Coalition Building for Health: A Community Garden Pilot Project with Apartment Dwelling Refugees.

Refugees often experience compromised health from both pre- and post-migration stressors. Coalition theory has helped guide the development of targeted programs to address the health care needs of vulnerable populations. Using the Community Coalition Action Theory as a framework, a coalition was formed to implement a community garden with apartment-dwelling refugees.

Variations in breast carcinoma treatment in older medicare beneficiaries: is it black or white.

Background: To evaluate associations between race and breast carcinoma treatment.

Methods: Data from 984 black and 849 white Medicare beneficiaries 67 years or older with local breast carcinoma and a subset of 732 surviving women interviewed 3-4 years posttreatment were used to calculate adjusted odds of treatment, controlling for age, comorbidity, attitudes, region, and area measures of socioeconomic and health care resources.

Results: Sixty-seven percent of women received a mastectomy and 33% received breast-conserving surgery.

Communication between physicians and older women with localized breast cancer: implications for treatment and patient satisfaction.

Purpose: To identify factors associated with patient-physician communication and to examine the impact of communication on patients' perception of having a treatment choice, actual treatment received, and satisfaction with care among older breast cancer patients.

Materials And Methods: Data were collected from 613 pairs of surgeons and their older (greater-than-or-equal 67 years) patients diagnosed with localized breast cancer. Measures of patients' self-reported communication included physician- and patient-initiated communication and the number of treatment options discussed.