A Systems-Level Evaluation Framework for Virtual Care.

The virtual care landscape is significantly changing, largely due to an increased demand initiated by the COVID-19 pandemic and the evolution of technology. Complex questions about how to best leverage virtual care and its impact remain unanswered. Our team developed a systems-level evaluation framework to inform virtual care service design and evaluation to take a more comprehensive approach to planning and implementing virtual care.

Moving toward a true depiction of tobacco behavior among Asian Indians in California: Prevalence and factors associated with cultural smokeless tobacco product use.

Background: Asian Indians (AIs) in the United States exhibit disproportionate burdens of oral cancer and cardiovascular disease, which are potentially linked to smokeless tobacco. However, little is known about the use of cultural smokeless tobacco (CST) products in this population.

Methods: California Asian Indian Tobacco Use Survey data from 2004 (n = 1618) were used to investigate CST prevalence among California's AIs.

Features of hepatocellular carcinoma in Hispanics differ from African Americans and non-Hispanic Whites.

Aim: To compare features of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in Hispanics to those of African Americans and Whites.

Methods: Patients treated for HCC at an urban tertiary medical center from 2005 to 2011 were identified from a tumor registry. Data were collected retrospectively, including demographics, comorbidities, liver disease characteristics, tumor parameters, treatment, and survival (OS) outcomes.

Testing antismoking messages for Air Force trainees.

Introduction: Young adults in the military are aggressively targeted by tobacco companies and are at high risk of tobacco use. Existing antismoking advertisements developed for the general population might be effective in educating young adults in the military. This study evaluated the effects of different themes of existing antismoking advertisements on perceived harm and intentions to use cigarettes and other tobacco products among Air Force trainees.

Collaboration with behavioral health care facilities to implement systemwide tobacco control policies--California, 2012.

The California Tobacco Control Program (CTCP) administered 4 regional trainings in 2012 to staffers at CTCP-funded projects, tobacco control coalitions, several county departments of mental health and alcohol and drug, and administrators and providers from behavioral health care facilities. These trainings focused on the special tobacco use cessation needs and opportunities for cessation among persons with mental illness or substance abuse disorders, and they provided information about cessation and smoke-free policies. CTCP surveyed county and private behavioral health care programs to assess their readiness for adopting tobacco control strategies at treatment facilities.

Paan (pan) and paan (pan) masala should be considered tobacco products.

Two products indigenous to the Indian subcontinent and popular among South Asians globally - paan and paan masala - are inconsistently categorised as tobacco by researchers, clinicians, program planners and policymakers. This article calls for a universally standard classification of these smokeless carcinogenic products as tobacco products and thus, subject to the same public health and clinical protections applied to other forms of tobacco. This recommendation is guided by scientific evidence strongly indicating the common presence of tobacco in paan and paan masala.

Culturally specific tobacco use and South Asians in the United States: a review of the literature and promising strategies for intervention.

Over the past two decades, the United States has attracted large South Asian populations, who have imported tobacco products previously unique to the native subcontinent. South Asian cigarette use prevalence is consistently lower than other U.S.

Cost-effective smoke-free multiunit housing media campaigns: connecting with local communities.

Presented are cost-effective paid media strategies to educate Californians to advocate for stronger smoke-free multiunit housing (SF-MUH) policies between 2006 and 2008. Included is a summary of general market and specific ethnic market costs that correspond to SF-MUH attitudes and home smoking bans. Statewide questionnaires indicated that half of the intended general market saw an antitobacco TV ad and half of the intended ethnic markets heard radio ads.

Individual and family factors associated with intention to quit among male Vietnamese American smokers: implications for intervention development.

Smoking prevalence among Vietnamese American males remains higher than the U.S. general population.

Assessing the relationship between ad volume and awareness of a tobacco education media campaign.

Background: The relation between aided ad recall and level of television ad placement in a public health setting is not well established. We examine this association by looking back at 8 years of the California's Tobacco Control Program's (CTCP) media campaign.

Methods: Starting in July 2001, California's campaign was continuously monitored using five telephone series of surveys and six web-based series of surveys immediately following a media flight.

An evaluation of the California community intervention.

Aim: We conducted this study to determine key community-level factors associated with higher tobacco control programme performance.

Methods: A combination of surveys, administrative and fiscal data were collected to measure local county-level health department performance over a 7-year period. Longitudinal analyses were performed using generalised estimating equations to examine whether counties that exerted higher effort were successful in creating more tobacco retail licensing (TRL) and secondhand smoke policies.

Prostate cancer disparities in South Carolina: early detection, special programs, and descriptive epidemiology.

Available evidence suggests that there may be qualitative differences in the natural history of PrCA by race. If this is true then additional etiologic research is needed to identify places in the causal chain where we can intervene to lower PrCA rates in AA men. South Carolina may prove to be a useful context in which to study prostate cancer etiology, because of the presence of unique environmental exposures.

Breast cancer disparities in South Carolina: early detection, special programs, and descriptive epidemiology.

A discrepancy exists between mortality and incidence rates between African-American and European-American women in South Carolina. The relationship between tumor grade and the estrogen/ progesterone receptor status is different in African-American and European-American women. African-American women with breast cancer should be encouraged to participate in clinical trials, with the goal of identifying biological factors that might facilitate the detection of tumors at an earlier stage and the development of more effective therapies.

Cervical cancer disparities in South Carolina: an update of early detection, special programs, descriptive epidemiology, and emerging directions.

Through careful examination of cervical cancer incidence and mortality rates and current resources available in South Carolina, we have identified research and intervention priorities related to cervical cancer that would best serve the women of this state. Mortality rates due to cervical cancer are largely explained by the lack of early detection among women rarely and never screened and non-adherence to recommended follow-up care of cervical dysplasia; however, other factors less well explained are determinants of observed disparities between AA and EA women. Efforts are underway to implement strategies recommended by the NCI to eliminate cervical cancer disparities through improved efforts to reach out to rarely and never-screened women and prepare health care providers for implementation of HPV vaccines.

Subject recruitment for cancer control studies in an adverse environment.

Subject recruitment in an adverse environment prompted researchers to identify a novel method to gain a different perspective on the problem. Lewin's Model of Change was used in a post hoc examination of recruitment strategies from 5 cancer control studies of breast or prostate cancer. Based on this evaluation, driving and restraining forces in recruitment were identified.

Internet users' prior psychological and social difficulties.

This study addressed the hypothesis that frequent Internet use produces social and psychological difficulties. An Internet-administered survey was given to a sample of Internet users. Comparisons were made between this sample and general population norms on a selection of social and psychological variables.