Integrated Community Strategies for Linking Youth to Adolescent Reproductive Health Services: A Case Study.

PURPOSE: This article describes the development and promotion of a full-service adolescent health center at a local health department intended to increase teen access to contraceptive and reproductive health care. This work was conducted as part of a multicomponent, community-based teen pregnancy prevention initiative in Gaston County, North Carolina. METHODS: To increase access to adolescent reproductive health services, we implemented multiple integrated strategies: (1) building community support for adolescent reproductive health services; (2) providing technical assistance to the health department in opening the Teen Wellness Center (TWC), a teen-centered, full-service clinic; (3) strengthening referral partnerships between community organizations and clinical services; and (4) educating teens on how to access reproductive health services. Data were collected to examine the change in the number of adolescent reproductive health clients after the opening of the TWC. RESULTS: In the first year, the TWC was opened, 1,675 adolescent clients received reproductive health services, for a 12.5% increase compared with the prior year. The number of adolescent clients who received more than one type of reproductive health services (e.g., wellness visit and family planning services) increased by 133%. The number of adolescent clients who received family planning services increased by 3.8%. CONCLUSIONS: The project achieved an increase in adolescent reproductive health clients. Establishment of a teen-centered, full-service clinic and working with youth-serving agencies to increase knowledge of the clinic's services are promising approaches to increasing teen access to reproductive health care.

Monodisperse cobalt ferrite nanomagnets with uniform silica coatings.

Ferro- and ferrimagnetic nanoparticles are difficult to manipulate in solution as a consequence of the formation of magnetically induced nanoparticle aggregates, which hamper the utility of these particles for applications ranging from data storage to bionanotechnology. Nonmagnetic shells that encapsulate these magnetic particles can reduce the interparticle magnetic interactions and improve the dispersibility of the nanoparticles in solution. A route to create uniform silica shells around individual cobalt ferrite nanoparticles--which uses poly(acrylic acid) to bind to the nanoparticle surface and inhibit nanoparticle aggregation prior to the addition of a silica precursor--was developed. In the absence of the poly(acrylic acid) the cobalt ferrite nanoparticles irreversibly aggregated during the silica shell formation. The thickness of the silica shell around the core-shell nanoparticles could be controlled in order to tune the interparticle magnetic coupling as well as inhibit magnetically induced nanoparticle aggregation. These ferrimagnetic core-silica shell structures form stable dispersion in polar solvents such as EtOH and water, which is critical for enabling technologies that require the assembly or derivatization of ferrimagnetic particles in solution.

Self-assembled diisocyanide monolayer films on gold and palladium.

Self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) of the aromatic diisocyanides, 1,4-phenylenediisocyanide, 2,3,5,6-tetramethyl-1,4-phenylenediisocyanide, 4,4'-biphenyldiisocyanide, 3,3',5,5'-tetramethyl-4,4'-biphenyldiisocyanide, and 4,4' '-p-terphenyldiisocyanide, were prepared on gold and palladium surfaces. The SAMs were characterized by ellipsometry, polarization-modulated infrared reflection-absorption spectroscopy (PM-IRRAS), and grazing-angle attenuated total reflectance infrared spectroscopy (GATR). Based on the position of the metal-coordinated isocyanide stretching band, the SAMs on gold were found to bind in the terminal (eta(1)) geometry, while the SAMs on palladium prefer a different geometry which is possibly a triply bridging (mu(3)-eta(1)) geometry. A side-reaction of the unbound isocyanide in the SAM was identified as oxidation to an isocyanate group.