United States Department of the Army

About: United States Department of the Army is a government organization based out in Arlington, Virginia, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Poison control & Population. The organization has 32668 authors who have published 42453 publications receiving 947075 citations. The organization is also known as: DA & U.S. Department of the Army.

Importance of anonymity to encourage honest reporting in mental health screening after combat deployment.

Abstract: Context US soldiers are required to undergo screening for depression, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and other mental health problems on return from service in Iraq or Afghanistan as part of routine postdeployment health assessments. Objective To assess the influence of the anonymity of screening processes on willingness of soldiers to report mental health problems after combat deployment. Design Anonymous and nonanonymous surveys. Setting US military. Patients US infantry soldiers' reporting of mental health problems on the routine Post-Deployment Health Assessment was compared with their reporting on an anonymous survey administered simultaneously. Main Outcome Measures The Primary Care PTSD Screen, the Patient Health Questionnaire–2 (modified), the suicidal ideation question from the Patient Health Questionnaire–9, and several other questions related to mental health were used on both surveys. Soldiers were also asked on the anonymous survey about perceptions of stigma and willingness to report honestly. Results Of 3502 US Army soldiers from one infantry brigade combat team undergoing the routine Post-Deployment Health Assessment in 2008, a total of 2500 were invited to complete the anonymous survey, and 1712 of these participated (response rate, 68.5%). Reporting of depression, PTSD, suicidal ideation, and interest in receiving care were 2-fold to 4-fold higher on the anonymous survey compared with the routine Post-Deployment Health Assessment. Overall, 20.3% of soldiers who screened positive for depression or PTSD reported that they were uncomfortable reporting their answers honestly on the routine postdeployment screening. Conclusions Current postdeployment mental health screening tools are dependent on soldiers honestly reporting their symptoms. This study indicates that the Post-Deployment Health Assessment screening process misses most soldiers with significant mental health problems. Further efforts are required to reduce the stigma of reporting and improve willingness to receive care for mental health problems.

Optimal maintenance decisions for pavement management

Abstract: The object of this investigation was to develop a procedure for making optimal maintenance decisions for a deteriorating system. The particular system chosen for study is a pavement, and a methodology is developed to ensure that pavements meet certain performance criteria while minimizing the expected maintenance cost. A cumulative damage model based upon a Markov process was developed to model pavement deterioration. The optimal repair action for each possible pavement state in the planning horizon was found by means of probabilistic dynamic programming. Sample sequences of repair actions were generated during a simulation in which the optimal repair policy was applied to sample pavement condition histories. Several sensitivity studies were performed to study the variation in expected cost, including the effect of delaying the optimal program.

Non-neutralizing monoclonal antibodies can prevent lethal alphavirus encephalitis

Abstract: Among the heterogeneous population of antibodies specifically induced during many acute viral infections, those having virus-neutralizing activity in vitro are generally considered to be most important for recovery and immunity to reinfection. Similarly, the ability to stimulate production of circulating neutralizing (NT) antibodies is a major criterion for evaluating the immunoprophylactic potential of many antiviral vaccines1. Although there is obviously an association between NT antibody induction and host resistance, we present here data which indicate that other virus-specific antibodies lacking NT function may be equally important in conferring protective immunity to alphaviruses. We used monoclonal antibodies against Sindbis virus (SV) to demonstrate that passive protection of SV-infected mice from fatal paralytic central nervous system (CNS) disease may be mediated not only by antibodies which neutralize the infectivity of extracellular virus particles but also by those lacking this capacity, which react preferentially with virus-infected cells.

When You and I Share Perspectives Pronouns Modulate Perspective Taking During Narrative Comprehension

Abstract: Readers mentally simulate the objects and events described in narratives. One common assumption is that readers mentally embody an actor's perspective; alternatively, readers might mentally simulate events from an external "onlooker" perspective. Two experiments examined the role of pronouns in modulating a reader's adopted perspective when comprehending simple event sentences. Experiment 1 demonstrated that readers embody an actor's perspective when the pronoun you or I is used, but take an external perspective when he is used. Experiment 2, however, found that a short discourse context preceding the event sentence led readers to adopt an external perspective with the pronoun I. These experiments demonstrate that pronoun variation and discourse context mediate the degree of embodiment experienced during narrative comprehension: In all cases, readers mentally simulate objects and events, but they embody an actor's perspective only when directly addressed as the subject of a sentence.

Changes in intestinal microbiota composition and metabolism coincide with increased intestinal permeability in young adults under prolonged physiological stress.

Abstract: Military training, a unique model for studying temporal dynamics of intestinal barrier and intestinal microbiota responses to stress, resulted in increased intestinal permeability concomitant with ...