Data analytics based positioning of health informatics programs

The Master of Science in Computer Information Systems (CIS) with concentration in Health Informatics (HI) at Metropolitan College (MET), Boston University (BU), is a 40-credit degree program that are delivered in three formats: face-to-face, online, and blended. The MET CIS-HI program is unique because of the population of students it serves, namely those interested in gaining skills in HI technology field, to serve as data analysts and knowledge-based technology drivers in the thriving health care industry. This set of skills is essential for addressing the challenges of Big Data and knowledge-based health care support of the modern health care. The MET CIS-HI program was accredited by the Commission on Accreditation for Health Informatics and Information Management Education (CAHIIM) in 2017

Body-mass index and all-cause mortality: individual-participant-data meta-analysis of 239 prospective studies in four continents

Background Overweight and obesity are increasing worldwide. To help assess their relevance to mortality in different populations we conducted individual-participant data meta-analyses of prospective studies of body-mass index (BMI), limiting confounding and reverse causality by restricting analyses to never-smokers and excluding pre-existing disease and the first 5 years of follow-up. Methods Of 10 625 411 participants in Asia, Australia and New Zealand, Europe, and North America from 239 prospective studies (median follow-up 13·7 years, IQR 11·4–14·7), 3 951 455 people in 189 studies were never-smokers without chronic diseases at recruitment who survived 5 years, of whom 385 879 died. The primary analyses are of these deaths, and study, age, and sex adjusted hazard ratios (HRs), relative to BMI 22·5–<25·0 kg/m2. Findings All-cause mortality was minimal at 20·0–25·0 kg/m2 (HR 1·00, 95% CI 0·98–1·02 for BMI 20·0–<22·5 kg/m2; 1·00, 0·99–1·01 for BMI 22·5–<25·0 kg/m2), and increased significantly both just below this range (1·13, 1·09–1·17 for BMI 18·5–<20·0 kg/m2; 1·51, 1·43–1·59 for BMI 15·0–<18·5) and throughout the overweight range (1·07, 1·07–1·08 for BMI 25·0–<27·5 kg/m2; 1·20, 1·18–1·22 for BMI 27·5–<30·0 kg/m2). The HR for obesity grade 1 (BMI 30·0–<35·0 kg/m2) was 1·45, 95% CI 1·41–1·48; the HR for obesity grade 2 (35·0–<40·0 kg/m2) was 1·94, 1·87–2·01; and the HR for obesity grade 3 (40·0–<60·0 kg/m2) was 2·76, 2·60–2·92. For BMI over 25·0 kg/m2, mortality increased approximately log-linearly with BMI; the HR per 5 kg/m2 units higher BMI was 1·39 (1·34–1·43) in Europe, 1·29 (1·26–1·32) in North America, 1·39 (1·34–1·44) in east Asia, and 1·31 (1·27–1·35) in Australia and New Zealand. This HR per 5 kg/m2 units higher BMI (for BMI over 25 kg/m2) was greater in younger than older people (1·52, 95% CI 1·47–1·56, for BMI measured at 35–49 years vs 1·21, 1·17–1·25, for BMI measured at 70–89 years; pheterogeneity<0·0001), greater in men than women (1·51, 1·46–1·56, vs 1·30, 1·26–1·33; pheterogeneity<0·0001), but similar in studies with self-reported and measured BMI. Interpretation The associations of both overweight and obesity with higher all-cause mortality were broadly consistent in four continents. This finding supports strategies to combat the entire spectrum of excess adiposity in many populations

Signals of demographic expansion in Drosophila virilis

BACKGROUND: The pattern of genetic variation within and among populations of a species is strongly affected by its phylogeographic history. Analyses based on putatively neutral markers provide data from which past events, such as population expansions and colonizations, can be inferred. Drosophila virilis is a cosmopolitan species belonging to the virilis group, where divergence times between different phylads go back to the early Miocene. We analysed mitochondrial DNA sequence variation among 35 Drosophila virilis strains covering the species' range in order to detect demographic events that could be used to understand the present characteristics of the species, as well as its differences from other members of the group. RESULTS: Drosophila virilis showed very low nucleotide diversity with haplotypes distributed in a star-like network, consistent with a recent world-wide exponential expansion possibly associated either with domestication or post-glacial colonization. All analyses point towards a rapid population expansion. Coalescence models support this interpretation. The central haplotype in the network, which could be interpreted as ancestral, is widely distributed and gives no information about the geographical origin of the population expansion. The species showed no geographic structure in the distribution of mitochondrial haplotypes, in contrast to results of a recent microsatellite-based analysis. CONCLUSION: The lack of geographic structure and the star-like topology depicted by the D. virilis haplotypes indicate a pattern of global demographic expansion, probably related to human movements, although this interpretation cannot be distinguished from a selective sweep in the mitochondrial DNA until nuclear sequence data become available. The particular behavioural traits of this species, including weak species-discrimination and intraspecific mate choice exercised by the females, can be understood from this perspective

Genetic characterization of flea-derived Bartonella species from native animals in Australia suggests host-parasite co-evolution

Fleas are important arthropod vectors for a variety of diseases in veterinary and human medicine, and bacteria belonging to the genus Bartonella are among the organisms most commonly transmitted by these ectoparasites. Recently, a number of novel Bartonella species and novel species candidates have been reported in marsupial fleas in Australia. In the present study the genetic diversity of marsupial fleas was investigated; 10 species of fleas were collected from seven different marsupial and placental mammal hosts in Western Australia including woylies (Bettongia penicillata), western barred bandicoots (Perameles bougainville), mardos (Antechinus flavipes), bush rats (Rattus fuscipes), red foxes (Vulpes vulpes), feral cats (Felis catus) and rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus). PCR and sequence analysis of the cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) and the 18S rRNA genes from these fleas was performed. Concatenated phylogenetic analysis of the COI and 18S rRNA genes revealed a close genetic relationship between marsupial fleas, with Pygiopsylla hilli from woylies, Pygiopsylla tunneyi from western barred bandicoots and Acanthopsylla jordani from mardos, forming a separate cluster from fleas collected from the placental mammals in the same geographical area. The clustering of Bartonella species with their marsupial flea hosts suggests co-evolution of marsupial hosts, marsupial fleas and Bartonella species in Australia

The genetic diversity and geographical separation study of Oncomelania hupensis populations in mainland China using microsatellite loci

© 2016 Guan et al. Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. The attached file is the published version of the article.NHM Repositor

Geographical trends in research: a preliminary analysis on authors' affiliations

In the last decade, research literature reached an enormous volume with an unprecedented current annual increase of 1.5 million new publications. As research gets ever more global and new countries and institutions, either from academia or corporate environment, start to contribute with their share, it is important to monitor this complex scenario and understand its dynamics. We present a study on a conference proceedings dataset extracted from Springer Nature Scigraph that illustrates insightful geographical trends and highlights the unbalanced growth of competitive research institutions worldwide. Results emerged from our micro and macro analysis show that the distributions among countries of institutions and papers follow a power law, and thus very few countries keep producing most of the papers accepted by high-tier conferences. In addition, we found that the annual and overall turnover rate of the top 5, 10 and 25 countries is extremely low, suggesting a very static landscape in which new entries struggle to emerge. Finally, we highlight the presence of an increasing gap between the number of institutions initiating and overseeing research endeavours (i.e. first and last authors' affiliations) and the total number of institutions participating in research. As a consequence of our analysis, the paper also discusses our experience in working with affiliations: an utterly simple matter at first glance, that is instead revealed to be a complex research and technical challenge yet far from being solved

Emerging viral respiratory tract infections—environmental risk factors and transmission

This article is made available for unrestricted research re-use and secondary analysis in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for the duration of the World Health Organization (WHO) declaration of COVID-19 as a global pandemic.The past decade has seen the emergence of several novel viruses that cause respiratory tract infections in human beings, including Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) in Saudi Arabia, an H7N9 influenza A virus in eastern China, a swine-like influenza H3N2 variant virus in the USA, and a human adenovirus 14p1 also in the USA. MERS-CoV and H7N9 viruses are still a major worldwide public health concern. The pathogenesis and mode of transmission of MERS-CoV and H7N9 influenza A virus are poorly understood, making it more difficult to implement intervention and preventive measures. A united and coordinated global response is needed to tackle emerging viruses that can cause fatal respiratory tract infections and to fill major gaps in the understanding of the epidemiology and transmission dynamics of these viruses

Space-time variation of malaria incidence in Yunnan province, China

BACKGROUND Understanding spatio-temporal variation in malaria incidence provides a basis for effective disease control planning and monitoring. METHODS Monthly surveillance data between 1991 and 2006 for Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium falciparum malaria across 128 counties were assembled for Yunnan, a province of China with one of the highest burdens of malaria. County-level Bayesian Poisson regression models of incidence were constructed, with effects for rainfall, maximum temperature and temporal trend. The model also allowed for spatial variation in county-level incidence and temporal trend, and dependence between incidence in June-September and the preceding January-February. RESULTS Models revealed strong associations between malaria incidence and both rainfall and maximum temperature. There was a significant association between incidence in June-September and the preceding January-February. Raw standardised morbidity ratios showed a high incidence in some counties bordering Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam, and counties in the Red River valley. Clusters of counties in south-western and northern Yunnan were identified that had high incidence not explained by climate. The overall trend in incidence decreased, but there was significant variation between counties. CONCLUSION Dependence between incidence in summer and the preceding January-February suggests a role of intrinsic host-pathogen dynamics. Incidence during the summer peak might be predictable based on incidence in January-February, facilitating malaria control planning, scaled months in advance to the magnitude of the summer malaria burden. Heterogeneities in county-level temporal trends suggest that reductions in the burden of malaria have been unevenly distributed throughout the province.This project was supported by a University of Queensland New Research Scientist Start-Up Fund grant. RWS is a Wellcome Trust Principal Research Fellow (#079080) and receives additional support from the Wellcome Trust for the Malaria Atlas Project (MAP, http://www.map.ox.ac.uk)