0000000001327171
AUTHOR
ÁLvaro Briz-redón
Estimating the occurrence of traffic accidents near school locations: A case study from Valencia (Spain) including several approaches
Traffic safety around school locations is a topic of particular interest given the large number of vulnerable users, such as pedestrians or cyclists, that commute to them at certain times of the day. A dataset of traffic accidents recorded in Valencia (Spain) during 2014 and 2015 is analyzed in order to estimate the effects that school locations produce on traffic risk within their surroundings. The four typologies of school in this city according to the academic levels they offer (All-level, Preschool, Primary, Secondary) are distinguished and taken into consideration for the analysis. Two time windows comprising the starting time in the morning and the evening time once day school has end…
Accounting for previous events to model and predict traffic accidents at the road segment level: A study in Valencia (Spain)
Abstract Predicting the occurrence of traffic accidents is essential for establishing preventive measures and reducing the impact of traffic accidents. In particular, it is fundamental to make predictions using fine spatio-temporal units. In this paper, the daily risk of traffic accident occurrence across the road network of Valencia (Spain) is modeled through logistic regression models. The spatio-temporal dependence between the observations is accounted for through the inclusion of lagged binary covariates representing the previous occurrence of a traffic accident within a spatio-temporal window centered at each combination of day and segment of the network. A temporal distance of 28 days…
Changing delta hepatitis patient profile: A single center experience in Valencia region, Spain
Background Delta hepatitis is a rare infection with an aggressive disease course. For almost three decades, however, there have been no epidemiological studies in our traditionally endemic area. Aim To investigate the prevalence of delta hepatitis in a sample of patients with chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection followed at a Hepatology Unit in Valencia, Spain. Methods Retrospective evaluation of anti-hepatitis D virus-immunoglobulin G seroprevalence among patients with chronic HBV infection (n = 605) followed at a reference Hepatology Unit in Spain. Results The prevalence of anti-hepatitis D virus-immunoglobulin G among HBV-infected patients was 11.5%: Male (63%) and median age of 52 …
Supplemental_material - The effect of climate on the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic: A review of findings, and statistical and modelling techniques
Supplemental_material for The effect of climate on the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic: A review of findings, and statistical and modelling techniques by Álvaro Briz-Redón and Ángel Serrano-Aroca in Progress in Physical Geography: Earth and Environment
Modeling accident risk at the road level through zero-inflated negative binomial models: A case study of multiple road networks
Abstract This paper presents a case study carried out in multiple cities of the Valencian Community (Spain) to determine the effect of sociodemographic and road characteristics on traffic accident risk. The analyzes are performed at the road segment level, considering the linear network representing the road structure of each city as a spatial lattice. The number of accidents observed in each road segment from 2010 to 2019 is taken as the response variable, and a zero-inflated modeling approach is considered. Count overdispersion and spatial dependence are also accounted for. Despite the complexity and sparsity of the data, the fitted models performed considerably well, with few exceptions.…
Identifying crime generators and spatially overlapping high-risk areas through a nonlinear model: A comparison between three cities of the Valencian region (Spain)
The behavior and spatial distribution of crime events can be explained through the characterization of an area in terms of its demography, socioeconomy, and built environment. In particular, recent studies on the incidence of crime in a city have focused on the identification of features of the built environment (specific places or facilities) that may increase crime risk within a certain radius. However, it is hard to identify environmental characteristics that consistently explain crime occurrence across cities and crime types. This article focuses on the assessment of the effect that certain types of places have on the incidence of property crime, robbery, and vandalism in three cities o…
Noise Disturbances and Calls for Police Service in València (Spain): A Logistic Model with Spatial and Temporal Effects
The purpose of this paper is to explore the presence of spatial and temporal effects on the calls for noise disturbance service reported to the Local Police of Valè
Investigation of the consequences of the modifiable areal unit problem in macroscopic traffic safety analysis: A case study accounting for scale and zoning.
Abstract Traffic safety analysis at the macroscopic level usually relies on previously defined areal traffic analysis zones (TAZs) that are used as the units of investigation. Hence, statistical inference is made on the basis of such units, implying that the consideration of a certain TAZ configuration may influence the results and conclusions achieved. Regarding this, the modifiable areal unit problem (MAUP) is a well-known issue in the field of spatial statistics, which refers to the effects that arise in statistical properties and estimations when there is a change in areal units of analysis. In this paper, the consequences of MAUP have been investigated through a dataset of traffic cras…
DRHotNet: An R package for detecting differential risk hotspots on a linear network
One of the most common applications of spatial data analysis is detecting zones, at a certain investigation level, where a point-referenced event under study is especially concentrated. The detection of this kind of zones, which are usually referred to as hotspots, is essential in certain fields such as criminology, epidemiology or traffic safety. Traditionally, hotspot detection procedures have been developed over areal units of analysis. Although working at this spatial scale can be suitable enough for many research or practical purposes, detecting hotspots at a more accurate level (for instance, at the road segment level) may be more convenient sometimes. Furthermore, it is typical that …
Accuracy of SCORTEN and ABCD‐10 to predict mortality and the influence of renal function in Stevens–Johnson syndrome/toxic epidermal necrolysis
Epidermal necrolysis (EN) compromises a spectrum of life-threatening dermatoses (Stevens-Johnson Syndrome [SJS], overlap syndrome and toxic epidermal necrolysis [TEN]). Currently, no active therapeutic regimen with unequivocal benefit exists for SJS/TEN. SCORTEN is the widely-used prognostic scale specific for SJS/TEN. Nevertheless, a new prognostic scale, the ABCD-10, has been recently proposed. In this context, acute renal failure (ARF) seems to be an important comorbidity that could influence prognosis in SJS/TEN patients more than it is assumed by these two scales. Our objectives were to compare the accuracy of the SCORTEN and ABCD-10 scales in predicting the mortality in SJS/TEN, and t…
Supplementary_file_Metropolis_Hastings – Supplemental material for Adjusting the Knox test by accounting for spatio-temporal crime risk heterogeneity to analyse near-repeats
Supplemental material, Supplementary_file_Metropolis_Hastings for Adjusting the Knox test by accounting for spatio-temporal crime risk heterogeneity to analyse near-repeats by Álvaro Briz-Redón, Francisco Martínez-Ruiz and Francisco Montes in European Journal of Criminology
A city-level analysis of air pollution, climate and COVID-19 early spread during the Spanish lockdown
AbstractThe COVID-19 outbreak has escalated into the worse pandemic of the present century. The fast spread of the new SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus has caused devastating health and economic crises all over the world, with Spain being one of the worst affected countries in terms of confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths per inhabitant. In this situation, the Spanish Government declared the lockdown of the country. The variations of air pollution in terms of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) levels in seven cities of Spain are analyzed here considering the effect of meteorology during the national lockdown. The possible associations of PM2.5pollution and climate with COVID-19 accumulated cases were als…
Adjusting the Knox test by accounting for spatio-temporal crime risk heterogeneity to analyse near-repeats
The near-repeat phenomenon usually occurs with any crime. Hence, to implement preventive measures, it is of great interest to figure out at which spatio-temporal scale crimes are more likely to be repeated by offenders. The Knox test is the most used statistical tool for evaluating the presence of the near-repeat phenomenon given a dataset of crimes that are located in space and time. The classic version of this test assumes that crime risk is homogeneous in both space and time, although this assumption rarely holds in reality. Therefore, the main goal of this article is to highlight the necessity of adjusting the standard version of the Knox test, including spatial and temporal effects th…
Do Social Chemophobic Attitudes Influence the Opinions of Secondary School Students?
For some time now, chemistry has not had a good reputation in society. The population identifies this discipline with industries and pollution, while its positive contributions are usually ignored. This fear of chemistry may affect the opinion of society toward not only science, but also the scientific work itself. To assess the prevalence of this social phenomenon among them, a group of 351 preuniversity students was surveyed and the answers provided were analyzed based on their characteristics (age, sex, and location). The results support the usefulness of the developed questionnaire and show that there already exists a tendency to reject everything “containing chemicals” or that “is not …
Spatial analysis of traffic accidents near and between road intersections in a directed linear network.
Although most of the literature on traffic safety analysis has been developed over areal zones, there is a growing interest in using the specific road structure of the region under investigation, which is known as a linear network in the field of spatial statistics. The use of linear networks entails several technical complications, ranging from the accurate location of traffic accidents to the definition of covariates at a spatial micro-level. Therefore, the primary goal of this study was to display a detailed analysis of a dataset of traffic accidents recorded in Valencia (Spain), which were located into a linear network representing more than 30 km of urban road structure corresponding t…
Accuracy of SCORTEN to predict the prognosis of Stevens‐Johnson syndrome/toxic epidermal necrolysis: a systematic review and meta‐analysis
BACKGROUND The SCORTEN score is a specific predictor of the probability of death for patients diagnosed with Stevens-Johnson syndrome (SJS)/toxic epidermal necrolysis (TEN). OBJECTIVES To evaluate the overall accuracy of SCORTEN and the influence of several moderators such as age, sex, geographical region and age of the study. METHODS A systematic search was performed on MEDLINE, The Cochrane Library, EMBASE, SCOPUS and Web of Knowledge, with no restriction on language (last update 5 February 2019 for all databases). Original studies on the use of SCORTEN were eligible. The standardized mortality ratio (SMR), defined as the quotient between the number of deaths observed and the number expec…
Systemic therapies for Stevens-Johnson Syndrome and Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis: a SCORTEN-based systematic review and meta-analysis.
Background The SCORTEN score is a specific predictor of mortality for patients with Stevens-Johnson syndrome (SJS)/toxic epidermal necrolysis (TEN). There is little evidence in support of the common immunomodulating therapies for SJS/TEN. Objectives To systematically assess the effectiveness of several therapies for SJS/TEN through the SCORTEN score. Methods Databases were searched for original studies on the use of SCORTEN. Six meta-analyses were carried out on patients with SJS/TEN who received supportive care only or in combination with immunomodulating drugs: corticosteroids, cyclosporine, etanercept, immunoglobulins or a combination of corticosteroids with immunoglobulins. A multivaria…
Reestimating a minimum acceptable geocoding hit rate for conducting a spatial analysis
Geocoding consists in converting a textual description of a location into coordinates. Hence, geocoding a dataset of events has to be carried out before performing a spatial analysis of some data. ...
Changes in air pollution during COVID-19 lockdown in Spain: a multi-city study
Highlights • Variations in air quality in terms of CO, SO2, PM10, O3 and NO2 levels were studied • The lockdown of Spain was not able to reduce severe air pollution in all its forms • Significant reductions of NO2 levels were achieved in most cities • Increases of O3 pollution levels were found in several cities
<em>Saccharomyces boulardii</em>: probiotic yeast for craft beer production, growth analysis and biovolume estimation
In recent years, an increase in the consumer interest has been observed for craft beers, which are unpasteurized and unfiltered. Thus, the use of probiotic starters remaining in the craft beers could significantly increase health benefits. Here, the first study on the use of the probiotic Sacharomyces boulardii (Sb) yeast as single starter for craft brewing at 20 L scale is presented. The probiotic biomass growth was studied in bioreactor batch culture and modelled by the logistic and Gompertz equations. Finally, the probiotic biovolume of Sb was estimated from microscopy images. All these experiments were compared with those obtained with a commercial Sacharomyces cerevisiae (Sc) yeast str…
The effect of climate on the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic: A review of findings, and statistical and modelling techniques
The new SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus has spread rapidly around the world since it was first reported in humans in Wuhan, China, in December 2019 after being contracted from a zoonotic source. This new virus produces the so-called coronavirus 2019 or COVID-19. Although several studies have supported the epidemiological hypothesis that weather patterns may affect the survival and spread of droplet-mediated viral diseases, the most recent have concluded that summer weather may offer partial or no relief of the COVID-19 pandemic to some regions of the world. Some of these studies have considered only meteorological variables, while others have included non-meteorological factors. The statistical and…
Crime Analysis of the Metropolitan Region of Santiago de Chile: A Spatial Panel Data Approach
The aim of our work is to determine the influence that socio-economic and demographic factors have had on crimes that have taken place during the period 2010–2018 in the communes of the Metropolitan Region of Chile, as well as the existence of possible spatial or temporal effects. We address 12 kinds of crime that we have grouped into two main types: against people and against property. Our interest focuses on crimes against people, using crimes against property as an additional covariate in order to investigate the existence of the broken-windows phenomenon in this context. The model chosen for our analysis is a spatial panel model with fixed effects. The results highlight that covariates …
Trends in Incidence and Transmission Patterns of COVID-19 in Valencia, Spain
Importance Limited information on the transmission and dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 at the city scale is available. Objective To describe the local spread of SARS-CoV-2 in Valencia, Spain. Design, Setting, and Participants This single-center epidemiological cohort study of patients with SARS-CoV-2 was performed at University General Hospital in Valencia (population in the hospital catchment area, 364 000), a tertiary hospital. The study included all consecutive patients with COVID-19 isolated at home from the start of the COVID-19 pandemic on February 19 until August 31, 2020. Exposures Cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection confirmed by the presence of IgM antibodies or a positive polymerase chain reacti…
Identification of differential risk hotspots for collision and vehicle type in a directed linear network
Traffic accidents can take place in very different ways and involve a substantially distinct number and types of vehicles. Thus, it is of interest to know which parts of a road structure present an overrepresentation of a specific type of traffic accident, specially for some typologies of collisions and vehicles that tend to trigger more severe consequences for the users being involved. In this study, a spatial approach is followed to estimate the risk that different types of collisions and vehicles present in the central area of Valencia (Spain), considering the accidents observed in this city during the period 2014-2017. A directed spatial linear network representing the non-pedestrian ro…
Novel pedagogical tool for simultaneous learning of plane geometry and R programming
Programming a computer is an activity that can be very beneficial to undergraduate students in terms of improving their mental capabilities, collaborative attitudes and levels of engagement in learning. Despite the initial difficulties that typically arise when learning to program, there are several well-known strategies to overcome them, providing a very high benefit-cost ratio to most of the students. Moreover, the use of a programming language usually raises the interest of students to learn any specific concept, which has caused that many teachers around the world employ a programming language as a learning environment to treat almost every possible topic. Particularly, mathematics can …