Targeting and Tailoring Health Communications in Breast Screening Interventions

Family Involvement in Asian American Health Interventions: A Scoping Review and Conceptual Model

Family members play a crucial role in the health of Asian American communities, and their involvement in health interventions can be pivotal in optimizing impact and implementation. To explore how family members can be effectively involved in Asian American health interventions and develop a conceptual framework of methods of involvement at the stages of intervention development, process, and evaluation, this scoping review documented the role of Asian American family members in interventions (across any health objective). Of the 7175 studies identified through database and manual searches, we included 48 studies in the final analysis. Many studies focused on Chinese (54%) or Vietnamese (21%) populations, were conducted in California (44%), and involved spouses (35%) or parents/children (39%). We observed involvement across 3 stages: (1) intervention development (formative research, review process, material development), (2) intervention process (recruitment, receiving the intervention together, receiving a parallel intervention, enlisting support to achieve goals, voluntary intervention support, agent of family-wide change, and participation gatekeepers), and (3) intervention evaluation (received evaluation together, indirect impact evaluation, and feedback during intervention). Impact of family member involvement was both positive (as sources of encouragement, insight, accountability, comfort, and passion) and negative (sources of hindrance, backlash, stigma, obligation, and negative influence). Suggestions for future research interventions include (1) exploring family involvement in South Asian or young adult interventions, (2) diversifying types of family members involved (eg, extended family), and (3) diversifying methods of involvement (eg, family members as implementation agents).

The nature and impact of patient and public involvement in cancer prevention, screening and early detection research: A systematic review

Patient and public involvement can produce high-quality, relevant research that better addresses the needs of patients and their families. This systematic review investigated the nature and impact of patient and public involvement in cancer prevention, screening and early detection research. Two patient representatives were involved as members of the review team. Databases (Medline, EMBASE, Emcare, Involve Evidence Library) were searched for English-language studies published 1995-March 2022. Titles/abstracts were screened by two reviewers independently. For eligible studies, data were extracted on study characteristics, patient and public involvement (who, when, how, and impact on research outcomes), and reporting quality using the Guidance for Reporting Involvement of Patients and the Public 2-Short Form. Of 4095 articles screened, 58 were eligible. Most research was from the United States (81%) and examined cancer screening or prevention (82%). Community members/organisations/public were the most involved (71%); fewer studies involved patients and/or carers (14%). Over half reported a high-level of involvement (i.e. partner and/or expert involvement), although this declined in later stages of the research cycle, e.g. data analysis. Common positive impacts included improved study design, research methods and recruitment, although most papers (62%) did not describe methods to determine impact. Reporting quality was sub-optimal, largely due to failure to consider challenges. This review found that high-level involvement of patients and the public in cancer prevention, screening and early detection research is feasible and has several advantages. However, improvements are needed to encourage involvement across the research cycle, and in evaluating and reporting its impact.

Barriers to breast cancer screening in Singapore: A literature review

INTRODUCTION

Breast cancer is a leading cause of cancer death among women, and its age-standardised incidence rate is one of the highest in Asia. We aimed to review studies on barriers to breast cancer screening to inform future policies in Singapore.

METHOD

This was a literature review of both quantitative and qualitative studies published between 2012 and 2020 using PubMed, Google Scholar and Cochrane databases, which analysed the perceptions and behaviours of women towards breast cancer screening in Singapore.

RESULTS

Through a thematic analysis based on the Health Belief Model, significant themes associated with low breast cancer screening uptake in Singapore were identified. The themes are: (1) high perceived barriers versus benefits, including fear of the breast cancer screening procedure and its possible outcomes, (2) personal challenges that impede screening attendance and paying for screening and treatment, and (3) low perceived susceptibility to breast cancer.

CONCLUSION

Perceived costs/barriers vs benefits of screening appear to be the most common barriers to breast cancer screening in Singapore. Based on the barriers identified, increasing convenience to get screened, reducing mammogram and treatment costs, and improving engagement with support groups are recommended to improve the screening uptake rate in Singapore.

Informing American Muslims about living donation through tailored health education: A randomized controlled crossover trial evaluating increase in biomedical and religious knowledge

Biomedical and religious knowledge affects organ donation attitudes among Muslims. We tested the effectiveness of mosque-based, religiously tailored, ethically balanced education on organ donation among Muslim Americans. Our randomized, controlled, crossover trial took place at 4 mosques randomized to an early arm where organ donation education preceded a control educational workshop or a late arm with the order reversed. Primary outcomes were changes in biomedical (Rotterdam Renal Replacement Knowledge Test living donation subscale, R3KT) and religious (Islamic Knowledge of Living Organ Donation, IK-LOD) living kidney donation knowledge. Statistical analysis employed a 2 (Treatment Arm) X 3 (Time of Assessment) mixed-method analysis of variance. Of 158 participants, 59 were in the early arm and 99 in the late arm. A between group t test comparison at Period 1 (Time 1 - Time 2), demonstrated that the early arm had a significantly higher mean IK-LOD (7.11 v 5.19, P < .05) and R3KT scores (7.65 v 4.90, P < .05) when compared to the late arm. Late arm participants also had significant increases in mean IK-LOD (5.19 v 7.16, P < .05) and R3KT scores (4.90 v. 6.81, P < .05) postintervention (Time 2-Time 3). Our novel program thus yielded significant kidney donation-related knowledge gains among Muslim Americans (NCT04443114 Clinicaltrials.gov).

Changing Mammography-Related Beliefs Among American Muslim Women: Findings from a Religiously-Tailored Mosque-Based Intervention

Background To advance the literature on religiously-tailored interventions and on Muslim cancer screening disparity research, we report on a behavioral intervention that used religiously-tailored messages to address salient mammography-related barrier beliefs. Methods We crafted specific, religiously-tailored messages and designed a two-session, peer-led, mosque-based educational program to deploy them. t-tests assessed pre- and post-intervention changes in mammography knowledge, intention to obtain mammography, and levels of agreement with mammography-related barrier and facilitator beliefs, while ordered logistic regression models assessed predictors of change. Results 58 women participated, 29 who were South-Asian and 18 Arab. Mean mammography knowledge increased post-intervention. Participants' overall mean agreement with facilitator beliefs trended upward and there was a significant decrease in agreement with the belief "Breast Cancer Screening is not important because God decides who will get cancer," Discussion Religiously-tailored messages provide an opportunity for addressing barriers to preventive health in a theologically consonant way.

Discordance Between Human Papillomavirus Twitter Images and Disparities in Human Papillomavirus Risk and Disease in the United States: Mixed-Methods Analysis

BACKGROUND

Racial and ethnic minorities are disproportionately affected by human papillomavirus (HPV)-related cancer, many of which could have been prevented with vaccination. Yet, the initiation and completion rates of HPV vaccination remain low among these populations. Given the importance of social media platforms for health communication, we examined US-based HPV images on Twitter. We explored inconsistencies between the demographics represented in HPV images and the populations that experience the greatest burden of HPV-related disease.

OBJECTIVE

The objective of our study was to observe whether HPV images on Twitter reflect the actual burden of disease by select demographics and determine to what extent Twitter accounts utilized images that reflect the burden of disease in their health communication messages.

METHODS

We identified 456 image tweets about HPV that contained faces posted by US users between November 11, 2014 and August 8, 2016. We identified images containing at least one human face and utilized Face++ software to automatically extract the gender, age, and race of each face. We manually annotated the source accounts of these tweets into 3 types as follows: government (38/298, 12.8%), organizations (161/298, 54.0%), and individual (99/298, 33.2%) and topics (news, health, and other) to examine how images varied by message source.

RESULTS

Findings reflected the racial demographics of the US population but not the disease burden (795/1219, 65.22% white faces; 140/1219, 11.48% black faces; 71/1219, 5.82% Asian faces; and 213/1219, 17.47% racially ambiguous faces). Gender disparities were evident in the image faces; 71.70% (874/1219) represented female faces, whereas only 27.89% (340/1219) represented male faces. Among the 11-26 years age group recommended to receive HPV vaccine, HPV images contained more female-only faces (214/616, 34.3%) than males (37/616, 6.0%); the remainder of images included both male and female faces (365/616, 59.3%). Gender and racial disparities were present across different image sources. Faces from government sources were more likely to depict females (n=44) compared with males (n=16). Of male faces, 80% (12/15) of youth and 100% (1/1) of adults were white. News organization sources depicted high proportions of white faces (28/38, 97% of female youth and 12/12, 100% of adult males). Face++ identified fewer faces compared with manual annotation because of limitations with detecting multiple, small, or blurry faces. Nonetheless, Face++ achieved a high degree of accuracy with respect to gender, race, and age compared with manual annotation.

CONCLUSIONS

This study reveals critical differences between the demographics reflected in HPV images and the actual burden of disease. Racial minorities are less likely to appear in HPV images despite higher rates of HPV incidence. Health communication efforts need to represent populations at risk better if we seek to reduce disparities in HPV infection.

Developing religiously-tailored health messages for behavioral change: Introducing the reframe, reprioritize, and reform ("3R") model

RATIONALE

As community health interventions advance from being faith-placed to authentically faith-based, greater discussion is needed about the theory, practice, and ethics of delivering health messages embedded within a religious worldview. While there is much potential to leverage religion to promote health behaviors and improve health outcomes, there is also a risk of co-opting religious teachings for strictly biomedical ends.

OBJECTIVE

To describe the development, implementation, and ethical dimensions of a conceptual model for religiously-tailoring health messages.

METHOD

We used data from 6 focus groups and 19 interviews with women aged 40 and older sampled from diverse Muslim community organizations to map out how religious beliefs and values impact mammography-related behavioral, normative and control beliefs. These beliefs were further grouped into those that enhance mammography intention (facilitators) and those that impede intention (barriers). In concert with a multi-disciplinary advisory board, and by drawing upon leading theories of health behavior change, we developed the "3R" model for crafting religiously-tailored health messages.

RESULTS

The 3R model addresses barrier beliefs, which are beliefs that negatively impact adopting a health behavior, by (i) reframing the belief within a relevant religious worldview, (ii) reprioritizing the belief by introducing another religious belief that has greater resonance with participants, and (iii) reforming the belief by uncovering logical flaws and/or theological misinterpretations. These approaches were used to create messages for a peer-led, mosque-based, educational intervention designed to improve mammography intention among Muslim women.

CONCLUSIONS

There are benefits and potential ethical challenges to using religiously tailored messages to promote health behaviors. Our theoretically driven 3R model aids interventionists in crafting messages that address beliefs that hinder healthy behaviors. It is particularly useful in the context of faith-based interventions for it highlights the ethical choices that must be made when incorporating religious values and beliefs in tailored messages.

Increasing Routine Cancer Screening Among Underserved Populations Through Effective Communication Strategies: Application of a Health Literacy Framework

Cancer prevention and control efforts serve as national priorities, as cancer is the second leading cause of death in the USA. In addition, cancer disparities exist, with racial/ethnic minority, low-income, and uninsured populations suffering the greatest burden. The goal of this paper is to describe the role that effective health communication can play in increasing routine cancer screening among medically underserved populations, thus decreasing persistent health disparities. For this paper, we applied Sorenson's integrated model of health literacy as a framework for identifying communication gaps and opportunities that can help improve cancer screening specifically at federally qualified health centers (FQHCs). This integrated model consists of four interrelated dimensions: access, understand, appraise, and apply. Employing communication strategies across this health literacy framework has the potential to facilitate improved decision making and cancer screening outcomes among the most underserved populations.

Message Received: African American Women and Breast Cancer Screening

African American women are more likely than other women to be diagnosed with breast cancer at a young age, to be diagnosed at a late stage, and to die from the disease. Yet we see evidence of irregular screening and follow-up. Previous research on psychosocial factors influencing decisions to screen reveals barriers: fear, fatalistic perceptions of cancer, inaccurate perceptions of risk, and associations with stigma. The current qualitative research with, largely, insured African American women ( n = 26), health navigators ( n = 6), and community stakeholders ( n = 24) indicates both positive and negative factors influencing decision making. The women in our sample believe in the value of early detection and are motivated to screen in response to encouragement from health providers. However, they also report several factors that contribute to their decisions to delay or not screen. These include (1) perceptions that the health community itself is confused about the need for screening, (2) perceptions that White women are the priority population for breast cancer, (3) family roles that prohibit self-care and encourage secrecy, and (4) fear of diagnosis. Participants report not feeling included in national-level health promotion campaigns. It is argued that African American women, in particular, may benefit from more nuanced health information about their risk.

SBIRT-Based Interventions to Improve Pediatric Oral Health Behaviors and Outcomes: Considerations for Future Behavioral SBIRT Interventions in Dentistry

Dental caries is the most common chronic disease in children and is caused by poor oral health behaviors. These behaviors include high-sugar diet, inadequate exposure to topical fluorides, and irregular use of professional dental care services. A number of behavioral intervention approaches have been used to modify health behaviors. One example is the Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) model, which has been widely used to reduce substance abuse in both adults and children. SBIRT is a promising behavior change approach that could similarly be used to address problematic oral health behaviors. In this paper, we will review oral health studies that have adopted SBIRT components, assess if these interventions improved oral health behaviors and outcomes, and outline considerations for researchers interested in developing and testing future oral health-related SBIRT interventions in dentistry.

A Legacy of Science and Community Engagement via the Community Networks Program

This special issue documents the progress of a unique group of research investigations that further legitimize the engagement of affected communities in quality cancer health disparities research and, the importance of mentoring and training of new and diverse health disparity researchers. The implications for the reduction and elimination of cancer health disparities within the United States are apparent. The diversity of populations included in these novel studies also has implications for addressing inequities in a global context.