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Simple Summary: Prostate cancer (PCa) is the leading cancer in incidence and second leading cause of cancer mortality in US men. Recent data showed a 3% increase in PCa incidence rate each year from 2014 through 2019. African American (AA) men have 1.6-fold higher incidence and 2.2-fold higher PC mortality rates than European American (EA) men. Growing evidence shows that miRNAs are closely associated with aggressiveness and racial disparity in prostate cancer and might facilitate the prediction of prognosis and a treatment plan. In this study, we identified differentially expressed miRNAs, which are significantly correlated with the aggressiveness and health disparity of prostate cancer. These findings may assist personalized medicine, suggesting miRNAs as promising biomarkers for prostate cancer, especially in African American men. Prostate cancer is the leading cancer in incidence and second leading cause of cancer mortality in US men. African American men have significantly higher incidence and mortality rates from prostate cancer than European American men. Previous studies reported that the disparity in prostate cancer survival or mortality can be explained by different biological backgrounds. microRNAs (miRNAs) regulate gene expression of their cognate mRNAs in many cancers. Therefore, miRNAs may be a potentially promising diagnostic tool. The role of miRNAs in prostate cancer aggressiveness and racial disparity has not been fully established. The goal of this study is to identify miRNAs associated with aggressiveness and racial disparity in prostate cancer. Here we report miRNAs that are associated with tumor status and aggressiveness in prostate cancer using a profiling approach. Further, downregulated miRNAs in African American tissues were confirmed by qRT-PCR. These miRNAs have also been shown to negatively regulate the expression of the androgen receptor in prostate cancer cells. This report provides a novel insight into understanding tumor aggressiveness and racial disparities of prostate cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including the drivers of job quality, the stagnation of wages in the job market in the United States, and the effect variations in job quality has for employee welfare.

The author, using data on 694 U.S. manufacturing establishments from a 1992 survey, examines the incidence of innovative work practices (teams, job rotation, quality circles, and Total Quality Management) and investigates what variables, including human resource practices, are associated with the adoption of these practices. He finds that about 35% of private sector establishments with 50 or more employees made substantial use of flexible work organization in 1992. Some factors associated with an establishment's adoption of these practices are being in an internationally competitive product market, having a technology that requires high levels of skill, following a "high road" strategy that emphasizes variety, service, and quality rather than low cost, and using such human resource practices as high levels of training and innovative pay systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the result of an empirical test dealing with the segmentation of the labor force through the hypothesis of economists Michael J. Piore and David M. Gordon. This paper explores a hypothesis that in understanding both worker behavior and the distribution of occupational rewards an important dimension to consider is the quality of individual jobs forms. This developed hypothesis is evaluated with the Survey of Economic Opportunity data conducted by the U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity.

Objectives: To compare the coronary heart disease risk among patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) initiating common biologic disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs of different mechanisms.Methods: We conducted a retrospective cohort study of patients with RA enrolled in Medicare, a public health plan covering >90% of US residents 65 years or older, from 2006 to 2012 who (1) initiated a biologic, (2) had complete medical and pharmacy coverage for at least 12 months before biologic initiation and (3) were free of coronary heart disease at the time of initiation. We compared the incidence rates (IRs) of (1) acute myocardial infarction (AMI) and (2) a composite outcome of AMI or coronary revascularisation and used multivariable adjusted Cox regression models to examine the associations between the type of biologic and the two outcomes.Results: We identified 47 193 eligible patients with RA with mean age 64 (SD 13) years; 85% were women. Crude IRs for AMI ranged from 5.7 to 8.8 cases per 1000 person-years (PYs). AMI risk was significantly elevated among antitumour necrosis factor (anti-TNF) initiators overall (adjusted HR (aHR) 1.3; 95% CI 1.0 to 1.6) and individually among etanercept (aHR 1.3; 95% CI 1.0 to 1.8) and infliximab (aHR 1.3; 95% CI 1.0 to 1.6) compared with abatacept initiators. Crude IRs for the composite outcome ranged from 7.6 to 14.5 per 1000 PYs. Tocilizumab initiators were at reduced risk of the composite outcome compared with abatacept initiators (aHR 0.64, 95% CI 0.41 to 0.99).Discussion: Findings from this observational study of patients with RA suggested that anti-TNF biologics may be associated with higher AMI risk compared with abatacept. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the U.S. laws concerning bankruptcy and intellectual property and technology transactions; mentions bankruptcy provisions applying to intellectual property rights; and reports laws aimed to provide licensor bankruptcy protection.

Background: The United States has recently experienced increases in both its rate of obesity and its cesarean rate. Our objective was to use a new item measuring prepregnancy body mass index (BMI) on the U.S. Standard Certificate of Live Birth to examine at a population level the relationship between maternal obesity and primary cesarean delivery for women at otherwise low risk for cesarean delivery. Methods: By 2012, 38 states with 86 percent of United States births had adopted the U.S. Standard Certificate. The sample was limited to the 2,233,144 women who had a singleton, vertex, term (37-41 weeks) birth in 2012 and no prior cesarean. We modeled the likelihood of a primary cesarean by BMI category, controlling for maternal socio-demographic and medical characteristics. Results: Overall, 46.4 percent of otherwise low-risk mothers had a prepregnancy BMI in the overweight (25.1%) or obese (21.3%) categories, with the obese category distributed as follows: obese I (BMI 30.0-34.9, 12.4%); obese II (BMI 35.0-39.9, 5.5%); and obese III (BMI 40+, 3.5%). Obesity rates were highest among American Indian and Alaska Native (32.5%) and non-Hispanic black mothers (30.5%). After adjustment for demographic and medical risks, the adjusted risk ratios (95% confidence intervals) of cesarean for low-risk primiparas were: 1.61 (1.60--1.63) for obese I, 1.86 (1.83-1.88) for obese II, and 2.21 (2.18-2.25) for obese III mothers compared with mothers in the normal weight category. Discussion: A relationship between prepregnancy obesity and primary cesarean delivery among relatively low-risk mothers remained even after controlling for social and medical risk factors. (BIRTH 42:4 December 2015) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports the decision of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in the case "Amarin Pharma Inc. v. U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA)" in which the court grants preliminary injunction against FDA for regulations of off-label promotion. Topics discussed include the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc.; laws concerning pharmaceutical marketing; and laws preventing infringement of free speech rights.

This comment considers the influence Saul Alinsky and the Industrial Areas Foundation on the trajectory of unions and community organizations in the United States. It argues that this influence has been constructive along a number of important dimensions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The number of births in the United States declined by 1% between 2012 and 2013, to a total of 3 932 181. The general fertility rate also declined 1% to 62.5 births per 1000 women, the lowest rate ever reported. The total fertility rate was down by 1% in 2013 (to 1857.5 births per 1000 women). The teenage birth rate fell to another historic low in 2013, 26.5 births per 1000 women. Birth rates also declined for women 20 to 29 years, but the rates rose for women 30 to 39 and were unchanged for women 40 to 44. The percentage of all births that were to unmarried women declined slightly to 40.6% in 2013, from 40.7% in 2012. In 2013, the cesarean delivery rate declined to 32.7% from 32.8% for 2012. The preterm birth rate declined for the seventh straight year in 2013 to 11.39%; the low birth weight (LBW) rate was essentially unchanged at 8.02%. The infant mortality rate was 5.96 infant deaths per 1000 live births in 2013, down 13% from 2005 (6.86). The age-adjusted death rate for 2013 was 7.3 deaths per 1000 population, unchanged from 2012. Crude death rates for children aged 1 to 19 years declined to 24.0 per 100 000 population in 2013, from 24.8 in 2012. Unintentional injuries and suicide were, respectively, the first and second leading causes of death in this age group. These 2 causes of death jointly accounted for 45.7% of all deaths to children and adolescents in 2013. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The marine microfauna of Mobile Bay has been profoundly influenced by the development and expansion of the primary shipping channel over the last ∼100 years. Foraminifers and sediments from seven box cores with excess lead-210 chronology document that channel dredging and spoil disposal have altered circulation, reduced estuarine mixing, changed sedimentation patterns, and caused a faunal turnover within the bay. Beginning in the late 1800s, changes in estuarine mixing allowed for greater low-pH freshwater influence in the bay, and ultimately began environmental changes that resulted in the loss of calcareous foraminifers. By the early 1900s, box cores throughout Mobile Bay record a ∼100-year trend of increasing calcareous test dissolution that continues to the present. Since the completion of the current shipping channel in the 1950s, restricted tidal flushing and increased terrestrial organic matter, documented by carbon-to-nitrogen ratios, stimulated an increase in agglutinated foraminiferal densities. However, in deeper areas of the bay, hypoxic water has negatively impacted the marine microfauna. Comparisons of the present-day foraminiferal assemblage with foraminifers collected in the early 1970s indicate that the continued biologic loss of calcareous foraminifers in the bay has allowed the introduction of a new agglutinated foraminiferal species into the bay. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In Good Jobs, Bad Jobs Arne Kalleberg provides an extremely useful portrait of job quality in America. This paper addresses the politics of job quality via a case study of weatherization jobs. Weatherization workers are typical of employees in many low wage jobs in America. The stimulus bill (the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) substantially increased weatherization funding and a political struggle emerged over the quality of these jobs. We find that the variable strength of progressive coalitions, legislative politics and timing all contributed to the development of an uneven set of regulations at the federal and local level. Groups that are putative allies often worked at cross-purposes. More strikingly government at both the local and Federal level has been conservative and even timid about establishing job standards. There are also more positive lessons. Training standards are being formalized. This stands to benefit both homeowners and workers. While there have been conflicts, it is also true that interests that have been historically at each other’s throats notably unions and community groups–found a way to work together more constructively than in the past. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: Background: Postoperative adhesions are common after surgery and can cause small-bowel obstruction (SBO) and require adhesiolysis. The impact that laparoscopy and other surgical advances have had on rates of SBO and adhesiolysis remains controversial. This study examines trends in discharges from US hospitals for SBO and adhesiolysis from 1988 to 2007. Methods: We performed an analysis of secular trends for SBO and adhesiolysis, using the National Hospital Discharge Survey. Spearman correlation coefficients were calculated to assess trends over time. Results: Rates of SBO were stable over time (ρ = .140; P = .28). Adhesiolysis rates were stable over time (ρ = −.18; P = .17), although there were significant downward trends in patients older than age 65 (ρ = −.55; P = .01) and age 15 to 44 (ρ = −.84; P < .01). Conclusions: There has been no significant change in overall rates of SBO or adhesiolysis from 1988 to 2007. For adhesiolysis, there were decreasing trends when stratified by age. Further research is required to understand the factors associated with adhesion-related complications. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The functionality of next generation the US Army's platforms, such as the Small Unmanned Ground Vehicles and Small Unmanned Arial Vehicles, is strongly dependent on the reliability of electronics-rich devices. Thus, the performance and accuracy of these systems will be dependent on the life-cycle of electronics. These electronic systems and the critical components in them experience extremely harsh environments such as shock and vibration. Therefore, it is imperative to identify the failure mechanisms of these components through experimental and virtual failure assessment. One of the key challenges in re-creating life-cycle vibration conditions during design and qualification testing in the lab is the re-creation of simultaneous multiaxial excitation that the product experiences in the field. Instead, the common practice is to use sequential single-axis excitation in different axes or uncontrolled multiaxial vibration on repetitive shock shakers. Consequently, the dominant failure modes in the field are sometimes very difficult to duplicate in a laboratory test. This paper presents the joint effort by the US Army Materiel Systems Analysis Activity (AMSAA) and the Center of Advanced Life Cycle Engineering (CALCE) at the University of Maryland to develop test methods and analytical models that better capture unforeseen design weaknesses prior to the qualification phase, by better replication of the life-cycle vibration conditions. One approach was to utilize a novel multi-degrees-of-freedom (M-DoF) electrodynamic shaker to ruggedize designs for fatigue damage due to multi-directional random vibration. The merits of vibration testing methods with six-DoF shaker and cost saving associated with such an approach will be addressed in this paper. There is a potential for M-DoF to detect critical design vulnerabilities earlier in the development cycle than has been traditionally possible with existing shaker technologies; and therefore to produce more cost effective, reliable and safe systems for the warfighters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present our Lunar Phases Project, an ongoing effort utilizing students' actual observations within a mental model building framework to improve student understanding of the causes and process of the lunar phases. We implement this project with a sample of undergraduate, nonscience major students enrolled in a midsized public university located in the southeast part of the United States. To quantitatively assess our activity, we use the Lunar Phases Concept Inventory, a research-validated assessment instrument. We observe significant gains in student understanding of the lunar phases for students who complete the Lunar Phases Project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Training has long been of considerable interest to both policy makers and to researchers. This collection addresses future skill and competency demands and then takes up specific topics regarding program strategies and target groups. Each chapter is well done but the book invites larger questions about the nature of the American employment and training system. In answering this question, we need to go beyond the topics emphasized in the book because important issues, such as immigration or the role of community colleges, are given inadequate attention. In addition, although a major theme running throughout the book is the need for a more coherent and comprehensive system, the fact is that this complaint is very long-standing yet very little has happened in response. Why the U.S. system has its particular characteristics is a key question requiring deeper analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pese a que el mercado laboral de los Estados Unidos demuestra tener mucho dinamismo, alrededor de una quinta parte de la población activa del sector privado desempeña empleos de mala calidad, cobra salarios de pobreza --o aún peores-- y no tiene apenas ninguna perspectiva de progreso. Con este telón de fondo, el autor estudia qué políticas en el ámbito de la demanda de fuerza de trabajo sirven para alentar a las empresas a mejorar la calidad de los empleos. Expone y valora diversos programas en marcha que persiguen este propósito, y aboga por que las actuaciones sean más coherentes y equilibradas. Defiende un planteamiento que conjugue dos facetas: los programas de formación profesional y desarrollo económico impulsados en colaboración con las empresas, y el fomento de la afiliación sindical y de la mejora de los salarios y las condiciones de trabajo. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the recent strength of the United States job market, about one fifth of the private-sector workforce is in poor-quality employment, earning poverty-level wages or less, with scant prospects for improvement. Against this background, the article focuses on demand-side policies, aimed at influencing firms' decision-making in the direction of better quality employment. Describing and evaluating a variety of programmes pursued to that end, the author argues for more policy coherence and a balanced approach combining training and economic development programmes working directly with employers, on the one hand, and increased unionization and better wage and working-time standards, on the other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The decline in the scope and power of American unions has led to a search for new strategies and new organizational forms to better succeed in representing the interests of employees in the labour market. This paper examines the role of community-based organizations of the sort that proved so powerful during the Civil Rights Movement. The subject of the paper is a strong national network of community organizations that is neighbourhood-based and draws heavily on churches and other community institutions. The organizations are put together in neighbourhoods, yet they also wield power at the city and state levels. The paper describes the organizations and examines and assesses their labour market policies. The second part of the paper takes up organizational issues and, in particular, describes how the structure and culture of these organizations enable them to avoid some of the organizational perils that have befallen unions and other social movement organizations. The paper concludes by comparing these organizations with traditional unions and by discussing their prospects for growth as well as their limitations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the 1980s, labor economists, industrial relations scholars, and organizational sociologists became fascinated with internal labor markets (ILM) and devoted a great deal of attention to describing these systems and to explaining why firms would choose to adopt them. Characteristically, many economists developed models explicating the rationality of these arrangements, while sociologists relied on imitation and social pressure as an explanation for their prevalence. Both camps were happy to run cross-sectional regressions searching for contemporaneous correlations with ILM practices. Into the void left by ahistorical theorizing stepped Sandy Jacoby, whose book "Employing Bureaucracy" quickly became the definitive history of modern empolyment systems and detailed the complex interaction of political and economic considerations that lay behind internal labor markets. With his book, "Modern Manors", Jacoby accomplishes the same feat with respect to a variant of formal internal labor markets, the nonunion model, and in doing so cements his status as the preeminent historian of employment relationships.

Explores the role conception of newly appointed urban principals within the context of school districts in the United States in order to identify personal and organizational forces that influence the emergence of transformational leadership. Failure of district leaders to support the principals; Survey on the principals' job performance; Principals' perspective on leadership.

While very popular in U.S. academic institutions, the lecture method suffers from a number of problems, most of which center around the lack of student involvement. The feedback lecture addresses this issue while satisfying both faculty and students. This article presents a case example and a discussion of the applicability of the feedback lecture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the relationship between skill, training and work organization in American firms. Hiring criteria; Skill level and skill trends; Variation in firm training practices; Quality practices; Skill changes.

In this paper we examine how the diffusion of technological innovation in the telecommunications industry influences employment levels across occupations and how a firm chooses among alternative personnel mechanisms to reach its target employment levels. We find that technological change has influenced the demand for different types of workers and has centralized office functions. The adjustment patterns to these demand changes differ by the union status, tenure, age, and gender composition of the affected occupations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reports on the results of case studies in four states regarding issues of concern that arise in employer-based training programs. Federal training policy; National policy initiatives; State-based employment and training programs; Targeting small and at-risk firms; Establishing general training standards; Building employer consortia; Agency-based programs; Education-based systems.

Examines the contribution of various size business establishments to job growth. Role of using gross versus net job generation as the measure of job generation contribution; David Birch's denial of his original findings that small businesses create at least a majority of all new jobs in the United States; Employment change over time; Industrial sector analysis.

The article examines disciplinary cases involving public employees in New York. The discipline of public employees had long been a difficult problem in New York State. The procedural framework for discipline was set by law and was found cumbersome and difficult to use. Progressive discipline culminating in binding arbitration offers an effective managerial tool to state agencies and procedural fairness to state employees. Section 75 of the Civil Service Law was the only available means of disciplining tenured civil servants prior to the negotiation of Article 33. Management and labor both agree that shortcomings and difficulties in the procedure prescribed by Section 75 limited its usefulness. Over the course of time, experience with the use of the procedure will enable management to start establishing appropriate penalty standards and guidelines. An employer as large and diversified as the State of New York is, of necessity, not a unity. There is an enormous variety among and within state agencies in the type of work performed and the type of work force employed. A positive aspect of decentralization of the procedure is that the agency-level hearing truly provides the employee with appeal to a higher level of administration.

The effectiveness of affirmative action efforts has been a topic of some controversy and the literature is unclear about whether women and/or minorities benefit. One source of confusion is that in some models the economy wide effect can be in a different direction than the effect upon regulated or covered individuals and firms. In a sense this is much like the minimum wage in that, while some individuals benefit, there is considerable controversy about the gains for target groups as a whole. This article has demonstrated that enforcement activities of the Federal Contract Compliance Program reduces quitting among female workers. Women employed in industries which receive greater OFCC attention and which are greater beneficiaries of federal purchases exhibit lower quit rates. The most likely explanation although one not directly tested is that these programs create better opportunities for women and hence increase their incentive to be stable employees. The results seem robust to two tests for possible sources of spuriousness.

The high unemployment rates experienced by teenagers, particularly those in minority groups, have been a continual source of public concern, a concern that led most recently to the passage of the $1.5 billion Youth Employment and Demonstration Projects Act. In attempting to understand this problem, it is helpful to examine the overall structure of the youth labor market. When young people leave high school and enter the labor market, they are generally not at once in a state of mind to be stable, reliable full-time employees. Rather, for many youths, sex, adventure and peer group activities are more important than work. Jobs are viewed in purely instrumental terms, as ways of getting money for these other activities. Young people who exhibit this pattern of behavior can be characterized as being in a moratorium stage. They have weak labor force attachments, frequently moving in and out of jobs as well as of the labor force itself. For many young people, particularly those whose families are in a position to provide some support, these secondary jobs adequately meet the requirements of the moratorium period.

The article presents a report that describes the characteristics of delivery and labor on the 2003 alteration of the U.S. Standard Certificate of Live Birth. The report reveals that approximately 60% of women in the reporting area obtained spinal or epidural anesthesia for pain relief during delivery and labor. The report shows that 47% of Hispanic women obtained spinal or epidural anesthesia during delivery or labor.