Housing Choice, Transportation Equity, and Access to Opportunities in Refugee and Immigrant Communities

Mobility directly impacts access to opportunities for all protected classes; however, transportation planning and public transit agencies and housing authorities rarely coordinate affordable housing and the transportation system planning decisions. This lack of coordination often leads to mismatches between access to opportunities and affordable housing. Safe access to employment, quality schools, and healthcare represent a few of the many factors that may influence housing choice. For most households with budget constraints, all of these factors may not be achievable. While existing research documents the mismatch between affordable housing and access to opportunities, the role that mobility plays in residential selection and the possible transportation barriers in access to essential services remains under investigated. The primary objective of this research was to investigate the role that a household’s primary and secondary mobility (i.e., using auto, public transit, social network, walking, etc. to access activities) plays in the housing location choice of immigrants and refugees. The secondary objective was to craft a methodology for producing an access to opportunity index relevant to the study population. The study investigated the importance of community cohesion and other social structures in the decision-making process, thereby providing greater clarification of the burdens encountered by immigrants, refugees, and other protected classes when affordable housing and the transportation system planning remain uncoordinated and fail to address the needs of transportation disadvantaged households. Our qualitative study was conducted in Dallas County, TX, where almost one quarter of the 2.6 million population were born outside the United States. We identified, with the assistance of community partners that serve immigrants and refugees, study participants who were planning to move and those who had recently moved from their initial residence following their arrival in Dallas County to a residence they have considered and selected. We collected qualitative data about the factors and values that drove transition decisions such as transit options, housing costs, proximity to health and mental healthcare, safe neighborhoods, access to quality education, employment proximity, community cohesion or distance, among others. We conducted a conventional content analysis of interviews from 32 participants and found three themes (and several sub-themes). These were: Theme 1) The Multiple Dimensions of Home; Theme 2) The Neighborhood Experience, and; Theme 3) Barriers and Bridges to Opportunity. We present method and findings related to the access to opportunity index using both transit and auto modes from Dallas County block groups. Then, we discuss recommendations for policy and practice that promote the coordination of transportation planning and housing choice for immigrants and refugees in Dallas County and the implications for other transportation-disadvantaged populations in other locations

What Drives Housing Choices of Refugees and Immigrants?

When newcomers to the US initially settle, if their chosen location does not meet their expectations or needs, that often propels them to relocate. To determine what helps drive those transition decisions, the researchers interviewed people if they fulfilled one of these requirements: They were members of the Dallas County community who were planning to move in the next five years. They had recently (within the past five years) moved from their initial residence following their arrival in Dallas County. They also had to be immigrants to or refugees in the US who were at least eighteen years old. Out of the 218 people initially interviewed, thirty-two participants qualified for the full interview. The participants were selected from a free community clinic in Dallas. The researchers gave the thirty-two participants the open-ended prompt of, “Please discuss why you decided to move.” Based on the responses, the researchers concluded that three main themes drove transition decisions: The Multiple Dimensions of Home, The Neighborhood Experience, and Barriers and Bridges to Opportunity

Did Medicaid Expansion Close African American-white Health Care Disparities Nationwide? A Scoping Review

Objectives: To investigate the impact of the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) Medicaid expansion on African Americanwhite disparities in health coverage, access to healthcare, receipt of treatment, and health outcomes. Design: A search of research reports, following the PRISMA-ScR guidelines, identified twenty-six national studies investigating changes in health care disparities between African American and white non-disabled, non-elderly adults before and after ACA Medicaid expansion, comparing states that did and did not expand Medicaid. Analysis examined research design and findings. Results: Whether Medicaid eligibility expansion reduced African American-white health coverage disparities remains an open question: Absolute disparities in coverage appear to have declined in expansion states, although exceptions have been reported. African American disparities in health access, treatment, or health outcomes showed little evidence of change for the general population. Conclusions: Future research addressing key weaknesses in existing research may help to uncover sources of continuing disparities and clarify the impact of future Medicaid expansion on African American health care disparities

Endocrine therapy resistant ESR1 variants revealed by genomic characterization of breast cancer derived xenografts

To characterize patient-derived xenografts (PDXs) for functional studies, we made whole-genome comparisons with originating breast cancers representative of the major intrinsic subtypes. Structural and copy number aberrations were found to be retained with high fidelity. However, at the single-nucleotide level, variable numbers of PDX-specific somatic events were documented, although they were only rarely functionally significant. Variant allele frequencies were often preserved in the PDXs, demonstrating that clonal representation can be transplantable. Estrogen-receptor-positive PDXs were associated with ESR1 ligand-binding-domain mutations, gene amplification, or an ESR1/YAP1 translocation. These events produced different endocrine-therapy-response phenotypes in human, cell line, and PDX endocrine-response studies. Hence, deeply sequenced PDX models are an important resource for the search for genome-forward treatment options and capture endocrine-drug-resistance etiologies that are not observed in standard cell lines. The originating tumor genome provides a benchmark for assessing genetic drift and clonal representation after transplantation

Community Engagement and Methodological Approaches in the Linguistic Translation and Cultural Adaptation of Standardized Instruments Among Refugee Populations: A Scoping Review of the Literature

The objective of this scoping review is to examine the extent, range, and nature of research activity regarding the linguistic translation and cultural adaptation of standardized instruments among refugee populations. Its specific focus is on understanding the degree of community engagement in these translation and adaptation processes and the types of methodologies (quantitative, qualitative, or mixed methods) employed. We aim to summarize and disseminate findings related to these aspects and to identify gaps in the existing literature, particularly concerning how refugee communities are involved and the methodological approaches used in these settings

Cognitive Impairment and Forced Displacement Scoping Review

The objective of this scoping review is to examine the extent, range, and nature of research on cognitive impairment among forcibly displaced populations, specifically focusing on refugees and asylum seekers.  We aim to summarize and disseminate these research findings and identify research gaps in the existing literature

Social Determinants of Health Among Forcibly Displaced Populations Resettled in the United States: A Qualitative Interpretative Meta-synthesis

Qualitative Interpretative Meta-synthesi

Slaying is Hell: Essays on Trauma and Memory in the Whedonverse

The films, television shows, and graphic novel series that comprise the Whedonverse continually show that there is a high price to be paid for love, rebellion, heroism, anger, death, betrayal, friendship, and saving the world. This collection of essays reveals the ways in which the Whedonverse treats the trauma of ordinary life with similar gravitas as trauma created by the supernatural, illustrating how memories are lost, transformed, utilized, celebrated, revered, questioned, feared, and rebuffed within the storyworlds created by Joss Whedon and his collaborators. Through a variety of approaches and examinations, the essays in this book seek to understand how the themes of trauma, memory, and identity enrich one another in the Whedonverse and beyond. As the authors present different arguments and focus on various texts, the essays work to build a mosaic of the trauma found in beloved works like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Dollhouse, and more. The book concludes with a meta-analysis that explores the allegations of various traumas made against Joss Whedon himself.https://digitalcommons.trinity.edu/mono/1187/thumbnail.jp

Summer temperature variability since 1730 CE across the low-to-mid latitudes of western North America from a tree ring blue intensity network

This project was supported by the National Science Foundation under BCS- 2012482, BCS-1759694, and AGS-2002524, the United States Forest Service, the University of Idaho, and Indiana University Institute for Advanced Studies.Regional reconstructions of air temperature over the past millennium provide critical context for ongoing climate change, but they are temporally limited in the recent period or absent for many parts of the world. We demonstrate the use of latewood blue intensity (LWB) to reconstruct current-year growing (warm) season maximum temperatures (Tmax) in the low-to-mid latitudes (30°-50°N) of western North America. We present a new tree ring network comprised of 26 LWB chronologies developed from living, high-elevation Engelmann spruce (Picea engelmannii Parry ex Engelm.) sampled across the western United States. The LWB parameter shows strong, positive (r = 0.65–0.73), and temporally-stable correlations with growing season Tmax. From this network we present 4 regional Tmax reconstructions, which characterize regional temperature histories across western North America from northern Mexico to southern British Columbia over the past 4 centuries. Our comparison of these 4 temperature reconstructions highlights the spatial patterns of regional temperature trends throughout time. These reconstructions provide important updates and increased data point density to the tree ring temperature proxy network of the Northern Hemisphere. We highlight the use of blue intensity methods at both low- and mid-latitude upper tree line locations to increase the presence of strongly temperature-sensitive records at increasingly lower latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere.PostprintPeer reviewe