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Item Anxiogenic CO2 Stimulus Elicits Exacerbated Hot Flash-like Responses in a Rat Menopause Model and Hot Flashes in Menopausal Women(Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins, 2016-11) Federici, Lauren M.; Roth, Sarah Dorsey; Krier, Connie; Fitz, Stephanie D.; Skaar, Todd C.; Shekhar, Anantha; Carpenter, Janet S.; Johnson, Philip L.; Anatomy and Cell Biology, School of MedicineObjective Since longitudinal studies determined that anxiety is a strong risk factor for hot flashes, we hypothesized that an anxiogenic stimulus that signals air hunger (hypercapnic, normoxic gas) would trigger an exacerbated hot flash-associated increase in tail skin temperature (TST) in a rat ovariectomy (OVEX) model of surgical menopause and hot flashes in symptomatic menopausal women. We also assessed TST responses in OVEX serotonin transporter (SERT)+/− rats that models a common polymorphism that is associated with increased climacteric symptoms in menopausal women and increases in anxiety traits. Methods OVEX and sham-OVEX rats (initial experiment) and wildtype and SERT+/− OVEX rats (subsequent experiment) were exposed to a 5 min infusion of 20%CO2 normoxic gas while measuring TST. Menopausal women were given brief 20% and 35%CO2 challenges, and hot flashes were self-reported and objectively verified. Results Compared to controls, OVEX rats had exacerbated increases in TST, and SERT+/− OVEX rats had prolonged TST increases following CO2. Most women reported mild/moderate hot flashes after CO2 challenges, and the hot flash severity to CO2 was positively correlated with daily hot flash frequency. Conclusions The studies demonstrate that this anxiogenic stimulus is capable of inducing cutaneous vasomotor responses in OVEX rats, and eliciting hot flashes in menopausal women. In rats, the severity of the response was mediated by loss of ovarian function and increased anxiety traits (SERT+/−), and, in women, by daily hot flash frequency. These findings may provide insights into anxiety related triggers and genetic risk factors for hot flashes in thermoneutral environments.Item Attentional selectivity, automaticity, and self-efficacy predict simulator-acquired skill transfer to the clinical environment(Elsevier, 2019-02) Anton, Nicholas E.; Mizota, Tomoko; Timsina, Lava R.; Whiteside, Jake A.; Myers, Erinn M.; Stefanidis, Dimitrios; Surgery, School of MedicineIntroduction Several studies demonstrated that simulator-acquired skill transfer to the operating room is incomplete. Our objective was to identify trainee characteristics that predict the transfer of simulator-acquired skill to the operating room. Methods Trainees completed baseline assessments including intracorporeal suturing (IS) performance, attentional selectivity, self-reported use of mental skills, and self-reported prior clinical and simulated laparoscopic experience and confidence. Residents then followed proficiency-based laparoscopic skills training, and their skill transfer was assessed on a live-anesthetized porcine model. Predictive characteristics for transfer test performance were assessed using multiple linear regression. Results Thirty-eight residents completed the study. Automaticity, attentional selectivity, resident perceived ability with laparoscopy and simulators, and post-training IS performance were predictive of IS performance during the transfer test. Conclusions Promoting automaticity, self-efficacy, and attention selectivity may help improve the transfer of simulator-acquired skill. Mental skills training and training to automaticity may therefore be valuable interventions to achieve this goal.Item Caregiver-Focused Evaluations to Assist Therapists in Addressing Family Mealtime Stress: A Doctoral Capstone Project(2022-05-02) Lentz, Jordan N.; Chase, Tony; Department of Occupational Therapy, School of Health and Human Sciences; Wasemann, ColleenThis paper will discuss the doctoral capstone process and evaluate the findings of a quality improvement project focused on implementing mealtime-focused assessments with caregivers for therapists to better address the mealtime stress of families, thus creating caregiver-focused evaluations. Before beginning this study, a needs assessment was conducted at Feeding Friends, a pediatric feeding clinic in Indianapolis, to identify gaps in caregiver-focused evaluations within this organization. From there, a comprehensive literature review was conducted to further examine assessments and evidence-based strategies used in therapy to address mealtime stress in families of children with disabilities. Finally, a 14-week study took place examining the effectiveness of two different mealtime-focused assessments in better informing therapists of caregiver stress during the mealtime process. The therapists then completed pre-and post-surveys allowing the researchers to gather information regarding the use of the assessments as well as potential sustainability plans. Through these assessments, therapists successfully applied results to clinical practice while better addressing communication, goal development, and guidance with caregivers; therefore, resulting in improved caregiver-focused evaluations. Overall, therapists found the Wasemann Confidence Rating Scale to be the most beneficial assessment in achieving this goal.Item Cold response biomarker identification in strawberry(2018-07-17) Deitch, Zachary M.; Randall, StephenStrawberry (Fragaria spp.) is an agricultural crop grown often in temperate regions that has high variability in its susceptibility to freezing injury. To breed cultivars for frost and freezing tolerance, identification of molecular markers associated with low temperature tolerance is advantageous. In this work, I investigated a high-throughput method for protein assays and western blotting. Success in streamlining these processes saves an immense amount of time and allows for the processing of more samples and obtaining larger datasets. Thirty-three octoploid varieties were tested for their accumulation of five different potential biomarkers in response to cold exposure. It was found that total dehydrin content, has the strongest potential to be reliable biomarkers for breeding programs. Previous work identified seven putative dehydrins in Fragaria, where two were purified and positively identified by mass spectrometry and determined to be COR47-like (SKn) and XERO2-like (YnSKn). This work demonstrated that cold tolerance positively correlated with dehydrin protein expression levels. To understand the cold-regulated expression of dehydrins as a function of cold exposure time, the levels of transcripts and corresponding proteins were examined in strongly cold tolerant (Alta) and lesser cold tolerant (FDP817, NCGR1363) Fragaria diploid genotypes. The COR47-like (SKn) and XERO2-like (YnSKn) dehydrins both had higher transcript accumulation and protein levels in the more cold tolerant line in comparison to the two less cold tolerant lines. Lack of correlation between transcript and resulting COR47 protein level in Alta were observed at several different timepoints, where protein accumulation preceded an increase in RNA. This trend was not seen with XERO2. This initiated an investigation to discover at what level COR47 is being regulated. First, the COR47 coding region was sequenced for all the genotypes to confirm against the predicted sequence. In addition, since two isoforms of the COR47 gene exist, and could possibly explain the discrepancy in transcript counts, primers were designed for both isoforms and RT-qPCR was performed to examine the transcripts of COR47 more closely. Through examination of the non-congruence of COR47 transcripts and protein, it was found that transcriptional mechanisms of regulation are not involved, and that post transcriptional and post-RNA splicing mechanisms are likely to be responsible for the observed trend in Alta. Conclusions from this work demonstrate that dehydrin transcripts and dehydrin protein accumulations are strong potential biomarkers for identifying low temperature tolerance in diploid strawberry.Item Does narrative writing instruction enhance the benefits of expressive writing?(Elsevier, 2010-05-01) Danoff-Burg, Sharon; Mosher, Catherine E.; Seawell, Asani H.; Agee, John D.We examined whether instructing participants to write in a narrative fashion about stressful life events would produce superior physical and psychological health benefits relative to standard expressive writing instructions that do not specify the essay's structure. Undergraduates (N=101) were randomly assigned to engage in two, 20-minute narrative writing, standard expressive writing, or control writing tasks. Follow-up data were obtained one month later. The essays of the narrative writing group evidenced higher levels of narrative structure than did those of the expressive writing group. Greater narrative structure was associated with mental health gains, and self-rated emotionality of the essays was associated with lesser perceived stress at follow-up. In addition, the narrative and expressive writing groups reported lower levels of perceived stress and depressive symptoms relative to controls but did not differ from each other with regard to these outcomes. Health care utilization at follow-up did not vary by group assignment. Findings suggest that both emotional expression and narrative structure may be key factors underlying expressive writing's mental health benefits. Results also suggest that, among college students, instruction in narrative formation does not increase the positive effects of expressive writing relative to standard expressive writing instructions.Item The effect of a one-time 15-minute guided meditation (Isha Kriya) on stress and mood disturbances among operating room professionals: a prospective interventional pilot study(F1000Research, 2019-03-26) Rangasamy, Valluvan; Thampi Susheela, Ammu; Mueller, Ariel; F. H. Chang, Tracy; Sadhasivam, Senthilkumar; Subramaniam, Balachundhar; Anesthesia, School of MedicineBackground: Operating room professionals are exposed to high levels of stress and burnout. Besides affecting the individual, it can compromise patient safety and quality of care as well. Meditation practice is getting recognized for its ability to improve wellness among various populations, including healthcare providers. Methods: Baseline stress levels of perioperative healthcare providers were measured via an online survey using a Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) questionnaire. An in-person meditation workshop was demonstrated during surgical grand rounds and an international anesthesia conference using a 15-minute guided Isha Kriya meditation. The participants were then surveyed for mood changes before and after meditation using a Profile of Mood States (POMS) questionnaire. Results: Surgeons and anesthesiologists were found to have higher median (interquartile range) Perceived Stress Scores as compared to nurses respectively (17 [12, 20] and 17 [12, 21] vs 14 [9, 19]; P = 0.01). Total mood disturbances were found to be significantly reduced after meditation in both the surgical grand rounds (pre-meditation median [IQR] 99 [85, 112] vs 87 [80, 93] post-meditation; P < 0.0001) and anesthesia conference cohorts (pre-meditation 92 [86, 106] vs 87 [81, 92] post-meditation; P < 0.0001). Conclusions: Isha Kriya, a guided meditation, is easy to learn and takes less than 15 minutes to complete. This meditation technique improves mood changes and negative emotions among operating room professionals and could be used as a potential tool for improving wellness.Item Managing Life's Anxieties(Indiana University, 2019-07-19) Oruche, Ukamaka M.Item Number of Recent Stressful Life Events and Incident Cardiovascular Disease: Moderation by Lifetime Depressive Disorder(Elsevier, 2017) Berntson, Jessica; Patel, Jay S.; Stewart, Jesse C.; Department of Psychology, School of ScienceObjective We investigated whether number of recent stressful life events is associated with incident cardiovascular disease (CVD) and whether this relationship is stronger in adults with a history of clinical depression. Methods Prospective data from 28,583 U.S. adults (mean age = 45 years) initially free of CVD who participated in Waves 1 (2001–2002) and 2 (2004–2005) of the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC) were examined. Number of past-year stressful life events (Wave 1), lifetime depressive disorder (Wave 1), and incident CVD (Wave 2) were determined by structured interviews. Results There were 1069 cases of incident CVD. Each additional stressful life event was associated with a 15% increased odds of incident CVD [Odds Ratio (OR) = 1.15, 95% Confidence Interval (CI): 1.11, 1.19]. As hypothesized, a stressful life events by lifetime depressive disorder interaction was detected (P = 0.003). Stratified analyses indicated that stressful life events had a stronger association with incident CVD among adults with (OR = 1.18, 95% CI: 1.10, 1.27, n = 4908) versus without (OR = 1.10, 95% CI: 1.07, 1.14, n = 23,675) a lifetime depressive disorder. Conclusion Our findings suggest that a greater number of recent stressful life events elevate the risk of new-onset CVD and that this risk is potentiated in adults with a history of clinical depression.Item Numerical Simulation of Dual-Fuel Compression-Ignition Engine in Part-Load Operating Condition With Double Injection(ASME, 2016-10) Jamali, Arash; Nalim, M. Razi; Mechanical Engineering, School of Engineering and TechnologyNatural gas substitution for diesel can result in significant reductions in pollutant emissions. In addition, with a high ignition temperature and relatively low reactivity, natural gas can enable promising approaches to combustion engine design. In particular, the combination of low-reactivity natural gas and high-reactivity diesel may allow for optimal operation as a reactivity-controlled compression ignition (RCCI) engine, which has potential for high efficiency and low emissions. In this computational study, a lean mixture of natural gas is ignited by direct injection of diesel fuel in part-load operating condition in a model of the heavy-duty CAT3401 diesel engine. A multi-dimensional simulation was performed using a finite-volume computational code for fuel spray and combustion processes in the Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) framework. Adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) and multi-zone reaction modeling enables simulation in a reasonable time. The latter approach avoids expensive kinetic calculations in every computational cell, with considerable speedup. The model produces encouraging agreement between the simulation and experimental data. For reasonable accuracy and computation cost, a minimum cell size of 0.2 millimeters is suggested for the natural gas-diesel (NGD) dual-fuel engine. The results reveal that in part-load operating condition, much of the CH4, which is used as surrogate fuel for natural gas, cannot burn. The main goal of this research work is to assess the possibility to improve the performance of Caterpillar-3401 engine in NGD dual-fuel operation by in-cylinder modification strategies. The results reveal that among different strategies, double injection of diesel fuel with an early main injection can reduce the unburned hydrocarbon (UHC) emission significantly.Item A Partial Safety Factor Method for System Reliability Prediction With Outsourced Components(ASME, 2019-06) Hu, Zhengwei; Du, Xiaoping; Mechanical and Energy Engineering, School of Engineering and TechnologySystem reliability is usually predicted with the assumption that all component states are independent. This assumption may not accurate for systems with outsourced components since their states are strongly dependent and component details may be unknown. The purpose of this study is to develop an accurate system reliability method that can produce complete joint probability density function (PDF) of all the component states, thereby leading to accurate system reliability predictions. The proposed method works for systems whose failures are caused by excessive loading. In addition to the component reliability, system designers also ask for partial safety factors for shared loadings from component suppliers. The information is then sufficient for building a system-level joint PDF. Algorithms are designed for a component supplier to generate partial safety factors. The method enables accurate system reliability predictions without requiring proprietary information from component suppliers.