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Background: In hospitalized patients, QT/QTc (heart rate corrected) prolongation on the electrocardiogram (ECG) increases the risk of torsade de pointes. Manual measurements are time-consuming and often inaccurate. Some bedside monitors automatically and continuously measure QT/QTc; however, the agreement between computerized versus nurse-measured values has not been evaluated. Objective: The aim of this study was to examine the agreement between computerized QT/QTc and bedside and expert nurses who used electronic calipers. Methods: This was a prospective observational study in 3 intensive care units. Up to 2 QT/QTc measurements (milliseconds) per patient were collected. Bland-Altman test was used to analyze measurement agreement. Results: A total of 54 QT/QTc measurements from 34 patients admitted to the ICU were included. The mean difference (bias) for QT comparisons was as follows: computerized versus expert nurses, −11.04 ± 4.45 milliseconds (95% confidence interval [CI], −2.3 to −19.8; P =.016), and computerized versus bedside nurses, −13.72 ± 6.70 (95% CI, −0.70 to −26.8; P =.044). The mean bias for QTc comparisons was as follows: computerized versus expert nurses, −12.46 ± 5.80 (95% CI, −1.1 to −23.8; P =.035), and computerized versus bedside nurses, −18.49 ± 7.90 (95% CI, −3.0 to −33.9; P =.022). Conclusion: Computerized QT/QTc measurements calculated by bedside monitor software and measurements performed by nurses were in close agreement; statistically significant differences were found, but differences were less than 20 milliseconds (on-half of a small box), indicating no clinical significance. Computerized measurements may be a suitable alternative to nurse-measured QT/QTc. This could reduce inaccuracies and nurse burden while increasing adherence to practice recommendations. Further research comparing computerized QT/QTc from bedside monitoring to standard 12-lead electrocardiogram in a larger sample, including non-ICU patients, is needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we focus on California high school students' transition to community colleges. Our unique dataset tracks five cohorts of California high school juniors into their freshmen year at in-state community colleges. We evaluate the extent to which high school achievement tests (currently not utilized by community colleges in course placement decisions) are useful for predicting academic success at community college. In addition, given persistent disparities in college attainment by race, we explore whether this fundamental relationship between high school achievement, college course-taking, and performance differs for students from different racial/ethnic backgrounds. (Contains 7 tables, 6 figures, and 13 footnotes.)

Background: Few nutrition interventions in kindergarten classes have been evaluated, and none has been tested for program effectiveness, implementation, and dissemination. Building a Healthy Me (BHM) is a nutrition intervention for kindergarteners that is classroom-based and includes a family component. This study evaluated the public health impact of BHM in California kindergarten classrooms using the RE-AIM (reach, efficacy, adoption, implementation, and maintenance) framework. Methods: A quasi-experimental design assessed pre-to-post changes in nutrition knowledge, dietary consumption, and parent behaviors of 25 intervention classrooms (414 students, 264 parents); and postintervention differences in nutrition knowledge between the intervention classrooms and 4 control classrooms measured at postintervention only (103 students). Results: Intervention students improved in knowledge of food groups and healthy breakfast/snack options, and scored higher than control students in food group knowledge at postintervention (ps < 0.05). Parents of intervention group children increased their use of food labels, and intervention group children increased intake of several healthy foods and decreased intake of candy and fried potatoes (ps < 0.05). The BHM program reached 41% of kindergarteners attending public schools in California, and teachers implemented most lesson material. Conclusions: The BHM program was effective, implemented with fidelity, and broadly disseminated, highlighting its potential public health impact for kindergarteners.

Open educational resources (OERs) provide a potential alternative to costly textbooks and can allow content to be edited and adapted to a variety of classroom environments. At the University of California, Davis, the OER "ChemWiki" project, as part of the greater STEMWiki Hyperlibrary, was developed to supplant traditional post-secondary chemistry textbooks. The effectiveness of using this OER was assessed by comparing two general chemistry classes, one using ChemWiki and one using a traditional textbook, during the spring quarter of 2014. Student performance was measured using common midterms, final, and a pre/post content exam. We also employed surveys, the Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey (CLASS) for Chemistry, and a weekly time-on-task survey to quantify students' attitudes and study habits. The effectiveness of the ChemWiki compared to a traditional textbook was examined using multiple linear regression analysis with a standard non-inferiority testing framework. Results show that the performance of students who were assigned readings from the ChemWiki section was non-inferior to the performance of students in the section who were assigned readings from the traditional textbook, indicating that the ChemWiki does not substantially differ from the standard textbook in terms of student learning outcomes. The results from the surveys also suggest that the two classes were similar in their beliefs about chemistry and minimal overall study time. These results indicate that the ChemWiki is a viable cost-saving alternative to traditional textbooks.

In 1998, California state legislation called for significant reform in the preparation of teachers. As a result, institutions of higher learning must now conduct a formal performance-based assessment. All teacher candidates must participate in the assessment at the end of the program for receipt of the preliminary teaching credential. The California Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CCTC) contracted with Educational Testing Service to develop a performance assessment that institutions could adopt in response to the requirement. The legislation also allowed institutions to develop alternative assessment designs, although they had to adhere to required standards and were subject to a formal review. However, there currently is a moratorium on performance assessments until state funding is secured to pay for the program. The Performance Assessment for California Teachers (PACT) consortium emerged in fall 2001 with a decision by deans and directors of teacher-education programs in the University of California (UC) system to explore the creation of an alternative proposal. This article discusses the PACT design and Embedded Signature Assessments (ESS) and contains the following sections: The PACT Design; Collaboration; The ESA Component; Selection Criteria for ESAs; ESA Scoring System; Two Case Studies; Benefits and Costs of the ESA Component; Benefits for Teacher Candidates; Benefits for Teacher-Education Programs; and Benefits for the PACT Consortium.

The Jurupa Unified School District in Southern California recently partnered with Microsoft, Dell and the Zone Integration Group for the implementation of a School Interoperability Framework (SIF) database repository model throughout the district (Magner 2002). A two-week project--the Integrated District Education Applications System, better known as New IDEAS--targeted the effective adoption of an integrated IT platform that would enable the district to automate routine tasks, integrate data across the district's core applications and drive process improvements. Budget constraints, coupled with increasing demands from local, state and federal requirements for data reporting, made it imperative that the district carefully maximize all investments in upgraded technologies. By optimizing processes in order to incorporate the ability to aggregate and share data across core systems, as well as by making this information readily available to all constituent groups throughout the district, technological and budgetary goals would be met. The results of this project are detailed in this article.

Reprints the California State Board of Education's resolution to endorse Character Counts! Week. Asserts that all educators are obliged to awaken youth to the moral and ethical values that build a fundamental strength of character. Identifies elements of character that are embedded in all curriculum frameworks. (MJP)

Abstract: Despite a clear need, little research has been carried out at the regional-level to quantify potential climate-related impacts to electricity production and delivery systems. This paper introduces a bottom-up study of climate change impacts on California''s energy infrastructure, including high temperature effects on power plant capacity, transmission lines, substation capacity, and peak electricity demand. End-of-century impacts were projected using the A2 and B1 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change emission scenarios. The study quantifies the effect of high ambient temperatures on electricity generation, the capacity of substations and transmission lines, and the demand for peak power for a set of climate scenarios. Based on these scenarios, atmospheric warming and associated peak demand increases would necessitate up to 38% of additional peak generation capacity and up to 31% additional transmission capacity, assuming current infrastructure. These findings, although based on a limited number of scenarios, suggest that additional funding could be put to good use by supporting R&D into next generation cooling equipment technologies, diversifying the power generation mix without compromising the system''s operational flexibility, and designing effective demand side management programs. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Birds are often the most numerous vertebrates damaged and rehabilitated in marine oil spills; however, the efficacy of avian rehabilitation is frequently debated and rarely examined experimentally. We compared survival of three radio-marked treatment groups, oiled, rehabilitated (ORHB), un-oiled, rehabilitated (RHB), and un-oiled, non-rehabilitated (CON), in an experimental approach to examine post-release survival of surf scoters (Melanitta perspicillata) following the 2007 M/V Cosco Busan spill in San Francisco Bay. Live encounter-dead recovery modeling indicated that survival differed among treatment groups and over time since release. The survival estimate (±SE) for ORHB was 0.143±0.107 compared to CON (0.498±0.168) and RHB groups (0.772±0.229), suggesting scoters tolerated the rehabilitation process itself well, but oiling resulted in markedly lower survival. Future efforts to understand the physiological effects of oil type and severity on scoters are needed to improve post-release survival of this species. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

We simulate long-period (T > 1.0-2.0 s) and broadband (T > 0.1 s) ground motions for 39 scenario earthquakes (Mw 6.7-7.2) involving the Hayward, Calaveras, and Rodgers Creek faults. For rupture on the Hayward fault, we consider the effects of creep on coseismic slip using two different approaches, both of which reduce the ground motions, compared with neglecting the influence of creep. Nevertheless, the scenario earthquakes generate strong shaking throughout the San Francisco Bay area, with about 50% of the urban area experiencing modified Mercalli intensity VII or greater for the magnitude 7.0 scenario events. Long-period simulations of the 2007 Mw 4.18 Oakland earthquake and the 2007 Mw 5.45 Alum Rock earthquake show that the U.S. Geological Survey's Bay Area Velocity Model version 08.3.0 permits simulation of the amplitude and duration of shaking throughout the San Francisco Bay area for Hayward fault earthquakes, with the greatest accuracy in the Santa Clara Valley (San Jose area). The ground motions for the suite of scenarios exhibit a strong sensitivity to the rupture length (or magnitude), hypocenter (or rupture directivity), and slip distribution. The ground motions display a much weaker sensitivity to the rise time and rupture speed. Peak velocities, peak accelerations, and spectral accelerations from the synthetic broadband ground motions are, on average, slightly higher than the Next Generation Attenuation (NGA) ground-motion prediction equations. We attribute much of this difference to the seismic velocity structure in the San Francisco Bay area and how the NGA models account for basin amplification; the NGA relations may underpredict amplification in shallow sedimentary basins. The simulations also suggest that the Spudich and Chiou (2008) directivity corrections to the NGA relations could be improved by increasing the areal extent of rupture directivity with period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We performed 3D ground-motion simulations for 10 recent small to moderate earthquakes (Mw 4.1-5.4) in the San Francisco Bay area to evaluate two versions of the USGS 3D velocity model (Brocher, 2005; Jachens et al., 2006: Brocher, 2008). Comparisons were made in terms of modeling phase arrival timing, peak ground-motion amplitudes, and the seismic waveforms. In the simulations we assumed the source parameters reported in the Berkeley Seismological Laboratory (BSL) Moment Tensor Catalog. Broadband seismic data from the Berkeley Digital Seismic Network (BDSN), and strong motion data from the USGS and the California Geological Survey (CGS) strong motion arrays were used in the analysis. The comparison of peak ground velocity (PGV) for both models reveals that both 3D models predict the observed PGV well over four orders of magnitude, and P- and S-wave timing and pseudospectral acceleration (PSA) are well modeled by the 3D structure. While the revised model (model 8.3.0) significantly improved the timing of the first arrival, and the waveform fit is generally good, there remain discrepancies in estimated amplitudes and durations that require improvements to the structure. Nevertheless, from our low-frequency (0.5 Hz) analysis we found that the 3D model is suitable for the simulation of PGV to assess the strong shaking hazard of future large earthquakes, because earthquakes larger than M 6 have PGV carried by waves of 1 to several seconds period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We estimate the ground motions produced by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake making use of the recently developed Song et al. (2008) source model that combines the available geodetic and seismic observations and recently constructed 3D geologic and seismic velocity models. Our estimates of the ground motions for the 1906 earthquake are consistent across five ground-motion modeling groups employing different wave propagation codes and simulation domains. The simulations successfully reproduce the main features of the Boatwright and Bundock (2005) ShakeMap, but tend to over predict the intensity of shaking by 0.1-0.5 modified Mercalli intensity (MMI) units. Velocity waveforms at sites throughout the San Francisco Bay Area exhibit characteristics consistent with rupture directivity, local geologic conditions (e.g., sedimentary basins), and the large size of the event (e.g., durations of strong shaking lasting tens of seconds). We also compute ground motions for seven hypothetical scenarios rupturing the same extent of the northern San Andreas fault, considering three additional hypocenters and an additional, random distribution of slip. Rupture directivity exerts the strongest influence on the variations in shaking, although sedimentary basins do consistently contribute to the response in some locations, such as Santa Rosa, Livermore, and San Jose. These scenarios suggest that future large earthquakes on the northern San Andreas fault may subject the current San Francisco Bay urban area to stronger shaking than a repeat of the 1906 earthquake. Ruptures propagating southward towards San Francisco appear to expose more of the urban area to a given intensity level than do ruptures propagating northward. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We compute ground motions for the Beroza (1991) and Wald et al. (1991) source models of the 1989 magnitude 6.9 Loma Prieta earthquake using four different wave-propagation codes and recently developed 3D geologic and seismic velocity models. In preparation for modeling the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, we use this well-recorded earthquake to characterize how well our ground-motion simulations reproduce the observed shaking intensities and amplitude and durations of recorded motions throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. All of the simulations generate ground motions consistent with the large-scale spatial variations in shaking associated with rupture directivity and the geologic structure. We attribute the small variations among the synthetics to the minimum shear-wave speed permitted in the simulations and how they accommodate topography. Our long-period simulations, on average, under predict shaking intensities by about one-half modified Mercalli intensity (MMI) units (25%-35% in peak velocity), while our broadband simulations, on average, under predict the shaking intensities by one-fourth MMI units (16% in peak velocity). Discrepancies with observations arise due to errors in the source models and geologic structure. The consistency in the synthetic waveforms across the wave-propagation codes for a given source model suggests the uncertainty in the source parameters tends to exceed the uncertainty in the seismic velocity structure. In agreement with earlier studies, we find that a source model with slip more evenly distributed northwest and southeast of the hypocenter would be preferable to both the Beroza and Wald source models. Although the new 3D seismic velocity model improves upon previous velocity models, we identify two areas needing improvement. Nevertheless, we find that the seismic velocity model and the wave-propagation codes are suitable for modeling the 1906 earthquake and scenario events in the San Francisco Bay Area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Silicon Valley lost ~50% of tree C storage in most scenarios over ca. 160 years. • Changes in the spatial distribution of tree C storage suggest homogenization over time. • Findings suggest opportunities to add C storage in urban context via restoration. • We challenge the hypothesis that C storage increases with urbanization in dryland ecosystems. Landscape changes such as urbanization can dramatically affect the provision of ecosystem services such as carbon storage. However, while cities have been shown to store substantial amounts of carbon in soils and vegetation, we have little information from long-term studies about how contemporary carbon storage in urban areas compares to carbon storage in the natural ecosystems that characterized these landscapes prior to urbanization. We used historical archival sources and land-cover data to quantify and map historical tree carbon storage in the now-urban Santa Clara Valley, California, USA prior to substantial Euro-American modification (ca. 1850) and to analyze change in the amount and distribution of carbon storage over the past ca. 160 years. We estimate that total tree carbon storage in the study area was ~784,000 to 2.2 million Mg (13.6–38.1 Mg C/ha) when the region was characterized by oak savanna and woodland habitats, compared to ~895,000 Mg C (15.5 Mg C/ha) today. This represents a non-significant gain of 14% to a significant loss of 60% depending on scenario. We also demonstrate changes in the spatial distribution of carbon on the landscape, as losses in carbon storage in areas of former oak woodland were partially offset by gains in carbon storage in historical habitat types that historically had few or no trees. This challenges the hypothesis that aboveground carbon storage increases with urbanization in Mediterranean-climate ecosystems due to irrigation and tree planting. Our study demonstrates the utility of using pre-1900s historical sources to reconstruct changes in ecosystem services such as carbon storage over century time scales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The California State University system is aware of a national trend of both the number of students seeking education, and the number of educationally and emotionally "high risk" students entering the CSU system. An online-hotline was established as a collaboration between the Human Services Department and the Women's Center at California State University, Fullerton. Design, implementation and application of this online-hotline met with ethical as well as logistical challenges. This article explores those challenges, examines the concept of E-Therapy and reviews other university online counseling services. The outcome is a well-utilized, highly-informational website with e-mail capacity to a licensed professional. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Cross-sectional studies examining the association between Western acculturation and BMI in Asians have been inconsistent, and studies on BMI change are lacking., Objective: This study examined the associations between indicators of acculturation (generational status, length of US residence, and age at immigration) and overweight (BMI ≥25kg/m(2)) as well as 5-year BMI changes in 7,073 Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, and Vietnamese men who lived in the US and were 44-71years old at baseline of the California Men's Health Study (2002-2003)., Methods: Indicators of acculturation were reported at baseline. Repeated clinical measures of BMI were extracted from electronic health records (2005-2012)., Results: Using generalized estimating equations we found that lower generational status, shorter duration of US residence and older age at immigration were inversely associated with being overweight. However, analysis of BMI curves using linear mixed models showed that shorter length of US residence and older age at immigration were associated with larger 5-year increases in BMI., Conclusions: Asian immigrants who were less acculturated had larger BMI increases as they became more acculturated but had not achieved overweight status. Healthy weight interventions among Asians immigrants may be most effective when targeting weight maintenance early in the process of acculturation., (Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: A growing body of cross-sectional, small-sample research has led to policy strategies to reduce food deserts--neighborhoods with little or no access to healthy foods--by limiting fast food restaurants and small food stores and increasing access to supermarkets in low-income neighborhoods., Methods: We used 15 years of longitudinal data from the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults (CARDIA) study, a cohort of US young adults (aged 18-30 years at baseline) (n = 5115), with linked time-varying geographic information system-derived food resource measures. Using repeated measures from 4 examination periods (n = 15,854 person-examination observations) and conditional regression (conditioned on the individual), we modeled fast food consumption, diet quality, and adherence to fruit and vegetable recommendations as a function of fast food chain, supermarket, or grocery store availability (counts per population) within less than 1.00 km, 1.00 to 2.99 km, 3.00 to 4.99 km, and 5.00 to 8.05 km of respondents' homes. Models were sex stratified, controlled for individual sociodemographic characteristics and neighborhood poverty, and tested for interaction by individual-level income., Results: Fast food consumption was related to fast food availability among low-income respondents, particularly within 1.00 to 2.99 km of home among men (coefficient, 0.34; 95% confidence interval, 0.16-0.51). Greater supermarket availability was generally unrelated to diet quality and fruit and vegetable intake, and relationships between grocery store availability and diet outcomes were mixed., Conclusion: Our findings provide some evidence for zoning restrictions on fast food restaurants within 3 km of low-income residents but suggest that increased access to food stores may require complementary or alternative strategies to promote dietary behavior change.