Preventive medicine
-
Preventive medicine · Mar 2007
Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative StudyRecruiting pregnant smokers into a clinical trial: using a network-model managed care organization versus community-based practices.
Recruiting pregnant smokers into smoking cessation intervention trials is challenging. Changes in health care systems offer new opportunities to overcome many of the obstacles encountered by researchers attempting to address the significant harm from maternal smoking. Investigators could facilitate smoking cessation study recruitment by collaborating with health care systems that systematically collect patient smoking status and record it in a centralized, retrievable fashion. This paper reports the results of utilizing this novel approach and compares it with a typical decentralized practice-based recruitment strategy. ⋯ A recruitment strategy using a health plan's centralized system was more efficient than a practice-based recruitment strategy at identifying potential study participants, but less efficient at generating study participants from the referrals received. Importantly, participants recruited by the two strategies differed by socioeconomic, but not cessation-related, characteristics. To date, recruiting pregnant smokers into intervention studies remains resource intensive and time consuming. Participant identification and recruitment will be greatly enhanced by health system innovations such as implementation of electronic medical records.
-
Preventive medicine · Mar 2007
Randomized Controlled TrialFighting cancer with fitness: dietary outcomes of a randomized, controlled lifestyle change intervention in healthy African-American women.
This study tested the efficacy of an 8-week, culturally targeted community-based nutrition and physical activity promotion intervention, Fight Cancer with Fitness! (FCF). ⋯ This individually targeted cancer prevention intervention produced beneficial effects on dietary quality that were sustained for at least 12 months.
-
Preventive medicine · Feb 2007
Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter Study Clinical TrialA cluster randomized controlled trial of school-based prevention of tobacco, alcohol and drug use: the EU-Dap design and study population.
The empirical evidence of effectiveness of many school-based programs against substance abuse is rather weak. The EU-Dap study is a multicenter cluster randomized community trial (CRCT) designed to evaluate such a program. This paper presents study design and baseline characteristics of the study population. ⋯ EU-Dap is the first European multicenter randomized study to evaluate the effectiveness of a school program targeting tobacco, alcohol and drug use. The baseline assessment showed high prevalence and wide geographical variations of substance use.
-
Preventive medicine · Feb 2007
Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical TrialEvaluating a community-based walking intervention for hypertensive older people in Taiwan: a randomized controlled trial.
To study the effect of a community-based walking intervention on blood pressure among older people. ⋯ Among hypertensive older people, a six-month community-based walking intervention was effective in increasing their exercise self-efficacy and reducing systolic blood pressure.
-
Preventive medicine · Jul 2006
Randomized Controlled TrialInfluencing healthful food choices in school and home environments: results from the TEENS study.
The purpose of this research is to examine the effects of an intervention designed to increase the availability of fruits, vegetables and lower fat foods in homes and schools. This research is part of the TEENS study, a school-based intervention study. ⋯ Our results show mixed results for positively influencing adolescents' school and home environments.