The Relationship Between Career and Technical Education (CTE) and Adolescent Depression

Poor mental health in childhood can be chronic and have lasting effects on one’s life prospects. Despite its significant impact, many depressed adolescents underutilize healthcare resources. Recently, more research has been done looking at ways in which vocational education policies can provide students with a greater sense of self-efficacy, and therefore better mental health. This study adds to this current research by utilizing data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (NLSY97) in multivariate regression analyses to examine whether participating in career and technical education (CTE) in secondary education may act as a protective measure against adolescent depression. Participation in CTE was defined by classifying secondary school students as either occupational investors, explorers, or concentrators. The depression level for adolescents was measured by a standardized score based on a five-question version of the Mental Health Inventory (MHI-5). The final analysis revealed that occupational investing and exploring is positively associated with better depression scores among high school seniors and occupational exploring is negatively associated with better depression scores among high school juniors. Implications include providing more support to CTE as a means to protect adolescents from depression as well as recruiting groups of students that are traditionally underrepresented in CTE and at a higher risk of developing depression during adolescence.Bachelor of Art

Health sciences librarians in academic libraries: a brief review of their developing role

Information relating to health has been gathered since ancient times. Physicians often gathered their own books which were sometimes donated to create early medical libraries. The explosion of information, the demands of qualification accrediting bodies and technological developments have also helped to promote the work of health libraries. The professionalisation of health occupations has tended to move their library support from hospitals into academic settings. Librarians are increasingly concerned with promoting their services and teaching patrons to use library resources. While some health sciences librarians see the availability of health information on the internet as a threat, to those that can see ways to exploit it, it may serve to enhance their role

Financial Toxicity: A Side Effect of Radiation Therapy for Cancer?

The field of oncology is ever-changing, as new treatment options become available and treatment plans are unceasingly optimized. While the US remains at the forefront of medical innovation and treatment options for serious and complex conditions such as cancer, costs for cancer care are extremely high and continue to increase. Modern healthcare does not come without a price, and medical expenses can have a profound economic impact on American households. Nearly half of bankruptcy filings are in some way a result of medical expenses. While recent healthcare initiatives have increased access to care, many remain underinsured while facing increasing copayments and deductibles. For many, the out of pocket (OOP) cost for treatment represents a significant portion of their income. Such a large and often unanticipated financial burden not only contributes to non-adherence to medications, but also reduced spending on essentials such as food and clothing. Cancer patients, because of the complexity of care and high cost of treatment are especially sensitive, with an estimated 20-50% of oncology patients facing difficulty in paying medical bills. The American Society for Clinical Oncology (ASCO) has recognized the runaway cost of cancer care and has developed a Cost of Care task force to address patient financial well-being. While ASCO is at the forefront of the much needed movement, their impact has been limited. Surprisingly, many physicians are unaware that the task force even exists. The cost of care and financial burden for radiation oncology patients is largely unknown. The use of radiation therapy for treatment, either as stand-alone therapy or part of a multimodal approach, is efficacious for many different types of cancer. In fact, radiation therapy is an important treatment modality for many of the most common cancer types, including prostate, breast, and lung. To date, there are no studies addressing OOP cost or other forms of financial burden and its sequelae on patients who received radiation therapy as a part of their cancertreatment. Likewise, there are no financial toxicity tools validated for use in radiation oncology. Given the large role radiation therapy plays in modern cancer treatment, it is important for the field to develop and utilize financial toxicity tools. We hypothesize that radiation oncologists do not routinely screen for financial toxicity, and that a significant percentage of patients encounter financial burden as a result of radiation treatment. Here, we aim to identify demographic trends in patients facing financial burden, as well as gauge physician understanding of treatment costs and their willingness to adopt use of financial toxicity tools. Strategically developed physician surveys and post-treatment patient surveys will be used, utilizing a prospective, non-interventional observational study approach. This is an ongoing study as of April 2016, which we are optimistic will reveal much needed information on the financial toxicity of radiation therapy. Preliminary data will be presented, showing some intriguing trends in both the physician and patient surveys

An FCER2 polymorphism is associated with increased oral leukotriene receptor antagonists and allergic rhinitis prescribing

The Fc Fragment of IgE Receptor II (FCER2) is expressed in several cells, such as macrophages, eosinophils, B cells and platelets. Studies have suggested that FCER2 is involved in the regulation of IgE responses, growth and differentiation of T and B cells, cellular adherence and antigen presentation. The activation of the receptor results in down-regulation of IgE-mediated immune responses. Two studies found that individuals with asthma on inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) with the CC genotype of the rs28364072 polymorphism had a two-fold increased odds of asthma exacerbations and uncontrolled asthma than individuals with at least one copy of the T allele (CT/TT)

UNBOUND

Featured here, are the extraordinary works of our graduating Fanshawe Design class. This accomplishment is truly a celebration of the three years of passion, hard work, and dedication put forth by our students. It is our greatest hope that family, friends and the fashion industry will enjoy the creative endeavors of these emerging designers from the Fashion Design program at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario.https://first.fanshawec.ca/famd_design_fashiondesign_unbound/1001/thumbnail.jp

Shelled pteropods in peril: Assessing vulnerability in a high CO2 ocean

The impact of anthropogenic ocean acidification (OA) on marine ecosystems is a vital concern facing marine scientists and managers of ocean resources. Euthecosomatous pteropods (holoplanktonic gastropods) represent an excellent sentinel for indicating exposure to anthropogenic OA because of the sensitivity of their aragonite shells to the OA conditions less favorable for calcification. However, an integration of observations, experiments and modelling efforts is needed to make accurate predictions of how these organisms will respond to future changes to their environment. Our understanding of the underlying organismal biology and life history is far from complete and must be improved if we are to comprehend fully the responses of these organisms to the multitude of stressors in their environment beyond OA. This review considers the present state of research and understanding of euthecosomatous pteropod biology and ecology of these organisms and considers promising new laboratory methods, advances in instrumentation (such as molecular, trace elements, stable isotopes, palaeobiology alongside autonomous sampling platforms, CT scanning and high-quality video recording) and novel field-based approaches (i.e. studies of upwelling and CO2 vent regions) that may allow us to improve our predictive capacity of their vulnerability and/or resilience. In addition to playing a critical ecological and biogeochemical role, pteropods can offer a significant value as an early-indicator of anthropogenic OA. This role as a sentinel species should be developed further to consolidate their potential use within marine environmental management policy making

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

31st Annual Meeting and Associated Programs of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC 2016) : part two

Background The immunological escape of tumors represents one of the main ob- stacles to the treatment of malignancies. The blockade of PD-1 or CTLA-4 receptors represented a milestone in the history of immunotherapy. However, immune checkpoint inhibitors seem to be effective in specific cohorts of patients. It has been proposed that their efficacy relies on the presence of an immunological response. Thus, we hypothesized that disruption of the PD-L1/PD-1 axis would synergize with our oncolytic vaccine platform PeptiCRAd. Methods We used murine B16OVA in vivo tumor models and flow cytometry analysis to investigate the immunological background. Results First, we found that high-burden B16OVA tumors were refractory to combination immunotherapy. However, with a more aggressive schedule, tumors with a lower burden were more susceptible to the combination of PeptiCRAd and PD-L1 blockade. The therapy signifi- cantly increased the median survival of mice (Fig. 7). Interestingly, the reduced growth of contralaterally injected B16F10 cells sug- gested the presence of a long lasting immunological memory also against non-targeted antigens. Concerning the functional state of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs), we found that all the immune therapies would enhance the percentage of activated (PD-1pos TIM- 3neg) T lymphocytes and reduce the amount of exhausted (PD-1pos TIM-3pos) cells compared to placebo. As expected, we found that PeptiCRAd monotherapy could increase the number of antigen spe- cific CD8+ T cells compared to other treatments. However, only the combination with PD-L1 blockade could significantly increase the ra- tio between activated and exhausted pentamer positive cells (p= 0.0058), suggesting that by disrupting the PD-1/PD-L1 axis we could decrease the amount of dysfunctional antigen specific T cells. We ob- served that the anatomical location deeply influenced the state of CD4+ and CD8+ T lymphocytes. In fact, TIM-3 expression was in- creased by 2 fold on TILs compared to splenic and lymphoid T cells. In the CD8+ compartment, the expression of PD-1 on the surface seemed to be restricted to the tumor micro-environment, while CD4 + T cells had a high expression of PD-1 also in lymphoid organs. Interestingly, we found that the levels of PD-1 were significantly higher on CD8+ T cells than on CD4+ T cells into the tumor micro- environment (p < 0.0001). Conclusions In conclusion, we demonstrated that the efficacy of immune check- point inhibitors might be strongly enhanced by their combination with cancer vaccines. PeptiCRAd was able to increase the number of antigen-specific T cells and PD-L1 blockade prevented their exhaus- tion, resulting in long-lasting immunological memory and increased median survival

Physical Therapy Service-learning in a Second World Country: What are the Benefits?

Social responsibility and service are key initiatives within the physical therapy profession and within the Lynchburg College Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT) program. Service-learning opportunities are offered in the DPT program within the country of St. Lucia on a yearly basis. The primary focus of this presentation is to evaluate the impact of this type of experiential learning on both students and the local community. During the 2018 service trip, the Minister of Special Education of St. Lucia provided special insight to our contribution to the special education schools in St. Lucia, which indicates the trip provides beneficial and sustaining services to an underserved population. On our most recent trip, we utilized our skills and learned new techniques for fitting adaptive equipment, using communication boards, and utilizing available equipment to treat our patients. In addition, we educated the teachers in the special needs schools on topics such as positioning of students and exercises that improved their learning environment. Our presentation will summarize the benefits of implementing physical therapy services in a second world country and we will discuss the benefits of applying our classroom curriculum to the special education patient population

Inspiratory flow rate, not type of incentive spirometry device, influences chest wall motion in healthy individuals

This study investigated the effect of flow rates and spirometer type on chest wall motion in healthy individuals. Twenty-one healthy volunteers completed breathing trials to either two times tidal volume (2xVT) or inspiratory capacity (IC) at high, low, or natural flow rates, using a volume-or flow-oriented spirometer. The proportions of rib cage movement to tidal volume (%RC/VT), chest wall diameters, and perceived level of exertion (RPE) were compared. Low and natural flow rates resulted in significantly lower %RC/VT compared to high flow rate trials (p0.001) at 2xVT. Low flow trials also resulted in significantly less chest wall motion in the upper anteroposterior direction than high and natural flow rates (