Health Care Engagement and Follow-up After Perceived Discrimination in Maternity Care.

Background: Negative experiences in the health care system, including perceived discrimination, can result in patient disengagement from health care. Four million US women give birth each year, and the perinatal period is a time of sustained interaction with the health care system, but potential consequences of negative experiences have not been examined in this context. We assessed whether perceived discrimination during the birth hospitalization were associated with postpartum follow-up care.

Calculating Power by Bootstrap, with an Application to Cluster-Randomized Trials.

Background: A key requirement for a useful power calculation is that the calculation mimic the data analysis that will be performed on the actual data, once that data is observed. Close approximations may be difficult to achieve using analytic solutions, however, and thus Monte Carlo approaches, including both simulation and bootstrap resampling, are often attractive. One setting in which this is particularly true is cluster-randomized trial designs.

Prevalence of and Factors Associated With Multidrug Resistant Organism (MDRO) Colonization in 3 Nursing Homes.

Nursing home residents are at risk for acquiring and transmitting MDROs. A serial point-prevalence study of 605 residents in 3 facilities using random sampling found MDRO colonization in 45% of residents: methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA, 26%); extended-spectrum β-lactamase-producing Enterobacteriaceae (ESBL, 17%); vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus spp. (VRE, 16%); carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE, 1%).

Surgical Site Infections: Volume-Outcome Relationship and Year-to-Year Stability of Performance Rankings.

Background: Surgical site infection (SSI) rates are publicly reported as quality metrics and increasingly used to determine financial reimbursement.

Objective: To evaluate the volume-outcome relationship as well as the year-to-year stability of performance rankings following coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery and hip arthroplasty.

Research Design: We performed a retrospective cohort study of Medicare beneficiaries who underwent CABG surgery or hip arthroplasty at US hospitals from 2005 to 2011, with outcomes analyzed through March 2012.

Family functioning and quality of parent-adolescent relationship: cross-sectional associations with adolescent weight-related behaviors and weight status.

Background: Little is known about how factors within the general family environment are associated with weight and related behaviors among adolescents/young adults.

Methods: We studied 3768 females and 2614 males, 14-24 years old in 2011, participating in the Growing Up Today Study 2. We used generalized mixed models to examine cross-sectional associations of family functioning and quality of mother- and father-adolescent relationship with adolescent/young adult weight status, disordered eating, intake of fast food and sugar-sweetened beverages, screen time, physical activity, and sleep duration.

Digital Storytelling as a Narrative Health Promotion Process: Evaluation of a Pilot Study.

Digital storytelling (DST) engages participants in a group-based process to create and share narrative accounts of life events. The process of individuals telling their own stories has not been well assessed as a mechanism of health behavior change. This study looks at outcomes associated with engaging in the DST process for vulnerable youth.

Spatial Stigma and Health in Postindustrial Detroit.

An emerging body of research suggests that those who reside in socially and economically marginalized places may be marked by a stigma of place, referred to as spatial stigma, which influences their sense of self, their daily experiences, and their relations with outsiders. Researchers conducted 60 semistructured interviews at partnering community-based organizations during summer 2011 with African American and Latina/o, structurally disadvantaged youth of diverse gender and sexual identities who were between 18 and 26 years of age residing in Detroit, Michigan. The disadvantaged structural conditions and dilapidated built environment were common themes in participants' narratives.

Access is Not Enough: Characteristics of Physicians Who Treat Medicaid Patients.

Background: Access to physicians is a major concern for Medicaid programs. However, little is known about relationships between physician participation in Medicaid and the individual-level and practice-level characteristics of physicians.

Methods: We used the 2011 Massachusetts All Payer Claims Database, containing all commercial and Medicaid claims; we linked with data on physician characteristics.

Genetic risk variants associated with in situ breast cancer.

Introduction: Breast cancer in situ (BCIS) diagnoses, a precursor lesion for invasive breast cancer, comprise about 20 % of all breast cancers (BC) in countries with screening programs. Family history of BC is considered one of the strongest risk factors for BCIS.

Methods: To evaluate the association of BC susceptibility loci with BCIS risk, we genotyped 39 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), associated with risk of invasive BC, in 1317 BCIS cases, 10,645 invasive BC cases, and 14,006 healthy controls in the National Cancer Institute's Breast and Prostate Cancer Cohort Consortium (BPC3).

Common germline polymorphisms associated with breast cancer-specific survival.

Introduction: Previous studies have identified common germline variants nominally associated with breast cancer survival. These associations have not been widely replicated in further studies. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the association of previously reported SNPs with breast cancer-specific survival using data from a pooled analysis of eight breast cancer survival genome-wide association studies (GWAS) from the Breast Cancer Association Consortium.

Association of breast cancer risk loci with breast cancer survival.

The survival of breast cancer patients is largely influenced by tumor characteristics, such as TNM stage, tumor grade and hormone receptor status. However, there is growing evidence that inherited genetic variation might affect the disease prognosis and response to treatment. Several lines of evidence suggest that alleles influencing breast cancer risk might also be associated with breast cancer survival.

Trends in mechanical ventilation among patients hospitalized with acute exacerbations of COPD in the United States, 2001 to 2011.

Background: The use of noninvasive ventilation (NIV) in acute exacerbation of COPD has increased over time. However, little is known about patient factors influencing its use in routine clinical practice.

Methods: This was a retrospective cohort study of 723,560 hospitalizations for exacerbation of COPD at 475 hospitals between 2001 and 2011.

Outcomes associated with invasive and noninvasive ventilation among patients hospitalized with exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Importance: Small clinical trials have shown that noninvasive ventilation (NIV) is efficacious in reducing the need for intubation and improving short-term survival among patients with severe exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Little is known, however, about the effectiveness of NIV in routine clinical practice.

Objective: To compare the outcomes of patients with COPD treated with NIV to those treated with invasive mechanical ventilation (IMV).