Age at Marriage and Women's Labour Market Outcomes in India

© 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. We examine the relationship between women's age at marriage and their labour market outcomes using nationally representative household data from India. Employing an instrumental variable-based empirical strategy, we find that a delay in women's age at marriage has no significant causal effect on their labour market outcomes. This is despite marriage delay being associated with higher education, lower fertility and (possibly) higher dowry for Indian women. We argue that this might be because older brides, as compared with younger brides, face more backlash from their partners. This backlash effect could be offsetting the positive labour market effects of marriage delay. © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

Use of alcoholic beverages in VA medical centers

BACKGROUND: Benzodiazepines are the first-line choice for the treatment of alcohol withdrawal syndrome. However, several hospitals continue to provide alcoholic beverages through their formulary for the treatment of alcohol withdrawal. While there are data on the prevalence of this practice in academic medical centers, there are no data on the availability of alcoholic beverages at the formularies of the hospitals operated by the department of Veteran's Affairs. METHODS: In this study, we surveyed the Pharmacy managers at 112 Veterans' Affairs Medical Centers (VAMCs) to ascertain the availability of alcohol on the VAMC formularies, and presence or lack of a policy on the use of alcoholic beverages in their VA Medical Center. RESULTS: Of the pharmacy directors contacted, 81 responded. 8 did not allow their use, while 20 allowed their use. There was a lack of a consistent policy across the VA medical centers on availability and use of alcoholic beverages for the treatment of alcohol withdrawal syndrome. CONCLUSION: There is lack of uniform policy on the availability of alcoholic beverages across the VAMCs, which may create potential problems with difference in the standards of care

Treatment course and outcomes following drug and alcohol-related traumatic injuries

Both authors are with the NeuroTexas Institute at St. David's HealthCare, St. David's Medical Center, 1015 East 32nd Street, Suite 404, Austin, Texas 78705, USA -- Matthew C. Cowperthwaite is with the Center for Systems and Synthetic Biology, The University of Texas at Austin, 1 University Station, A4800, Austin, Texas 78712, USABackground: Alcohol and drug use is known to be a major factor affecting the incidence of traumatic injury. However, the ways in which immediate pre-injury substance use affects patients' clinical care and outcomes remains unclear. The goal of the present study is to determine the associations between pre-injury use of alcohol or drugs and patient injury severity, hospital course, and clinical outcome. Materials and methods: This study used more than 200,000 records from the National Trauma Data Bank (NTDB), which is the largest trauma registry in the United States. Incidents in the NTDB were placed into one of four classes: alcohol related, drug related, alcohol-and-drug related, and substance negative. Logistic regression models were used to determine comorbid conditions or treatment complications that were significantly associated with pre-injury substance use. Hospital charges were associated with the presence or absence of drugs and alcohol, and patient outcomes were assessed using discharge disposition as delimited by the NTDB. Results: The rates of complications arising during treatment were 8.3, 10.9, 9.9 and 8.6 per one hundred incidents in the alcohol related, drug related, alcohol-and-drug related, and substance-negative classes, respectively. Regression models suggested that pre-injury alcohol use is associated with a 15% higher risk of infection, whereas pre-injury drug use is associated with a 30% higher risk of infection. Pre-injury substance use did not appear to significantly impact clinical outcomes following treatment for traumatic injury, however. Conclusion: This study suggests that pre-injury drug use is associated with a significantly higher complication rate. In particular, infection during hospitalization is a significant risk for both alcohol and drug related trauma visits, and drug-related trauma incidents are associated with increased risk for additional circulatory complications. Although drug and alcohol related trauma incidents are not associated with appreciably worse clinical outcomes, patients experiencing such complications are associated with significantly greater length of stay and higher hospitalization costs. Therefore significant benefits to trauma patients could be gained with enhanced surveillance for pre-injury substance use upon admission to the ED, and closer monitoring for infection or circulatory complications during their period of hospitalization.Center for Systems and Synthetic [email protected]