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Objective: To examine sharps injury (SI) rates among US workers treated in hospital emergency departments., Methods: A national probability-based sample of approximately 67 US hospital emergency departments from the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System-Occupational Supplement was used to examine annual national estimates of SI rates (number of injuries/10,000 full-time equivalents) for US workers from 2006 to 2020., Results: Among the general US worker population, the 25- to 34-year age group experienced the highest annual SI rate. Health care industry workers experienced SI rates up to 16 times the rate of all US workers., Conclusion: Younger age (≤34 years) is associated with increased SI risk. Tailored prevention efforts should be developed to address the specific needs of these workers, especially among health care workers. Continual occupational surveillance will maximize the health and safety of US workers., Competing Interests: Conflict of interest: None declared., (Copyright © 2023 American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.)

Young adults typically gain more dietary autonomy as they start college, though this can also present nutritional challenges; however, research on the generalizability of their dietary intake data is scarce. To address this representativeness concern, we compared food and nutrient intakes reported by college freshmen attending a large, diverse university to an age-matched sample from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). We studied 269 students 18-24 years old recruited through the Mason: Health Start Here (HSH) study, a population-based cohort study of college students. Diet was assessed using a diet history questionnaire (DHQ-III) and estimated with food source composition tables. The NHANES sample of 835 adults was the reference dataset. Reported dietary intakes were weighted and compared with national intakes via t-tests. We observed comparable energy, carbohydrate, fat, and protein intakes in both groups; however, the HSH cohort reported a higher density intake of most micronutrients than the NHANES sample. Differences between these samples in intake, mode of dietary assessment administration, and reactivity may help explain the differences detected. These results demonstrate that when appropriately contextualized in terms of methodology and potential sources of bias, single college studies can be useful for understanding nutrition in young adults more broadly.

Objectives: To understand the factors underlying the decision by U.S. hospitals to participate or not in the U.S. Smallpox Pre-Event Vaccination Program (SPVP)., Methods: We conducted semistructured telephone interviews with a convenience sample of 123 hospital decision-makers in nine states between June and November 2003., Results: Within our sample, 88 hospitals (72%) decided to participate in the SPVP and 35 (28%) decided against doing so. Nearly all hospital decision-makers considered the risk of a smallpox outbreak, risks associated with vaccination, hospital costs, and the reaction of hospital stakeholders. However, these factors often were weighed differently by hospitals that decided to participate compared to those that did not. Fewer than half of all hospitals reported that public health officials played an important role in their decision-making process, but those that did felt the influence of public health officials was positive., Conclusions: Strengthening the linkage between the public and private health sectors may help to address some of the barriers to broader participation by hospitals in the SPVP and foster the success of smallpox outbreak response preparedness efforts in the future.