Integrating Oral Health Curricula into Midwifery Graduate Programs: Results of a US Survey

Introduction: Midwives are a significant segment of the US maternal and primary health care workforce and play a pivotal role in addressing women's oral health care needs during pregnancy and throughout their life span. The purpose of this research was to assess oral health curricular integration in midwifery programs and examine factors that influence integration and satisfaction with graduates’ level of oral health competence. Methods: A cross-sectional, national survey of midwifery programs was conducted using an electronically distributed 19-item, self-administered questionnaire completed by the Directors of Midwifery Education. Data analysis included univariate and bivariate statistics. Results: All of the responding midwifery programs (N = 33) were educating their graduates about oral health; however, less than a quarter (22.6%) of program directors were satisfied with their graduates’ competency. Significant factors promoting integration were routine teaching by a dental professional and a formal relationship with a dental school, dental residency, or dental hygiene program. Programs with 4 or more hours of oral health curriculum were more likely to have a faculty oral health champion, use simulation in evaluation of their learners, and include interprofessional oral health education. Discussion: With adequate oral health education, midwives are ideally positioned to integrate oral health in pregnancy care as well as well woman care throughout the life span, thereby expanding access to oral health care

Is It What We Do or How We Do It? New Evidence on Agglomeration Economies and Metropolitan Growth

This paper uses data on U.S. metropolitan areas from 1970 to 1999 to examine the extent to which recent increases in earnings are attributable to agglomeration economies. We decompose the total change in earnings over the 1970-1999 period into components attributable to changes in relative growth, industry mix and interaction effects. We find strong evidence that relative growth matters more than industry mix. In addition, we find that relative growth effects are related to both localization and urbanization economies. Copyright 2004 by the American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association

Approaches to Biosimulation of Cellular Processes

Modelling and simulation are at the heart of the rapidly developing field of systems biology. This paper reviews various types of models, simulation methods, and theoretical approaches that are presently being used in the quantitative description of cellular processes. We first describe how molecular interaction networks can be represented by means of stoichiometric, topological and kinetic models. We briefly discuss the formulation of kinetic models using mesoscopic (stochastic) or macroscopic (continuous) approaches, and we go on to describe how detailed models of molecular interaction networks (silicon cells) can be constructed on the basis of experimentally determined kinetic parameters for cellular processes. We show how theory can help in analyzing models by applying control analysis to a recently published silicon cell model. Finally, we review some of the theoretical approaches available to analyse kinetic models and experimental data, respectively