual electronic surveys with 24-48 months follow-up.

A Campus Climate/Violence Survey's Psychometrics and Findings.

Data from a campus climate/violence survey (CCS) include psychometric information for survey items/scales plus findings from a large state university to promote its usefulness for assessment of interpersonal violence/harassment. This CCS can thus be evaluated for its measurement and documented findings, allowing for benchmarking purposes. An innovative measurement strategy is introduced to comprehensively capture incidence of victimization types through streamlined questioning.

Sexual Minority High School Boys' and Girls' Risk of Sexual Harassment, Sexual Violence, Stalking, and Bullying.

We report the prevalence and number of violent events of sexual violence, sexual harassment, stalking, and bullying experienced among sexual minority girls, sexual minority boys, heterosexual girls, and heterosexual boys. We conducted covariate-adjusted analyses of variance on 16,243 high school youth from 13 schools in Kentucky. Sexual minority boys and girls and heterosexual girls had higher rates of all forms of violence compared with heterosexual boys, but rates of violence between sexual minority girls and boys were statistically equivalent.

Sexual Violence Perpetration as a Risk Factor for Current Depression or Posttraumatic Symptoms in Adolescents.

Sexual violence perpetration (SVP), including coerced, physically forced, and alcohol- or drug-facilitated unwanted sex, occurs frequently in adolescence and may represent a risk factor for future perpetration. Sexual violence victimization (SVV) has been found to be a risk factor for increased rates of depression and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD); however, the associations of SVP with depression or posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) have been less well described. This study examined associations between symptoms of depression and PTSS with SVP in the prior 12 months among high school students.

Bystander Program Effectiveness to Reduce Violence and Violence Acceptance Within Sexual Minority Male and Female High School Students Using a Cluster RCT.

Bystander interventions have been highlighted as promising strategies to reduce sexual violence and sexual harassment, yet their effectiveness for sexual minority youth remains largely unexamined in high schools' populations. This rigorous cluster randomized control trial addresses this gap by evaluating intervention effectiveness among sexual majority and minority students known be to at increased risk of sexual violence. Kentucky high schools were randomized to intervention or control conditions.

Do Violence Acceptance and Bystander Actions Explain the Effects of Green Dot on Reducing Violence Perpetration in High Schools?

This study extends prior analyses from a 5-year multisite cluster-randomized controlled trial to examine how the previously reported effects of the Green Dot bystander-based prevention program worked to reduce violence perpetration. Bystander-based interventions are hypothesized to prevent violence by reducing violence acceptance and increasing trained participants' willingness and ability to actively engage others in violence prevention using safe and effective bystander actions to diffuse or avoid potentially violent situations. We tested this hypothesis by examining whether Green Dot worked to reduce violence through two mediators measured over time: reducing violence acceptance and increasing bystander actions.

Bystander Program Effectiveness to Reduce Violence Acceptance: RCT in High Schools.

Bystander-based violence prevention interventions have shown efficacy to reduce dating violence and sexual violence acceptance at the individual level yet no large randomized controlled trial (RCT) has evaluated this effect at the high-school level and over time. This rigorous cluster-randomized controlled trial addresses this gap by evaluating intervention effectiveness at both school and individual levels. Kentucky high schools were randomized to intervention or control conditions.

Can the Impact of Interpersonal Violence on Current Health-Related Quality of Life Be Mitigated?

Interpersonal violence continues to affect health long after violence has ended. This analysis investigated stress, support, and health behaviors as mediators potentially explaining persistent health impacts of violence. Using a cross-sectional analysis of 12,594 women "Wellness, Health & You" (WHY) participants, authors measured violence as intimate partner violence (IPV), sexual assaults (SA), and childhood abuse (CA) by recency (current, past as an adult, or child) and number of violence forms.

Types of Trauma and Self-Reported Pain That Limits Functioning in Different-Aged Cohorts.

There is a growing body of literature that childhood or adult trauma exposure can have lifelong mental and physical health impacts. In this large cross-sectional analysis, authors investigated combinations of trauma types and pain resulting in functional limitations among women recruited into a statewide health registry. Combinations of traumas such as child physical abuse (CPA), child sexual abuse (CSA), and adult violence were hypothesized to be associated with greater likelihood of limiting pain and earlier symptom onset, relative to women with no or singular trauma exposures.

Utilization of community health workers in Canada's Children's Oral Health Initiative for indigenous communities.

Objective: The Children's Oral Health Initiative (COHI) is a federally funded community-based preventive dental programme implemented in geographically remote Canadian Indigenous communities. The study investigated the effect of the availability of local community health workers (COHI Aides) on access to the programme's preventive dental services for children.

Methods: Twenty-five communities were continuously enrolled in the COHI during the 7-year study period.

Direct Effects of the Home, School, and Consumer Food Environments on the Association between Food Purchasing Patterns and Dietary Intake among Rural Adolescents in Kentucky and North Carolina, 2017.

: Obesity rates are higher among rural versus urban adolescents. To examine possible mechanisms for the rural-urban adolescent obesity disparity, we examined the direct and indirect effects of food purchasing patterns, and the home, school, and consumer food environments on dietary intake among rural adolescents. : A baseline survey was conducted among adolescents in eight rural high schools (four in Eastern Kentucky, and four in Eastern North Carolina).

RCT Testing Bystander Effectiveness to Reduce Violence.

Introduction: Bystander-based programs have shown promise to reduce interpersonal violence at colleges, yet limited rigorous evaluations have addressed bystander intervention effectiveness in high schools. This study evaluated the Green Dot bystander intervention to reduce sexual violence and related forms of interpersonal violence in 26 high schools over 5 years.

Design: A cluster RCT was conducted.

Frequency of Guns in the Households of High School Seniors.

Background: In 2013, President Obama lifted the federal ban on gun violence research. The current study provides one of the first reports to estimate household gun ownership as reported by youth.

Methods: In this cohort study of 3006 high school seniors from 24 schools, we examined the frequency of household guns ownership.

Do Guns in the Home Predict Gender and Relationship Attitudes? An Exploratory Study.

This study explores the potential relationship of guns in students' homes with attitudes indicative of tolerance of violence, negative attitudes toward women and their roles, and attitudes suggestive of myths regarding sexual assault. Seniors in Kentucky high schools whose families possessed guns (N=1749) produced higher scores on scales measuring these variables as well as on scales of relationship dependency and religious involvement than seniors whose families did not own guns (N=912). Students whose families owned more than 10 guns tended to score highest on these measures compared with students whose families owned no or a few guns.