Psychological consequences of childhood obesity: psychiatric comorbidity and prevention

Childhood obesity is one of the most serious public health challenges of the 21st century with far-reaching and enduring adverse consequences for health outcomes. Over 42 million children <5 years worldwide are estimated to be overweight (OW) or obese (OB), and if current trends continue, then an estimated 70 million children will be OW or OB by 2025. The purpose of this review was to focus on psychiatric, psychological, and psychosocial consequences of childhood obesity (OBy) to include a broad range of international studies. The aim was to establish what has recently changed in relation to the common psychological consequences associated with childhood OBy. A systematic search was conducted in MEDLINE, Web of Science, and the Cochrane Library for articles presenting information on the identification or prevention of psychiatric morbidity in childhood obesity. Relevant data were extracted and narratively reviewed. Findings established childhood OW/OBy was negatively associated with psychological comorbidities, such as depression, poorer perceived lower scores on health-related quality of life, emotional and behavioral disorders, and self-esteem during childhood. Evidence related to the association between attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and OBy remains unconvincing because of various findings from studies. OW children were more likely to experience multiple associated psychosocial problems than their healthy-weight peers, which may be adversely influenced by OBy stigma, teasing, and bullying. OBy stigma, teasing, and bullying are pervasive and can have serious consequences for emotional and physical health and performance. It remains unclear as to whether psychiatric disorders and psychological problems are a cause or a consequence of childhood obesity or whether common factors promote both obesity and psychiatric disturbances in susceptible children and adolescents. A cohesive and strategic approach to tackle this current obesity epidemic is necessary to combat this increasing trend which is compromising the health and well-being of the young generation and seriously impinging on resources and economic costs

13. Long Term Care: Medicaid Reimbursement Does High Cost Yield High Quality?

This paper suggests a new focus for government policy in the providing of Medicaid services. To put it simply, the government needs to provide incentives (and sanctions) that make the business of caring for the elderly profitable to proprietary nursing home. Although profit and quality care are strange bedfellows, the government must adapt the Medicaid system to keeping them close (i.e., maintaining a positive relationship between profit and quality care)

The Development of a Screening Questionnaire for Obstructive Sleep Apnea in Children with Down Syndrome

Obstructive sleep apnea is a condition which affects an estimated 50% of children with Down syndrome, particularly in their early years. It can cause serious sequelae in affected children but may not be recognized by parents or health professionals. Routine screening has been recommended in some countries, but is not standard practice. There are no validated questionnaire-based tools available to screen this population of children for this particular sleep-related disorder. Using existing validated sleep questionnaire items, we have developed a questionnaire to screen children with Down syndrome up to 6 years of age for obstructive sleep apnea, which corresponds with the recommendations made in UK national guidelines. This paper describes these first steps in demonstrating content validity for a new questionnaire, which will be subject to further in-depth psychometric analysis. Relevance, clarity, and age appropriateness were rated for 33 items using a content review questionnaire by a group of 18 health professionals with expertise in respiratory pediatrics, neurodevelopmental pediatrics, and sleep physiology. The content validity index was calculated for individual items and contributed to decisions about item inclusion. Scale level content validity index for the modified questionnaire of 14 items was at an accepted level of 0.78. Two parents of children with Down syndrome took part in cognitive interviews after completing the modified questionnaire. We describe the development of this 14 item questionnaire to screen for OSA in children with DS from infancy to 6 years

Ontology, a Mediator for Agent-Based Modeling in Social Science

Agent-Based Models are useful to describe and understand social, economic and spatial systems\' dynamics. But, beside the facilities which this methodology offers, evaluation and comparison of simulation models are sometimes problematic. A rigorous conceptual frame needs to be developed. This is in order to ensure the coherence in the chain linking at the one extreme the scientist\'s hypotheses about the modeled phenomenon and at the other the structure of rules in the computer program. This also systematizes the model design from the thematician conceptual framework as well. The aim is to reflect upon the role that a well defined ontology, based on the crossing of the philosophical and the computer science insights, can play to solve such questions and help the model building. We analyze different conceptions of ontology, introduce the \'ontological test\' and show its usefulness to compare models. Then we focus on the model building and show the place of a systematic ABM ontology. The latter process is situated within a larger framework called the \'knowledge framework\' in which not only the ontologies but also the notions of theory, model and empirical data take place. At last the relation between emergence and ontology is discussed.Ontology, Agent-Based Computational Economic, Agent-Based Model of Simulation, Model Design, Model Building, Knowledge Framework, Spatial Simulation, Social Simulation, Ontological Test

Diversity of microbial eukaryotes along the West Antarctic Peninsula in austral spring

© The Author(s), 2022. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Grattepanche, J.-D., Jeffrey, W., Gast, R., & Sanders, R. Diversity of microbial eukaryotes along the West Antarctic Peninsula in austral spring. Frontiers in Microbiology, 13, (2022): 844856, https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.844856.During a cruise from October to November 2019, along the West Antarctic Peninsula, between 64.32 and 68.37°S, we assessed the diversity and composition of the active microbial eukaryotic community within three size fractions: micro- (> 20 μm), nano- (20–5 μm), and pico-size fractions (5–0.2 μm). The communities and the environmental parameters displayed latitudinal gradients, and we observed a strong similarity in the microbial eukaryotic communities as well as the environmental parameters between the sub-surface and the deep chlorophyll maximum (DCM) depths. Chlorophyll concentrations were low, and the mixed layer was shallow for most of the 17 stations sampled. The richness of the microplankton was higher in Marguerite Bay (our southernmost stations), compared to more northern stations, while the diversity for the nano- and pico-plankton was relatively stable across latitude. The microplankton communities were dominated by autotrophs, mostly diatoms, while mixotrophs (phototrophs-consuming bacteria and kleptoplastidic ciliates, mostly alveolates, and cryptophytes) were the most abundant and active members of the nano- and picoplankton communities. While phototrophy was the dominant trophic mode, heterotrophy (mixotrophy, phagotrophy, and parasitism) tended to increase southward. The samples from Marguerite Bay showed a distinct community with a high diversity of nanoplankton predators, including spirotrich ciliates, and dinoflagellates, while cryptophytes were observed elsewhere. Some lineages were significantly related—either positively or negatively—to ice coverage (e.g., positive for Pelagophyceae, negative for Spirotrichea) and temperature (e.g., positive for Cryptophyceae, negative for Spirotrichea). This suggests that climate changes will have a strong impact on the microbial eukaryotic community.This work was supported by the National Science Foundation (Grant Nos. ANT 1744767 to RS, ANT 1744663 to RG, and ANT 1744638 to WJ). This research was based, in part, upon sequencing conducted using the Rhode Island Genomics and Sequencing Center, which was supported in part by the National Science Foundation (MRI Grant No. DBI-0215393 and EPSCoR Grant Nos. 0554548 and EPS-1004057), the US Department of Agriculture (Grant Nos. 2002-34438-12688 and 2003-34438-13111), and the University of Rhode Island. This research includes calculations carried out on Temple University HPC resources supported in part by the National Science Foundation through major research instrumentation (Grant No. 1625061) and by the US Army Research Laboratory under (Contract No. W911NF-16-2-0189)

Vector theories in cosmology

This article provides a general study of the Hamiltonian stability and the hyperbolicity of vector field models involving both a general function of the Faraday tensor and its dual, $f(F^2,F\tilde F)$, as well as a Proca potential for the vector field, $V(A^2)$. In particular it is demonstrated that theories involving only $f(F^2)$ do not satisfy the hyperbolicity conditions. It is then shown that in this class of models, the cosmological dynamics always dilutes the vector field. In the case of a nonminimal coupling to gravity, it is established that theories involving $R f(A^2)$ or $Rf(F^2)$ are generically pathologic. To finish, we exhibit a model where the vector field is not diluted during the cosmological evolution, because of a nonminimal vector field-curvature coupling which maintains second-order field equations. The relevance of such models for cosmology is discussed.Comment: 17 pages, no figur

ASSESSMENT OF PROCEDURAL ASPECTS AND QUALITY CONTROL IN HUMAN PLACENTAL RNA ISOLATION PROTOCOLS

poster abstractHigh quality RNA is of paramount importance in accurately interpreting gene expression changes in the placenta throughout pregnancy, as well as in common placental pathologies. The purpose of this study was to develop a standard operating procedure for the collection of human placental tissue and isolation of high quality RNA for pregnancy-related molecular studies. To accomplish this task, we compared several different parameters to minimize RNA degradation, including preservation (liquid nitrogen vs. RNAlater), dis-ruption (mortar/pestle vs. homogenization), and isolation (Trizol vs. RNeasy). We performed 150 RNA isolations from 30 term placentas. The overall yield was 365 ± 197 ng RNA per mg of tissue. The A260/280 ratio for all samples was 2.11 ± 0.1 (mean ± s.d.) and the RQI was 7.1 ± 1.4. No significant differences in RNA purity, yield, or quality were observed between different placental collections or RNA isolation techniques. However, poor RQI values of 2.7 to 3.3 were obtained after brief thawing of frozen placental samples. We also compared storage of RNAlater stabilized tissue at 4 de-grees or room temperature for 1 day, 7 days, and 30 days. The integrity of RNA stored at room temperature for 1 day was significantly better (P‹0.05 RQI 7.3 ± 0.58, mean ± s.d) than RNA stored at room temperature for 30 days (RQI 5.0 ±1.2, mean ± s.d). The results of these studies will be useful for establishing standard procedures for placenta collection for pregnancy biobanks

Predicting future coexistence in a North American ant community

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Demographic and Outcome Trends in a Naturopathic Teaching Clinic

Naturopathic Doctors (NDs) are trained to treat patients using an individualized approach combining dietary and lifestyle changes, botanical and nutritional medicines, homeopathic medicines, and counseling techniques. In order to effectively study naturopathic medicine, it is beneficial to use whole systems research rather than standardized protocols. In our study, we monitored 27 patients treated individually with wholistic naturopathic medicine for various chief concerns over the course of 12 weeks in the UB Naturopathic Clinic. These patients were given surveys at baseline, 6 weeks, and 12 weeks pertaining to their health-related quality of life (HRQoL), which is considered by the CDC to be an effective tool for predicting mortality and morbidity compared to many objective measures. We used the PROMIS Global Health Scale questionnaire, a validated tool for monitoring HRQoL, for these measures. We also collected demographic data at baseline, including gender, chief medical concerns, age, ethnicity, income level, and education. In our study population, 38.5% of patients were seeking care for depression/anxiety and 15.4% of patients were seeking care for fatigue. 46.2% of participants are aged 50-69 years old, and 71.8% are female. 28.2% have an income under $29,999 per year, and 51.3% are Caucasian. PROMIS Global Health Measures are divided into Physical Health and Mental Health T-scores, and a T-score of 50 is considered an average score for a control population sampled by PROMIS. GPH scores started at 44.652 and increased to 47.8 at 6 weeks and declined to 45.324 at 12 weeks (average SD +/- 7.94). GMH scores started at 45.5259 at baseline, increased to 46.5185 at 6 weeks, and increased to 47.356 at 12 weeks (average SD +/- 8.40). While not statistically significant, our research helps us to understand the type of patients who visit a naturopathic clinic and to perform future research to target treatments for this particular population. A trend towards improved GMH scores was noted over 12 weeks