American journal of preventive medicine
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Neighborhood environments may play a role in the rising prevalence of obesity among older adults. However, research on built environmental correlates of obesity in this age group is limited. The current study aimed to explore associations of Walk Score, a validated measure of neighborhood walkability, with BMI and waist circumference in a large, diverse sample of older women. ⋯ Findings suggest that neighborhood walkability is linked to abdominal adiposity, as measured by waist circumference, among older women and provide support for future longitudinal research on associations between Walk Score and adiposity in this population.
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Law enforcement officers (LEOs) in the U.S. are at an increased risk for homicide. The purpose of this study is to describe the characteristics of homicides of LEOs in 17 U.S. states participating in the National Violent Death Reporting System. This active surveillance system uses data from death certificates, coroner/medical examiner reports, and law enforcement reports. ⋯ This information is critical to help describe encounter situations faced by LEOs. The results of this study can be used to help educate and train LEOs on hazards, inform prevention efforts designed to promote LEO safety, and prevent homicide among this population.
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Preventive care delivery is an important quality outcome, and electronic data reports are being used increasingly to track these services. It is highly informative when electronic data sources are compared to information manually extracted from medical charts to assess validity and completeness. ⋯ Findings suggest that automated EHR and claims data provide valid sources for measuring receipt of most preventive services; however, ordered and unbilled services were primarily captured via EHR data and completed referrals were more often documented in claims data.
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Suicide among military personnel and young Veterans remains a health concern. This study examined stateside distribution of suicides by U.S. county to help focus prevention efforts. ⋯ These findings suggest that military and Veteran suicides are concentrated in a small number of counties. Increased efforts at these locales might be beneficial.
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To address the current obesity and inactivity epidemics, public health researchers have attempted to identify spatial factors that influence physical inactivity and obesity. Technologic and methodologic developments have led to a revolutionary ability to examine dynamic, high-resolution measures of temporally matched location and behavior data through GPS, accelerometry, and GIS. These advances allow the investigation of spatial energetics, high-spatiotemporal resolution data on location and time-matched energetics, to examine how environmental characteristics, space, and time are linked to activity-related health behaviors with far more robust and detailed data than in previous work. ⋯ Third, the field must come to agreement on appropriate statistical methodologies to account for multiple observations per person. Finally, these challenges must be considered within the context of maintaining participant privacy and security. This article describes gaps in current practice and understanding and suggests solutions to move this promising area of research forward.