446 results match your criteria: "Curtin School of Population Health[Affiliation]"

Background: Early initiation of antenatal care (ANC) is essential for the early detection of pregnancy-related problems and unfavorable pregnancy outcomes. However, a significant number of mothers do not initiate ANC at the recommended time. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the median time of ANC initiation and its predictors among reproductive-age women in Ethiopia.

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This population-based study investigated the association of BMI and other predictors with gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) among Australian Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal mothers. We conducted a state-wide retrospective cohort study that included all singleton births in Western Australia (n = 134,552) between 2012 and 2015 using population health datasets linked by the Western Australian Data Linkage Branch. Associations between GDM and its predictors were estimated as adjusted relative risks (aRRs) from multivariable generalised linear models.

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Association of a healthy lifestyle with mortality in older people.

BMC Geriatr

October 2023

School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, 553 St Kilda Road , Melbourne, Victoria, 3004, Australia.

Background: Unhealthy lifestyle behaviours such as smoking, high alcohol consumption, poor diet or low physical activity are associated with morbidity and mortality. Public health guidelines provide recommendations for adherence to these four factors, however, their relationship to the health of older people is less certain.

Methods: The study involved 11,340 Australian participants (median age 7.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study aimed to evaluate the feasibility of the Zingo app, a gamified therapy tool for children with neurodisability, in delivering therapy programs at school and home.
  • A mixed-methods approach was used, involving 8 children and their parents, therapists, and teachers over a 4-week therapy program, measuring adherence, engagement, app quality, and user experience.
  • Results showed a 58% adherence rate with a solid engagement score of 74%, and high app quality ratings (around 4.5 out of 5) from parents and educators, suggesting Zingo can motivate children to complete therapy programs despite challenges like the COVID-19 outbreak.
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Seeds of the species Acacia retinodes, A. provincialis, and A. tenuissima) from different growing locations were analysed for their mineral composition, free and bound polyphenols, and flavonoids.

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Exploring the design and utility of an integrated web-based chatbot for young adults to support healthy eating: a qualitative study.

Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act

October 2023

School of Health Sciences, College of Health, Medicine and Wellbeing, University of Newcastle, 2308, Callaghan, NSW, Australia.

Article Synopsis
  • A study aimed to explore how a chatbot could be integrated into a healthy eating website to better engage young adults and promote healthier eating habits.
  • Eighteen interviews were conducted with three groups: dietary behavior experts, young adult website users, and chatbot design experts, utilizing a behavioral change framework for data analysis.
  • Key findings revealed three main potential roles for the chatbot: enhancing healthy eating knowledge, reducing time barriers to healthy eating, and providing support/social engagement, with specific features suggested for each role to optimize user experience and effectiveness.
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Background: Asthma is among the commonest noncommunicable diseases of childhood and often occurs with other atopic comorbidities. A previous case-control study found evidence that compared to children who received acellular pertussis (aP) vaccines in early infancy, children who received one or more doses of whole-cell pertussis (wP) vaccine had lower risk of developing IgE-mediated food allergy. We hypothesized that wP vaccination in early infancy might protect against atopic asthma in childhood.

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Background: The association between early-life respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infections and later respiratory morbidity is well established. However, there is limited evidence on factors that influence this risk. We examined sociodemographic and perinatal factors associated with later childhood respiratory morbidity requiring secondary care following exposure to a laboratory-confirmed RSV episode in the first 2 years.

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Implementation of interprofessional quality circles on deprescribing in Swiss nursing homes: an observational study.

BMC Geriatr

October 2023

Community Pharmacy, Center for Primary Care and Public Health (Unisanté), University of Lausanne, Rue du Bugnon 44, CH-1011, Lausanne, Switzerland.

Article Synopsis
  • Polypharmacy and the use of potentially inappropriate medications (PIMs) are common issues among older adults in nursing homes, and the QC-DeMo intervention aims to address this by helping healthcare professionals create a consensus on which PIMs to reduce.
  • The study evaluated the implementation of the QC-DeMo intervention across 26 nursing homes, utilizing questionnaires to measure its effectiveness in terms of reach, adoption, and fidelity, while also identifying strategies for better integration into existing practices.
  • While the intervention showed successful initial implementation, it struggled with long-term maintenance as none of the nursing homes continued the practice after the trial, despite positive feedback from healthcare professionals about the training and strategies used.
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Validation of the Iowa Head-Mounted Open-Source Perimeter.

Transl Vis Sci Technol

September 2023

Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, Carver College of Medicine, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA.

Purpose: To assess the validity of visual field (VF) results from the Iowa Head-Mounted Display (HMD) Open-Source Perimeter and to test the hypothesis that VF defects and test-retest repeatability are similar between the HMD and Octopus 900 perimeters.

Methods: We tested 20 healthy and nine glaucoma patients on the HMD and Octopus 900 perimeters using the Open Perimetry Interface platform with size V stimuli, a custom grid spanning the central 26° of the VF, and a ZEST thresholding algorithm. Historical data from the Humphrey Field Analyzer (HFA) were also analyzed.

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Background: Developmental language disorder (DLD) is one of the most common neurodevelopmental conditions. Due to variable rates of language growth in children under 5 years, the early identification of children with DLD is challenging. Early indicators are often outlined by speech pathology regulatory bodies and other developmental services as evidence to empower caregivers in the early identification of DLD.

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Psychosocial interventions for personality and behavior changes in adults with a brain tumor: A scoping review.

Neurooncol Pract

October 2023

Faculty of Health Sciences, Curtin School of Nursing/Curtin Health Innovation Research Institute (CHIRI), Curtin University, Perth, WA, Australia.

Background: The objective of this scoping review was to describe the intervention characteristics and effectiveness of psychosocial interventions aimed at managing personality and behavior changes in people with brain tumors. A secondary objective was to explore if these interventions had an impact on outcomes for carers. Personality and behavior changes considered included aggression, apathy, paranoia, disinhibition, and emotional lability.

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Telephone bereavement support is recommended in bereavement care policy and practice; however, little is known about what constitutes best practice. To explore how best practice in telephone bereavement support is conceptualized by those who provide the service, 26 healthcare professionals working in Australian hospitals, hospices, and other palliative care settings were interviewed. Thematic analysis was used to construct seven themes: A Valuable Service with Limited Resources, The First Call, The Dance of Rapport, A Space to Share, Identifying and Responding to Risk, Maintaining Contact, and Training and Development Needs.

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Background: Air pollution is a cause of lung cancer and is associated with bladder cancer. However, the relationship between air pollution and these cancers in regions of low pollution is unclear. We investigated associations between fine particulate matter (PM), nitrogen dioxide, and black carbon (BC), and both these cancers in a low-pollution city.

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Introduction: The demand for adolescent mental health services has increased significantly in recent years, leading to excessive wait times for adolescents seeking mental health services and poor mental health outcomes. Timely access to mental health services is critical to reducing the risk of symptom chronicity and progression to mental disorder. A better understanding of whether and how interventions to reduce wait times impact mental health outcomes is needed to guide mental health policymakers and service planners in their approach to reducing wait times.

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Meta-analyses confirm a link between persistent human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) infections and cardiovascular disease, but the mechanisms are unclear. We assess whether proportions of T-cell populations are reliable predictors of subclinical atherosclerosis and/or reflect the burden of HCMV in healthy adults and renal transplant recipients (RTR). Samples were collected from healthy adults and RTR at baseline (T0) and after 32 (24-40) months (T1).

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Objective: The aim of this study was to explore health perceptions and self-defined facilitators to health in general population. An additional aim of the study was to assess if these perceptions were connected with the context of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Design: We applied photo-elicitation method by gathering original photographs and narratives (captions) social media and e-mails.

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COVID-19 vaccine coverage targets to inform reopening plans in a low incidence setting.

Proc Biol Sci

August 2023

Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Article Synopsis
  • * With the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines in early 2021, the government aimed to shift from high suppression to a strategy focusing on vaccine coverage and manageable transmission levels, outlined in their July 2021 re-opening plan.
  • * A modeling study informed this transition, indicating that at least 60% adult vaccination coverage was necessary to minimize health impacts, while also highlighting the importance of ongoing public health measures during the vaccine rollout.
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More than mateship: exploring how Australian male expatriates, longer-term and frequent travellers experience social support.

Int J Qual Stud Health Well-being

December 2023

Collaboration for Evidence, Research and Impact in Public Health, Curtin School of Population Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, Curtin University, Perth, WA, Australia.

Purpose: Those travelling overseas for work or leisure including male expatriates, longer-term and frequent travellers (ELoFTs) may be at heightened risk for a range of health and wellbeing issues. Social support may mediate this risk. However, from a public health perspective, little is written about how ELoFTs access health information and support and the role of their social networks in facilitating health and wellbeing outcomes.

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Voice hearers' explanations of trauma-related voices and processes of change throughout imagery rescripting: A qualitative exploration.

Psychol Psychother

December 2023

Discipline of Psychology, Curtin School of Population Health & enAble Institute, Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia, Australia.

Objectives: Post-traumatic stress is common among people who hear voices (auditory verbal hallucinations), many of whom hear trauma-related voices, whereby voice content is related to past trauma. Preliminary evidence suggests that imagery rescripting (ImRs) may more effectively reduce post-traumatic stress and voices compared to treatments that are based on existing models of PTSD or positive symptoms. No known studies have explored the potential maintaining factors of trauma-related voices in relation to ImRs.

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Background: Restoring hemostasis in patients on oral anticoagulants presenting with major hemorrhage (MH) or before surgical intervention has changed, with the replacement of vitamin K antagonist (VKA) with direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs).

Objectives: To observe the difference in urgent hemostatic management between patients on VKA and those on DOACs.

Methods: A multicenter observational study evaluated the variation in laboratory testing, hemostatic management, mortality, and hospital length of stay (LOS) in patients on VKA or DOACs presenting with MH or urgent hemostatic restoration.

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Objective: To assess the usefulness of night-time presentations to measure alcohol-related harm (ARH) in young trauma patients, aged 12-24 years, attending Western Australian EDs.

Methods: A retrospective longitudinal study examined alcohol-related ED presentations in Western Australia (WA; 2002-2016) among 12- to 24-year-olds. Data from the Emergency Department Data Collection, WA State Trauma Registry Database and Hospital Morbidity Data Collection were used to identify ARH through specific codes and text searches.

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Different studies have suggested that fluoride can induce apoptosis in non-skeletal tissues, however, evidence from these experimental studies is still controversial. This meta-analysis aims to clarify the mechanism of fluoride-induced apoptosis in non-skeletal tissues of experimental animals. Primary studies which measured apoptosis were identified through exhaustive database searching in PubMed, Embase, Web of Science Core Collection, Scopus, and references of included studies.

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Background: The influence of diet quality on multiple sclerosis (MS) progression or inflammatory activity is not well understood.

Methods: Study participants with MS from the AusLong cohort, were followed annually (10 years, n = 223 post-onset). At baseline, 5 and 10-year reviews, indices of dietary quality - the Australian Recommended Food Score (ARFS) and Diet Quality Tracker (DQT) - were calculated from self-reported dietary intake data of the preceding 12 months (Food Frequency Questionnaire, Dietary Questionnaire for Epidemiological Studies v2).

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