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Research

A community-based program to reduce acute rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease in northern Australia

In Australia’s north, Aboriginal peoples live with world-high rates of rheumatic heart disease (RHD) and its precursor, acute rheumatic fever (ARF); driven by social and environmental determinants of health. We undertook a program of work to strengthen RHD primordial and primary prevention using a model addressing six domains: housing and environmental support, community awareness and empowerment, health literacy, health and education service integration, health navigation and health provider education.

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A simulation study of disaggregation regression for spatial disease mapping

Disaggregation regression has become an important tool in spatial disease mapping for making fine-scale predictions of disease risk from aggregated response data.

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Evaluation of real-life clinical outcomes in Australian youth with type 1 diabetes on hybrid closed-loop therapy: A retrospective study

To determine the clinical outcomes and evaluate the perspectives of children with Type 1 diabetes (T1D) and their parents managing their child on hybrid closed-loop (HCL) therapy.

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Risks and Benefits of UV Radiation

While UV radiation is a skin carcinogen, this should not obscure the growing evidence that sunlight has significant health benefits, including impacts on cardiovascular and metabolic health.

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Vision, future, cycle and effect: A community life course approach to prevent prenatal alcohol exposure in central Australia

Prevention approaches specific to prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) and foetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) have been identified as urgently needed in Australia, including in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. However, very little work has aimed to describe and evaluate health promotion initiatives, especially those developed in rural and remote areas.

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Modelling evolutionary pathways for commensalism and hypervirulence in neisseria meningitidis

Neisseria meningitidis, the meningococcus, resides exclusively in humans and causes invasive meningococcal disease (IMD). The population of N. meningitidis is structured into stable clonal complexes by limited horizontal recombination in this naturally transformable species.

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Temperament in individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A systematic review

The study of temperament in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) has the potential to provide insight regarding variability in the onset, nature, and course of both core and co-morbid symptoms. The aim of this systematic review was to integrate existing findings concerning temperament in the context of ASD. Searches of Medline, PsychInfo and Scopus databases identified 64 relevant studies. As a group, children and adolescents with ASD appear to be temperamentally different from both typically developing and other clinical non-ASD groups, characterized by higher negative affectivity, lower surgency, and lower effortful control at a higher-order level.

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Optimising a 6-plex tetanus-diphtheria-pertussis fluorescent bead-based immunoassay

Small volume assays are required for large-scale research studies and in particular paediatric trials, where multiple measures are required from a single sample. Fluorescent bead-based technology (Bioplex/Luminex) allows high through-put and simultaneous quantification of multiple analytes in a single test. This technology uses sets of microspheres, each with a unique spectral address that can be coated with a different antigen of interest.

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Prenatal Exposure to General Anesthesia and Childhood Behavioral Deficit

Exposure to surgery and anesthesia in early childhood has been found to be associated with an increased risk of behavioral deficits. While the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has warned against prenatal exposure to anesthetic drugs, little clinical evidence exists to support this recommendation. This study evaluates the association between prenatal exposure to general anesthesia due to maternal procedures during pregnancy and neuropsychological and behavioral outcome scores at age 10.

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PPARalpha and PPARgamma activation is associated with pleural mesothelioma invasion but therapeutic inhibition is ineffective

Mesothelioma is a cancer that typically originates in the pleura of the lungs. It rapidly invades the surrounding tissues, causing pain and shortness of breath. We compared cell lines injected either subcutaneously or intrapleurally and found that only the latter resulted in invasive and rapid growth.