Publications by authors named "Puffer E"

In task-shared, mental health, and psychosocial support interventions, monitoring the quality of delivery (fidelity and competence) of nonspecialist providers is critical. Quality of delivery is frequently reported in brief, summary statistics, and while both fidelity and competence scores tend to be high, rarely have factors associated with quality of delivery in low-resource, mental health, and psychosocial support interventions been examined using inferential statistics. Understanding both modifiable and non-modifiable predictors of quality of delivery is important for adapting training and supervision approaches throughout intervention delivery.

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Studies suggest issues may arise when using childcare setting assessment tools designed for high-resource settings in low-resource settings to assess and improve the quality of care, including placing disproportionate weight on features of the childcare environment that may not be available or culturally appropriate within the low-resource context. This study compares a novel assessment tool developed in and for low-income and low-resource settings with a standardized "gold standard" tool developed for use in high-resource settings. The study included a randomized sample of 34 childcare centers in a low-resource context that provided care for approximately 918.

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Families in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) face significant mental health and psychosocial care gaps. In recent years, researchers and practitioners have addressed these gaps by task-sharing evidence-based mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) interventions to nonspecialist community providers. Supervision and training approaches are intended to prepare nonspecialists to deliver evidence-based interventions with quality.

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Purpose: Physically harsh discipline is associated with poor developmental outcomes among children. These practices are more prevalent in areas experiencing poverty and resource scarcity, including in low- and middle-income countries. Designed to limit social desirability bias, this cross-sectional study in rural Uganda estimated caregiver preferences for physically harsh discipline; differences by caregiver sex, child sex, and setting; and associations with indicators of household economic stress and insecurity.

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Collaboration with African religious congregations can promote psychosocial well-being with greater accessibility. Effective collaboration requires studying congregations as unique intervention contexts. This study explored how an intervention in western Kenya fit within and altered congregational discussion patterns.

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Armed conflict and forced displacement can significantly strain nurturing family environments, which are essential for child well-being. Yet, limited evidence exists on the effectiveness of family-systemic interventions in these contexts. We conducted a two-arm, single-masked, feasibility Randomised Controlled Trial (fRCT) of a whole-family intervention with Syrian, Iraqi and Jordanian families in Jordan.

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Structural barriers perpetuate mental health disparities for minoritized US populations; global mental health (GMH) takes an interdisciplinary approach to increasing mental health care access and relevance. Mutual capacity building partnerships between low and middle-income countries and high-income countries are beginning to use GMH strategies to address disparities across contexts. We highlight these partnerships and shared GMH strategies through a case series of said partnerships between Kenya-North Carolina, South Africa-Maryland, and Mozambique-New York.

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In this pilot study, we tested a virtual family strengthening and mental health promotion intervention, Coping Together (CT), during the COVID-19 pandemic. We explored changes at the family and individual levels, as well as mechanisms of change. Participants included 18 families (24 caregivers, 24 youth) with children aged 7 to 18 years.

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Purpose: Sidedness has emerged as a prognostic factor for metastatic colorectal cancer treated with modern systemic therapies. This study investigates whether it is also relevant for an unselected patient cohort including all stages.

Methods: All consecutive patients admitted with colon cancer between 1995 and 2018 were retrieved from an institution-held database.

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Background: Substance use is a major problem among youth in sub-Saharan Africa, yet interventions that address this problem are scarce within the region. Screening and brief intervention is a cost-effective, efficacious, and easy to scale public health approach to addressing substance use problems. We conducted a pilot study to evaluate the feasibility of implementing a peer delivered screening and brief intervention program for youth in Kenya.

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Rectal cancer invading adjacent organs (T4) and locally recurrent rectal cancer (LRRC) pose a special challenge for surgical resection. We investigate the diagnostic performance of MRI and the results that can be achieved with MRI-guided surgery. All consecutive patients who underwent MRI-based multivisceral resection for T4 rectal adenocarcinoma or LRRC between 2005 and 2019 were included.

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Background: Youth in sub-Saharan Africa are at high risk of substance use yet lack access to substance use interventions. The goal of this project was to evaluate the feasibility and acceptability of a peer-delivered, single-session substance use screening and brief intervention program for youth in Kenya.

Methods: This was a convergent parallel mixed methods study utilizing both quantitative and qualitative approaches.

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Background: Child maltreatment is a global public health crisis with negative consequences for physical and mental health. Children in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC)-particularly those affected by poverty, armed conflict, and forced migration-may be at increased risk of maltreatment due to heightened parental distress and disruptions to social support networks. Parenting interventions have been shown to reduce the risk of child maltreatment as well as improve a range of caregiver and child outcomes, yet large-scale implementation remains limited in low-resource displacement settings.

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Background: In March 2020, the novel 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) was declared a pandemic. In May 2020, George Floyd was murdered, catalyzing a national racial reckoning. In the Southern United States, these events occurred in the context of a history of racism and high rates of poverty and discrimination, especially among racially and ethnically minoritized populations.

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Mental health needs and disparities are widespread and have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, with the greatest burden being on marginalized individuals worldwide. The World Health Organization developed the Mental Health Gap Action Programme to address growing global mental health needs by promoting task sharing in the delivery of psychosocial and psychological interventions. However, little is known about the training needed for non-specialists to deliver these interventions with high levels of competence and fidelity.

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Background: A key question in implementation science is how to balance adaptation and fidelity in translating interventions to new settings. There is growing consensus regarding the importance of planned adaptations to deliver interventions in contextually sensitive ways. However, less research has examined ad-hoc adaptations, or those that occur spontaneously in the course of intervention delivery.

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Objectives: Guided by the bioecological model, the purpose of this study was to examine the associations of (1) individual level factors (sociodemographic, health behaviour and mental health), (2) family (micro) level COVID-19 experiences (difficulty with household management, managing child mood and behaviour, and pandemic-related positive experiences) and (3) community (macro) level factors (residential instability, ethnic concentration, material deprivation and dependency, an indicator of age and labour force) with harsh parenting practices and inter-partner conflict during the early lockdown of the COVID-19 pandemic in Ontario, Canada.

Design: A cross-sectional analysis of data from the Ontario Parent Survey.

Setting: A convenience sample of 7451 caregivers living in Ontario, Canada, at the time of baseline data collection (May-June 2020).

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Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a global public health crisis with long-term adverse consequences for both victims and perpetrators. Patterns of violence often begin during adolescence, yet most interventions target adult relationships. A systematic review was conducted to identify correlates of IPV victimization and perpetration among adolescents and young adults in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

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Peer-delivered interventions for adolescent mental health can help address poor access to mental health interventions. Questions remain about how interventions can be adapted for peer delivery and whether peers can be trained. In this study, we adapted problem solving therapy (PST) for peer-delivery with adolescents in Kenya and explored whether peer counselors can be trained in PST.

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Objectives: This study aimed to examine the intergenerational effects of maternal adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and child mental health outcomes in rural Uganda, as well as the potentially mediating role of maternal depression in this pathway. Additionally, we sought to test the extent to which maternal social group membership attenuated the mediating effect of maternal depression on child mental health.

Methods: Data come from a population-based cohort of families living in the Nyakabare Parish, a rural district in southwestern Uganda.

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Background: Resettlement experiences of refugee parents are under-researched despite evidence indicating higher risk of poor mental health. The current study integrates family systems and social determinants of refugee mental health frameworks to examine: (1) Refugee parents' experiences of resettlement stressors and mental health; (2) Perceived impacts of resettlement stressors on individual and family indicators of well-being; and (3) Refugee parents' coping strategies and resources.

Methods: The study draws on data from a mixed methods survey conducted with 40 Government-Assisted Refugee parents who had resettled to Hamilton, Canada within the past 4 years.

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