Exploration of how emotional social support predicts food insecurity among college students.

Food insecurity has broad detrimental impacts on college students, including failing grades, depression, and social disconnection. Social disconnection is concerning as students often use various support resources to manage food insecurity. Racial disparities in food insecurity are well documented in the literature. The purpose of the current study was to explore the relationship between constructs of emotional support and food insecurity among African American and White students. A validated electronic survey based on the Sense of Support Scale and the U.S. Food Security Scale was utilized for the study. Results indicated that specific constructs of emotional social support were associated with food insecurity (OR: 3.778; p = .011); (OR: -2.116; p = .036). Students who reported strong emotional ties were more likely to experience food insecurity (OR = - 3.837, p = .044). Findings implicate further campus outreach to all students.

Acquired lower eyelid epiblepharon in patients with thyroid eye disease.

PURPOSE: To describe a series of patients with acquired epiblepharon secondary to thyroid-related orbitopathy. METHODS: Retrospective case series of 9 patients with thyroid-related orbitopathy who had epiblepharon. RESULTS: Seven patients had epiblepharon in both lower eyelids and 2 patients had it in one lower eyelid. Six of the 9 patients were Asian. Each patient had punctate keratopathy. Epiblepharon resolved in all but one patient after treating coexisting manifestations of thyroid-related orbitopathy. One patient required epiblepharon repair. CONCLUSIONS: We describe a new finding of acquired epiblepharon in the setting of thyroid-related orbitopathy. The majority of patients have spontaneous resolution of the epiblepharon after other surgical procedures for thyroid-related orbitopathy.

Visually guided performance of simple tasks using simulated prosthetic vision.

Loss of photoreceptor cells is one of the major causes of blindness. Several groups are exploring the functional replacement of photoreceptors by a retinal prosthesis. The goal of this study was to simulate the vision levels that recipients of retinal prostheses with 4 x 4, 6 x 10, and 16 x 16 electrode arrays may experience, and to test the functionality of this vision. A PC video camera captured images that were converted in real time into dots ("pixels"). The PC monitor and a head-mounted display worn by test subjects displayed the pixelized images. To assess performance of normally sighted individuals with each array, we designed a set of tasks including: four-choice orientation discrimination of a Sloan letter E, object recognition and discrimination, a cutting task, a pouring task, symbol recognition, and two reading tasks. In the letter E task, subjects were found to have visual acuities of 20/1,810, 20/1,330, and 20/420 with the 4 x 4, 6 x 10, and 16 x 16 arrays, respectively. Most subjects were able to read fonts as small as 36 point with the 16 x 16 array, corresponding with a visual acuity of 20/600 in our system. The test subjects partially overcame the visual limitation of the system by scanning the video camera over the letters allowing spatial and temporal integration of visual information. In all categories, subjects performed best with the 16 x 16 array and least well with the 4 x 4 array. Even with the lowest resolution array, however, some subjects could recognize simple objects and symbols.