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Background Existing evidence indicates Black patients have higher incidence of pulmonary embolism (PE) and PE‐related mortality compared with other races/ethnicities, yet disparities in presenting severity and treatment remain incompletely understood. Methods and Results We retrospectively queried a multihospital healthcare system for all hospitalizations for acute PE (2012–2019). Of 10 329 hospitalizations, 8743 met inclusion criteria. Black patients (14.3%) were significantly younger (54.6±17.8 versus 63.1±16.6 years; P <0.001) and more female (56.1% versus 51.6%; P =0.003) compared with White patients. Using ordinal regression, Black race was significantly associated with higher PE severity after matching 1:3 on age and sex (1210:3264; odds ratio [OR], 1.08; 95% CI, 1.03–1.14), adjusting for clinical (OR, 1.13; 95% CI, 1.01–1.27), and socioeconomic (OR, 1.05; 95% CI, 1.05–1.35) characteristics. Among intermediate and high‐severity PE, Black race was associated with a decreased risk of intervention controlling for the competing risk of mortality and censoring on hospital discharge. This effect was modified by PE severity ( P value <0.001), with a lower and higher risk of intervention for intermediate and high‐severity PE, respectively. Race was not associated with in‐hospital mortality (OR, 0.84; 95% CI, 0.69–1.02). Conclusions Black patients hospitalized with PE are younger with a higher severity of disease compared with White patients. Although Black patients are less likely to receive an intervention overall, this differed depending on PE severity with higher risk of intervention only for life‐threatening PE. This suggests nuanced racial disparities in management of PE and highlights the complexities of healthcare inequalities.

Driven by critical race theory, this essay employs composite counterstorytelling to narrate the experiences of black male faculty on traditionally white campuses. Situated at the intersections of race and gender, our composite counterstory is richly informed by 11 interviews with black male faculty alongside critical race scholarship that documents the omnipresence of black misandric ideology. Through our protagonist Dr Timesnow, a black male Assistant Professor, we reflect on how his daily experiences incite racial battle fatigue, feed into imposter syndrome, and circumvent an inclusive campus community.

Objective To determine whether and how transcription factor Erg participates in the genesis, establishment and maintenance of articular cartilage. Methods Floxed Erg mice were mated with Gdf5-Cre mice to create conditional mutants lacking Erg in their joints. Mutant and control joints were subjected to morphological and molecular characterization and also experimental osteoarthritis (OA) surgery. Gene expression, promoter reporter assays and gain- and loss-of-function in vitro tests were used to characterize molecular mechanisms of Erg action. Results Conditional Erg ablation did not elicit obvious changes in limb joint development and overall phenotype in juvenile mice. Over aging, however, mutant joints became spontaneously deranged and exhibited clear OA-like phenotypic defects. Mutant joints in juvenile mice were more sensitive to surgically induced OA and became defective sooner than operated control joints. Global gene expression data and other studies identified PTHrP and lubricin as possible downstream effectors and mediators of Erg action in articular chondrocytes. Reporter assays using control and mutated promoter/enhancer constructs did indicate that Erg acted on ets DNA binding sites to stimulate PTHrP expression. ERG was up-regulated in severely affected areas in human OA articular cartilage, but remained barely appreciable in less affected cartilage areas. Conclusion The study shows for the first time that Erg is a critical molecular regulator of articular cartilage’s endurance over postnatal life and ability to mitigate spontaneous and experimental OA. Erg appears to do so through its regulation of PTHrP and lubricin expression, factors known for their protective roles in joints.

To date, there are no general overviews of feminist and queer game studies, though there are several core texts, edited collections, and special journal issues. Much of feminist game studies might more rightly be called women’s game studies, as the feminist goals of the work were largely focused on ethnographic and qualitative scholarship on women and girls who play and make games. Research on masculinity in games comprises a much smaller subcategory of research. A related but separate thread of this work includes feminist analyses of game texts, as well as feminist critical game making praxis. Importantly, feminist game studies has existed for as long as game studies has been around (being formally named as such around the year 2000), questioning essentialist and hegemonic approaches to gender differences in game play and production. However, it took several years for feminist game scholarship on the whole to adopt an intersectional approach that could account for how gender presentation, sex, sexuality, race, age, embodiment, and so on shape game play experiences, the game industry, and textual representation. As feminist game scholarship became more intersectional, moreover, queer game studies (which has many overlaps with feminist game studies) coalesced in the early 2010s, owning in part to a slow but increasing acceptance of game analysis in departments more traditionally associated with queer theory (such as comparative literature and film studies departments). Moreover, an increase in mainstream representations and discussions of sexuality, a critical mass of game studies work on gender and sexuality, the rise of a queer indie game movement (due in part to new distribution channels and free design software), and academic conferences such as Different Games and the Queerness and Games Conference, all helped lead to a proliferation of queer game studies work. Similar to the trajectory of earlier feminist game studies, early work in this area focused on analyses of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) game content, players, and the game industry. The emergence of queer game studies communities, however, also corresponded with queer game design communities taking a queer approach to games beyond literal forms of representation. Moreover, queer game scholarship has come to represent a new paradigm through which queerness as a lens is used to question norms of design, play, and representation.