INTRODUCTION Although county-level obesity estimates are necessary for planning and evaluating community-based interventions, the quality of these data has never been examined. OBJECTIVES To evaluate the reliability of the county-level obesity prevalence estimates from Wisconsin's 72 counties and to highlight the variation of obesity among Wisconsin counties. METHODS Obesity prevalence data...

The State of Tennessee consists of 95 counties endowed with abundant forest resources that encompass more than 13.3 million acres. The forest products industries in Tennessee consist of two major industries: the primary and secondary wood processing industries. This study examined if there are differences among counties in the primary wood processing industries as related to employment, payroll...

Certificate of Need (CON) laws, state laws requiring providers to obtain licenses before adopting health-care technology, have been controversial. The effect of CON on technology supply has not been well established. In part this is because analyses have focused on state-level supply effects, which may reflect either the consequence of CON regulation on supply or the cause for its adoption or r...

BACKGROUND Appalachia is a region of the United States noted for the poverty and poor health outcomes of its residents. Residents of the poorest Appalachian counties have a high prevalence of diabetes and risk factors (obesity, low income, low education, etc.) for type 2 diabetes. However, diabetes prevalence exceeds what these risk factors alone explain. Based on this, the history of poor heal...

In May 2012, the Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services noted that 23 cases of gonorrhea were reported in Roosevelt County during October 2011-March 2012, compared with only three cases during January-September 2011. An analysis of surveillance data for Roosevelt County and the six other Montana counties most closely associated with American Indian (AI) reservations showed that,...

BACKGROUND Defecating in the open predisposes people to soil transmitted helminthes and diarrhoeal diseases. An estimated 5.6 million Kenyans defecate in the open. Kenya launched a program to eradicate open defecation by 2013 in the rural areas. By end of 2013, only two sub-counties had eliminated open defecation. These are Nambale and Nyando. The study looked at the impact of eradicating open ...

BACKGROUND The intent of this investigation was to study the distribution of obstetric providers and prenatal care utilization in Wisconsin and analyze the potential impact of these factors on the frequency of low birth weight. METHODS State perinatal vital statistics and physician professional association surveys were used to compare the frequency of low birth weight, physician distribution,...

Introduction: There is concern about cancer risk from living near nuclear power plants (NPP). Different studies yield different results and this study seeks to add to the body of knowledge on the topic. Methods: Using an ecological design, pair-wise comparisons were made for cancer death rates (CDR) in three county classifications for U.S. NPPs: counties where a NPP was located, counties that b...

BACKGROUND Counties are the smallest unit for which mortality data are routinely available, allowing consistent and comparable long-term analysis of trends in health disparities. Average life expectancy has steadily increased in the United States but there is limited information on long-term mortality trends in the US counties This study aimed to investigate trends in county mortality and cross...

Nosema is a genus of microsporidia, which have significant negative impacts on honeybees. The aim of this study is the epidemiological evaluation and molecular characterization of Nosema spices in various counties of East-Azerbaijan province (Northwest of Iran). 387 samples were collected from colonies maintained in various counties of East-Azerbaijan province. Samples after preparation were ex...