Health Care Expenditures and Use Associated with Hypertension Among U.S. Adults.

Introduction: This study seeks to estimate health care expenditures and use associated with hypertension, focusing on differences among racial and ethnic groups.

Methods: Data were from the 2019 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey, analyzed in 2023. The study sample included noninstitutionalized U.

Policy implementation and outcome evaluation: establishing a framework and expanding capacity for advocacy organizations to assess the impact of their work in public policy.

Advocacy organizations can play a crucial role in evaluating whether legislation or regulation has had its intended effect by supporting robust public policy implementation and outcome evaluation. The American Heart Association, working with expert advisors, has developed a framework for effective evaluation that can be used by advocacy organizations, in partnership with researchers, public health agencies, funders, and policy makers to assess the health and equity impact of legislation and regulation over time. Advocacy organizations can use parts of this framework to evaluate the impact of policies relevant to their own advocacy and public policy efforts and inform policy development and guide their organizational resource allocation.

Timing of State and Territorial COVID-19 Stay-at-Home Orders and Changes in Population Movement - United States, March 1-May 31, 2020.

SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), is thought to spread from person to person primarily by the respiratory route and mainly through close contact (1). Community mitigation strategies can lower the risk for disease transmission by limiting or preventing person-to-person interactions (2). U.

An exploratory review of the literature evaluating nonclinical fellowship programs.

Fellowship programs offer career development opportunities, provide experiential training, and can be used to recruit personnel to address specific challenges facing the public health workforce. Given the potential influence fellowships have on the future public health workforce, it is important to understand and articulate the results of such programs and to identify areas of improvement to meet current workforce needs. The purpose of this literature review was to identify common practices used to evaluate nonclinical fellowship programs.

Social Environmental Correlates of Health Behaviors in a Faith-Based Policy and Environmental Change Intervention.

Diet and physical activity are behavioral risk factors for many chronic diseases, which are among the most common health conditions in the United States. Yet most Americans fall short of meeting established dietary and physical activity guidelines. Faith-based organizations as settings for health promotion interventions can affect members at multiple levels of the social ecological model.

Practice to Evidence: Using Evaluability Assessment to Generate Practice-Based Evidence in Rural South Georgia.

Evidence from formal evaluation of real-world practice can address gaps in the public health knowledge base and provide information about feasible, relevant strategies for varied settings. Interest in evaluability assessment (EA) as an approach for generating practice-based evidence has grown. EA has been central to several structured assessment processes that identify and select promising programs and evaluate those most likely to produce useful findings.

Increasing Community Access to Fresh Fruits and Vegetables: A Case Study of the Farm Fresh Market Pilot Program in Cobb County, Georgia, 2014.

Background: Ecological models of health suggest that to effectively prevent chronic disease, community food environments must support healthy eating behaviors. However, disparities in access to healthy foods persist in the United States.

Community Context: The Farm Fresh Market (FFM) was a fruit and vegetable market that sold low-cost fresh produce in Cobb County, Georgia in 2014.

Promoting Policy and Environmental Change in Faith-Based Organizations: Description and Findings From a Mini-Grants Program.

Purpose: The Emory Prevention Research Center's Cancer Prevention and Control Research Network mini-grant program funded faith-based organizations to implement policy and environmental change to promote healthy eating and physical activity in rural South Georgia. This study describes the existing health promotion environment and its relationship to church member behavior.

Design: Cross-sectional.

Results from an Evaluation of the Georgia Colorectal Cancer Control Program's Community Education and Outreach Events, 2013.

Although public health practitioners commonly use community education and outreach events to promote cancer screening, the effectiveness of this strategy remains unclear. This study evaluated 23 outreach events, conducted as part of the Georgia Colorectal Cancer Control Program. Of the estimated 1778 individuals who attended these events, those ages 50-75 were eligible to participate in a telephone survey 3 months after attending an event.

Promoting Policy and Environmental Change in Faith-Based Organizations: Outcome Evaluation of a Mini-Grants Program.

High rates of heart disease, cancer, and stroke exist in rural South Georgia where the Emory Prevention Research Center's Cancer Prevention and Control Research Network provided mini-grant funding to six churches to implement policy and environmental change to promote healthy eating and physical activity. This study sought to determine whether perceptions of the health promotion environment changed over time and whether perceived environmental change was associated with healthy behavior at church and in general. This study used a single-group pre-post design with 1-year follow-up.

Evaluating Policy, Systems, and Environmental Change Interventions: Lessons Learned From CDC's Prevention Research Centers.

Introduction: The field of public health is increasingly implementing initiatives intended to make policies, systems, and environments (PSEs) more supportive of healthy behaviors, even though the evidence for many of these strategies is only emerging. Our objective was 3-fold: 1) to describe evaluations of PSE-change programs in which the evaluators followed the steps of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC's) Framework for Program Evaluation in Public Health, 2) to share the resulting lessons learned, and 3) to assist future evaluators of PSE-change programs with their evaluation design decisions.

Methods: Seven Prevention Research Centers (PRCs) applied CDC's framework to evaluate their own PSE-change initiatives.

Policy, systems, and environmental change in the Mississippi Delta: considerations for evaluation design.

Community-level policy, systems, and environmental (PSE) change strategies may offer an economical and sustainable approach to chronic disease prevention. The rapidly growing number of untested but promising PSE strategies currently underway offers an exciting opportunity to establish practice-based evidence for this approach. This article presents lessons learned from an evaluation of a community-based PSE initiative targeting stroke and cardiovascular disease prevention in the Mississippi Delta.

Applying the chronic care model to an employee benefits program: a qualitative inquiry.

Objective: To assess how employee benefits programs may strengthen and/or complement elements of the chronic care model (CCM), a framework used by health systems to improve chronic illness care.

Methods: A qualitative inquiry consisting of semi-structured interviews with employee benefit administrators and partners from a self-insured, self-administered employee health benefits program was conducted at a large family-owned business in southwest Georgia.

Results: Results indicate that the employer adapted and used many health system-related elements of the CCM in the design of their benefit program.

Evaluation of a patient navigation program to promote colorectal cancer screening in rural Georgia, USA.

Background: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a leading cause of cancer death in the United States. Early detection through recommended screening has been shown to have favorable treatment outcomes, yet screening rates among the medically underserved and uninsured are low, particularly for rural and minority populations. This study evaluated the effectiveness of a patient navigation program that addresses individual and systemic barriers to CRC screening for patients at rural, federally qualified community health centers.

Balancing fidelity and adaptation: implementing evidence-based chronic disease prevention programs.

Objectives: To describe adaptations that community-based organizations (CBOs) made to evidence-based chronic disease prevention intervention programs and to discuss reasons for those adaptations.

Design: The process evaluation used project report forms, interviews, and focus groups to obtain information from organizational staff.

Setting: Programs were conducted in community-based organizations (n = 12) in rural southwest Georgia including churches, worksites, community coalitions, a senior center, and a clinical patient setting.

Research to reality: a process evaluation of a mini-grants program to disseminate evidence-based nutrition programs to rural churches and worksites.

Objectives: To describe a project that used mini-grants plus technical assistance to disseminate evidence-based programs, to understand how the project worked in different settings, and to generate recommendations for future programming and evaluation.

Design: Process evaluation using program records, activity forms completed by grantees, interviews, and focus groups.

Setting: Churches and worksites in rural, southwest Georgia.

The role of community context in planning and implementing community-based health promotion projects.

The current study examines how community context affected collaborative planning and implementation in eight sites participating in a healthy cities and communities initiative in California. Data are from 23 focus groups conducted with coalition members, and 76 semi-structured interviews with local coordinators and community leaders. Multiple case study methods were used to identify major themes related to how five contextual domains influenced collaborative planning and implementation.

Training for and dissemination of the Nutrition Environment Measures Surveys (NEMS).

Introduction: Researchers believe that nutrition environments contribute to obesity and may explain some health disparities. The Nutrition Environment Measures Surveys (NEMS) are valid and reliable observational measures of the nutrition environment. This article describes the dissemination of the measures, including the development, implementation, and evaluation of training workshops, and a follow-up survey of training participants.

How does community context influence coalitions in the formation stage? A multiple case study based on the Community Coalition Action Theory.

Background: Community coalitions are rooted in complex and dynamic community systems. Despite recognition that environmental factors affect coalition behavior, few studies have examined how community context impacts coalition formation. Using the Community Coalition Action theory as an organizing framework, the current study employs multiple case study methodology to examine how five domains of community context affect coalitions in the formation stage of coalition development.

Youth risk behavior surveillance--selected steps communities, 2005.

Problem: Unhealthy dietary behaviors, physical inactivity, and tobacco use contribute to chronic disease and other health conditions, including obesity, diabetes, and asthma. These behaviors often are established during childhood and adolescence, extend into adulthood, are interrelated, and are preventable.

Reporting Period Covered: January-May 2005.