Determining the Effects of Quercetin on Cadmium Toxicity in Kidney Cells

Cadmium is a heavy transition metal that causes kidney disease via prolonged, low-level exposure due to circulating metallothioneins. These proteins transport cadmium ions to the proximal convoluted tubule, where they induce the creation of reactive oxygen species (ROS). Oxidative damage from ROS can lead to kidney dysfunction and eventually failure. Previous studies have shown that antioxidants, including quercetin, which is found in most fruits and vegetables, can lessen cadmium-induced toxicity. In this study, human embryonic kidney cells were pretreated for one hour with varying concentrations of quercetin ranging from 10 - 100 μM. This was followed by 24-hour treatment with 30 μM cadmium chloride, and growth was measured by a cell proliferation assay. In contrast to previous reports, these studies suggest that quercetin concentrations above 10 μM result in an increase in cell death, suggesting that quercetin enhances, rather than inhibits, the toxic effect of cadmium within this concentration range. To determine if cadmium toxicity induced cell death through activation of the JNK pathway, the level of JNK phosphorylation was measured by immunoblot analysis. These results suggest that cadmium alone increases JNK phosphorylation slightly while quercetin activates JNK in a concentration-dependent manner. This activation was increased up to thirteenfold when treated with both cadmium and quercetin. Taken together, these studies indicate that cadmium toxicity induces cell death via the JNK pathway, that quercetin above 10 μM also exhibits cytotoxic effects through JNK phosphorylation, and that quercetin and cadmium act synergistically to lower cell proliferation

Had Grass, Water and Wood: Scanning and Transcribing the 1864 Travel Diary of John Heinen

This collaborative project included scanning and transcribing a diary owned by Caroline Gilson passed down from her mother. The diary is from May-September 1864, kept by Ernst John Heinen, recording his trip from Nebraska to California on the Overland Trail. Heinen is Caroline’s great-great grandfather, born in Germany in 1836. Elizabeth Dugan worked hands-on with the diary, scanning the work and transcribing the work. Elizabeth and Caroline developed a manuscript transcription guide, based on established best practices. A reading list Caroline created guided the exploration of the diary, including emigrant migration and native American encounters and perspectives of the time, and westward expansion in the 1860s

Risk Factors for Driving Cessation Vary by Race and Ethnicity

Driving is related to our identity and independence as well as allowing us to get needed goods, services, and social opportunities that enrich daily life. Yet with increasing age, the risk for developing threats to medical fitness to drive increases. Driving cessation is related to a long list of negative outcomes, such as: depression, social isolation, diminished access to health care, and diminished quality of life. We investigated risks for driving cessation, paying close attention to racial differences. This study used data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), 1998-2008. The study included N=46, 528 older people (age 65 and older), including whites (85%), African Americans (8%), Hispanic (5%), and other race (2%)

Development of abbreviated measures to assess patient trust in a physician, a health insurer, and the medical profession

BACKGROUND: Despite the recent proliferation in research on patient trust, it is seldom a primary outcome, and is often a peripheral area of interest. The length of our original scales to measure trust may limit their use because of the practical needs to minimize both respondent burden and research cost. The objective of this study was to develop three abbreviated scales to measure trust in: (1) a physician, (2) a health insurer, and (3) the medical profession. METHODS: Data from two samples were used. The first was a telephone survey of English-speaking adults in the United States (N = 1117) and the second was a telephone survey of English-speaking adults residing in North Carolina who were members of a health maintenance organization (N = 1024). Data were analyzed to examine data completeness, scaling assumptions, internal consistency properties, and factor structure. RESULTS: Abbreviated measures (5-items) were developed for each of the three scales. Cronbach's alpha was 0.87 for trust in a physician (test-retest reliability = 0.71), 0.84 for trust in a health insurer (test-retest reliability = 0.73), and 0.77 for trust in the medical profession. CONCLUSION: Assessment of data completeness, scale score dispersion characteristics, reliability and validity test results all provide evidence for the soundness of the abbreviated 5-item scales

Covalent Chemical Capture of Transcriptional Protein-Protein Interactions Using Genetically Incorporated Photo-crosslinking Amino Acids.

Transient and moderate affinity protein-protein interactions (PPIs) play a critical role in the regulation of essential cellular processes including protein folding, ubiquitylation, and transcription. A number of disease states are believed to be the result of aberrations within these protein networks; therefore, a longstanding therapeutic goal has been to design small molecules that can tunably modulate the constituent interactions. However, the discovery of small molecule modulators has been hindered by lack of structural and mechanistic information, in part due to the limitations of the approaches currently available for studying transient PPIs in their native environments. Techniques such as co-crystallization and co-purification in vitro and two-hybrid studies in vivo are best suited for probing stably associated proteins, but are less ideal for studying proteins that engage in modest-affinity and/or transient multi-protein binding interaction. In my thesis, I focus on the in vivo covalent capture of such binding partners of the prototypical activator VP16 using in vivo photocrosslinking with a genetically incorporated photo-labile amino acid. The success of using this methodology for characterizing activator-coactivator complexes in vivo indicates that this strategy can be implemented more broadly for the capture and discovery of transient protein-protein interactions in their native contexts.PHDChemical BiologyUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/102310/1/duganam_1.pd

Workplace Stress and Productivity: A Cross-Sectional Study

INTRODUCTION. The primary purpose of this study was to evaluate the association between workplace stress and productivity among employees from worksites participating in a WorkWell KS Well-Being workshop and assess any differences by gender and race. METHODS. A multi-site, cross-sectional study was conducted to survey employees across four worksites participating in a WorkWell KS Well Being workshop to assess levels of stress and productivity. Stress was measured by the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) and productivity was measured by the Health and Work Questionnaire (HWQ). Pearson correlations were conducted to measure the association between stress and productivity scores. T-tests evaluated differences in scores by gender and race. RESULTS. Of the 186 participants who completed the survey, most reported being white (94%), female (85%), married (80%), and having a college degree (74%). A significant inverse relationship was observed between the scores for PSS and HWQ, r = -0.35, p < 0.001; as stress increased, productivity appeared to decrease. Another notable inverse relationship was PSS with Work Satisfaction subscale, r = -0.61, p < 0.001. One difference was observed by gender- males scored significantly higher on the HWQ Supervisor Relations subscale compared with females, 8.4 (2.1) vs. 6.9 (2.7), respectively, p = 0.005. CONCLUSIONS. Scores from PSS and the HWQ appeared to be inversely correlated; higher stress scores were significantly associated with lower productivity scores. This negative association was observed for all HWQ subscales, but was especially strong for work satisfaction. This study also suggests that males may have better supervisor relations compared with females, although no gender differences were observed by perceived levels of stress

Guideline Adherence in Dyspepsia Investigation and Treatment

Introduction: The impact of dyspepsia guidelines on clinical practice may be poor. Provider adherence with dyspepsia guidelines was examined to determine their impact on clinical practice. Methods: Provider adherence with the 2005 American College of Gastroenterology Guidelines for the Management of Dyspepsia and the 2017 American College of Gastroenterology and Canadian Association of Gastroenterology joint Dyspepsia Management Guidelines was assessed on a national level using data from the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS). Patient visit data, including reason for visit of dyspepsia, diagnosis of dyspepsia, or diagnosis of H. pylori infection from NAMCS years 2012 through 2015, were used. Provider adherence with dyspepsia management guidelines was determined based upon provision of at least one recommended test or treatment for dyspepsia. Results: Providers appeared to adhere to the 2005 ACG guidelines for 49.7% of patient visits. Providers appeared to adhere to the 2017 ACG/CAG guidelines for 51.0% of patient visits. Conclusions: Provider adherence with the 2005 ACG and the 2017 ACG/CAG Dyspepsia Management Guidelines was determined to be low in this study, highlighting the need to increase evidence-based medical treatment and efficient resource use for dyspepsia

Massachusetts Healthy Aging Data Report: Community Profiles

The Massachusetts Healthy Aging Data Report: Community Profiles was created by researchers at the Gerontology Institute of the John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston and commissioned by the Tufts Health Plan Foundation. In this report, we have created a custom profile of nearly 100 healthy aging indicators for every city and town in Massachusetts including the 16 neighborhoods of Boston (367 Community Profiles). Each Community Profile is designed to help community residents, agencies, providers, and governments understand the older adults who live in their cities and towns – their ages, living arrangements, health status, strengths, and vulnerabilities. Never before has Massachusetts had such a comprehensive view of healthy aging indicators reported at this local geographic level

A Geo-Stratified Analysis of Associations Between Socio-Economic Factors and Diabetes Risk

Introduction. In 2019, diabetes was the seventh leading cause of death in the United States. The association between diabetes risk and socio-economic factors in the United States has been examined primarily at the national level; little is known about this association at the regional level. This study examines and compares the association between diabetes risk and previously established socio-economic factors across four geographic regions (South, Midwest, West, and Northwest). Methods. We analyzed the 2014 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) data stratified by four geographic regions of the United States. The risk estimates of diabetes associated with previously established socio-economic factors as well as diabetes prevalence were compared across four geographic regions. Results. There was marked variation in association between diabetes risk and previously established risk factors across the four geographic regions. In the South, rural residency was associated with increased diabetes risk, whereas in the other geographic regions rural residency had a protective effect. In the South, the diabetes risk for males was 22% higher compared to females in the South, whereas the risk for males was 41% higher than females in the Northeast. Independently, age had the strongest discriminative ability to distinguish between a person with diabetes and a person without diabetes, whereas ethnicity, race and sex had the weakest discriminative abilities. Conclusions. Our findings suggest a higher prevalence of diabetes by race/ethnicity (Non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic) and income across all four regions. While rural residency is highest in the South, but protective in other regions. Overall, we found age and income provide the highest predictive ability for diabetes risk.  This study highlights differences in diabetes prevalence in association between previously established socio-economic variables and diabetes risk across four geographic regions. These findings could help public health professionals and policy makers in understanding the dynamic relationship between diabetes and risk factors at the regional level

The relationship between individual characteristics, behavioral motifs, and interactive friendship processes among older relocated adults

An integrative conceptual framework for friendship research was proposed by Adams and Blieszner (1994). Their framework states that individual characteristics, expressed through a behavioral motif, affect friendship patterns, and that friendship patterns vary by the structural and cultural context. The purpose of this study was to determine if the conceptual framework can explain variation in the friendships of older adults. A cross-sectional survey design was used to assess interactive processes of a random sample of older urban and rural relocated adults in North Carolina (N=282). It was hypothesized that: (1.) Individual characteristics (e.g., age, gender, education, marital status, and health) would predict affective, behavioral, and cognitive processes and frequency of contact, a proxy measure of processes. (2.) Behavioral motif (e.g., social involvement, proximity) would moderate the relationship between individual characteristics and friendship processes and frequency of contact. (3.) The relationship of individual characteristics and behavioral motif to interactive friendship processes of older relocated adults would vary with the structural and cultural context (e.g., rural, urban). Stepwise and hierarchical multiple regression analyses were used to test the hypotheses. Mixed support was found for the first hypothesis. No support was found for the second hypothesis. Limited support was found for hypothesis three