Faculty Bibliography

BACKGROUND: Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is facing a double burden of disease with a rising prevalence of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) while the burden of communicable diseases (CDs) remains high. Despite these challenges, there remains a significant need to understand how or under what conditions health interventions implemented in sub-Saharan Africa are sustained. The purpose of this study was to conduct a systematic review of empirical literature to explore how health interventions implemented in SSA are sustained. METHODS: We searched MEDLINE, Biological Abstracts, CINAHL, Embase, PsycInfo, SCIELO, Web of Science, and Google Scholar for available research investigating the sustainability of health interventions implemented in sub-Saharan Africa. We also used narrative synthesis to examine factors whether positive or negative that may influence the sustainability of health interventions in the region. RESULTS: The search identified 1819 citations, and following removal of duplicates and our inclusion/exclusion criteria, only 41 papers were eligible for inclusion in the review. Twenty-six countries were represented in this review, with Kenya and Nigeria having the most representation of available studies examining sustainability. Study dates ranged from 1996 to 2015. Of note, majority of these studies (30 %) were published in 2014. The most common framework utilized was the sustainability framework, which was discussed in four of the studies. Nineteen out of 41 studies (46 %) reported sustainability outcomes focused on communicable diseases, with HIV and AIDS represented in majority of the studies, followed by malaria. Only 21 out of 41 studies had clear definitions of sustainability. Community ownership and mobilization were recognized by many of the reviewed studies as crucial facilitators for intervention sustainability, both early on and after intervention implementation, while social and ecological conditions as well as societal upheavals were barriers that influenced the sustainment of interventions in sub-Saharan Africa. CONCLUSION: The sustainability of health interventions implemented in sub-Saharan Africa is inevitable given the double burden of diseases, health care worker shortage, weak health systems, and limited resources. We propose a conceptual framework that draws attention to sustainability as a core component of the overall life cycle of interventions implemented in the region.

In patients with sleep-disordered breathing and heart failure, continuous positive airway pressure has been found to be associated with an improvement in cardiovascular end points. We conducted a systematic review of the current literature and a meta-analysis to pool data from 15 published randomized controlled trials. End points analyzed were left ventricular ejection fraction, diastolic blood pressure, systolic blood pressure, heart rate, and mortality. A fixed effects model was used for end points demonstrating homogeneity among included studies, whereas a random effects model was used for end points demonstrating heterogeneity among included studies. A significant improvement in left ventricular ejection fraction was noted with continuous positive airway pressure (mean difference, 5.05%; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 3.72 to 6.38), diastolic blood pressure (mean difference, −1.67; 95% CI: −3.09 to −0.25), and heart rate (mean difference, −5.92; 95% CI: −10.12 to−1.72). No significant changes in mortality (odds ratio, 0.63; 95% CI: 0.40 to 1.00) and systolic blood pressure were noted (mean difference, −6.35; 95% CI: −16.11 to 2.41). The analysis also revealed the need for additional studies to clarify the associations noted and the presence of publication bias with small studies with a paucity of small studies with negative results. In this meta-analysis, treatment with continuous positive airways pressure was associated with improvements in ejection fraction, diastolic blood pressure, and heart rate in patients with sleep-disordered breathing and congestive heart failure.

INTRODUCTION This paper describes the development of the New York University Health Sciences Library's Faculty Bibliography. DESCRIPTION Since 2000, the NYU Health Sciences Library's Faculty Bibliography project has systematically tracked publications of the NYU School of Medicine faculty. The project has grown to a significant institutional service making prominent contributions to the School of Medicine's public web presence and to advanced productivity metrics. Migrating from Gopher to EndNote to MySQL, the Faculty Bibliography harvests data from multiple abstracting and indexing resources and uses sophisticated quality assurance methodologies. At present the Faculty Bibliography tracks over 228,000 publications of well over 13,000 faculty, including faculties of the NYU Colleges of Dentistry and Nursing. Both technical and social engineering aspects of the project's success are discussed; the project's role in deepening professional contact between the Library, clinical and research faculty, and School administration is stressed. NEXT STEPS The Library currently envisions broadening coverage to include faculty engaged in scientific and medical publishing from other schools and colleges at NYU. We also anticipate significant improvements in the project's methodology once the ORCID initiative takes root.

With nearly all library resources and services delivered digitally, librarians working for the New York University Health Sciences Library struggled with maintaining awareness of changing user needs, understanding barriers faced in using library resources and services, and determining knowledge management challenges across the organization. A liaison program was created to provide opportunities for librarians to meaningfully engage with users. The program was directed toward a subset of high-priority user groups to provide focused engagement with these users. Responsibility for providing routine reference service was reduced for liaison librarians to provide maximum time to engage with their assigned user communities.

BACKGROUND: Exercise testing with echocardiography or myocardial perfusion imaging is widely used to risk-stratify patients with suspected coronary artery disease. However, reports of diagnostic performance rarely adjust for referral bias, and this practice may adversely influence patient care. Therefore, we evaluated the potential impact of referral bias on diagnostic effectiveness and clinical decision-making. METHODS AND RESULTS: Searching PubMed and EMBASE (1990-2012), 2 investigators independently evaluated eligibility and abstracted data on study characteristics and referral patterns. Diagnostic performance reported in 4 previously published meta-analyses of exercise echocardiography and myocardial perfusion imaging was adjusted using pooled referral rates and Bayesian methods. Twenty-one studies reported referral patterns in 49 006 patients (mean age 60.7 years, 39.6% women, and 0.8% prior history of myocardial infarction). Catheterization referral rates after normal and abnormal exercise tests were 4.0% (95% CI, 2.9% to 5.0%) and 42.5% (36.2% to 48.9%), respectively, with odds ratio for referral after an abnormal test of 14.6 (10.7 to 19.9). After adjustment for referral, exercise echocardiography sensitivity fell from 84% (80% to 89%) to 34% (27% to 41%), and specificity rose from 77% (69% to 86%) to 99% (99% to 100%). Similarly, exercise myocardial perfusion imaging sensitivity fell from 85% (81% to 88%) to 38% (31% to 44%), and specificity rose from 69% (61% to 78%) to 99% (99% to 100%). Summary receiver operating curve analysis demonstrated only modest changes in overall discriminatory power but adjusting for referral increased positive-predictive value and reduced negative-predictive value. CONCLUSIONS: Exercise echocardiography and myocardial perfusion imaging are considerably less sensitive and more specific for coronary artery disease after adjustment for referral. Given these findings, future work should assess the comparative ability of these and other tests to rule-in versus rule-out coronary artery disease.

BACKGROUND CONTEXT: Nonspecific low back pain (LBP) remains a large public health problem despite attempts to minimize its impact. Evidence- based guidelines (EBG) are well defined and their efficacy demonstrated, yet clinical adherence is inconsistent. Various explanations for non-adherence to the evidence include clinician beliefs that guidelines are incongruent with patient expectations and clinician desire to satisfy patients' request for non-guideline care. PURPOSE: This study systematically explored the low back pain literature to synthesize what is known about patient expectations of care, and investigated the knowledge, beliefs and attitudes of patients with LBP regarding seeking care and how they use this information to guide their health care choices. The purpose was to explore patient perceptions on topics related to LBP including natural history, red flags, management, and attitudes about patient-clinician shared decision making. STUDY DESIGN/SETTING: This pilot study is a mixed methods design combining a systematic review with qualitative study design. Subjects were recruited at the New York University Langone Medical Center (NYULMC) Spine Center. PATIENT SAMPLE: Ten adult volunteer subjects with recurrent chronic LBP seeking care from a spine specialist were recruited at the NYULMC Spine Center. OUTCOME MEASURES: Domains related to patient attitudes and beliefs, and their impact on health care consumption for managing LBP were extracted from the admissible evidence. These domains were then compared with coded and synthesized interview data to either support or refute the patient narrative. METHODS: Literature review: A systematic literature search was performed with a NYULMC clinical librarian. Two researchers systematically screened the references using pre-defined inclusion-exclusion criteria. Structured interviews: Subjects with recurrent chronic LBP were recruited for a semi structured interview developed by a multidisciplinary team of LBP experts. Themes were extracted using !

Barriers to blood pressure control exist at the patient, physician, and system levels. We review the current evidence for interventions that target patient- and physician-related barriers, such as patient education, home blood pressure monitoring, and computerized decision-support systems for physicians, and we emphasize the need for more studies that address the effectiveness of these interventions in African American patients