American journal of preventive medicine
-
A cross-sectional study was conducted to examine the association between childhood abuse, HIV-related sexual risks, and gender relations among African-American women. ⋯ Awareness of a women's history of child sexual abuse can assist in making appropriate medical and social referrals and can lead to the development of more tailored HIV prevention programs for African-American women.
-
Our objective was to review historical trends in U.S. fatal firearm-related injuries for the years 1962-1993. ⋯ These surveillance data help characterize trends over time and the magnitude of firearm-related mortality and identify groups at risk. However, further efforts to improve our understanding of firearm-related deaths and injuries, such as expansion of current surveillance to include information about morbidity associated with firearms and additional epidemiologic research to identify modifiable individual and societal risk factors, are necessary.
-
This study was carried out to determine the predisposing, enabling, and reinforcing factors related to practice behaviors in the prevention of adolescent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), and to assess physicians' "ideal" history taking and service provision versus their actual practice in this clinical area. ⋯ Analysis of predisposing factors found that, for seven of 10 areas related to knowledge of the epidemiology of adolescent pregnancy and STDs, fewer than 50% of male physicians were able to give correct responses. All physicians believed this to be an important area for prevention, and 89% that prevention is possible, but only 62% believed that their own prevention efforts are effective. Respondents were about equally likely to view schools and physicians as having responsibility for prevention of adolescent pregnancy and STDs. Significant enabling factors included high levels of perceived personal comfort and skill, but time factors and opportunities to interact with adolescents sufficiently frequently to carry out prevention were seen as barriers. Most physicians (68%) agreed that the physician fee schedule was a negative reinforcing factor. Male physicians and those in rural practice were significantly more likely to have larger gaps between those preventive practices they saw as desirable and those they actually performed.