Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, COVID -19 Coronavirus, JAMA / 15.02.2022

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Kao-Ping Chua, MD, PhD Assistant Professor, Department of Pediatrics Assistant Professor, Health Management and Policy School of Public Health University of Michigan MedicalResearch.com:  What is the background for this study? Response: In 2020, most insurers waived the cost of COVID-19 hospitalization for patients. In early 2021, many major insurers started to abandon those waivers. By August 2021, the vast majority of insurers had started billing patients for COVID-19 hospitalizations again. (more…)
Author Interviews, Endocrinology, Environmental Risks, JCEM, Menopause / 05.06.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Ning Ding MPH, PhD candidate Sung Kyun Park Sc.D, MPH Associate Professor Department of Epidemiology University of Michigan School of Public Health Ann Arbor, MI 48109  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), also known as ‘forever chemicals’, are a family of synthetic chemicals used in a wide variety of nonstick and waterproof products and firefighting foams. The main issue is that PFAS are everywhere. It has been estimated that 110 million Americans, 1 out of three, may consume drinking water contaminated with PFAS. PFAS are very persistent and once PFAS enter the body, they don't break down and build up in the body over time. (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Infections, University of Michigan / 08.04.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Arnold S. Monto, M.D. Professor, Epidemiology Professor, Global Public Health Thomas Francis, Jr. Collegiate Professor of Public Health University of Michigan  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: This is part of a continuing study in families first designed to examine how influenza vaccine is working in the community  We have expanded it to look broadly at all respiratory viruses There are 4 coronaviruses which are known to cause respiratory illnesses each year and we had these data ready to go when the pandemic started. (more…)
Author Interviews, Pediatrics, University of Michigan, Vitamin D / 21.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Eduardo Villamor, M.D., M.P.H., Dr.P.H. Professor, Epidemiology School of Public Health University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Vitamin D deficiency has been related to adverse mental health outcomes, including depression and schizophrenia, in adults.  Some studies have suggested a potential role of vitamin D status prenatally on other neurodevelopmental outcomes in childhood.  However, few studies had extended into adolescence which is the life period when certain mental health issues that predict disease later in life, namely behavioral problems, first appear.  (more…)
Author Interviews, HIV, University of Michigan / 15.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rogério Meireles Pinto, LCSW, Ph.D. Professor and Associate Dean for Research University of Michigan School of Social Work MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: In order to decrease the rate of HIV infection, interventions to scale up PrEP will need to address identified barriers at multiple ecological levels. In the past decade, interventions proposed to address PrEP implementation barriers were limited to one ecological level or another (e.g., individual or community). The failure to consider interventions targeting multiple ecological levels simultaneously may help explain why PrEP implementation is lagging. This failure is also due to methodological limitations of PrEP implementation studies.This high-quality paper presents a thorough and theoretically grounded review of original research on HIV Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) implementation in the U.S. (more…)
Addiction, Author Interviews, JAMA, Opiods, University of Michigan / 30.06.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rebecca L. Haffajee, J.D., Ph.D., M.P.H. Assistant Professor Department of Health Management & Policy umichsphumichsph MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?  Response: Evidence suggests that the availability of medications to treat opioid use disorder (OUD) has been slow to expand, particularly in rural areas, despite the efficacy and effectiveness of these medications in reducing overdose deaths and other adverse life outcomes. We were interested in understanding the characteristics of counties both with high need (as measured by above-national rates in opioid overdose deaths) AND low provider capacity to deliver medications to treat OUD in 2017. We found that such "opioid high-risk" counties were likely to be in the East North Central (e.g., Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana), South Atlantic (e.g., North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia), and Mountain (e.g., New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada) regions. We also found that these opioid high-risk counties were more likely to have higher rates of unemployment and less likely to have fewer primary care clinicians or be micropolitan (more…)
Author Interviews, Flu - Influenza, Infections, PLoS, University of Michigan / 25.01.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Betsy Foxman PhD Hunein F. and Hilda Maassab Endowed Professor of Epidemiology Director, Center for Molecular and Clinical Epidemiology of Infectious Diseases Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-2029 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Influenza is a major cause of human illness and death worldwide. Vaccines are the best available means of prevention. However, vaccine effectiveness has been low to moderate in recent years and coverage remains low in many countries. There is increasing evidence suggesting the microbiome plays an important role in shaping host immunity and may be a potential target for reducing disease. In our study, we used a household transmission study to explore whether the respiratory microbiome was associated with influenza susceptibility.  (more…)
AHA Journals, Author Interviews, Blood Pressure - Hypertension, Toxin Research, University of Michigan / 26.10.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Sung Kyun Park Sc.D. M.P.H. Associate professor of epidemiology and environmental health sciences University of Michigan School of Public Health Ann Arbor, Michigan MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: It is poorly understood that why some patients need more drugs to control high blood pressure than others. Resistant hypertension is that blood pressure is not controlled with 3 medications of different classes including diuretics or is required 4 or more medications of different classes for blood pressure controls. Genes, obesity, physical inactivity, high salt diet, pain medications may do something. Lead is a widespread environmental toxin that can influence high blood pressure. In this study, we examined whether long-term exposure to lead, measured as bone lead, is associated with the risk of resistant hypertension. Bone lead offers a better method over blood lead measurement to discern long-term lead exposure and accumulation. The main finding of our study is that low-level lead exposure, measured in the tibia (hard bone), is associated with higher risk of development of resistant hypertension in a cohort of patients diagnosed with hypertension.  (more…)