Moderate influenza vaccine effectiveness with variable effectiveness by match between circulating and vaccine strains in Australian adults aged 20-64 years, 2007-2011.

Background: Influenza vaccines are licensed annually based on immunogenicity studies. We used five sequential years of data to estimate influenza vaccine effectiveness (VE), the critical outcome in the field.

Methods: Between 2007 and 2011, we performed annual prospective test-negative design case-control studies among adults aged 20-64 years recruited from sentinel general practices in the Australian state of Victoria.

Cognition and eye movements: assessment of cerebral dysfunction.

Background: Many neurological disorders show deficits in ocular motor function. In the past, evaluation has been limited to assessing abnormalities largely generated by pathology of the brainstem andcerebellum. In disorders that primarily or substantially, affect the cerebral hemispheres, disruption of cognitive processes occur, often early in the clinical course.

Estimating benefits of past, current, and future reductions in smoking rates using a comprehensive model with competing causes of death.

Introduction: Despite years of declining smoking prevalence, tobacco use is still the leading preventable contributor to illness and death in the United States, and the effect of past tobacco-use control efforts has not fully translated into improvements in health outcomes. The objective of this study was to use a life course model with multiple competing causes of death to elucidate the ongoing benefits of tobacco-use control efforts on US death rates.

Methods: We used a continuous-time life course simulation model for the US population.

Moderate influenza vaccine effectiveness in Victoria, Australia, 2011.

We used a sentinel general practitioner (GP) network to conduct surveillance for laboratory-confirmed influenza amongst patients presenting with influenza-like illness (ILI) in Victoria, Australia in 2011. The test negative variation of the case control study design was used to estimate effectiveness for seasonal trivalent influenza vaccine. Cases and controls were ILI patients that tested positive and negative for influenza, respectively.

Effects of alcohol retail privatization on excessive alcohol consumption and related harms: a community guide systematic review.

Context: Excessive alcohol consumption is the third-leading cause of preventable death in the U.S. This systematic review is one in a series exploring effectiveness of interventions to reduce alcohol-related harms.

A framework for mobilizing communities to advance local tobacco control policy: the Los Angeles County experience.

The Los Angeles County Tobacco Control and Prevention Program was significantly restructured in 2004 to improve capacity for local policy adoption. Restructuring included creating a fully staffed and trained policy unit; partnering with state-funded tobacco control organizations to provide high-quality, continuous technical assistance and training; implementing a highly structured policy adoption approach; expanding community capacity building; and establishing local coalitions to mobilize communities. Over the ensuing 6 years (2004-2010), 97 tobacco control policies were enacted in the county's 88 cities and unincorporated area, including 79 that were attributable to the program.

Longitudinal assessment of antisaccades in patients with multiple sclerosis.

We have previously demonstrated that assessment of antisaccades (AS) provides not only measures of motor function in multiple sclerosis (MS), but measures of cognitive control processes in particular, attention and working memory. This study sought to demonstrate the potential for AS measures to sensitively reflect change in functional status in MS. Twenty-four patients with relapsing-remitting MS and 12 age-matched controls were evaluated longitudinally using an AS saccade task.

Diffusion tensor imaging correlates of visual impairment in multiple sclerosis and chronic optic neuritis.

Purpose: To compare white matter (WM) injuries associated with vision loss in multiple sclerosis (MS) and optic neuritis (ON).

Methods: Twenty-three patients with clinically definite relapsing-remitting MS and chronic unilateral ON and 14 neurologically healthy volunteers were monocularly tested with Sloan 100%, 2.5%, and 1.

A multistate outbreak of hepatitis A associated with semidried tomatoes in Australia, 2009.

Background: A large outbreak of hepatitis A affected individuals in several Australian states in 2009, resulting in a 2-fold increase in cases reported to state health departments compared with 2008. Two peaks of infection occurred (April-May and September-November), with surveillance data suggesting locally acquired infections from a widely distributed food product.

Methods: Two case-control studies were completed.

Imaging the pregnant patient with abdominal pain.

Imaging of pregnant patients with non-obstetric abdominal pain is reviewed, with an accompanying pictorial essay of cases with concentration on magnetic resonance imaging. Non-obstetric causes of abdominal pain during pregnancy are similar to those of non-pregnant patients. The most common causes are appendicitis and cholecystitis.

Healthy people: a 2020 vision for the social determinants approach.

For the past three decades, the Healthy People initiative has represented an ambitious yet achievable health promotion and disease prevention agenda for the nation. The recently released fourth version-Healthy People 2020-builds on the foundations of prior iterations while newly embracing and elevating a comprehensive "social determinants" perspective. By clearly articulating a new overarching goal to "create social and physical environments that promote good health for all" and a new topic area dedicated to defining the social determinants of health approach, it breaks new ground.

Health reform and Healthy People initiative.

The passage of the Affordable Care Act builds on and strengthens the foundation for prevention and wellness that Healthy People--the nation's health promotion and disease prevention aspirations for a healthier nation--established. The Affordable Care Act reaffirms the themes of Healthy People by promoting population-based prevention and sets the stage for Healthy People 2020. The heart of Healthy People 2010 lies in its leading health indicators, reflecting high-priority health issues for the nation.

Inequalities in exposure and awareness of flood risk in England and Wales.

This paper explores the environmental inequalities of living in the floodplains of England and Wales and the differences in flood awareness of those 'at risk'. An area comparison is made between an etic, objective flood risk exposure, and an emic, subjective perception of that risk by social class. In all areas except the Midlands, the working classes were more likely to reside in the floodplains; the greatest exposure inequality is seen in the North East and Anglian regions.

Recommendations for and compliance with social restrictions during implementation of school closures in the early phase of the influenza A (H1N1) 2009 outbreak in Melbourne, Australia.

Background: Localized reactive school and classroom closures were implemented as part of a suite of pandemic containment measures during the initial response to influenza A (H1N1) 2009 in Melbourne, Australia. Infected individuals, and those who had been in close contact with a case, were asked to stay in voluntary home quarantine and refrain from contact with visitors for seven days from the date of symptom onset or exposure to an infected person. Oseltamivir (Tamiflu) was available for treatment or prophylaxis.

Audit of antipsychotic prescribing in dementia: Cambridgeshire results and lessons learnt.

Background: Behavioural and psychological symptoms in dementia (BPSD) are common and distressing. Anti psychotic medication has been shown to have modest efficacy but is associated with well documented risks including excess cardiovascular events and increased mortality. The current NICE recommendations are that antipsychotics should only be prescribed to those with severe BPSD after exploring other possible interventions.

Health of adults in Los Angeles County: findings from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 1999-2004.

Objective: Los Angeles County has the largest population of any county in the nation. Population-based estimates of health conditions for Los Angeles County are based primarily on telephone surveys, which are known to underestimate conditions of public health importance. This report presents the prevalence of selected health conditions for civilian noninstitutionalized adults aged 20 and over living in Los Angeles County households and group quarters, based on survey data using direct physical measurements.

Intrahousehold transmission of pandemic (H1N1) 2009 virus, Victoria, Australia.

To examine intrahousehold secondary transmission of pandemic (H1N1) 2009 virus in households in Victoria, Australia, we conducted a retrospective cross-sectional study in late 2009. We randomly selected case-patients reported during May-June 2009 and their household contacts. Information collected included household characteristics, use of prevention and control measures, and signs and symptoms.

Improving the care of mentally ill patients in a tertiary emergency department: development of a psychiatric assessment and planning unit.

Objective: The aim was to describe the Psychiatric Assessment and Planning Unit (PAPU), established at the Royal Melbourne Hospital (RMH) to improve access to psychiatric care for patients presenting via the Emergency Department (ED).

Method: PAPU was opened in January 2007. Data was recorded from RMH ED databases to compare ED lengths of stay (LOS) prior to and after establishing PAPU.

Effects of dram shop liability and enhanced overservice law enforcement initiatives on excessive alcohol consumption and related harms: Two community guide systematic reviews.

Context: Dram shop liability holds the owner or server(s) at a bar, restaurant, or other location where a patron, adult or underage, consumed his or her last alcoholic beverage responsible for harms subsequently inflicted by the patron on others. Liability in a state can be established by case law or statute. Overservice laws prohibit the sale of alcoholic beverages to intoxicated patrons drinking in on-premises retail alcohol outlets (i.

A midpoint process evaluation of the Los Angeles Basin Racial and Ethnic Approaches to Community Health Across the US (REACH US) Disparities Center, 2007-2009.

Background: Racial/ethnic minority groups have higher risks for disease resulting from obesity.

Community Context: The University of California, Los Angeles, and the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health partnered with community organizations to disseminate culturally targeted physical activity and nutrition-based interventions in worksites.

Methods: We conducted community dialogues with people from 59 government and nonprofit health and social service agencies to develop wellness strategies for implementation in worksites.

Effectiveness of seasonal influenza vaccine against pandemic (H1N1) 2009 virus, Australia, 2010.

To estimate effectiveness of seasonal trivalent and monovalent influenza vaccines against pandemic influenza A (H1N1) 2009 virus, we conducted a test-negative case-control study in Victoria, Australia, in 2010. Patients seen for influenza-like illness by general practitioners in a sentinel surveillance network during 2010 were tested for influenza; vaccination status was recorded. Case-patients had positive PCRs for pandemic (H1N1) 2009 virus, and controls had negative influenza test results.

Continued dominance of pandemic A(H1N1) 2009 influenza in Victoria, Australia in 2010.

The 2010 Victorian influenza season was characterized by normal seasonal influenza activity and the dominance of the pandemic A(H1N1) 2009 strain. General Practice Sentinel Surveillance rates peaked at 9.4 ILI cases per 1000 consultations in week 36 for metropolitan practices, and at 10.