M Patricia Fabian
Biographic Data
| ID | 1273073 |
|---|---|
| NAME | M Patricia Fabian |
| GIVEN NAMES | M Patricia |
| FAMILY NAME | Fabian |
| SIGNATURE | FABIAN M P |
| AFFILIATIONS | Boston University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1658-3349 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 14 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 20 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2011 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Communication recovery in the classroom: A mixed-methods evaluation of a pilot program
Introduction Classrooms are environments for learning and growth, yet they also present opportunities for microaggressions to occur that may perpetuate feelings of exclusion in various educational contexts. Communication recovery frameworks offer guidance on how to engage in discussions that include diverse viewpoints, emphasizing the importance of empathy, humility, and active listening. Objective In this study, we implemented and evaluated a pi…
High populations near fossil fuel energy infrastructure across the supply chain and implications for an equitable energy transition
Fossil fuel energy infrastructure poses health risks for local communities, primarily due to the presence of air pollution emissions and other hazards. There is also evidence of racial/ethnic disparities in the siting of this infrastructure for select components. However, population counts and demographic composition near fossil fuel energy infrastructure have not been systematically characterized across all types, supply chain stages, and predom…
Evaluating Covid-19 Risk to Essential Workers by Occupational Group: A Case Study in Massachusetts
Occupational exposure to SARS-CoV-2 varies by profession, but “essential workers” are often considered in aggregate in COVID-19 models. This aggregation complicates efforts to understand risks to specific types of workers or industries and target interventions, specifically towards non-healthcare workers. We used census tract-resolution American Community Survey data to develop novel essential worker categories among the occupations designated as…
The role of sensors and community engagement in the mission toward equitable, healthy cities
The role of sensors and community engagement in the mission toward equitable, healthy cities, Amy Mueller, M. Patricia Fabian, Bianca Navarro-Bowman, Barbara Espinosa Barrera, Yasser Aponte, Ben Cares, Karl Allen, Roseann Bongiovanni, Madeleine Scammel
Carbon, indoor air, energy and financial benefits of coupled ventilation upgrade and enhanced rooftop garden installation: An interdisciplinary climate mitigation approach
Building energy use contributes to urban carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions while inadequate ventilation can yield indoor CO2 build up from human respiration. However, increasing ventilation rates can add to energy costs and climate burdens. Our objective was to quantify changes in emissions, energy, and financial cost when rooftop garden and ventilation upgrades are done simultaneously, with an opportunity to enhance plant growth from exhausted CO2.…
Missing Race and Ethnicity Data among Covid-19 Cases in Massachusetts
Infectious disease surveillance frequently lacks complete information on race and ethnicity, making it difficult to identify health inequities. Greater awareness of this issue has occurred due to the COVID-19 pandemic, during which inequities in cases, hospitalizations, and deaths were reported but with evidence of substantial missing demographic details. Although the problem of missing race and ethnicity data in COVID-19 cases has been well docu…
Simulating Energy Use, Indoor Temperatures, and Utility Cost Impacts Amidst a Warming Climate in a Multi-family Housing Model
Facilitators and Barriers for Keeping Cool in an Urban Heat Island: Perspectives from Residents of an Environmental Justice Community
This research highlights the importance of understanding perceptions of residents in EJ communities to contextualize vulnerability and identify multipronged heat coping strategies and targeted interventions
Mixed methods assessment of personal heat exposure, sleep, physical activity, and heat adaptation strategies among urban residents in the Boston area, MA
The growing frequency, intensity, and duration of extreme heat events necessitates interventions to reduce heat exposures. Local opportunities for heat adaptation may be optimally identified through collection of both quantitative exposure metrics and qualitative data on perceptions of heat. In this study, we used mixed methods to characterize heat exposure among urban residents in the area of Boston, Massachusetts, US, in summer 2020. Repeated i…
Medicaid Expansion and Change in Federally Qualified Health Center Accessibility From 2008 to 2016
BACKGROUND: The Affordable Care Act expanded health coverage for low-income residents through Medicaid expansion and increased funding for Health Center Program New Access Points from 2009 to 2015, improving federally qualified health center (FQHC) accessibility. The extent to which these provisions progressed synergistically as intended when states could opt out of Medicaid expansion is unknown. OBJECTIVE: To compare change in FQHC accessibility…
Prenatal Ambient Particulate Matter Exposure and Longitudinal Weight Growth Trajectories in Early Childhood
Air pollution exposure during pregnancy has been associated with impaired fetal growth and postnatal weight gain, but few studies have examined the effect on weight growth trajectories. We examine the association between validated 1 km 2 resolution particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) concentrations, averaged over pregnancy, and sex-specific growth trajectories from birth to age six of participants in the Boston-based Children's HealthWatch cohort (4797 …
Racial Disparities in Associations between Neighborhood Demographic Polarization and Birth Weight
Neighborhood demographic polarization, or the extent to which a privileged population group outnumbers a deprived group, can affect health by influencing social dynamics. While using birth records from 2001 to 2013 in Massachusetts ( n = 629,675), we estimated the effect of two demographic indices, racial residential polarization (RRP) and economic residential polarization (ERP), on birth weight outcomes, which are established predictors of the n…
Estimating the Combined Effects of Natural and Built Environmental Exposures on Birthweight among Urban Residents in Massachusetts
Intrauterine growth has health implications both in childhood and adulthood. Birthweight is partially determined by prenatal environmental exposures. We aim to identify important predictors of birthweight out of a set of environmental, built environment exposures, and socioeconomic environment variables during pregnancy (i.e., fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ), temperature, greenness, walkability, noise, and economic indices). We included all sin…
Effects of Maternal Homelessness, Supplemental Nutrition Programs, and Prenatal PM2.5 on Birthweight
Few studies examined the impact of maternal socioeconomic status and of its combined effects with environmental exposures on birthweight. Our goal was to examine the impact of maternal homelessness (mothers ever homeless or who lived in shelters during pregnancy) and participation in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) during pregnancy in conjunction with air pollution exposure on birthweight in the Bo…
Neighborhood Greenness Attenuates the Adverse Effect of PM2.5 on Cardiovascular Mortality in Neighborhoods of Lower Socioeconomic Status
Features of the environment may modify the effect of particulate matter ≤2.5 μm in aerodynamic diameter (PM 2.5 ) on health. Therefore, we investigated how neighborhood sociodemographic and land-use characteristics may modify the association between PM 2.5 and cardiovascular mortality. We obtained residence-level geocoded cardiovascular mortality cases from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health ( n = 179,986), and PM 2.5 predictions from …
Consumption of Contaminated Seafood in an Environmental Justice Community: A Qualitative and Spatial Analysis of Fishing Controls
New Bedford Harbor (NBH) in Massachusetts was listed as a Superfund site in 1983 due to extensive contamination with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) from industrial pollution. Since 1999, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has posted signage and fencing in areas around NBH to discourage fishing activity, along with distributing consumption advisories locally. This exploratory study combined qualitative and geographic information syst…
Residential Proximity to Roadways and Ischemic Placental Disease in a Cape Cod Family Health Study
Exposure to air pollution may adversely impact placental function through a variety of mechanisms; however, epidemiologic studies have found mixed results. We examined the association between traffic exposure and placental-related obstetric conditions in a retrospective cohort study on Cape Cod, MA, USA. We assessed exposure to traffic using proximity metrics (distance of residence to major roadways and length of major roadways within a buffer ar…
Community-Engaged Modeling of Geographic and Demographic Patterns of Multiple Public Health Risk Factors
Many health risk factors are intervention targets within communities, but information regarding high-risk subpopulations is rarely available at a geographic resolution that is relevant for community-scale interventions. Researchers and community partners in New Bedford, Massachusetts (USA) collaboratively identified high-priority behaviors and health outcomes of interest available in the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). We deve…
Modeling Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) Infiltration in Low-Income Multifamily Housing before and after Building Energy Retrofits
Secondhand exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) in multifamily housing remains a health concern despite strong recommendations to implement non-smoking policies. Multiple studies have documented exposure to ETS in non-smoking units located in buildings with smoking units. However, characterizing the magnitude of ETS infiltration or measuring the impact of building interventions or resident behavior on ETS is challenging due to the comple…
Moving Environmental Justice Indoors: Understanding Structural Influences on Residential Exposure Patterns in Low-Income Communities
Objectives. The indoor environment has not been fully incorporated into the environmental justice dialogue. To inform strategies to reduce disparities, we developed a framework to identify the individual and place-based drivers of indoor environment quality. Methods. We reviewed empirical evidence of socioeconomic disparities in indoor exposures and key determinants of these exposures for air pollutants, lead, allergens, and semivolatile organic …
Moving Environmental Justice Indoors: Understanding Structural Influences on Residential Exposure Patterns in Low-Income Communities
Objectives. The indoor environment has not been fully incorporated into the environmental justice dialogue. To inform strategies to reduce disparities, we developed a framework to identify the individual and place-based drivers of indoor environment quality. Methods. We reviewed empirical evidence of socioeconomic disparities in indoor exposures and key determinants of these exposures for air pollutants, lead, allergens, and semivolatile organic …
Moving Environmental Justice Indoors: Understanding Structural Influences on Residential Exposure Patterns in Low-Income Communities
Objectives. The indoor environment has not been fully incorporated into the environmental justice dialogue. To inform strategies to reduce disparities, we developed a framework to identify the individual and place-based drivers of indoor environment quality. Methods. We reviewed empirical evidence of socioeconomic disparities in indoor exposures and key determinants of these exposures for air pollutants, lead, allergens, and semivolatile organic …
Modeling Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) Infiltration in Low-Income Multifamily Housing before and after Building Energy Retrofits
Secondhand exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) in multifamily housing remains a health concern despite strong recommendations to implement non-smoking policies. Multiple studies have documented exposure to ETS in non-smoking units located in buildings with smoking units. However, characterizing the magnitude of ETS infiltration or measuring the impact of building interventions or resident behavior on ETS is challenging due to the comple…
Consumption of Contaminated Seafood in an Environmental Justice Community: A Qualitative and Spatial Analysis of Fishing Controls
New Bedford Harbor (NBH) in Massachusetts was listed as a Superfund site in 1983 due to extensive contamination with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) from industrial pollution. Since 1999, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has posted signage and fencing in areas around NBH to discourage fishing activity, along with distributing consumption advisories locally. This exploratory study combined qualitative and geographic information syst…
Residential Proximity to Roadways and Ischemic Placental Disease in a Cape Cod Family Health Study
Exposure to air pollution may adversely impact placental function through a variety of mechanisms; however, epidemiologic studies have found mixed results. We examined the association between traffic exposure and placental-related obstetric conditions in a retrospective cohort study on Cape Cod, MA, USA. We assessed exposure to traffic using proximity metrics (distance of residence to major roadways and length of major roadways within a buffer ar…
Community-Engaged Modeling of Geographic and Demographic Patterns of Multiple Public Health Risk Factors
Many health risk factors are intervention targets within communities, but information regarding high-risk subpopulations is rarely available at a geographic resolution that is relevant for community-scale interventions. Researchers and community partners in New Bedford, Massachusetts (USA) collaboratively identified high-priority behaviors and health outcomes of interest available in the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). We deve…
Effects of Maternal Homelessness, Supplemental Nutrition Programs, and Prenatal PM2.5 on Birthweight
Few studies examined the impact of maternal socioeconomic status and of its combined effects with environmental exposures on birthweight. Our goal was to examine the impact of maternal homelessness (mothers ever homeless or who lived in shelters during pregnancy) and participation in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) during pregnancy in conjunction with air pollution exposure on birthweight in the Bo…
Neighborhood Greenness Attenuates the Adverse Effect of PM2.5 on Cardiovascular Mortality in Neighborhoods of Lower Socioeconomic Status
Features of the environment may modify the effect of particulate matter ≤2.5 μm in aerodynamic diameter (PM 2.5 ) on health. Therefore, we investigated how neighborhood sociodemographic and land-use characteristics may modify the association between PM 2.5 and cardiovascular mortality. We obtained residence-level geocoded cardiovascular mortality cases from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health ( n = 179,986), and PM 2.5 predictions from …
Prenatal Ambient Particulate Matter Exposure and Longitudinal Weight Growth Trajectories in Early Childhood
Air pollution exposure during pregnancy has been associated with impaired fetal growth and postnatal weight gain, but few studies have examined the effect on weight growth trajectories. We examine the association between validated 1 km 2 resolution particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) concentrations, averaged over pregnancy, and sex-specific growth trajectories from birth to age six of participants in the Boston-based Children's HealthWatch cohort (4797 …
Racial Disparities in Associations between Neighborhood Demographic Polarization and Birth Weight
Neighborhood demographic polarization, or the extent to which a privileged population group outnumbers a deprived group, can affect health by influencing social dynamics. While using birth records from 2001 to 2013 in Massachusetts ( n = 629,675), we estimated the effect of two demographic indices, racial residential polarization (RRP) and economic residential polarization (ERP), on birth weight outcomes, which are established predictors of the n…
Estimating the Combined Effects of Natural and Built Environmental Exposures on Birthweight among Urban Residents in Massachusetts
Intrauterine growth has health implications both in childhood and adulthood. Birthweight is partially determined by prenatal environmental exposures. We aim to identify important predictors of birthweight out of a set of environmental, built environment exposures, and socioeconomic environment variables during pregnancy (i.e., fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ), temperature, greenness, walkability, noise, and economic indices). We included all sin…
Facilitators and Barriers for Keeping Cool in an Urban Heat Island: Perspectives from Residents of an Environmental Justice Community
This research highlights the importance of understanding perceptions of residents in EJ communities to contextualize vulnerability and identify multipronged heat coping strategies and targeted interventions
Mixed methods assessment of personal heat exposure, sleep, physical activity, and heat adaptation strategies among urban residents in the Boston area, MA
The growing frequency, intensity, and duration of extreme heat events necessitates interventions to reduce heat exposures. Local opportunities for heat adaptation may be optimally identified through collection of both quantitative exposure metrics and qualitative data on perceptions of heat. In this study, we used mixed methods to characterize heat exposure among urban residents in the area of Boston, Massachusetts, US, in summer 2020. Repeated i…
Medicaid Expansion and Change in Federally Qualified Health Center Accessibility From 2008 to 2016
BACKGROUND: The Affordable Care Act expanded health coverage for low-income residents through Medicaid expansion and increased funding for Health Center Program New Access Points from 2009 to 2015, improving federally qualified health center (FQHC) accessibility. The extent to which these provisions progressed synergistically as intended when states could opt out of Medicaid expansion is unknown. OBJECTIVE: To compare change in FQHC accessibility…
Carbon, indoor air, energy and financial benefits of coupled ventilation upgrade and enhanced rooftop garden installation: An interdisciplinary climate mitigation approach
Building energy use contributes to urban carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions while inadequate ventilation can yield indoor CO2 build up from human respiration. However, increasing ventilation rates can add to energy costs and climate burdens. Our objective was to quantify changes in emissions, energy, and financial cost when rooftop garden and ventilation upgrades are done simultaneously, with an opportunity to enhance plant growth from exhausted CO2.…
Missing Race and Ethnicity Data among Covid-19 Cases in Massachusetts
Infectious disease surveillance frequently lacks complete information on race and ethnicity, making it difficult to identify health inequities. Greater awareness of this issue has occurred due to the COVID-19 pandemic, during which inequities in cases, hospitalizations, and deaths were reported but with evidence of substantial missing demographic details. Although the problem of missing race and ethnicity data in COVID-19 cases has been well docu…
Simulating Energy Use, Indoor Temperatures, and Utility Cost Impacts Amidst a Warming Climate in a Multi-family Housing Model
Evaluating Covid-19 Risk to Essential Workers by Occupational Group: A Case Study in Massachusetts
Occupational exposure to SARS-CoV-2 varies by profession, but “essential workers” are often considered in aggregate in COVID-19 models. This aggregation complicates efforts to understand risks to specific types of workers or industries and target interventions, specifically towards non-healthcare workers. We used census tract-resolution American Community Survey data to develop novel essential worker categories among the occupations designated as…
The role of sensors and community engagement in the mission toward equitable, healthy cities
The role of sensors and community engagement in the mission toward equitable, healthy cities, Amy Mueller, M. Patricia Fabian, Bianca Navarro-Bowman, Barbara Espinosa Barrera, Yasser Aponte, Ben Cares, Karl Allen, Roseann Bongiovanni, Madeleine Scammel
High populations near fossil fuel energy infrastructure across the supply chain and implications for an equitable energy transition
Fossil fuel energy infrastructure poses health risks for local communities, primarily due to the presence of air pollution emissions and other hazards. There is also evidence of racial/ethnic disparities in the siting of this infrastructure for select components. However, population counts and demographic composition near fossil fuel energy infrastructure have not been systematically characterized across all types, supply chain stages, and predom…
Communication recovery in the classroom: A mixed-methods evaluation of a pilot program
Introduction Classrooms are environments for learning and growth, yet they also present opportunities for microaggressions to occur that may perpetuate feelings of exclusion in various educational contexts. Communication recovery frameworks offer guidance on how to engage in discussions that include diverse viewpoints, emphasizing the importance of empathy, humility, and active listening. Objective In this study, we implemented and evaluated a pi…
Medicine (15 works) · Environmental health (13 works) · Demography (9 works) · Geography (8 works) · Population (8 works) · Environmental Science (7 works) · Climate Change and Health Impacts (6 works) · Demography (6 works) · Gerontology (6 works) · Air Quality and Health Impacts (5 works)