Publications by authors named "Vaca F"

Objective: Distracted driving is a primary contributor to for motor vehicle crashes, the leading cause for injuries and fatalities for youth. Although attention and working memory clearly underlie driving abilities, few studies explore these functions on the brain-level under the cognitive load of driving. To understand the load driving has on auditory attention processing, we examined the differences in dynamic brain response to auditory stimuli during LOAD (while driving in a high-fidelity driving simulator) and No-LOAD conditions (seated in simulator, parked on the side of the road).

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Objective: To contextually examine facilitators of young driver decisions to ride with an impaired driver (RWI) or drive while impaired (DWI).

Methods: Data were from the NIH's NEXT Generation Health Study (NEXT), a 7-year longitudinal nationally representative study with a U.S.

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Alcohol-impaired driving is a formidable public health problem in the United States, claiming the lives of 37 individuals daily in alcohol-related crashes. Alcohol-impaired driving is affected by a multitude of interconnected factors, coupled with long delays between stakeholders' actions and their impacts, which not only complicate policy-making but also increase the likelihood of unintended consequences. We developed a system dynamics simulation model of drinking and driving behaviors among adolescents and young adults.

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Introduction: Prior work has found incongruencies in injury information reported by crash and hospital records. However, no work has focused on child passengers. The objective of this study was to compare crash scene and hospital-reported injury information for crash-involved child passengers.

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Background Objectives: Sandflies are vector insects associated with terrestrial forest ecosystems; in the Ecuadorian Andes, they participate in the transmission of human cutaneous leishmaniasis. This geographical area represents an opportunity to evaluate the role of sandflies as bioindicators of the degree of intervention of tropical humid forest ecosystems (THF) associated with changes in the ecology of the local landscape.

Methods: CDC-light traps were used for collecting adult sandflies in February 2020 in a humid tropical forest within the Chocó Biosphere Reserve.

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Rickettsiales are obligate intracellular bacteria that need vertebrates and arthropods to maintain their life cycles. Some species of the genera Anaplasma, Ehrlichia, and Rickettsia are transmitted by ticks to both animals and humans and can cause mild to severe and even fatal cases. In the Americas, there is substantial data on rickettsial agents, encompassing both clinical cases and the detection of these agents in ticks, but in Ecuador, the information about them remains poorly understood.

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Purpose: Driving after drinking is a preventable threat to public health. We examined the prospective association of adolescent-reported parental monitoring knowledge (PMK) with recurrent driving after drinking in emerging adulthood.

Methods: We analyzed six annual rounds (1-4, 6, 11) of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 with a sample of 5,261 participants.

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Article Synopsis
  • - Trypanosomosis is a tropical disease affecting livestock, caused by protozoan haemoparasites like Trypanosoma vivax and Trypanosoma evansi, which is poorly understood in Ecuador compared to other regions.
  • - A study tested 745 cattle serum samples across various provinces in Ecuador, finding a general seroprevalence of 19.1%, with higher rates in the Amazonian provinces Sucumbíos and Napo, and the Coastal province Esmeraldas.
  • - The study identified significant risk factors such as region, province, and management practices, particularly extensive management on Amazonian farms, suggesting the need for more research and improved surveillance and treatment strategies for affected cattle.
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Background Objectives: Sand flies are insects vector associated with terrestrial forest ecosystems; in the Ecuadorian Andes, they participate in the transmission of human cutaneous leishmaniasis. This geographical area is an opportunity to evaluate the role of sand flies as bioindicators od the degree of intervention of a tropical humid forest ecosystems (THF) associated with changes in the ecology of the local landscape.

Methods: CDC-light traps were used for collecting adults' sand flies in February 2020 in a humid tropical forest within Choco Biosphere Reserve.

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Objective: To explore shared and distinct parental influences on rural and suburban adolescents' riding with an impaired driver (RWI) and driving while impaired (DWI) behaviors during high school.

Methods: Participants in the NEXT Generation Health Study (NEXT) were classified into four RWI/DWI trajectory classes (i.e.

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Background: A recent study shows four trajectories of riding with an impaired driver (RWI) and driving while impaired (DWI) from adolescence to emerging adulthood. We examined prospective associations of adolescent RWI/DWI trajectory class with early adulthood RWI/DWI behavior.

Methods: Data were from the NEXT Generation Health Study (NEXT), a nationally representative longitudinal study (N = 2783) beginning with a 10th-grade cohort completing 7 annual assessment waves (W1-W7) between 2010 and 2016 and a later follow-up mixed methods study.

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Objective: To explore decisions and perceptions of engaging in riding with a cannabis-impaired driver (RWI) during high school and young adulthood to build context around RWI-cannabis events.

Methods: Participants were sampled from the NEXT Generation Health Study (NEXT), a 7-year national cohort study of adolescent health behaviors. Four RWI and driving while impaired (DWI) trajectories classes (i.

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Importance: Alcohol use disorders have a high disease burden among US Latino groups. In this population, health disparities persist, and high-risk drinking has been increasing. Effective bilingual and culturally adapted brief interventions are needed to identify and reduce disease burden.

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Background: Although inequality in traumatic brain injury (TBI) by individual socioeconomic status (SES) exists, interventions to modify individual SES are difficult. However, as interventions for area-based SES can affect the individual SES, monitoring or public health intervention can be planned. We analyzed the effect of area-based SES on hospitalization for TBI and revealed yearly inequality trends to provide a basis for health intervention.

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Trypanosoma theileri is a cosmopolitan opportunistic haemoparasite described in wild and domestic ruminants, and also in arthropod vectors. The presence of this parasite has been reported in several South American countries, including Amazonian regions. Despite the importance of livestock production, Ecuador possesses scarce studies about trypanosomosis and no T.

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Article Synopsis
  • - COVID-19 has led to over 3.5 million deaths and more than 160 million infections, with many individuals experiencing neurological issues, including loss of smell, seizures, and strokes, which can lead to long-term cognitive and neuropsychiatric problems regardless of the severity of respiratory symptoms.
  • - The article explores potential links between COVID-19 and neurological symptoms, particularly focusing on Alzheimer's disease and related dementias, while examining factors like inflammation and viral mechanisms that may cause such issues.
  • - A global research effort, the CNS SC2 consortium, is underway to standardize methods for studying the long-term effects of COVID-19 on brain health, with data collection occurring across multiple countries to improve overall understanding.
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Studies about the evolution of SARS-CoV-2 lineages in different backgrounds such as naive populations are still scarce, especially from South America. This work aimed to study the introduction and diversification pattern of SARS-CoV-2 during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Northwestern Argentina (NWA) region and to analyze the evolutionary dynamics of the main lineages found. In this study, we analyzed a total of 260 SARS-CoV-2 whole-genome sequences from Argentina, belonging to the Provinces of Jujuy, Salta, and Tucumán, from March 31st, 2020, to May 22nd, 2021, which covered the full first wave and the early second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Argentina.

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Introduction: The clinical model of screening, providing a brief psychosocial and/or pharmacological intervention, and directly referring patients to treatment (SBIRT) is a compelling model to address drug use among assault-injured individuals in the busy emergency department (ED) setting. Our objective in this study was to examine the current literature and determine ED-based strategies that have been reported that screen, directly refer to drug mis-use/addiction specialized treatment services, or initiate addiction treatment among individuals injured by non-partner assault in the United States.

Methods: We conducted a systematic review of ED-based studies using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Protocol.

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In the United States, nearly 28 people die in alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes every day (1 fatality every 52 min). Over decades, states have enacted multiple laws to reduce such fatalities. From 1982 to 2019, the proportion of drivers in fatal crashes with a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) above 0.

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Introduction: For young drivers, independent transportation has been noted to offer them opportunities that can be beneficial as they enter early adulthood. However, those that choose to engage in riding with an impaired driver (RWI) and drive while impaired (DWI) over time can face negative consequences reducing such opportunities. This study examined the prospective association of identified longitudinal trajectory classes among adolescents that RWI and DWI with their later health, education, and employment in emerging adulthood.

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Purpose: Driving licensure remains a major developmental milestone for adolescents as they become more independent to access important health, education, and employment opportunities. Today, more teens are delaying driving licensure than before. We investigated associations of delayed licensure with health, education, and employment 4 years after high school.

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Background: The proportion of motor vehicle crash fatalities involving alcohol-impaired drivers declined substantially between 1982 and 1997, but progress stopped after 1997. The systemic complexity of alcohol-impaired driving contributes to the persistence of this problem. This study aims to identify and map key feedback mechanisms that affect alcohol-impaired driving among adolescents and young adults in the U.

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