Medicaid State Plan personal care services: trends in programs and policies

Policymakers face mounting pressures from consumer demand and the 1999 Olmstead Supreme Court decision to extend formal (paid) programs that deliver personal care to the elderly, chronically ill, and disabled. Despite this, very little is known about the largest program that delivers personal care: the Medicaid State Plan personal care services (PCS) optional benefit. This paper presents the latest available national program (participant and expenditure) trend data (1999-2002) on the Medicaid PCS benefit and findings from a national survey of eligibility and cost control policies in use on the program. The program trends show that, over the study period, the number of states providing the Medicaid PCS benefit grew by four (from 26 to 30), and national program participation, adjusted for population growth, increased by 27%. However, inflation-adjusted program expenditures per participant declined by 3% between 1999 and 2002. Findings from the policy survey reveal that between 1999 and 2002 there was a marked decline in the range of services provided, and by 2004, almost half the programs operated a cap on the hours of services provided.     

Prevalence of snoring in college students

Snoring in college students may be the earliest presentation of adult sleep-disordered breathing, yet the literature contains few studies that demonstrate its effects on learning or whether early diagnosis leads to interruption of disease progression or prevention of comorbidities. OBJECTIVE AND PARTICIPANTS: The authors conducted this study in January-April 2004 to assess the prevalence of snoring in college students (N = 2,200). METHODS: They developed a questionnaire on sleep behaviors and distributed it to 18- to 25-year-old undergraduates at a California university. RESULTS: Almost one-third (30%) of participants reported snoring. The prevalence of snoring was higher among men than women (42% and 25%, respectively). The prevalence of self-reported snoring was highest in Asian students (37%). CONCLUSIONS: Snoring is highly prevalent in college students; prevalence is higher in men than women, correlates with body mass index, and varies by ethnicity.     

Olympic news and attitudes towards the Olympics: a compositional time-series analysis of how sentiment is affected by events

Sentiment affects the evolving economic valuation of companies through the stock market. It is unclear how ‘news’ affects the sentiment towards major public investments like the Olympics. In this paper we consider, from the context of the pre-event stage of the 30th Olympiad, the relationship between attitudes towards the Olympics and Olympic-related news; specifically the bad news associated with an increase in the cost of provision, and the good news associated with Team Great Britain's medal success in 2008. Using a unique data set and an event-study approach that involves compositional time-series analysis, it is found that ‘good’ news affects sentiments much more than ‘bad’, but that the distribution of such sentiment varies widely. For example, a much more pronounced effect of good news is identified for females than males, but ‘bad’ news has less of an impact on the young and older age groups.     

Using Mixture Regression to Identify Varying Effects: A Demonstration With Paternal Incarceration

The most widely used techniques for identifying the varying effects of stressors involve testing moderator effects via interaction terms in regression or multiple‐group analysis in structural equation modeling. The authors present mixture regression as an alternative approach. In contrast to more widely used approaches, mixture regression identifies varying effects without reliance on tests of moderator variables, such as using interaction terms or multiple group analyses. In many instances, the use of mixture regression also more effectively tests higher order and multiple interactions. A mixture regression example is presented using 214 families from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing study, half of whom had experienced paternal incarceration. Whereas typical regression and moderator analyses fail to find an effect or varying effects, mixture regression identified 4 classes uniquely influenced by the incarceration.     

A critical cross‐cultural perspective for developing nonprofit international management capacity

Issues of the effectiveness of international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are becoming critical among a claim that cultural sensitivity to people's needs and the appropriateness of interventions is a competitive advantage of the sector. Here, the cross‐cultural management agenda is set out, particularly in terms of the transferability or appropriateness of management knowledge and development interventions. Research propositions are presented that, if supported through future empirical findings, suggest cultural hybridization is a process that can be managed through greater stakeholder involvement, leading to greater appropriateness as well as effectiveness of international NGOs.     

Loneliness and Social Isolation in a Sample of Youth Hospitalized for Psychiatric Illness

Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal - Social connections can act as a protective factor against long term consequences impacting the physical and emotional well-being of youth. This purpose...     

Celebrating Stonewall at 50: A Culturally Geographic Approach to Introducing LGBT Themes

July 28, 2019, marks the 50th anniversary of a police raid on the Stonewall Inn. During this raid, police verbally, and in some cases, physically accosted patrons of the Stonewall Inn. Events from this encounter eventually set off a series of protests by members and allies of the LGBT community. These protests came to be known as the Stonewall Riots. On June 24, 2016, the Stonewall Inn became the first U.S. National Monument dedicated to LGBT history. While this event served as a pivotal role in the gay rights movement, this article begins with an investigation into the geographical and spatial conditions surrounding the Stonewall Inn and its neighborhood. In asking, “Why New York City, why Stonewall?” we attempt to establish a cultural version of geography that uses a National Monument as a way for students to engage in the world around them through an examination of human/environment relationships. To explore this further and to celebrate Stonewall at 50, we present a pedagogical framework using articles, letters, photographs, podcasts, and Google Earth.     

The balance of planting and mortality in a street tree population

Street trees have aesthetic, environmental, human health, and economic benefits in urban ecosystems. Street tree populations are constructed by cycles of planting, growth, death, removal and replacement. The goals of this study were to understand how tree mortality and planting rates affect net population growth, evaluate the shape of the mortality curve, and assess selected risk factors for survival. We monitored a street tree population in West Oakland, CA for 5 years after an initial inventory (2006). We adapted the classic demographic balancing equation to quantify annual inputs and outputs to the system, tracking pools of live and standing dead trees. There was a 17.2 % net increase in live tree counts during the study period (995 in 2006, 1166 in 2011), with population growth observed each year. Of the live trees in 2006, 822 survived to 2011, for an annual mortality rate of 3.7 %. However, population growth was constrained by high mortality of young/small trees. Annual mortality was highest for small trees, and lower for mid-size and large trees; this represents a Type III mortality curve. We used multivariate logistic regression to evaluate the relationship between 2011 survival outcomes and inventory data from 2006. In the final model, significant associations were found for size class, foliage condition, planting location, and a multiplicative interaction term for size and foliage condition. Street tree populations are complex cultivated systems whose dynamics can be understood by a combination of longitudinal data and demographic analysis. Urban forest monitoring is important to understand the impact of tree planting programs.     

Bayesian Truncated Poisson Regression with Application to Dutch Illegal Immigrant Data

This article presents a Bayesian approach to the regression analysis of truncated data, with a focus on zero-truncated counts from the Poisson distribution. The approach provides inference not only on the regression coefficients but also on the total sample size and the parameters of the covariate distribution. The theory is applied to some illegal immigrant data from The Netherlands. Several models are fitted with the aid of Markov chain Monte Carlo methods and assessed via posterior predictive p-values. Inferences are compared with those obtained elsewhere using other approaches.