Relative Validity of a Short Food Frequency Questionnaire for Disadvantaged Families in Hong Kong.

Individuals with lower socioeconomic status are more vulnerable in securing good nutritional quality. It was also found that people who had received a lower education level had greater difficulty in completing the conventional dietary assessment such as a food frequency questionnaire (FFQ). Previous studies have demonstrated the validity of a short FFQ in Hong Kong's pregnant women, but its validity among a wider community was still unknown. For the present study, we aimed to validate a short FFQ among disadvantaged communities in Hong Kong. Amongst 103 individuals participating in a dietary intervention programme, their dietary data were collected by FFQs and three-day dietary records. Relative validity was assessed by correlation analysis, cross-tabulation, one-sample t-test, and linear regression. In general, water and total energy intake had significant correlations (0.77 for crude water intake and 0.87 for crude total energy intake) between values reported by FFQ and dietary records, good agreement (both with over 50% of observations falling into the same quartile), and insignificant differences between assessment methods reported by one-sample t-test and linear regression. Meanwhile, several nutrients had good agreement in terms of the values reported by FFQ and dietary records, such as energy from total fat, carbohydrates, total fat, cholesterol, phosphorus, and potassium. The results of this study demonstrated that the short version FFQ could be a convenient assessment tool of multiple dietary behaviors, especially in total energy and water intakes.

Seroprevalence and Correlates of SARS-CoV-2 Antibodies in Healthcare Workers in Chicago

Background: Identifying factors associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection among healthcare workers (HCW)s may help health systems optimize SARS-CoV-2 infection control strategies. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional analysis of baseline data from the Northwestern HCW SARS-CoV-2 Serology Cohort Study. The Abbott Architect Nucleocapsid IgG assay was used to determine seropositivity. Logistic regression models (unadjusted and adjusted for demographics and self-reported community exposure to COVID-19) were fit to quantify the associations between occupation group, healthcare delivery tasks, and community exposure and seropositive status. Results: 6,510 HCWs, including 1,794 nurses, and 904 non-patient facing administrators participated. The majority were women (79.6%), 74.9% were white, 9.7% were Asian, 7.3% were Hispanic and 3.1% were Black. The crude prevalence rate of seropositivity was 4.8% (95% confidence interval (CI): 4.6%-5.2%). Out-of-hospital exposure to COVID-19 occurred in 9.3% of HCWs and was strongly associated with seropositivity (OR=4.7, 95% CI: 3.5-6.4). When compared to administrators, nursing was the only occupation group with a significantly higher adjusted-odds (OR: 1.9, 95% CI: 1.3-2.9) of seropositivity. Exposure to COVID-19 patients was reported by 37.8% of participants and was associated with higher positivity than those not exposed (OR= 2.2, 95% CI: 1.6-3.0). Being exposed to patients receiving high-flow oxygen therapy, and hemodialysis also remained significantly associated with a 45% and 57% higher odds for seropositive status, respectively. Conclusions: Exposure to COVID-19 patients, and longer duration patient therapies were each associated with higher risk for seropositive status; however, the community burden of COVID-19 remains a significant source of exposure to SARS CoV-2 infection among HCWs in Chicago.

Mobile Health in the Retinal Clinic Population: Access to and Interest in Self-Tracking.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Implementation of mobile health-tracking programs for retinal pathology requires both access to mobile devices and patient motivation to participate in self-tracking. The authors' study aimed to evaluate the prevalence of smartphone and tablet ownership and patient interest in self-tracking among a retinal clinic population. PATIENTS AND METHODS: This is an institutional, prospective, cross-sectional survey of 103 retinal clinic outpatients. Consenting patients underwent a one-on-one interview conducted in the examination room during their waiting period by one researcher. RESULTS: Overall, 75 of 103 participants (72.2%) reported either owning a smartphone and/or tablet or having access at their household to a device that could be used to track eye health. The majority of participants (69 of 103 participants; 67%) reported interest in using a mobile application (smartphone or tablet) to track their eye health. CONCLUSION: These data suggest strong patient interest in the use of mobile devices to track eye health.

Optical coherence tomography study of retinal changes in normal aging and after ischemia.

PURPOSE: Age-related thinning of the retinal ganglion cell axons in the nerve fiber layer has been measured in humans using optical coherence tomography (OCT). In this study, we used OCT to measure inner retinal changes in 3-month-, 1-year-, and 2-year-old mice and after experimental anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (AION). METHODS: We used OCT to quantify retinal thickness in over 200 eyes at different ages before and after a photochemical thrombosis model of AION. The scans were manually or automatically segmented. RESULTS: In normal aging, there was 1.3-µm thinning of the ganglion cell complex (GCC) between 3 months and 1 year (P < 0.0001) and no further thinning at 2 years. In studying age-related inner retinal changes, measurement of the GCC (circular scan) was superior to that of the total retinal thickness (posterior pole scan) despite the need for manual segmentation because it was not contaminated by outer retinal changes. Three weeks after AION, there was 8.9-µm thinning of the GCC (circular scan; P < 0.0001), 50-µm thinning of the optic disc (posterior pole scan; P < 0.0001), and 17-µm thinning of the retina (posterior pole scan; P < 0.0001) in the 3-month-old group. Changes in the older eyes after AION were similar to those of the 3-month-old group. CONCLUSIONS: Optical coherence tomography imaging of a large number of eyes showed that, like humans, mice exhibited small, age-related inner retinal thinning. Measurement of the GCC was superior to total retinal thickness in quantifying age-related changes, and both circular and posterior pole scans were useful to track short-term changes after AION.