Mindful Eco-Wellness: Steps Toward Personal and Planetary Health.

Rising greenhouse gas levels heat the earth's surface and alter climate patterns, posing unprecedented threats to planetary ecology and human health. At the same time, obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease have reached epidemic proportions across the globe, caused in part by decreases in physical activity and by over-consumption of carbon-intensive foods. Thus, interventions that support active transportation (walking or cycling rather than driving) and healthier food choices (eating plant-based rather than meat-based diets) would yield health and sustainability "co-benefits.

Rapid Detection of Influenza Outbreaks in Long-Term Care Facilities Reduces Emergency Room Visits and Hospitalization: A Randomized Trial.

Objectives: To assess whether the use of rapid influenza diagnostic tests (RIDTs) for long-term care facility (LTCF) residents with acute respiratory infection is associated with increased antiviral use and decreased health care utilization.

Design: Nonblinded, pragmatic, randomized controlled trial evaluating a 2-part intervention with modified case identification criteria and nursing staff-initiated collection of nasal swab specimen for on-site RIDT.

Setting And Participants: Residents of 20 LTCFs in Wisconsin matched by bed capacity and geographic location and then randomized.

Rapid Detection of Influenza Outbreaks in Long Term Care Facilities Reduces Emergency Room Visits and Hospitalization.

Context: Influenza is a significant respiratory pathogen for residents of long-term care facilities (LTCFs). Rapid influenza detection tests (RIDT) may enable early outbreak detection allowing a timely response. Objective: We assessed whether RIDT for LTCF residents with acute respiratory infection is associated with increased antiviral use and decreased healthcare utilization.

The Influence of Rapid Influenza Diagnostic Testing on Clinician Decision-Making for Patients With Acute Respiratory Infection in Urgent Care.

Background: The potential benefits of using rapid influenza diagnostic tests (RIDTs) in urgent care facilities for clinical care and prescribing practices are understudied. We compared antiviral and antibiotic prescribing, imaging, and laboratory ordering in clinical encounters with and without RIDT results.

Methods: We compared patients with acute respiratory infection (ARI) symptoms who received an RIDT and patients who did not at 2 urgent care facilities.

Surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 in Asymptomatic Faculty and Staff at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Introduction: Surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 among university employees is an important part of mitigation strategies to prevent asymptomatic transmission and ensure a safe learning and work environment. Here, we assess the feasibility and performance of a program that relies on monitored self-collected nasal swabs to detect SARS-CoV-2 among asymptomatic faculty and staff.

Methods: We recruited 1,030 faculty and staff via rolling enrollment who completed the required University of Wisconsin-Madison employee COVID-19 training and reported working on campus.

Wisconsin Upper Respiratory Symptom Survey for Kids: Validation of an Illness-specific Quality of Life Instrument.

Background: Acute respiratory infections (ARIs) are the most common illness seen in the pediatric ambulatory setting. Research in this area is hampered by the lack of validated ARI measures. The aim of this study was to assess the reliability and validity of the Wisconsin Upper Respiratory Symptom Survey for Kids (WURSS-K), a 15-item instrument, which measures illness-specific symptoms and impact on quality of life during an ARI.

Comparison of participant-collected nasal and staff-collected oropharyngeal specimens for human ribonuclease P detection with RT-PCR during a community-based study.

We analyzed 4,352 participant- and staff-collected respiratory specimens from 2,796 subjects in the Oregon Child Absenteeism due to Respiratory Disease Study. Trained staff collected oropharyngeal specimens from school-aged children with acute respiratory illness while household participants of all ages collected their own midturbinate nasal specimens in year one and anterior nasal specimens in year two. Human ribonuclease P levels were measured using RT-PCR for all staff- and participant-collected specimens to determine adequacy, defined as Cycle threshold less than 38.

Evaluation of Viruses Associated With Acute Respiratory Infections in Long-Term Care Facilities Using a Novel Method: Wisconsin, 2016‒2019.

Residents of long-term care facilities (LCTFs) have high morbidity and mortality associated with acute respiratory infections (ARIs). Limited information exists on the virology of ARI in LTCFs, where virological testing is reactive. We report on findings of a surveillance feasibility substudy from a larger prospective trial of introducing rapid influenza diagnostic testing (RIDT) at 10 Wisconsin LTCFs.

Mindfulness and Climate Change Action: A Feasibility Study.

Pro-environmental behaviors and the cultural shifts that can accompany these may offer solutions to the consequences of a changing climate. Mindfulness has been proposed as a strategy to initiate these types of behaviors. In 2017, we pilot-tested Mindful Climate Action (MCA), an eight-week adult education program that delivers energy use, climate change, and sustainability content in combination with training in mindfulness meditation, to 16 individuals living in Madison, WI.

Mindful Climate Action: Health and Environmental Co-Benefits from Mindfulness-Based Behavioral Training.

Greenhouse gases from human activities are causing climate change, creating risks for people around the globe. Behaviors involving transportation, diet, energy use, and purchasing drive greenhouse gas emissions, but are also related to health and well-being, providing opportunity for co-benefits. Replacing shorter automobile trips with walking or cycling, or eating plants rather than animals, for example, may increase personal health, while also reducing environmental impact.

Positioner and clothing artifact can affect one-third radius bone mineral density measurement.

This report identifies a radius dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) confounder and technical approach to avoid this inaccuracy. Initially, a precision study revealed substantial differences (p<0.001) in radius bone mineral density (BMD) least significant change ranging from 0.

BMD measurement and precision: a comparison of GE Lunar Prodigy and iDXA densitometers.

This study assessed bone mineral density (BMD) comparability and precision using Lunar Prodigy and iDXA densitometers (GE Healthcare, Madison, WI) in adults. Additionally, the utility of supine forearm measurement with iDXA was investigated. Lumbar spine and bilateral proximal femur measurements were obtained in routine clinical manner in 345 volunteers, 202 women and 143 men of mean age 52.

Vitamin K treatment reduces undercarboxylated osteocalcin but does not alter bone turnover, density, or geometry in healthy postmenopausal North American women.

Low vitamin K status is associated with low BMD and increased fracture risk. Additionally, a specific menaquinone, menatetrenone (MK4), may reduce fracture risk. However, whether vitamin K plays a role in the skeletal health of North American women remains unclear.

Calcium supplement ingestion may alter lumbar spine bone mineral density measurement.

Densitometry centers commonly request patients abstain from ingesting calcium supplements prior to dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) examination to avoid interference with bone mineral density (BMD) measurement. However, it is not clear that this practice is necessary. This study assessed the impact of recent calcium supplement intake on lumbar spine BMD measurement.