Weight loss interventions for patients with prostate cancer: a scoping review.

Background: The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Scoping Review Guidelines were used to conduct a scoping review of weight loss interventions for patients with prostate cancer, with the goal to ascertain the impact of these interventions on body weight, body composition, metabolic biomarkers, and prostate cancer-related outcomes.

Methods: Six bibliographical databases were searched. Eligible studies included articles reporting weight loss behavioral interventions with at least dietary change as an intervention component, body weight as an outcome, and interventions not solely focused on weight loss maintenance.

Sweet Beverages and Cancer: A Scoping Review of Quantitative Studies.

Unlabelled: We conducted a scoping review of sweet beverages (SB) and cancer outcomes to ascertain SB's relationship with cancer by SB type and cancer type. We used the PRISMA Scoping Review Guidelines to review quantitative studies of SB and cancer. Eligible studies included articles reporting a quantitative association between SB intake and a cancer-related health outcome in humans, including adiposity-related versus non-adiposity-related cancers.

Assessing the Feasibility of an Online Training Designed to Enable Community Health Workers to Deliver a Comprehensive, Evidence-Based Weight Loss Intervention for Rural African Americans of Faith.

Obesity is a critical modifiable risk factor in cancer prevention, control, and survivorship. Comprehensive weight loss interventions (e.g.

BMI and related risk factors among U.S. Marshallese with diabetes and their families.

Examine cross-sectional associations between body mass index (BMI) and related health behaviors, barriers and facilitators to health care, and perceived health status among a sample of U.S. Marshallese adults with Type 2 diabetes and evaluate associations of interest between participants and their family members.

How stakeholder engagement influenced a randomized comparative effectiveness trial testing two Diabetes Prevention Program interventions in a Marshallese Pacific Islander Community.

Background: Marshallese face significant health disparities, with particularly high rates of type 2 diabetes. Engaging stakeholders in the research process is essential to reduce health inequities.

Methods: A community- and patient-engaged research approach was used to involve community Marshallese stakeholders in a randomized comparative effectiveness trial testing two Diabetes Prevention Program interventions.

Religion and Body Weight Among African-American Adults Attempting to Lose Weight: An Exploratory Study.

Religion and body weight was explored at two time points among overweight and obese African-American adults. Baseline and follow-up data were collected from 26 adults participating in a weight loss intervention and analyzed using multiple regression analyses of religious measures, body weight, and other variables. Frequent church attendance was significantly associated with greater weight lost from baseline to 16-week follow-up.

Design of a comparative effectiveness randomized controlled trial testing a faith-based Diabetes Prevention Program (WORD DPP) vs. a Pacific culturally adapted Diabetes Prevention Program (PILI DPP) for Marshallese in the United States.

Background: Pacific Islander populations, including Marshallese, face a disproportionately high burden of health disparities relative to the general population.

Objectives: A community-based participatory research (CBPR) approach was utilized to engage Marshallese participants in a comparative effectiveness trial testing 2 Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) interventions designed to reduce participant's weight, lower HbA1c, encourage healthy eating, and increase physical activity.

Design: To compare the effectiveness of the faith-based (WORD) DPP to the culturally adapted (Pacific Culturally Adapted Diabetes Prevention Program [PILI]) DPP, a clustered randomized controlled trial (RCT) with 384 Marshallese participants will be implemented in 32 churches located in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma.

Lessons learned from using an audience response system in a community setting for research data collection.

Objectives: A community-academic team implemented a study involving collection of quantitative data using a computer-based audience response system (ARS) whereby community partners led data collection efforts. The team participated in a reflection exercise after the data collection to evaluate and identify best practices and lessons learned about the community partner-led process.

Design & Sample: The methods involved a qualitative research consultant who facilitated the reflection exercise that consisted of two focus groups-one academic and one community research team members.

Reducing depressive symptoms through behavioral activation in churches: A Hybrid-2 randomized effectiveness-implementation design.

Unlabelled: Rural African Americans are disproportionately exposed to numerous stressors such as poverty that place them at risk for experiencing elevated levels of depressive symptoms. Effective treatments for decreasing depressive symptoms exist, but rural African Americans often fail to receive adequate and timely care. Churches have been used to address physical health outcomes in rural African American communities, but few have focused primarily on addressing mental health outcomes.

Religion and body weight: a review of quantitative studies.

Increasing interest in relationships between religion and health has encouraged research about religion and body weight, which has produced mixed findings. We systematically searched 11 bibliographic databases for quantitative studies of religion and weight, locating and coding 85 studies. We conducted a systematic review, analysing descriptive characteristics of the studies as well as relevant religion-body weight associations related to study characteristics.

Design of a randomized, controlled, comparative-effectiveness trial testing a Family Model of Diabetes Self-Management Education (DSME) vs. Standard DSME for Marshallese in the United States.

Background: Type 2 diabetes (T2D) is a significant public health problem, with U.S. Pacific Islander communities-such as the Marshallese-bearing a disproportionate burden.

To what extent do community members' personal health beliefs and experiences impact what they consider to be important for their community-at-large?

Background: Health assessments are used to prioritize community-level health concerns, but the role of individuals' health concerns and experiences is unknown. We sought to understand to what extent community health assessments reflect health concerns of the community-at-large versus a representation of the participants sampled.

Methods: We conducted a health assessment survey in 30 rural African American churches (n = 412).

Feasibility Test of a Community-Relevant Intervention Designed to Promote African American Participation in Translational, Breast Cancer Disparities Research: Know About Health Options for Women (Know HOW).

There are marked racial differences in breast cancer, the second leading cause of death among US women. Understanding the causes of these differences is essential to eliminate breast cancer inequities. More prevalent in African American than in Caucasian women, metabolic syndrome has been associated with breast cancer outcomes.

Usefulness of the Audience Response System in training lay health advisors for chronic disease prevention.

Lay health promoters (LHPs) have been successful in preventing disease. Given the complexity of health interventions, a crucial component that is necessary for LHPs' success is the training they receive. Engaging methods have the potential to increase LHPs' learning and efficacy to implement health interventions.

Women's Perceptions of Provider Empathy in the Context of Healthcare Disparities.

An issue in addressing racial healthcare disparities is the need to reduce, often unconscious, provider bias. Provider empathy can overcome such bias. Patient perceptions of provider empathy were explored to identify which provider behaviors patients perceived as conveying empathy and how perceived provider empathy influenced patient-provider interactions.

The WORD (Wholeness, Oneness, Righteousness, Deliverance): design of a randomized controlled trial testing the effectiveness of an evidence-based weight loss and maintenance intervention translated for a faith-based, rural, African American population using a community-based participatory approach.

Background: The positive effects of weight loss on obesity-related risk factors diminish unless weight loss is maintained. Yet little work has focused on the translation of evidence-based weight loss interventions with the aim of sustaining weight loss in underserved populations. Using a community-based participatory approach (CBPR) that engages the strong faith-based social infrastructure characteristic of rural African American communities is a promising way to sustain weight loss in African Americans, who bear a disproportionate burden of the obesity epidemic.

A rural African American faith community's solutions to depression disparities.

Objective: The aim of this study was to explore how a rural African American faith community would address depression within their congregations and the community as a whole.

Design And Sample: A qualitative, interpretive descriptive methodology was used. The sample included 24 participants representing pastors, parishioners interested in health, and African American men who had experienced symptoms of depression in a community in the Arkansas Delta.

Using population data to reduce disparities in colorectal cancer screening, Arkansas, 2006.

Introduction: Colorectal cancer is a common disease, and incidence and death rates are higher in medically underserved populations. The colorectal cancer death rate in Arkansas exceeds the national rate. The objective of this study was to examine population characteristics relevant to the design and implementation of a state-sponsored colorectal cancer screening program that is responsive to medically underserved populations.

The examination of process evaluation use in church-based health interventions: a systematic review.

Churches have been a popular site for the implementation of health promotion interventions. Although the efficacy of church-based health programs have been established, it is unknown which aspects of church-based health promotion drive health behavior change. Process evaluation is a way to increase our understanding of key components of church-based health promotion and to move the field forward.

Feasibility of an evidence-based weight loss intervention for a faith-based, rural, African American population.

Background: African Americans and rural residents are disproportionately affected by obesity. Innovative approaches to address obesity that are sensitive to the issues of rural African Americans are needed. Faith-based and community-based participatory approaches show promise for engaging racial/ethnic minorities to change health outcomes, but few faith-based weight loss interventions have used a community-based participatory approach.

Evaluating coalition capacity to strengthen community-academic partnerships addressing cancer disparities.

The Arkansas Cancer Connection Program is a community-academic partnership between the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and nine community-based coalitions designed to address cancer health disparities through community-based participatory research. In 2005, a survey measuring coalition capacity was administered to 51 Cancer Council members to assess training needs and increase coalition capacity. The highest scoring components were leadership and member engagement while the lowest were development and capacity effectiveness.

A community-based approach to translational research addressing breast cancer disparities.

Disparities in breast cancer survival rates suggest that biological processes contribute. Translational research addressing health disparities would benefit from using a community-based participatory approach (CBPR) to examine biological processes commonly seen as the proximal causes of illness as well as behavioral and social-ecological "causes of the causes" within an integrated conceptual framework. This paper describes a CBPR study that explored perceptions regarding breast cancer relevant behaviors, and the application of the study's results to develop translational research.