Addressing US Youth Violence and Central American Migration through Fortifying Children, Families, and Educators in Central America: A Collaborative Approach to the Development and Testing of a Youth Violence Preventive Intervention

Youth violence is a pressing problem in the United States (US) with multiple contributors. Some violence involving US youth can be linked to a larger global epidemic of youth violence in Latin America and in Central America, specifically. Hemispheric histories of violence fueled by a century of US resource extraction and intervention, and other factors such as internal economic and political strain, contribute to present-day migration from Central America to the US. Addressing the intricate problems of US youth violence and migration requires multi-systemic prevention programs to address youth violence in families, schools, and communities in Central America. One such example is Miles de Manos (MdM; “Thousands of Hands”). MdM is intended to target risk and protective factors related to migration from Central America to the US. It is a multi-modal, culturally-specified and community-based violence prevention intervention for elementary-school aged children, their families, and children’s teachers and school staff. Data collected during pilot trials indicate promise in terms of MdM increasing positive teacher and parent behaviors that promote prosocial behaviors and reduce problem behaviors in youth. Outcomes due to MdM for youth, parents and other caregivers, and teachers are currently being examined in a randomized controlled trial in Tegucigalpa, Honduras

Addressing US Youth Violence and Central American Migration through Fortifying Children, Families, and Educators in Central America: A Collaborative Approach to the Development and Testing of a Youth Violence Preventive Intervention

15 pagesYouth violence is a pressing problem in the United States (US) with multiple contributors. Some violence involving US youth can be linked to a larger global epidemic of youth violence in Latin America and in Central America, specifically. Hemispheric histories of violence fueled by a century of US resource extraction and intervention, and other factors such as internal economic and political strain, contribute to present-day migration from Central America to the US. Addressing the intricate problems of US youth violence and migration requires multi-systemic prevention programs to address youth violence in families, schools, and communities in Central America. One such example is Miles de Manos (MdM; “Thousands of Hands”). MdM is intended to target risk and protective factors related to migration from Central America to the US. It is a multi-modal, culturally-specified and community- based violence prevention intervention for elementary-school aged children, their families, and children’s teachers and school staff. Data collected during pilot trials indicate promise in terms of MdM increasing positive teacher and parent behaviors that promote prosocial behaviors and reduce problem behaviors in youth. Outcomes due to MdM for youth, parents and other caregivers, and teachers are currently being examined in a randomized controlled trial in Tegucigalpa, Honduras

Effects of branching spatial structure and life history on the asymptotic growth rate of a population

Author Posting. © The Author(s), 2009. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here by permission of Springer for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Theoretical Ecology 3 (2010): 137-152, doi:10.1007/s12080-009-0058-0.The dendritic structure of a river network creates directional dispersal and a hierarchical arrangement of habitats. These two features have important consequences for the ecological dynamics of species living within the network.We apply matrix population models to a stage-structured population in a network of habitat patches connected in a dendritic arrangement. By considering a range of life histories and dispersal patterns, both constant in time and seasonal, we illustrate how spatial structure, directional dispersal, survival, and reproduction interact to determine population growth rate and distribution. We investigate the sensitivity of the asymptotic growth rate to the demographic parameters of the model, the system size, and the connections between the patches. Although some general patterns emerge, we find that a species’ mode of reproduction and dispersal are quite important in its response to changes in its life history parameters or in the spatial structure. The framework we use here can be customized to incorporate a wide range of demographic and dispersal scenarios.Funding for this work came from the James S. McDonnell Foundation (EEG, HJL, WFF). MGN was supported by grants from the National Science Foundation (CMG-0530830, OCE-0326734, ATM-0428122)

Plasma lipid profiles discriminate bacterial from viral infection in febrile children

Fever is the most common reason that children present to Emergency Departments. Clinical signs and symptoms suggestive of bacterial infection are often non-specific, and there is no definitive test for the accurate diagnosis of infection. The 'omics' approaches to identifying biomarkers from the host-response to bacterial infection are promising. In this study, lipidomic analysis was carried out with plasma samples obtained from febrile children with confirmed bacterial infection (n = 20) and confirmed viral infection (n = 20). We show for the first time that bacterial and viral infection produces distinct profile in the host lipidome. Some species of glycerophosphoinositol, sphingomyelin, lysophosphatidylcholine and cholesterol sulfate were higher in the confirmed virus infected group, while some species of fatty acids, glycerophosphocholine, glycerophosphoserine, lactosylceramide and bilirubin were lower in the confirmed virus infected group when compared with confirmed bacterial infected group. A combination of three lipids achieved an area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve of 0.911 (95% CI 0.81 to 0.98). This pilot study demonstrates the potential of metabolic biomarkers to assist clinicians in distinguishing bacterial from viral infection in febrile children, to facilitate effective clinical management and to the limit inappropriate use of antibiotics

Plasma lipid profiles discriminate bacterial from viral infection in febrile children

Fever is the most common reason that children present to Emergency Departments. Clinical signs and symptoms suggestive of bacterial infection ar