Mail-delivered arthritis self-management tool kit: a randomized trial and longitudinal followup.

Objective: To determine the effectiveness of an intervention Tool Kit of arthritis self-management materials to be sent once through the mail, and to describe the populations reached.

Methods: Spanish speakers (n = 335), non-Hispanic English-speaking African Americans (n = 156), and other non-Hispanic English speakers (n = 404) were recruited separately and randomized within each of the 3 ethnic/racial categories to immediately receive the intervention Tool Kit (n = 458) or to a 4-month wait-list control status (n = 463). At the end of 4 months, controls were sent the Tool Kit.

Building nursing research capacity to address health disparities: engaging minority baccalaureate and master's students.

In order to decrease health disparities, nursing needs to promote opportunities for minority nursing students to incorporate the conduct, as well as the utilization, of research into their professional careers. This article describes a model program to facilitate minority research career development, the Research Enrichment and Apprenticeship Program (REAP). REAP was developed and implemented by a federally funded partnership between 2 historically Black universities and a research-intensive university.

Self-management education for persons with arthritis: Managing comorbidity and eliminating health disparities.

Objective: To compare short-term and long-term effectiveness of the Arthritis Self-Help Course (ASHC) and the Chronic Disease Self-Management Program (CDSMP) for persons with arthritis concerning health care use, health-related quality of life, health behaviors, and arthritis self-efficacy.

Methods: Forty-eight workshops were randomized to the ASHC (n = 26) or CDSMP (n = 22). A total of 416 individuals, including 365 African Americans, participated.

An enriched research experience for minority undergraduates--a step toward increasing the number of minority nurse researchers.

This article describes a partnership between a research-intensive university and a historical minority-serving institution to create a year-long Research Enrichment and Apprenticeship Program for 9 undergraduate minority nursing students. The apprenticeship program provides undergraduate students an opportunity to directly experience nursing research and has the long-term goal of increasing the number of racial and ethnic minority researchers in nursing.

The role of community advisory boards: involving communities in the informed consent process.

Ethical research involving human subjects mandates that individual informed consent be obtained from research participants or from surrogates when participants are not able to consent for themselves. The existing requirements for informed consent assume that all study participants have personal autonomy; fully comprehend the purpose, risks, and benefits of the research; and volunteer for projects that disclose all relevant information. Yet contemporary examples of lapses in the individual informed consent process have been reported.