Publications by authors named "Pamela Sinicrope"

Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates digital access interventions designed to enhance engagement with an online smoking cessation program among rural adults, who generally have lower access to such resources.
  • A pilot trial involved 90 rural smokers aged 18 and older, where participants were randomized into three groups: a control group with print materials, a group with a loaner iPad, and a group with the iPad plus coaching calls.
  • Results indicated no significant differences in overall engagement among groups, but the group receiving coaching showed greater improvements in smoking cessation outcomes and had positive feedback about the intervention.
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Background: Individualized treatment for commercial tobacco smoking cessation, such as through the utilization of the nicotine metabolite ratio (NMR), offers potential clinical benefit. NMR is a metabolism-informed biomarker that can be used to guide medication selection. NMR testing is particularly promising for tobacco cessation efforts in populations with high rates of smoking, such as some Alaska Native and American Indian (AN/AI) communities.

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Introduction: The ongoing opioid misuse epidemic has had a marked impact on American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) communities. Culture- and gender-specific barriers to medically assisted recovery from opioid use disorder (OUD) have been identified, exacerbating its impact for AI/AN women. Wiidookaage'win is a community-based participatory research study that aims to develop a culturally tailored, moderated, private Facebook group intervention to support Minnesotan AI/AN women in medically assisted recovery from OUD.

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Introduction: Alaska Native and American Indian (ANAI) peoples in Alaska currently experience a disproportionate burden of morbidity and mortality from tobacco cigarette use. Financial incentives for smoking cessation are evidence-based, but a family-level incentive structure has not been evaluated. We used a community-based participatory research and qualitative approach to culturally adapt a smoking cessation intervention with ANAI families.

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Background: Individualized treatment for commercial tobacco smoking cessation, such as through the utilization of the nicotine metabolite ratio (NMR), offers substantial clinical benefit. NMR is a metabolism-informed biomarker that can be used to guide medication selection. NMR testing is particularly promising for tobacco cessation efforts in populations with high rates of smoking, such as some Alaska Native and American Indian (AN/AI) communities.

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Background: During the COVID-19 outbreak, video appointments became a popular method for health care delivery, particularly in the early stages of the pandemic. Although Mayo Clinic aimed to reduce face-to-face (F2F) appointments to prevent the spread of the virus, some patients continued seeing their health care providers in person. In the later stages of the pandemic, many patients became comfortable with video appointments, even if they were initially hesitant.

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Background: Tobacco smoking remains the leading cause of preventable morbidity and mortality in the United States, with significant rural-urban disparities. Adults who live in rural areas of the United States have among the highest tobacco smoking rates in the nation and experience a higher prevalence of smoking-related deaths and deaths due to chronic diseases for which smoking is a causal risk factor. Barriers to accessing tobacco use cessation treatments are a major contributing factor to these disparities.

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Purpose: To develop a culturally-tailored American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) women's Facebook group supporting opioid recovery as an adjunct to medication.

Design: Community-based, qualitative approach.

Setting: Minnesota, U.

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Rural populations are more vulnerable to the impacts of COVID-19 compared to their urban counterparts as they are more likely to be older, uninsured, to have more underlying medical conditions, and live further from medical care facilities. We engaged the Southeastern MN (SEMN) community (N = 7,781, 51% rural) to conduct a survey of motivators and barriers to masking to prevent COVID-19. We also assessed preferences for types of and modalities to receive education/intervention, exploring both individual and environmental factors primarily consistent with Social Cognitive Theory.

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Background: Alaska Native and American Indian (ANAI) communities in Alaska are disproportionately affected by commercial tobacco use. Financial incentive interventions promote cigarette smoking cessation, but family-level incentives have not been evaluated. We describe the study protocol to adapt and evaluate the effectiveness and implementation of a remotely delivered, family-based financial incentive intervention for cigarette smoking among Alaskan ANAI people.

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Social media platforms have potential for reach and effectiveness to motivate smoking cessation and use of evidence-based cessation treatment, even during the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. This study builds on our prior community participatory approach to developing content postings for the CAN Quit Facebook intervention among Alaska Native (AN) people who smoke. With input from a community advisory committee, we selected new content on COVID-19 preventive practices (e.

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Introduction: There is some evidence that social media interventions can promote smoking cessation. This randomized controlled pilot study is the first to evaluate the feasibility and potential efficacy of a Facebook smoking cessation intervention among Alaska Native (AN) adults.

Aims And Methods: Recruitment and data collection occurred from December 2019 to March 2021.

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Background: Cigarette smoking prevalence is higher among rural compared with urban adults, yet access to cessation programming is reduced. The Increasing Digital Equity and Access (IDEA) study aims to evaluate three digital access and literacy interventions for promoting engagement with an online evidence-based smoking cessation treatment (EBCT) program among rural adults.

Methods: The pilot trial will use a pragmatic, three-arm, randomized, parallel-group design with participants recruited from a Midwest community-based health system in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Iowa.

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Background: During the COVID-19 pandemic, to prevent the spread of the virus, federal regulatory barriers around telemedicine were lifted, and health care institutions encouraged patients to use telemedicine, including video appointments. Many patients, however, still chose face-2-face (f2f) appointments for nonemergent clinical care.

Objective: We explored patients' personal and environmental barriers to the use of video appointments from April 2020 to December 2020.

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Social media provides an effective tool to reach, engage, and connect smokers in cessation efforts. Our team developed a Facebook group, CAN Quit (Connecting Alaska Native People to Quit smoking), to promote use of evidence-based smoking cessation resources for Alaska Native people living in Alaska, which are underused despite their effectiveness. Often separated by geography and climate, Alaska Native people prefer group-based approaches for tobacco cessation that support their culture and values.

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Objective: Treat-to-target (T2T) and shared decision-making are valued features of current guidelines for rheumatoid arthritis (RA) management. Although T2T has demonstrated value for improving RA outcomes, implementation remains inconsistent and lacks standardization and procedures for including patient input. We sought to better understand the impact of shared decisions on T2T and how treatment goal discussions between patients and providers impact RA treatment improvement and satisfaction.

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Objective: To identify motivators and barriers to wearing a mask to prevent COVID-19.

Participants And Methods: An anonymous, online survey of adults from Southeastern Minnesota conducted August 2020. We assessed willingness to wear a mask and its associations with socio-demographics, COVID-19-related factors and prevention behaviors using multivariable ordinal logistic regression.

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Background: Face-to-face tobacco cessation has had limited reach and efficacy in Alaska Native (AN) communities. We describe our two-phased approach to develop content for Connecting Alaska Native People to Quit Smoking, a Facebook group intervention to reduce barriers to evidence-based smoking cessation treatment for AN people in Alaska.

Methods: Phase 1 included semi-structured telephone interviews with 30 AN people who smoke and ten stakeholders.

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Purpose: Develop and evaluate a mammography intervention that provides hope about cancer prevention and treatment.

Design: Pilot randomized controlled trial.

Setting: Two communities on the Navajo Nation.

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Background: Despite the high prevalence of tobacco use among Alaska Native (AN) people, tobacco cessation interventions developed specifically for this group are lacking. Social media hold promise as a scalable intervention strategy to promote smoking treatment utilization and cessation, given the barriers to treatment delivery (ie, geographic remoteness, limited funding, climate, and travel costs) in the state of Alaska (AK). Building on a longstanding tobacco control research partnership with the AK Tribal Health System, in this study, we are developing and pilot-testing a culturally relevant, Facebook (FB)-delivered intervention that incorporates a digital storytelling approach adapted from the effective Centers for Disease Control Tips from Former Smokers campaign.

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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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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: Lifestyle factors and genetic information has been found to contribute to the occurrence of lung cancer. This study assessed receptivity to participating in lifestyle programs to reduce cancer risk among unaffected lung cancer family members. We also explored demographic, medical, and psychosocial correlates of willingness to participate in lifestyle programs.

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Purpose: Frameworks highlighting disease actionability and severity are evolving to address the need to organize results from genome-wide analyses. This approach represents a paradigm shift from consultations focused on one or more genes to multiple genes for multiple disorders. Empirical input from the general population is lacking, yet seems essential for understanding how to maximize patient autonomy and satisfaction in the decision-making process.

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