How Community Health Workers can Address Tobacco Dependence of High-Risk patients: A Qualitative Analysis of the Unique Training Needs of Community Health Workers.

Introduction: Communities with low socioeconomic status have disproportionately high rates of tobacco use, and community health workers (CHWs) have an increasing role in delivering tobacco cessation interventions. However, existing tobacco cessation trainings are not appropriate for the CHW model of care. The aim of this study was to identify training needs of CHWs to develop a tailored tobacco cessation curriculum to help them effectively serve their high-risk patients.

Adverse Childhood Experiences, Resilience, and Cardiovascular Disease in Adult Survivors of Childhood Cancer: A Report from the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study.

Background: The impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACE, e.g., abuse, neglect, and/or household dysfunction experienced before the age of 18) and resilience on risk for cardiovascular disease (CVD) has not previously been investigated in adult survivors of childhood cancer.

Perceptions of family functioning impact smoking during pregnancy.

Background: Although socio-environmental factors are known to contribute to the maintenance of smoking behavior, few studies have examined the impact of family functioning on smoking during pregnancy.

Objective: The current study examined the relationship between perceptions of family functioning and smoking during pregnancy.

Methods: Pregnant women ( = 345, 59% ethnic/racial minority) completed the Family Assessment Device, a gold-standard assessment examining perceptions of family functioning in seven domains.

Challenges and Opportunities in Diagnosis and Management of Cardiometabolic Risk in Adolescents.

Purpose Of Review: This review aims to elucidate the limitations of diagnosing metabolic syndrome in adolescents as well as challenges and opportunities in the identification and reduction of cardiometabolic risk in this population.

Recent Findings: There are multiple criticisms of how we define and approach obesity in clinical practice and scientific research, and weight stigma further complicates the process of making and communicating weight-related diagnoses. While the goal of diagnosing and managing metabolic syndrome in adolescents would be to identify individuals at elevated future cardiometabolic risk and intervene to reduce the modifiable component of this risk, there is evidence that identifying cardiometabolic risk factor clustering may be more useful in adolescents than establishing a cutoff-based diagnosis of metabolic syndrome.

Addressing Tobacco Use in Underserved Communities Outside of Primary Care: The Need to Tailor Tobacco Cessation Training for Community Health Workers.

Individuals from communities with a low socioeconomic status have the highest rates of tobacco use but are less likely to receive assistance with quitting. Community health workers (CHWs) are well-positioned to engage these communities; however, CHWs face barriers in receiving relevant tobacco cessation training. The objective of this study was to conduct a mixed methods needs assessment to describe tobacco practices and the desire for training among CHWs.

Advance Care Planning With Black Women with Breast Cancer: A Community Health Worker Model.

Background: Despite the importance of advance care planning (ACP), a process that optimizes future medical treatment and end-of-life care, for at-risk populations, rates of patient-provider ACP conversations are extremely low among Black women with breast cancer. Community health workers (CHWs) are well-positioned to support patients in engaging in ACP conversations with their providers; yet research on integrating CHWs to promote ACP is scant. The current study examined multilevel facilitators and barriers to successful ACP conversations among Black women from the perspective of providers and CHWs who serve this community.

Adverse childhood experiences and resilience in childhood and adolescent and young adult cancer patients.

Childhood and adolescent and young adult (AYA) cancer survivors experience poor health outcomes in adulthood. Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) also portend poor health outcomes for the general population. Resilience can mitigate effects of ACEs.

The role of smoking history in longitudinal changes in C-reactive protein between Black and White older adults in the US.

Smoking cessation is associated with decreases in C-reactive protein (CRP), a biomarker of systemic inflammation and cancer risk; yet CRP levels remain higher long-term in individuals who quit vs. those who never smoked. While non-Hispanic, Black/African American (NHB) have higher levels of CRP vs.

Gaps in Knowledge and Practice in Treating Tobacco Use Among Non-physician Healthcare Professionals and Lay Health Workers in Chicago, Illinois.

Objective: To conduct a needs assessment for lay health workers and non-physician healthcare professionals [i.e., community health workers (CHW) and lung health professionals who spend more time face-to-face with tobacco-related disparity populations] to describe current gaps in tobacco cessation practices and knowledge.

Techniques for Advertising Healthy Food in School Settings to Increase Fruit and Vegetable Consumption.

Background: Childhood obesity rates in Western developed countries are rapidly increasing. While research shows that eating more fruits and vegetables (FV) is a preventive measure, children do not eat adequate amounts of FV. Marketing of high salt, fat, and sugar foods influences children's eating behaviors, decreases FV consumption, and is prevalent in children's surroundings.

Race differences in predictors of weight gain among a community sample of smokers enrolled in a randomized controlled trial of a multiple behavior change intervention.

African Americans have disproportionate rates of post-cessation weight gain compared to non-Hispanic whites, but few studies have examined this weight gain in a multiracial sample of smokers receiving evidence-based treatment in a community setting. We examined race differences in short-term weight gain during an intervention to foster smoking cessation plus weight management. Data were drawn from the Best Quit Study, a randomized controlled trial conducted via telephone quitlines across the U.

Six Month Abstinence Heterogeneity in the Best Quit Study.

Background: Understanding the characteristics of smokers who are successful in quitting may help to increase smoking cessation rates.

Purpose: To examine heterogeneity in cessation outcome at 6 months following smoking cessation behavioral counseling with or without weight management counseling.

Methods: 2,540 smokers were recruited from a large quitline provider and then randomized to receive proactive smoking cessation behavioral counseling without or with two versions of weight management counseling.

Menthol Cigarettes, Tobacco Dependence, and Smoking Persistence: The Need to Examine Enhanced Cognitive Functioning as a Neuropsychological Mechanism.

Introduction: Despite the overall decline in the prevalence of cigarette use in the United States, menthol cigarette use among smokers is rising, and evidence shows that it may lead to more detrimental effects on public health than regular cigarette use. One of the mechanisms by which nicotine sustains tobacco use and dependence is due to its cognitive enhancing properties, and basic science literature suggests that menthol may also enhance nicotine's acute effect on cognition.

Aims And Methods: The purpose of this review is to suggest that the cognitive enhancing effects of menthol may be a potentially important neuropsychological mechanism that has yet to be examined.

Simultaneous vs. sequential treatment for smoking and weight management in tobacco quitlines: 6 and 12 month outcomes from a randomized trial.

Background: Smoking cessation often results in weight gain which discourages many smokers from quitting and can increase health risks. Treatments to reduce cessation-related weight gain have been tested in highly controlled trials of in-person treatment, but have never been tested in a real-world setting, which has inhibited dissemination.

Methods: The Best Quit Study (BQS) is a replication and "real world" translation using telephone delivery of a prior in-person efficacy trial.

Association between smoking cessation and weight gain in treatment-seeking African Americans.

Introduction: Research has shown that African Americans gain more than average weight after smoking cessation. However, African Americans have been underrepresented in post-cessation weight gain research. The current study examined 1) the pattern of weight gain and 2) the association between smoking status and weight gain in a sample of African Americans seeking smoking cessation treatment.

Large-scale, high-throughput validation of short hairpin RNA sequences for RNA interference.

A method for high-throughput cloning and analysis of short hairpin RNAs (shRNAs) is described. Using this approach, 464 shRNAs against 116 different genes were screened for knockdown efficacy, enabling rapid identification of effective shRNAs against 74 genes. Statistical analysis of the effects of various criteria on the activity of the shRNAs confirmed that some of the rules thought to govern small interfering RNA (siRNA) activity also apply to shRNAs.