Publications by authors named "Miguel Valdez-Soto"

Background: Community engagement can make a substantial difference in health outcomes and strengthen the capacity to deal with disruptive public health events such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Social media platforms such as Facebook are a promising avenue to reach the broader public and enhance access to clinical and translational science, and require further evaluation from the scientific community.

Objective: This study aims to describe the use of live community events to enhance communication about clinical and health research through a Facebook platform case study (Minnesota [MN] Research Link) with a Minnesota statewide community.

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Introduction: To assess researchers' experiences working with community advisory boards (CABs) and perceptions of how community member stakeholder feedback impacted the research.

Methods: Individual interviews were conducted with researchers (= 34) who had presented their research to a Mayo Clinic CAB (at MN, AZ, or FL) from 2014 to 2017, with an average interview duration of 10-15 min. Researchers were asked "In what ways did the feedback you received from the CAB influence your research?" A validated, structured, 7-item interview was used to assess domains of the potential influence that CABs had on the research: (1) pre-research (e.

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Youth are an understudied population requiring additional safeguards when participating in research. Their input is necessary to facilitate participation and interest in studies. To address this, Mayo Clinic established one of the first pediatric advisory boards (PAB) comprised of 18 diverse youth aged 11-17.

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Introduction: Community engagement is important for advancing Clinical and Translational Science (CTS), but face-to-face engagement has limited reach and scale. We examined the feasibility of a novel virtual Facebook community platform for public engagement on health research statewide in Minnesota.

Methods: The Facebook platform, , was evaluated from June 19, 2019 to June 30, 2020.

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Background: Almost 80% of adolescents do not achieve 60 minutes or more of physical activity each day as recommended by current US national guidelines. There is a need to develop and promote interventions that increase physical activity among adolescents. With increased interest in digital technologies among adolescents, robotic-assisted platforms are a novel and engaging strategy to deliver physical activity interventions.

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Introduction: Researchers have explored using the internet and social media to recruit participants to specific research projects. Less systematic work has been done to inform the engagement of large populations in virtual communities to advance clinical and translational science. We report on our first step to use social media to engage Minnesota residents by studying the willingness of participants to engage in a virtual (Facebook) community about the concepts of health and health-related research.

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Introduction: Social support from nonsmokers may have a role in prompting smokers to use evidence-based cessation treatment. Prior studies found that an intervention for nonsmoking support persons (SPs) was effective for promoting smokers' use of free, state quitline services. This pilot study adapted and assessed feasibility of this intervention for a racially diverse, low-income population.

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Background: Linking podcasts with social media is a strategy to promote and disseminate health and health research information to the community without constraints of time, weather, and geography.

Objective: To describe the process of creating a podcast library and promoting it on social media as a strategy for disseminating health and biomedical research topics to the community.

Methods: We used a community and patient engagement in research approach for developing a process to use podcasts for dissemination of health and health research information.

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Introduction: Lack of health equity ultimately leads to unequal treatment of diverse patients and contributes to the growing disparities seen in national health. Academic medical centers should consider providing health care providers and biomedical researchers training on how to identify and address health disparities.

Methods: The authors led an introductory health disparities course for graduate students and research and clinical fellows at an academic medical center in the Midwest.

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Science Cafés, informal venues to promote bidirectional dialog, inquiry and learning about science between community members, scientists, healthcare and service providers, hold promise as an innovative tool for healthcare researchers and community members to improve health outcomes, especially among populations with health disparities. However, the process of optimizing science cafés is under-studied. We describe the pilot evaluation of a series of Science Cafés, called Garden Cafés (n = 9), conducted from September 2015 through April 2016 in Olmsted County, MN and Duval County, FL to connect Mayo Clinic researchers and local service providers with the community.

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A prior project found that an intensive (12 weeks, thrice weekly sessions) in-person, supervised, exercise coaching intervention was effective for smoking cessation among depressed women smokers. However, the sample was 90% White and of high socioeconomic status, and the intensity of the intervention limits its reach. One approach to intervention scalability is to deliver the supervised exercise coaching using a robotic human exercise trainer.

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Background: Medical research strives to improve health; community-engaged research (CEnR) supports translation to the community.

Methods: This article describes the use of andragogical theory to develop asynchronous CEnR training.

Results: A total of 43 researchers and community members completed at least one module.

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Background: Community-engaged research is defined by the Institute of Medicine as the process of working collaboratively with groups of people affiliated by geographic proximity, special interests, or similar situations with respect to issues affecting their well-being. Traditional face-to-face community-engaged research is limited by geographic location, limited in resources, and/or uses one-way communications. Web 2.

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Article Synopsis
  • Diabetes significantly impacts racial minorities, particularly Black men, in the U.S., underscoring the need for tailored educational efforts.
  • A study was conducted in a Rochester, Minnesota barbershop to evaluate Black men's attitudes toward diabetes prevention and awareness.
  • Results revealed that participants recognized the importance of diet, exercise, and family history in diabetes management, supporting barbershops as effective venues for health education and outreach.
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