Gender disparities in access to care for time-sensitive conditions during COVID-19 pandemic in Chile

Background During the COVID-19 pandemic, reductions in healthcare utilization are reported in different contexts. Nevertheless, studies have not explored specifically gender disparities in access to healthcare in the context of COVID-19. Methods To evaluate gender disparities in access to medical in Chile we conducted an interrupted time series analysis using segmented regression. The outcome variable was the number of weekly confirmed cases of a set of oncologic and cardiovascular time-sensitive conditions at a national level. The series contained data from weeks 1 to 39 for 2017 to 2020. The intervention period started at week 12. We selected this period because preventive interventions, such as school closures or teleworking, were implemented at this point. We estimated the level effect using a dummy variable indicating the intervention period and slope effect using a continuous variable from weeks 12 to 39. To test heterogeneity by gender and age group, we conducted a stratified analysis. Results We observed a sizable reduction in access to care with a slowly recovery for oncologic (level effect 0.323; 95% CI 0.291–0.359; slope effect 1.022; 95% CI 1.016–1.028) and cardiovascular diseases (level effect 0.586; 95% CI 0.564–0.609; slope effect 1.009; 95% CI 1.007–1.011). Greater reduction occurred in women compared to men, particularly marked on myocardial infarction (level effect 0.595; 95% CI 0.566–0.627 versus 0.532; 95% CI 0.502–0.564) and colorectal cancer (level effect 0.295; 95% CI 0.248–0.35 versus 0.19; 95% CI 0.159–0.228). Compared to men, a greater absolute reduction was observed in women for oncologic diseases, excluding sex-specific cancer, (1352; 95% CI 743–1961) and cardiovascular diseases (1268; 95% CI 946–1590). Conclusion We confirmed a large drop in new diagnoses for time-sensitive conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic in Chile. This reduction was greater for women. Our findings should alert policy-makers about the urgent need to integrate a gender perspective into the pandemic response.

Investigating Emotion Dynamics and Its Association with Multimedia Content During Video Watching Through EEG Microstate Analysis

Emotions dynamically change in response to ever-changing environments. It is of great importance, both clinically and scientifically, to investigate the neural representation and evoking mechanism of emotion dynamics. But, there are many unknown places in this stream of research, such as consistent and conclusive findings are still lacking. In this work, we perform an in-depth investigation of emotion dynamics under a video-watching task by gauging the dynamic associations among evoked emotions, electroencephalography (EEG) responses, and multimedia stimulation. Here, we introduce EEG microstate analysis to study emotional EEG signals, which provides a spatial-temporal neural representation of emotion dynamics. To investigate the temporal characteristics of evoking emotions during video watching with its neural mechanism, we conduct two studies from the perspective of EEG microstates. In Study 1, the dynamic microstate activities under different emotion states and emotion levels are explored to identify EEG spatial-temporal correlates of emotion dynamics. In Study 2, the stimulation effects of multimedia content (visual and audio) on EEG microstate activities are examined to learn about the involved affective information and investigate the emotion-evoking mechanism. The results show that emotion dynamics could be well reflected by four EEG microstates (MS1, MS2, MS3, and MS4). Specifically, emotion tasks lead to an increase in MS2 and MS4 coverage but a decrease in MS3 coverage, duration, and occurrence. Meanwhile, there exists a negative association between valence and MS4 occurrence as well as a positive association between arousal and MS3 coverage and occurrence. Further, we find that MS4 and MS3 activities are significantly affected by visual and audio content, respectively. In this work, we verify the possibility to reveal emotion dynamics through EEG microstate analysis from sensory and stimulation dimensions, where EEG microstate features are found to be highly correlated to different emotion states (emotion task effect and level effect) and different affective information involved in the multimedia content (visual and audio). Our work deepens the understanding of the neural representation and evoking mechanism of emotion dynamics, which can be beneficial for future development in the applications of emotion decoding and regulation.

Goldilocks at the dawn of complex life: mountains might have damaged Ediacaran–Cambrian ecosystems and prompted an early Cambrian greenhouse world

We combine U–Pb in-situ carbonate dating, elemental and isotope constraints to calibrate the synergy of integrated mountain-basin evolution in western Gondwana. We show that deposition of the Bambuí Group coincides with closure of the Goiás-Pharusian (630–600 Ma) and Adamastor (585–530 Ma) oceans. Metazoans thrived for a brief moment of balanced redox and nutrient conditions. This was followed, however, by closure of the Clymene ocean (540–500 Ma), eventually landlocking the basin. This hindered seawater renewal and led to uncontrolled nutrient input, shallowing of the redoxcline and anoxic incursions, fueling positive productivity feedbacks and preventing the development of typical Ediacaran–Cambrian ecosystems. Thus, mountains provide the conditions, such as oxygen and nutrients, but may also preclude life development if basins become too restricted, characterizing a Goldilocks or optimal level effect. During the late Neoproterozoic-Cambrian fan-like transition from Rodinia to Gondwana, the newborn marginal basins of Laurentia, Baltica and Siberia remained open to the global sea, while intracontinental basins of Gondwana became progressively landlocked. The extent to which basin restriction might have affected the global carbon cycle and climate, e.g. through the input of gases such as methane that could eventually have collaborated to an early Cambrian greenhouse world, needs to be further considered.

Spending More on the Poor? A Comprehensive Summary of State-Specific Responses to School Finance Reforms from 1990–2014

Sixty-seven school finance reforms (SFRs), a combination of court-ordered and legislative reforms, have taken place since 1990; however, there is little empirical evidence on the heterogeneity of SFR effects. In this study, we estimate the effects of SFRs on revenues and expenditures between 1990 and 2014 for 26 states. We find that, on average, per pupil spending increased, especially in low-income districts relative to high-income districts. However, underlying these average effect estimates, the distribution of state-level effect sizes ranges from negative to positive—there is substantial heterogeneity. When predicting SFR impacts, we find that multiple state-level SFRs, union strength, and some funding formula components are positively associated with SFR effect sizes in low-income districts. We also show that, on average, states without SFRs adopted funding formula components and increased K-12 state revenues similarly to states with SFRs.

Assessing income tax perturbations

We present a scheme for analysing income tax perturbations, applied to a real Norwegian tax reform during 2016–2018. The framework decomposes the reform into a structural reform part and a tax level effect. The former consists of a distributional impact and a social efficiency effect measured as the behavioural-induced change in tax revenue. Considering the overall welfare effect conditional on inequality aversion, we back out the pivotal value of the decision makers’ inequality aversion, according to which unfavourable redistributional effects exactly cancel out a social efficiency enhancement.

Psychological Profile in Female Cyclists and Its Relationship with Age, Training Parameters, Sport Performance, and Injury Incidence

Previous studies have highlighted the importance of psychology on sports performance and its relationship with the incidence of sport injuries. The objectives of the present investigation were: (1) to analyze the psychological profile of female cyclists as a function of age, training parameters, sport performance, and injuries suffered and (2) to design a model to predict their psychological profile. Sixty-one female cyclists participated in the study. Differences were found as a function of a competitive category for team cohesion (F = 5.035; p = 0.002), sport level effect on performance evaluation (F = 5.030; p = 0.004) and team cohesion (F = 64.706; p = 0.000), the effect of having reached the podium in the last competition on performance evaluation (t = 2.087; p = 0.041) and motivation (t = 4.035; p = 0.000), and injury severity on stress management (F = 6.204; p = 0.008). The factors that affected the psychological profile of the female cyclists the most, in addition to the independent psychological parameters, were the number of podiums in the last year and the years of cycling experience. In conclusion, there is an interaction between the psychological profile, sociodemographic variables, training, performance, and injuries suffered in female cyclists.

Gender disparities in access to care for time-sensitive conditions during COVID-19 pandemic in Chile

Background: During the COVID-19 pandemic reduction on the utilization of healthcare services are reported in different contexts. Nevertheless, studies have not explored specifically gender disparities on access to healthcare in the context of covid-19. Methods: To evaluate gender disparities in access to medical in Chile we conducted an interrupted time series design using a segmented regression. The outcome variable was the number of weekly confirmed cases of a set of oncologic and cardiovascular time-sensitive conditions at a national level. The series contained data from week 1 to 39 for 2017 to 2020. Intervention period started at week 12. We selected this period because preventive interventions, such as school closures or teleworking, were implemented at this point. We estimated level effect using a dummy variable indicating the intervention period and slope effect using a continuous variable from week 12 to 39. To test heterogeneity by sex and age-group, we conducted stratified analysis. Results: We observed a sizable reduction in access to care with a slowly recovery for oncologic (level effect 0,323; 95% CI 0,291-0,359; slope effect 1,022; 95% CI 1,016-1,028) and cardiovascular diseases (level effect 0,586; 95% CI 0,564-0,609; slope effect 1,009; 95% CI 1,007-1,011). Greater reduction occurred in women compared to men, particularly marked on myocardial infarction (level effect 0,595; 95% CI 0,566-0,627 versus 0,532; 95% CI 0,502-0,564) and colorectal cancer (level effect 0,295; 95% CI 0,248-0,35 versus 0,19; 95% CI 0,159-0,228). Compared to men, a greater absolute reduction was observed in women for oncologic diseases, excluding sex-specific cancer, (1.352; 95% CI 743-1.961) and cardiovascular diseases (1.268; 95% CI 946-1.590). Conclusion: We confirmed a large drop in new diagnosis for time-sensitive conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic in Chile. This reduction was greater for women. Our findings should alert policy-makers about the urgent need to integrate a gender perspective into the pandemic response.