Inpatient Costs of Treating Patients With COVID-19.

Importance: With more than 6.2 million hospitalizations due to COVID-19 in the US, recognition of the average hospital costs to provide inpatient care during the pandemic is necessary to understanding the national medical resource use and improving public health readiness and related policies.

Objective: To examine the mean cost to provide inpatient care to treat COVID-19 and how it varied through the pandemic waves and by important sociodemographic patient characteristics.

COVID-19 severity scale for claims data research.

Objective: To create and validate a methodology to assign a severity level to an episode of COVID-19 for retrospective analysis in claims data.

Data Source: Secondary data obtained by license agreement from Optum provided claims records nationally for 19,761,754 persons, of which, 692,094 persons had COVID-19 in 2020.

Study Design: The World Health Organization (WHO) COVID-19 Progression Scale was used as a model to identify endpoints as measures of episode severity within claims data.

Surge in Incidence and Coronavirus Disease 2019 Hospital Risk of Death, United States, September 2020 to March 2021.

Background: Studies of the early months of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic indicate that patient outcomes may be adversely affected by surges. However, the impact on in-hospital mortality during the largest surge to date, September 2020-March 2021, has not been studied. This study aimed to determine whether in-hospital mortality was impacted by the community surge of COVID-19.

Factors Associated With COVID-19 Death in the United States: Cohort Study.

Background: Since the initial COVID-19 cases were identified in the United States in February 2020, the United States has experienced a high incidence of the disease. Understanding the risk factors for severe outcomes identifies the most vulnerable populations and helps in decision-making.

Objective: This study aims to assess the factors associated with COVID-19-related deaths from a large, national, individual-level data set.

Chaos to complexity: leveling the playing field for measuring value in primary care.

Rationale, Aims And Objectives: Develop a risk-stratification model that clusters primary care patients with similar co-morbidities and social determinants and ranks 'within-practice' clusters of complex patients based on likelihood of hospital and emergency department (ED) utilization.

Methods: A retrospective cohort analysis was performed on 10 408 adults who received their primary care at the Medical University of South Carolina University Internal Medicine clinic. A two-part generalized linear regression model was used to fit a predictive model for ED and hospital utilization.

Junior Doctors of Health©: an interprofessional service-learning project addressing childhood obesity and encouraging health care career choices.

While much literature describes programmatic success of clinical service-learning opportunities, this initiative integrates student learning across a comprehensive discipline set (Dental Medicine, Graduate Studies, Health Administration, Medicine, Nursing, Occupational Therapy, Pharmacy, Physical Therapy, and Physician Assistant), providing preventive health education and role modeling to low-income elementary-school children. Junior Doctors of Health© (JDOH), a health education curriculum taught by Medical University of South Carolina students, addresses childhood obesity and encourages child interest in health professional (HP) and biomedical science (BS) careers. Of the 78 surveyed HP/BS students, over 80% agreed JDOH was worthwhile for their professional development, increased their appreciation and ability as an interprofessional team member, improved their understanding and interest in underserved communities, and provided them with valuable childhood-obesity prevention information.

Changing the future of health professions: embedding interprofessional education within an academic health center.

Institutions are increasingly considering interprofessional education (IPE) as a means to improve health care and reduce medical errors in the United States. Effective implementation of IPE within health professions education requires a strategic institutional approach to ensure longevity and sustainability. In 2007, the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) established Creating Collaborative Care (C), an IPE initiative that takes a multifaceted approach to weaving interprofessional collaborative experiences throughout MUSC's culture to prepare students to participate in interprofessional, collaborative health care and research settings.

Preventing and responding to complaints of sexual harassment in an academic health center: a 10-year review from the Medical University of South Carolina.

There is a high incidence of sexual harassment and gender discrimination in academic health center (AHC) settings according to multiple surveys of medical students. Therefore, it is incumbent on AHCs to develop programs both to educate faculty, residents, and students and to handle complaints of possible episodes of sexual harassment or gender discrimination. Despite the apparent high prevalence of gender discrimination and sexual harassment, and the importance of handling complaints of gender discrimination and sexual harassment in a prompt, consistent, and rational manner, there are few descriptions of programs that address those concerns in AHCs.

Occupation, pesticide exposure and risk of multiple myeloma.

Objectives: This population-based case-control study examined the relationship between occupation, living or working on a farm, pesticide exposure, and the risk of multiple myeloma.

Methods: The study included 573 persons newly diagnosed with myeloma and 2131 controls. Information was obtained on sociodemographic factors, occupational history, and history of living and working on a farm.

Survival experience of black patients and white patients with bladder carcinoma.

Background: Blacks are less likely than whites to develop bladder carcinoma. However, once they are diagnosed, black patients experience poorer survival. The authors investigated which factors were related to survival differences in black patients and white patients with bladder carcinoma stratified by extent of disease.

Secondhand smoke exposure in adulthood and risk of lung cancer among never smokers: a pooled analysis of two large studies.

The interpretation of the evidence linking exposure to secondhand smoke with lung cancer is constrained by the imprecision of risk estimates. The objective of the study was to obtain precise and valid estimates of the risk of lung cancer in never smokers following exposure to secondhand smoke, including adjustment for potential confounders and exposure misclassification. Pooled analysis of data from 2 previously reported large case-control studies was used.

Why do Black Americans have a higher risk of pancreatic cancer than White Americans?

Background: For several decades, the incidence of pancreatic cancer has been 50% to 90% higher among blacks than among whites in the United States. The purpose of this study was to identify risk factors that may contribute to this racial disparity.

Methods: We conducted a population-based case-control study of pancreatic cancer diagnosed in Atlanta (GA), Detroit (MI), and 10 New Jersey counties from August 1986 through April 1989.

Serum selenium and risk of prostate cancer in U.S. blacks and whites.

Prostate cancer is the fourth most common cancer in men worldwide and the most common cancer in men in the United States, with reported incidence rates for U.S. blacks being the highest in the world.