Identifying High-Risk ZIP Codes for Childhood Lead Exposure: A Statewide ZCTA-Level Priority List for North Carolina.

Background: Research has consistently shown that there is no safe blood lead level (BLL) for children. Despite progress in lead poisoning prevention, lead exposure remains a persistent threat to the health and neurological development of children. To identify high-risk ZIP codes for use by families and health care providers for the entire state of North Carolina, we developed a risk model using ZIP Code Tabula-tion Area (ZCTA)-level census data.

Adverse Health Outcomes Following Hurricane Harvey: A Comparison of Remotely-Sensed and Self-Reported Flood Exposure Estimates.

Remotely sensed inundation may help to rapidly identify areas in need of aid during and following floods. Here we evaluate the utility of daily remotely sensed flood inundation measures and estimate their congruence with self-reported home flooding and health outcomes collected via the Texas Flood Registry (TFR) following Hurricane Harvey. Daily flood inundation for 14 days following the landfall of Hurricane Harvey was acquired from FloodScan.

Economic and mental health impacts of multiple adverse events: Hurricane Harvey, other flooding events, and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Objectives: To assess the economic and mental health impacts of COVID-19 in the presence of previous exposure to flooding events.

Methods: Starting in April 2018, the Texas Flood Registry (TFR) invited residents to complete an online survey regarding their experiences with Hurricane Harvey and subsequent flooding events. Starting in April 2020, participants nationwide were invited to complete a brief online survey on their experiences during the pandemic.

Genetic determinants of multiple myeloma risk within the Wnt/beta-catenin signaling pathway.

Background: Aberrant Wnt/beta-catenin pathway activation is implicated in Multiple Myeloma (MM) development, but little is known if genetic variants within this pathway contribute to MM susceptibility.

Methods: We performed a discovery candidate pathway analysis in 269 non-Hispanic white MM cases and 272 controls focusing on 171 variants selected from 26 core genes within the Wnt/beta-catenin pathway. Significant candidate variants (P < 0.

The Texas flood registry: a flexible tool for environmental and public health practitioners and researchers.

Background: Making landfall in Rockport, Texas in August 2017, Hurricane Harvey resulted in unprecedented flooding, displacing tens of thousands of people, and creating environmental hazards and exposures for many more.

Objective: We describe a collaborative project to establish the Texas Flood Registry to track the health and housing impacts of major flooding events.

Methods: Those who enroll in the registry answer retrospective questions regarding the impact of storms on their health and housing status.

Unruptured intracranial aneurysm growth trajectory: occurrence and rate of enlargement in 520 longitudinally followed cases.

Objective: As imaging technology has improved, more unruptured intracranial aneurysms (UIAs) are detected incidentally. However, there is limited information regarding how UIAs change over time to provide stratified, patient-specific UIA follow-up management. The authors sought to enrich understanding of the natural history of UIAs and identify basic UIA growth trajectories, that is, the speed at which various UIAs increase in size.

Preoperative chemoradiation therapy induces primary-tumor complete response more frequently than chemotherapy alone in gastric cancer: analyses of the National Cancer Database 2006-2014 using propensity score matching.

Background: The benefit of preoperative chemoradiation (CXRT) over preoperative chemotherapy alone ("chemotherapy" hereafter) is unknown. By analyzing the National Cancer Database (NCDB), we investigated whether preoperative CXRT improves the incidence of primary tumor pathologic complete response (ypT0) and overall survival (OS) compared with preoperative chemotherapy in patients with gastric cancer.

Methods: Patients with non-metastatic gastric adenocarcinoma who underwent CXRT or chemotherapy followed by gastrectomy were included.

Recent trends in airway management: we are not ready to give up fiberoptic endoscopy.

The purpose of this correspondence is to discuss recent findings related to current trends in airway management and to discuss the utilization rates of video laryngoscopes versus traditional techniques in USA, UK, and Canada. To highlight the increased use of video laryngoscopes in difficult airway situations, data on the use of alternative airway devices at our institution collected from 2008 to 2010 are presented alongside the results of previously published surveys collected from 2002 to 2013.