Pedestrian Traffic Fatalities by State: 2015 Preliminary Data

The number of pedestrian fatalities in the United States increased 19 percent from 2009 to 2014, a period in which total traffic deaths decreased by about 4 percent. In fact, pedestrians now account for the largest proportion of traffic fatalities recorded in the past 25 years. Earlier studies by the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA), based on preliminary data reported by State Highway Safety Offices (SHSOs), were the first to predict recent increases in pedestrian fatalities.The present study, based on preliminary data from all states and the District of Columbia (DC) for the first six months of 2015, found an increase of 6 percent in the reported number of fatalities compared with the first six months of 2014. After adjusting for anticipated underreporting in the preliminary state data, GHSA estimates there has been a 10 percent increase in the number of pedestrians killed in 2015 compared with 2014. In addition, pedestrian deaths as a percent of total motor vehicle crash deaths have increased steadily from 11 percent in 2005-2007 to 15 percent in 2014. It has been 25 years (1990) since pedestrians accounted for 15 percent of total traffic fatalities. Preliminary data indicate that pedestrians will represent about 15 percent of total fatalities again in 2015

Finding Our Stride: A Health System Repository 4 Years In / Providence Patents: Using an Institutional Repository to Promote Technology Transfer

In 2018 Providence launched its Digital Commons Institutional Repository (IR) becoming one of only a small group of large health systems providing such a service. In nearing the end of Year 4 there has been sustained growth and continued engagement of this initiative. Expanding on the initial ask from senior leadership to simply track and compile Providence scholarly activity, subsequent years saw significant development in scope and scale of the IR. New projects included the creation of special collections, including: COVID-19 Research; Environmental Stewardship; Genomics; Diversity & Inclusion; and a Patents collection. The library partnered with nursing and graduate medical education to host virtual conferences and archive conference materials. Targeting marketing emails to authors and institutional leadership leveraging the PlumX Altmetrics component of the BePress platform brought increased visibility and excitement. Providence Digital Commons is now an essential part of the Research division’s success metrics whose value is recognized throughout the health system. Technology Transfer is the process of moving inventions, discoveries, research tools, and other intellectual property to the world outside. Providence System Library Services partnered with the Providence Health Technology Transfer Office to leverage our institutional repository platform to internally track patents owned by the institution and promote them externally. Library staff created a robust metadata architecture for this unique collection with links to individual US Patent Office Records. This special collection makes records more easily discoverable to external end users, particularly those with novice search skills related to patents and trademarks, and increases visibility of Providence innovation

Pure-ly for Authors: An Update of a Health System Researcher Profile Platform

In 2023, a large healthcare system transitioned their institutional repository\u27s author profile service to an upgraded and more comprehensive platform, and in doing so re-energized author and leadership buy-in. After Digital Commons\u27™ Expert Gallery Suite eliminated some functionality, institutional repository (IR) staff began the process of exploring other author profile platforms that would align with essential workflows. Elsevier\u27s™ Pure rose to the top of compatible and robust platforms suitable to replace our previous solution. Pure\u27s™ automated importing and database-integration was a primary draw, but IR staff had to find creative ways to utilize the administrative features that didn\u27t integrate with the organization\u27s existing HR/IS systems. Utilizing the health system\u27s Digital Commons\u27™ institutional repository and other internal databases IR staff compiled a list of eligible researchers and authors for the new platform. Automation allowed IR staff to populate at launch greater than 4x the number of profiles as the previous platform. Throughout this process, the IR staff made new contacts with researchers and administrators across the enterprise growing opportunities for marketing and outreach for the IR and the Library. While the new and improved platform is in an ongoing cycle of updates and polishing, the process has given the Library/IR new prominence within the organization and the ability to be responsive to researcher and administration needs around scholarly communication and research visibility

What is the Cost of a Preschool Program?

State and local governments that wish to establish or improve preschool programs need cost estimates to evaluate the magnitude of appropriations required. Yet even a casual scrutiny of available expenditure data reveals an enormous variance between the most expensive and least expensive preschool provisions. The purpose of this paper is to delineate the root causes of differences in per-student costs of states’ preschool programs and to suggest cost tradeoffs as different features such as smaller class size or longer school days are introduced or substituted for each other. These cost findings are contrasted with recent meta-analyses of the effectiveness of different program provisions. The goal of this paper is to advance the still nascent body of research on preschool cost effectiveness, and to aid state or local governments to assess the mix of characteristics that are most effective for any given budget constraint. The paper builds partially on the authors’ previous analysis of international preschool programs

Comparing Costs of Early Childhood Care and Education Programs: An International Perspective

The purpose of this article is to outline the determinants of early childhood care and education (EccE) costs as well as a method for measuring them, and to set out available cost data provided by countries for their EccE endeavors. The analysis is based upon comparison of available data for 17 countries. We first address why costs may differ significantly for EccE from country to country. Second, we address why existing reporting of costs is highly inconsistent and typically incomplete, including an examination of disparities in reported EccE expenditures across countries. Third, we outline an appropriate way, known as the “ingredients method”, for determining costs that can provide consistent measurement for comparative purposes

Long-Term Dynamics of the Kidney Disease Epidemic Among HIV-Infected Individuals

One of many risks facing HIV+ individuals is the development of kidney dysfunction and end stage kidney disease (ESKD). A differential equation-based mathematical model was developed to assess the impact of antiretroviral therapy on the progression to kidney disease and on reducing mortality due to kidney failure. Analytical and numerical predictions of long-term HIV+ ESKD prevalence show that therapy can lead to either extremely low levels of disease prevalence or increased prevalence, depending on drug efficacy levels and mechanisms of action. Maintenance of HIV+ ESKD prevalence below one individual is possible with sufficient efficacy (e.g., 99%) against the progression from AIDS to HIV+ ESKD and against entry to the AIDS population, when the reduction in mortality in the AIDS and HIV+ ESKD populations is modest (e.g., 10%). However, the concomitant decrease in mortality in the AIDS and HIV+ ESKD populations due to therapy is predicted to sustain greater disease prevalence

Under Pressure: Job Security, Resource Allocation, and Productivity in Schools Under NCLB

The most sweeping federal education law in decades, the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, requires states to administer standardized exams and to punish schools that do not make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) for the fraction of students passing these exams. While the literature on school accountability is well-established, there exists no nationwide study of the strong short-term incentives created by NCLB for schools on the margin of failing AYP. We assemble the first comprehensive, national, school-level dataset concerning detailed performance measures used to calculate AYP, and demonstrate that idiosyncrasies in state policies create numerous cases where schools near the margin for satisfying their own state’s AYP requirements would have almost certainly failed or almost certainly made AYP if they were located in other states. Using this variation as a means of identification, we examine the impact of NCLB on the behavior of school personnel and students’ academic achievement in nationally representative samples. We find that accountability pressure from NCLB lowers teachers’ perceptions of job security and causes untenured teachers in high-stakes grades to work longer hours than their peers. We also find that NCLB pressure has either neutral or positive effects on students’ enjoyment of learning and their achievement gains on low-stakes exams in reading, math, and science.

Pluripotent stem cell-derived hepatocyte-like cells

Liver disease is an important clinical problem, impacting over 30 million Americans and over 600 million people worldwide. It is the 12th leading cause of death in the United States and the 16th worldwide. Due to a paucity of donor organs, several thousand Americans die yearly while waiting for liver transplantation. Unfortunately, alternative tissue sources such as fetal hepatocytes and hepatic cell lines are unreliable, difficult to reproduce, and do not fully recapitulate hepatocyte phenotype and functions. As a consequence, alternative cell sources that do not have these limitations have been sought. Human embryonic stem (hES) cell- and induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cell-derived hepatocyte-like cells may enable cell based therapeutics, the study of the mechanisms of human disease and human development, and provide a platform for screening the efficacy and toxicity of pharmaceuticals. iPS cells can be differentiated in a step-wise fashion with high efficiency and reproducibility into hepatocyte-like cells that exhibit morphologic and phenotypic characteristics of hepatocytes. In addition, iPS-derived hepatocyte-like cells (iHLCs) possess some functional hepatic activity as they secrete urea, alpha-1-antitrypsin, and albumin. However, the combined phenotypic and functional traits exhibited by iHLCs resemble a relatively immature hepatic phenotype that more closely resembles that of fetal hepatocytes rather than adult hepatocytes. Specifically, iHLCs express fetal markers such as alpha-fetoprotein and lack key mature hepatocyte functions, as reflected by drastically reduced activity (~ 0.1%) of important detoxification enzymes (i.e. CYP2A6, CYP3A4). These key differences between iHLCs and primary adult human hepatocytes have limited the use of stem cells as a renewable source of functional adult hepatocytes for in vitro and in vivo applications. Unfortunately, the developmental pathways that control hepatocyte maturation from a fetal into an adult hepatocyte are poorly understood, which has hampered the field in its efforts to induce further maturation of iPS-derived hepatic lineage cells. This review analyzes recent developments in the derivation of hepatocyte-like cells, and proposes important points to consider and assays to perform during their characterization. In the future, we envision that iHLCs will be used as in vitro models of human disease, and in the longer term, provide an alternative cell source for drug testing and clinical therapy.National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Roadmap for Medical Research Grant 1 R01 DK085713-01))American Gastroenterological Association (Research Scholar Award