Excessive patient loads were the greatest cause of moral distress among health personnel during the pandemic

UNIVERSITY OF CÓRDOBA

 

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RESEARCHERS CRISTINA BELTRÁN, ELOY GIRELA AND MANUEL ROMERO 

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CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF CÓRDOBA

Being a woman, a nursing professional, and working in the community sphere increased the risk of moral distress (MD), according to a study by the University of Cordoba carried out among more than 500 professionals with the Public Health Service of Andalusia in a period immediately after the COVID-19 PANDEMIC

Moral distress is the psychological harm that arises when people are forced to witness or perform actions that clash with their moral values. It is a problem that affects healthcare professionals, who are often exposed to hardships, long shifts, stress, and high levels of responsibility. During the pandemic, while society saw them as heroes, these professionals suffered high levels of moral distress.

"Worryingly high" levels of moral stress are recorded in the recent work published by Eloy Girela, Cristina Beltrán and Manuel Romero, researchers at the University of Cordoba who evaluated the prevalence of this problem among professionals in different areas of the Public Health Service of Andalusia during the early post-pandemic period.

"Our most significant findings were that women, nurses and those who work in the community sphere (primary care and emergency community services) face a higher risk of moral stress," explained Eloy Girela, a researcher in the Legal and Forensic Medicine Area.

The study was carried out with a sample of 566 professionals spanning Primary Care, Palliative Care, Intensive Care, Internal Medicine, Pulmonology and ER, services that apparently "featured more moral conflicts during the pandemic because there was a scarcity of resources to care for patients, so they had to make decisions entailing great responsibility," says Girela.

To evaluate the level of moral stress suffered by these professionals, and obtain the predictors associated with this problem, the team validated and used the MMD-HP-SPA (Measure of Moral Distress for Healthcare Professionals), developed in 2019 and which has 27 items  corresponding to situations experienced by these workers.

"We obtained a significantly higher level of moral distress than in other similar studies, an aspect that we found worrisome," said Manuel Romero, a researcher with the Department of Nursing, Pharmacology and Physiotherapy.

Being a woman, working in Nursing, and being dedicated to community services increases the risk of suffering from it, but so does a lack of health care resources. "Having to care for more patients than I can, safely," "a lack of resources, equipment, or beds," and "seeing patient care suffer from a lack of continuous care" were the three factors that generated the most moral distress in participants, according to the study.

This situation not only affects the physical and mental health of health personnel, but also that of patients as well. "The institutional response is fundamental," say the authors of this study, who see institutional organization and greater funding for services as solutions to the situations of excessive patient loads and scant resources suffered by the health personnel. "Training, the existence of protocols, a more ethical climate, work-life balance strategies, and actions more focused on each service," proposes Legal and Forensic Medicine researcher Cristina Beltrán.

With this study, almost simultaneously with another published by a Galician team (Rodríguez-Ruiz et al. 2022), the MMD-HP-SPA scale was validated in Spain.

Ascertaining why being a woman is a risk factor, and the relationship between moral distress and  burnout, are among the lines of study that the research team will explore to address this problem affecting society's health.

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JOURNAL

BMC Medical Ethics

DOI

10.1186/s12910-024-01041-z 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Measuring moral distress in healthprofessionalsusingthe MMD-HP-SPA scale

 

One in 5 adults in Canada without access to primary care

CANADIAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION JOURNAL

More than 1 in 5 adults in Canada did not have access to primary care, with large regional gaps in access, found new research in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) https://www.cmaj.ca/lookup/doi/10.1503/cmaj.231372.

“Translated to the population of Canada, our survey estimates that more than 6.5 million adults across the country don’t have access to a family doctor or nurse practitioner they can see regularly,” says Dr. Tara Kiran, a family physician and researcher at the MAP Centre for Urban Health Solutions at St. Michael’s Hospital, Unity Health Toronto and the University of Toronto. “And even those lucky enough to have a family doctor are struggling to get timely care for urgent concerns or care on evenings and weekends.”

As part of an 18-month, across-Canada initiative to develop a vision with patients and the public for primary care called OurCare, researchers conducted a survey to understand people’s values and experiences with primary care. They analyzed data from more than 9200 people via survey, with 73% of surveys in English and 27% in French to provide a national overview.

“What is most surprising is the provincial variation in access to primary care,” says Dr. Kiran. “Primary care is the front door to the health care system — the first point of access for acute concerns, managing chronic disease, preventing illness, and helping people access other supports. It is simply unconscionable that in some parts of the country, this door is now closed for almost one-third of the population.”

In Quebec and the Atlantic provinces, almost 1 in 3 people reported they did not have a primary care clinician, even after the authors adjusted for differences in age, gender, education, and other demographic characteristics of survey respondents. People in Ontario were most likely to report having a primary care clinician. Men, people younger than 65 years, and those with poor health were less likely to have a primary care clinician.

People with primary care clinicians also reported challenges in accessing care, as most practices did not offer appointments outside of usual weekday 9–5 hours, and more than half of respondents said they could not get an urgent appointment within 3 days of attempting to book. Many turn to walk-in clinics, which do not provide continuity of care, something that patients indicated was important.

The research team notes that 90% of survey respondents would be comfortable with getting care from another member of a primary care health team, suggested internationally as one solution to address the primary care crisis. Yet less than 15% of respondents reported that their primary care clinician worked with a social worker or pharmacist or dietitian. There was substantial provincial variation, with the odds of working with any health professional lower for people living outside Ontario and Quebec.

“The crisis in access to primary care is in stark contrast to the values that people in Canada hold dear — that everyone should have access to health care regardless of where they live and who they are,” says Dr. Kiran.

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JOURNAL

Canadian Medical Association Journal

DOI

10.1503/cmaj.231372 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Survey

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Public experiences and perspectives of primary care in Canada: results from a cross-sectional survey

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

21-May-2024

 

Addressing homelessness in older people

CANADIAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION JOURNAL

Homelessness doesn’t only happen to young people but also affects older adults in growing numbers, write authors in an analysis in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) that describes this emerging crisishttps://www.cmaj.ca/lookup/doi/10.1503/cmaj.231493.

People experiencing homelessness are considered older adults at age 50, as visible aging is often evident at younger ages in individuals experiencing homelessness compared with individuals who have secure housing. Individuals experiencing homelessness often develop chronic medical conditions earlier, as well as age-related conditions like cognitive impairment.

As well, the risk of premature death for older people experiencing homelessness is 3.5 times higher than for those who are housed, and the risk is especially high for people experiencing homelessness for the first time late in life.

In 2021, 32% of people in Canadian shelters were aged 50 and older. There are also many older people living outdoors or living temporarily with friends or family.

“Older adults experiencing homelessness deserve shelter policies and government strategies that consider their care needs, and age-friendly shelters that have adequate physical environments, appropriate staffing, and access to required medical services,” writes Dr. Jillian Alston, a geriatrician at St. Michael’s Hospital, Unity Health Toronto, with coauthors. “Older adults experiencing homelessness may have faced substantial marginalization, dehumanization, and structural violence, and care models should prioritize trust, rapport building, and ensuring personal safety.

To support older adults at risk of and experiencing homelessness, adequate housing that supports individual needs is essential. Conditions that become more common with aging, like cognitive impairment and mobility concerns, can make maintaining housing more difficult for some older adults. Some solutions to prevent homelessness include tenancy monitoring programs, individualized in-home supports, and community programs that address isolation. In-shelter health care programs, such as primary care and geriatric outreach programs can help support older adults living in shelters. Innovative permanent supportive housing such as The Oaks in Ottawa, and other housing models that support aging in the right place can help provide appropriate homes for older people experiencing homelessness to relocate to. For some, the most appropriate environment to support their needs will be long-term care homes.

Addressing this growing problem requires collaboration between health, long-term care, public health, and housing and other community supports. As well, trauma-informed approaches are important for those who have experienced adversity and trauma earlier in their lives.  

“Without urgent action, older adults experiencing homelessness will remain marginalized, undergo early aging, and continue to be at risk for deterioration and death in shelters and other temporary accommodations that are neither equipped nor designed to meet their needs,” conclude the authors.

“The human toll of homelessness is immense,” writes Dr. Andrew Boozary, a primary care physician and executive director of the UHN Gattuso Centre for Social Medicine, Toronto, with coauthors Dr. Catherine Varner, CMAJ deputy editor and emergency medicine physician, and CMAJ editor Dr. Andreas Laupacis in an editorial https://www.cmaj.ca/lookup/doi/10.1503/cmaj.240649. “People who are chronically unhoused live half as long as those who are housed, experience accelerated aging, have many more comorbidities, and develop health conditions at a much younger age than those who are housed. Homelessness disproportionately affects Indigenous, Black, refugee and newcomer, and 2SLGBTQ+ people.”

To help address this chronic problem, some health networks are building affordable housing for unhoused people — a novel approach that the authors say speaks to the magnitude of the homelessness crisis.

“The fact that hospitals are dedicating scarce resources to provide housing is a testament to how undeniable the homelessness crisis has become and how ineffective and costly conventional approaches, such as lengthy hospital admissions, have been,” they write.

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JOURNAL

Canadian Medical Association Journal

DOI

10.1503/cmaj.231493 

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Tackling late-life homelessness in Canada

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

21-May-2024

 

Improving the effectiveness of earthquake early warning systems

Researchers propose improving phone alerts to enhance emergency response times based on their study of Japanese earthquake alert reactions

DOSHISHA UNIVERSITY

 

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DESPITE THE WIDESPREAD USE OF MOBILE PHONES FOR DELIVERING EMERGENCY ALERTS, CURRENT SYSTEMS DO NOT PROMPT RECIPIENTS TO TAKE PROTECTIVE ACTION. BY EXAMINING PEOPLE'S RESPONSES TO ALERTS, THE RESEARCHERS PROPOSE SEVERAL MEASURES TO ENHANCE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF ALERT SYSTEMS.

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CREDIT: IMAGE CREDIT: FLASH FLOOD WARNING- CELL PHONE WIRELESS EMERGENCY ALERT BY TONY WEBSTER

Mobile phones have become invaluable for receiving emergency alerts such as weather warnings, evacuation notices and notifications about missing persons. In Japan, where earthquakes are frequent, they are vital for delivering earthquake warnings and advising people to take protective actions beforehand. To deal with such situations promptly, the Earthquake Early Warning (EEW) system sends out notifications to areas expected to experience strong tremors by detecting primary seismic waves (P-waves) that arrive before the secondary waves (S-waves). However, the short time between receiving the notification and the arrival of S-waves requires immediate response from individuals in affected areas.

But this is not always the case as Professor Kazuya Nakayachi from the Faculty of Psychology, Doshisha University, Japan, explains: “Designers of the disaster information system assume that those who receive an emergency alert will immediately take protective action, but this is rarely the case. People stay still looking at their cell phone screens receiving the alert.” Surveys conducted in Japan found that despite advanced warnings, people fail to take protective actions.

To determine why individuals might not act upon receiving such warnings delivered through mobile phones, Prof. Nakayachi, along with Dr. Ryosuke Yokoi from Kyoto Tachibana University and Dr. James Goltz from Kyoto University conducted two surveys, investigating people’s responses immediately after receiving EEW alerts on their mobile phones between 2021 and 2023. Their findings, published online in the International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction on 15 April 2024, aim to improve the effectiveness of EEW alerts to reduce the risk of injury or fatalities during earthquakes.

The researchers collected responses from participants affected by the 6.0 magnitude earthquake in Chiba Prefecture, which occurred on October 1, 2021, and the 6.3 magnitude earthquake in Ishikawa Prefecture on May 5, 2023. To determine the initial reactions to the alerts, the participants were asked the following question: “When you received the EEW alert on your mobile phone, what did you do first and what did you do next?”

Out of 3000 participants who experienced the earthquake at Chiba, about 34% said that their first reaction was to pay attention to their mobile phones by listening to the alert or checking the screen. Out of the 829 participants who checked their phone screens as their first reaction, only 51 participants said that they took protective measures as their second reaction. But, 36% of the participants said that they did not take any action upon receiving the alert. Instead, they waited for the tremors to begin and stayed still. Only 7% took immediate steps to protect themselves, and 10% listed protective actions as their second response.

Similar reactions were observed in the group from Ishikawa Prefecture. Out of 1000 responses, 46% of participants reported paying attention to their mobile phones as their first reaction, with only 20 participants taking protective measures as their second reaction. Additionally, 30-40% of participants did not take any protective actions, and less than 10% acted immediately upon receiving the EEW alert. The results suggest that the EEW alert was ineffective at prompting the intended response from the recipients.

To address this, the researchers suggest three measures. First, to prevent people from wasting time unnecessarily looking at their phones for more information, further, they propose conducting nationwide emergency drills to train people to react immediately when peoples receive EEW alerts on their phones. Second, they recommend maintaining a safe environment at home, work, and school by securing furniture and storing heavy items near the ground. This can help protect people when it is difficult to take protection actions during an earthquake. Lastly, the researchers suggest that adding clear instructions like 'protect yourself now' to EEW alert messages would encourage people to react immediately.

With the widespread availability of mobile phones, many governments are increasingly sending alerts through these devices. However, as the study shows, it is not just about delivering the message; the system needs to ensure that the alert motivates people to act.

“To improve the effectiveness of warning systems, researchers and practitioners should consider not only the delivery of warnings to the public but also track their behavioral and psychological reactions after receiving these warnings,” says Prof. Nakayachi.
 

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About Professor Kazuya Nakayachi from Doshisha University, Japan
Kazuya Nakayachi is a professor in the Faculty of Psychology at the Department of Psychology. He specializes in the fields of risk perception, trust, and humanities & social sciences, with a focus on social psychology. He has held prestigious positions in various universities and research societies and has published numerous papers on risk analysis, human behavior, and disaster preparedness in reputed scientific journals.

Funding information
This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI [grant number 20H01756]

Media contact:
Organization for Research Initiatives & Development
Doshisha University
Kyotanabe, Kyoto 610-0394, JAPAN
E-mail：jt-ura@mail.doshisha.ac.jp

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JOURNAL

International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction

DOI

10.1016/j.ijdrr.2024.104401 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Human behavioral response to earthquake early warnings (EEW): Are alerts received on mobile phones inhibiting protective actions?

 

Screen time not the main factor making parent-child interactions worse, study finds

Researchers investigated if ‘technoference’ has worse effects on parent-child interactions than non-digital distractions and found that distraction itself – not its source – may be to blame

FRONTIERS

Technology use is at an all-time high and understanding how this impacts daily life is crucial. When it comes to parent-child interactions, scientists have coined the term ‘technoference,’ meaning technology interference. It occurs when parent-child interaction and communication are disrupted by the use of digital devices.

But is distraction caused by digital devices more detrimental to parent-child interaction than when parental distraction comes from different sources? Researchers in Switzerland have investigated.

“In this study, we show that when parents are distracted, the quality and quantity of parent-child interaction is impaired compared to when parents are not being distracted,” said Prof Nevena Dimitrova, a researcher at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Western Switzerland and principal investigator of the study published in Frontiers in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. “This was regardless of if that distraction came from a digital or a non-digital activity.”

Screening distraction

Although the negative impact of parents being distracted by their phones while around their children has been established, less is known about whether these negative effects come from the fact that the parent uses a screen or from the fact that the parent is distracted in general.

To fill this gap, the team around Dimitrova tasked 50 parent-child pairs, in which children were 22 months old on average, to play together for 10 minutes. Participant pairs were divided in three groups. In the first group, there was no disruption. In the second group, after five minutes of play, the parent was given a questionnaire to fill out on paper, whereas in the third group, also after five minutes, the parent was instructed to fill out the same questionnaire using a tablet. Parents that filled out the questionnaire were instructed to continue interacting with their children.

The researchers found that parents who filled out the questionnaire were less sensitive to children’s communication signals, and that children showed lower levels of social involvement towards their parents.

Technoference, however, did not affect parent-child interactions more negatively than non-digital distractions. Instead, all distraction, regardless of whether it was caused by screens or pen and paper, had negative effects on parents, children, and pairs. “We interpret this finding—that was equally surprising for us—as the possibility that screens are so ubiquitous nowadays that young children might be becoming used to the reality of seeing their parents use screens,” said Dimitrova.

Regardless of their findings, the researchers stressed that parent-child interaction is at its best when parents are not distracted at all. This might be especially important for parents who find it difficult to bond with their children.

Curbing a ‘moral panic’

In the media, mostly alarmistic messages about the risks of screen use are discussed, said the researchers. However, research does not support the thesis that screen use by or in the presence of children is exclusively bad. For example, positive effects of screens on child psychological development have been shown in previous research.

“This study shows how important it is to rely on scientific evidence rather that public opinion about screen use. We see that it’s not screens per se that are detrimental to the quality of parent-child interaction,” concluded Dimitrova. “Instead, it seems to be the fact that the parent is not fully engaged in the interaction that negatively impacts parent-child communication.”

The researchers, however, also pointed out that it is difficult to make definitive statements about parental screen use based on one study alone. This is partly because everyday parent-child interaction differs from the experimental set-up. For example, the ways in which parents use screen while around their children cannot always be replicated fully. Studies in naturalistic context are needed and might lead to different results, the scientists noted.

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JOURNAL

Frontiers in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry

DOI

10.3389/frcha.2024.1330331 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Effects of Digital and Non-digital Parental Distraction on Parent-Child Interaction and Communication

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

21-May-2024

 

The first homo sapiens facilitated the establishment of the Bonelli's eagle in the Mediterranean 50,000 years ago

A study led by Spanish researchers shows that European ancestors altered the relationship between Bonelli's eagles and their major competitors, golden eagles

UNIVERSIDAD MIGUEL HERNANDEZ DE ELCHE

 

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BONELLI’S EAGLES (AQUILA FASCIATA) TOLERATE HUMAN PRESENCE BETTER THAN LARGER COMPETITORS SUCH AS GOLDEN EAGLES (A. CHRYSAETOS), ENABLING THE FORMER TO INHABIT RELATIVELY HUMANIZED AREAS. THIS COULD EXPLAIN WHY BONELLI’S EAGLES SEEMED TO ESTABLISH IN THE MEDITERRANEAN BASIN ONLY AFTER THE ARRIVAL OF THE FIRST EUROPEANS.

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CREDIT: TONY PERAL.

Spanish and Portuguese scientists have unraveled the ancestral history of one of the most iconic birds of prey in the current Iberian fauna, the Bonelli's eagle (Aquila fasciata). The work, published in the scientific journal People and Nature, integrates evidence from various disciplines, such as paleontology, genetics, and ecology, to answer questions about when and why the Bonelli's eagle, a species primarily found in tropical and subtropical regions, colonized the Mediterranean basin. The study is led by the University of Granada with participation from researchers in the Ecology area of the Miguel Hernández University of Elche (UMH).

As Professor Marcos Moleón Paiz, from the Department of Zoology at UGR and the article's lead author, explains, "The Bonelli's eagle is a 'newcomer' to Europe. This species probably began establishing itself in the Mediterranean basin around 50,000 years ago. In contrast, others, like the golden eagle (A. chrysaetos), have been present here much longer, as fossil records attest."

Spatial analyses conducted in the study show that Bonelli's eagle is significantly disadvantaged during cold climatic periods, unlike the golden eagle. "During the last glacial period, the Bonelli's eagle could only find refuge in warm coastal areas, precisely where its oldest fossils have been found." Eva Graciá, a professor of Ecology at UMH, notes that "genetic analyses confirmed that around the last glacial maximum, the Mediterranean population of Bonelli's eagles must have been formed by few individuals." This ancestral population thrived as the temperature in the Mediterranean basin rose, and the human population grew and became sedentary.

Once the 'when' was resolved, the team sought to understand why Bonelli's eagle began to establish itself in the Mediterranean during such a climatically challenging period and why it settled there during the last glacial cycle and not before.

The Role of Our Ancestors

According to Moleón, "After testing several alternative hypotheses, all pieces of the puzzle indicated that the early European settlers of our species (Homo sapiens) played a fundamental role."

This study collected and analyzed the most comprehensive information on the competitive interactions between Bonelli's eagles and golden eagles today. This allowed them to confirm that in this relationship, the golden eagle is the 'dominant' species and the Bonelli's eagle the 'subordinate' species. The results showed that Bonelli's eagles can only survive where golden eagles are scarce, mainly in highly humanized areas.

"Our mathematical models indicated that if we were able to eliminate all golden eagle pairs in climatically favorable areas, we would expect a strong increase in the number of Bonelli's eagle pairs, but not vice versa," the researchers explain. The study also states that golden eagles can kill Bonelli's eagles and usurp their territories, which does not happen the other way around.

It is noteworthy that golden eagles are less tolerant of humans than Bonelli's eagles. The authors hypothesize that with the arrival of the first anatomically modern humans in Europe, some of the golden eagle territories closest to human settlements were abandoned, and these 'vacant' territories began to be occupied by Bonelli's eagles from the Middle East. In short, Bonelli's eagles could not have established themselves in the Mediterranean before the arrival of the first Homo sapiens because the competitive pressure exerted by golden eagles and other species would have been too overwhelming.

Living Near or Far from Humans?

The researchers point out that humans can modify species distributions is nothing new. The novelty of this study lies in revealing a mechanism called 'human-mediated competitive release' by which our species, including our ancestors, could indirectly modify the distribution of other species, including long-lived ones. However, the advantage that living near humans once provided for the Bonelli's eagle has turned against it today. "Ironically, the future of the Bonelli's eagle in the Mediterranean is currently threatened by the relentless intensification of human activities in the environment, leading to mortality from power lines, prey scarcity, and disturbances in nesting areas, among other threats," the authors conclude. "The conservation of threatened species like large eagles will undoubtedly benefit from knowledge derived from large-scale spatial and temporal ecological processes," notes UMH Professor Toni Sánchez Zapata.

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JOURNAL

People and Nature

DOI

10.1002/pan3.10642 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Computational simulation/modeling

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animal tissue samples

ARTICLE TITLE

Wildlife following people: A multidisciplinary assessment of the ancient colonization of the Mediterranean Basin by a long-lived raptor

 

Can coal mines be tapped for rare earth elements?

New research documents elevated levels of the critical minerals, needed for energy transition, above and below coal seams in Utah and Colorado

UNIVERSITY OF UTAH

 

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UNIVERSITY OF UTAH GEOLOGIST LAUREN BIRGENHEIER INSPECTS SAMPLES AT COAL PROCESSING WASTE PILE.

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CREDIT: MICHAEL VANDEN BERG, UTAH GEOLOGICAL SURVEY

Deposits of designated critical minerals needed to transition the world’s energy systems away from fossil fuels may, ironically enough, be co-located with coal deposits that have been mined to produce the fossil fuel most implicated in climate change.

Now, research led by the University of Utah has documented elevated concentrations of a key subset of critical minerals, known as rare earth elements, or REEs, in active mines rimming the Uinta coal belt of Colorado and Utah.

These findings open the possibility that these mines could see a secondary resource stream in the form of metals used in renewable energy and numerous other high-tech applications, according to study co-author Lauren Birgenheier, an associate professor of geology and geophysics.

“The model is if you're already moving rock, could you move a little more rock for resources towards energy transition?” Birgenheier said. “In those areas, we're finding that the rare earth elements are concentrated in fine-grain shale units, the muddy shales that are above and below the coal seams.”

This research was conducted in partnership with the Utah Geological Survey and Colorado Geological Survey as part of the Department of Energy-funded Carbon Ore, Rare Earth and Critical Minerals project, or CORE-CM. The new findings will form the basis for a grant request of an additional $9.4 million in federal funding to continue the research.

While these metals are crucial for U.S. manufacturing, especially in high-end technologies, they are largely sourced from overseas.

"When we talk about them as 'critical minerals,' a lot of the criticality is related to the supply chain and the processing," said Michael Free, a professor metallurgical engineering and the principal investigator on the DOE grant. "This project is designed around looking at some alternative unconventional domestic sources for these materials."

The association between coal and REE deposits has been well documented elsewhere, but little data had been previously gathered or analyzed in Utah and Colorado’s coal fields.

“The goal of this phase-one project was to collect additional data to try and understand whether this was something worth pursuing in the West,” said study co-author Michael Vanden Berg, Energy and Minerals Program Manager at the Utah Geological Survey. “Is there rare earth element enrichment in these rocks that could provide some kind of byproduct or value added to the coal mining industry?”

Researchers analyzed 3,500 samples from 10 mines, four mine waste piles, seven stratigraphically complete cores, and even some coal ash piles near power plants.

“The coal itself is not enriched in rare earth elements,” Vanden Berg said. “There's not going to be a byproduct from mining the coal, but for a company mining the coal seam, could they take a couple feet of the floor at the same time? Could they take a couple feet of the ceiling? Could there be potential there? That's the direction that the data led us.”

The team deployed two different methods to record levels of rare earths, expressed in parts per million, or ppm, in the samples. One was a hand-held device for quick readings in the field, the other used Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry, or ICP-MS, in an on-campus lab.

“We’re mostly using this portable x-ray fluorescence device, which is an analysis gun that we hold to the rock for two minutes, and it only gives us five or six of the 17 rare earth elements,” Birgenheier said. If samples showed concentrations higher than 200 ppm, they ran a more complete analysis using the more costly mass spectrometry equipment.

The Department of Energy has set 300 ppm as the minimum concentration for rare earth mining to be potentially economically viable. But for the study, researchers deemed concentrations greater than 200 ppm to be considered “REE enriched.”

The study found the highest prevalence of such concentrations in coal-adjacent formations of siltstone and shale, while sandstone and the coal itself were mostly devoid of rare earths.

The team has analyzed 11,000 samples to date, far more than were used in the published study. Next steps include determining how much rare earth ore is present, likely to be done with colleagues at the University of Wyoming and New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.

Michael Vanden Berg, geologist with the Utah Geological Survey, examines a coal outcrop near Utah's old Star Point mine.

CREDIT

Lauren Birgenheier, University of Utah

Titled "Rare earth element enrichment in coal and coal-adjacent strata of the Uinta Region, Utah and Colorado," the study appeared April 26 in Frontiers of Earth Science.

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JOURNAL

Frontiers of Earth Science

DOI

10.3389/feart.2024.1381152 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Rare earth element enrichment in coal and coal-adjacent strata of the Uinta Region, Utah and Colorado