CALL FOR ABSTRACTS — 139th APHA Annual Meeting (October 29 - November 2, 2011)

Theme: Healthy Communities Promote Healthy Minds & Bodies

Public Health Education and Health Promotion

Submission Deadline: Friday, February 11, 2011

• Advocay
  Advocacy is a critical competency for health educators and an essential strategy in profession-wide efforts to foster improvements in individual and population health in all settings. This session seeks abstracts pertaining to building effective political alliances with policymakers to strengthen and expand the resource base for behavioral/social sciences research, health education programs and practice, professional preparation in health education, and public health workforce employment.
• Alcohol : Preventing excessive consumption
  Excessive alcohol consumption is the third leading cause of preventable death in the United States and is a risk factor for many health and societal problems. Among adults, it can take the form of heavy drinking, binge drinking, or both. Approximately 5% of the total population drinks heavily and 15% of the population engages in binge drinking. This session seeks abstracts for interventions that prevent excessive alcohol consumption, including mass media and social marketing campaigns; legislative actions and taxation; harm-reduction education; etc.
• Alcohol: Reducing underage drinking
  Underage drinking often involves consumption in quantities and settings that can lead to serious immediate and long-term consequences. People aged 12 to 20 years drink 11% of all alcohol consumed in the United States. More than 90% of this alcohol is consumed in the form of binge drinks. This session seeks abstracts of programs/interventions that delay alcohol initiation in youth; discourage underage drinking; and promote harm reduction strategies.
• Asthma education and management
  Almost 9% of children and 7% of adults in the United States have asthma, but is more common among the poor and certain minority groups. This session seeks abstract of programs/interventions that improve overall quality of life and productivity, especially among youth and those disproportionately affected by this disease.
• Back pain: Improving through health education and promotions
  Back pain is one of the most common health problems in adults. In the United States, back pain is reported to occur at least once in 85% of adults below the age of 50. It is the second most common illness-related reason given for a missed workday and the most common cause of disability. Work-related back injury is the number one occupational hazard. This session seeks abstracts of health education and promotion interventions to reduce the burden of back pain, including those that prevent back injuries; reducing recurrence of back pain (eg, posture education); and educate on self-care options and non-invasive treatments.
• Breastfeeding
  Breastfeeding provides the optimal healthy beginning for newborns and mothers. In addition to having a protective effect against numerous acute and chronic illnesses, breastfeeding fosters family bonding, social development, and is environmentally and economically responsible. This session seeks abstracts of successful strategies/interventions to increase breastfeeding initiation and duration as well as those that facilitate awareness and support of breastfeeding across societal settings.
• Cancer communication: Prevention and survivorship (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on communication programs and initiatives that span the cancer care continuum—screening to diagnosis, treatment, relapse, survivorship, and end-of-life care.
• Cancer prevention and screening in risk populations
  Although cancer death rates are declining in the US, cancer remains a major public health issue, especially in risk populations where this decline is not being observed. This session seeks abstracts for programs/interventions that have effectively reached at-risk populations for screening and other preventive services.
• Communicating health care reform at the individual and community levels (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on how health care reform legislation is, or can be, communicated to and understood by individuals, communities, and other local stakeholders.
• Community and lay health workers: Building public health capacity
  Community/lay health workers serve an important role in reaching and teaching various disadvantaged and often hard-to-reach populations. This session seeks abstracts for projects that have effectively utilized community/lay health workers to help build public health capacity within their communities. Abstracts should emphasize best practices, challenges, and achievements.
• Credentialing: Preparing public health practitioners
  The importance of quality assurance and the promotion of standards for professional practice of health educators are evidenced in the credentialing efforts aimed at preparing public health practitioners. This session seeks abstracts that provide up-to-date information on credentialing efforts as well as how standards are adapted into practice.
• Cross-cultural health communication (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on communication campaigns, initiatives, or programs that target immigrant, multinational, or other culturally distinct audiences.
• Culture and language: Best practices in health education and promotion
  Health education, promotion, and communication activities are most salient to the intended recipients when they are culturally and linguistically appropriate. This session seeks abstracts of programs that demonstrate best practices and strategies to improve the health and lives of diverse at-risk populations through culturally and linguistically tailored approaches.
• Diabetes prevention & control
  Diabetes is the seventh leading cause of death in the United States. Almost 24 million Americans have diabetes, including 5.7 million who don’t know they have the disease. This session seeks abstracts for disease management programs and self-management educational interventions designed to improve glycemic control and prevent co-morbid conditions.
• Disability: Inclusivity in health education and promotion
  National statistics suggest that one in every five Americans have a disability. People with disabilities are often more vulnerable to developing preventable secondary conditions, which then further compromises their health and well-being. While health education/health promotion is a critical issue for both people with and without disability in maintaining health and independence in the community, people with disabilities often have limited or no access to such opportunities compared to those without disability. This session seeks abstracts of programs/activities that illustrate best practices and the cutting research related to inclusivity regardless of ability.
• Discrimination and bias
  When present in the health care and public health settings, discrimination and bias further compromise the health and well-being of an already disadvantaged population. This session seeks abstracts that characterize and address the needs of various marginalized and stigmatized populations.
• Engaging communities in research: Best practices
  Participatory models of research, in which communities are actively engaged in the research process through partnerships with academic institutions and/or other trained experts, are central to the national prevention research agenda. This session focuses on research projects that utilize community-based participatory research (CBPR) or other frameworks to ensure community engagement in research planning and processes. This session seeks abstracts that focus on effective methods of engaging community members, research designs, and/or evaluation of community engagement success.
• Evaluation: Methods for measuring impact and outcome of public health programs
  Evaluation is an integral part of planning and implementing public health initiatives. It is, however, often neglected, especially during the initial planning phases, thus limiting its effectiveness of determining an initiative’s value. This session seeks abstracts of public health initiatives that have effectively integrated evaluation activities and/or have utilized multiple methods for evaluating impact and outcome.
• Food marketing and availability
  The types of food available in a community and how foods are marketed influence that community’s health. This session seeks abstracts for interventions that seek to improve the nutritional status of a community or groups of people by addressing issues such as availability of fresh fruits and vegetables; providing nutritional content/calorie information, etc.
• Genomics: Collecting and using family history information for improving health
  Family history is increasingly being recognized as a critical factor in chronic disease prevention. Major national initiatives have been launched to encourage individuals to collect their family history and share the information with their providers. However, much research is needed to investigate individuals’ beliefs about family history, the understandability of current family history tools, and whether this information changes disease prevention practices. This session seeks abstracts that address these research needs.
• HIV in men who have sex with men
  Gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) represent approximately 2% of the US population, yet are the population most severely affected by HIV and are the only risk group in which new HIV infections have been increasing steadily since the early 1990s. This session seeks behavioral interventions at the individual, small group, or community level designed to increase protective behaviors among MSWMs.
• HIV/AIDS, other STIs and pregnancy prevention: Comprehensive risk reduction interventions
  Comprehensive risk reduction (CRR) promotes behaviors that prevent or reduce the risk of pregnancy, HIV, and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs). These interventions may suggest a hierarchy of recommended behaviors that identifies abstinence as the best, or preferred method but also provides information about sexual risk reduction strategies; promote abstinence and sexual risk reduction without placing one approach above another; or, promote sexual risk reduction strategies.
• Health Education Competencies in Research & Practice
  The Health Education Competencies provide a framework for research and practice in the health education field. Since the 1980s, the framework has been created, verified and updated to identify the role of health educators in order to define the Competencies of the profession. This session seeks abstract submissions that highlight research and practice guided by the Health Education Competences and Sub-competencies, at both the entry and advanced levels.
• Health literacy and nutrition education for communities (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on how communities address and overcome health literacy issues as part of nutrition, dietary, and healthy eating programs.
• Health literacy issues at the community level (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on how communities, community-based organizations, and other stakeholders identify, address, and evaluate health literacy barriers and issues.
• Income inequality and health promotion
  There has been a great deal of research comparing income inequality between U.S. states, cities and counties and between countries showing that where income inequality is greatest health and social problems, including obesity, mental illness, homicide, life expectancy, infant mortality and other measures are the worst. This session seeks abstract submissions about: a) health education and promotion interventions that address this issue, including through policy, and b) research on income inequality and health that suggests proposals for health education and promotion interventions.
• Mass media influences on health behavior (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on how traditional and mass media—television, radio, newspapers, large-scale Web sites—influence and affect individuals’ health behaviors.
• Men of color: Implications for health
  Men of color are among the most neglected populations in the United States, experiencing poor health outcomes and numerous healthcare barriers. This session is seeks abstracts of research and intervention projects that address health behaviors and outcomes of men of color.
• Mental health
  In the United States, 57.7 million people have diagnosable mental disorders, including about one in four adults. This session seeks abstracts for health education, promotion, and/or communication programs/interventions that address mental health issues including screening and management of depressive disorders and other mental disorders; depression and mental health care management in home, clinic, and community settings; etc.
• Motor vehicle-related injury prevention
  Each year, motor vehicle crashes take the lives of more than 40,000 people in the United States and result in 2.7 million emergency department visits. Motor vehicle-related injuries kill more children and young adults than any other single cause in the United States and are the leading cause of death from injury for people of all ages. This session seeks abstracts of programs/interventions that promote motor-vehicle safety, including use of child safety seats; safety belts and other passenger restraint systems; reducing impaired and distracted driving; etc.
• Obesity and Overweight: Technologies to reduce weight and maintain weight loss
  Overweight and obesity have been shown to increase the likelihood of certain diseases and other health problems, and are important concerns for adults, children, and adolescents in the United States. An estimated 26.7 percent of adults in the United States reported being obese in 2009, up 1.1 percentage points since 2007. This session seeks abstracts of interventions that influence weight-related behaviors and outcomes in individuals or groups through use of technology, including: Computers (e.g., internet, CD-ROM, e-mail, kiosk, computer program); video conferencing; personal digital assistants; pagers; pedometers with computer interaction; computerized telephone system interventions that target physical activity, nutrition, or weight; etc.
• Online health communities for patients, providers, and caregivers (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on open and closed online communities where patients, providers, caregivers, or other stakeholders meet to discuss specific illnesses or health topics.
• Online, social, and mobile media initiatives (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on online, social media, and mobile media initiatives for promoting healthy behavior or delivering health care.
• Oral health
  Good oral health is integral to general health and well-being. Most oral diseases and injuries that affect health and well-being throughout life are preventable, yet the burden of these oral problems is extensive and particularly severe in vulnerable populations. This session seeks abstracts that demonstrate effective health education and promotion interventions aimed at preventing/reducing burden from oral diseases (eg., dental caries, oral and pharyngeal cancers, etc.) and injuries, including those that are administered by practitioners and delivered in groups settings (eg., schools, community-wide, worksite, etc.)
• Parental influence on child, adolescent, and teen health behaviors (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on how parental attitudes, decisions, and behaviors affect youth health or influence their health beliefs or behaviors.
• Pharmacists’ role in health education and health promotion
  With their knowledge of medication safety, highly visible roles in the community, and frequent interactions with diverse individuals, pharmacists are in key positions to expand their roles in the promotion and support of healthy behaviors. Leveraging an underutilized resource such as pharmacists to address unmet preventive health needs is especially important in our current health care delivery environment. This session seeks abstracts related to research, policy, and delivery of services that utilize pharmacists and student pharmacists in roles promoting health education, promotion, and improving health literacy, as well as abstracts related to increasing exposure of student pharmacists to public health in their courses and clinical rotations as well as expanding their roles as public health care providers in community settings.
• Physical activity in youth: Reducing screen time
  As they grow older, children and adolescents spend more time in front of the computer and television and less time participating in physical activities. This session seeks abstracts of behavioral interventions to reduce screen time (time spent watching TV, videotapes, or DVDs; playing video or computer games; and surfing the internet) as a strategy to reduce childhood and adolescent overweight and obesity.
• Physical activity: Behavior change programs
  This session seeks abstracts of successful individually-adapted health behavior change programs that teach behavioral skills to help participants incorporate physical activity into their daily routines. Of interest are programs tailored to each individual’s specific interests, preferences, and readiness for change and those that teach behavioral skills such as: goal-setting and self-monitoring of progress toward those goals; building social support for new behaviors; behavioral reinforcement through self-reward and positive self-talk; structured problem solving to maintain the behavior change; and, prevention of relapse into sedentary behavior.
• Physical activity: Environmental and community approaches
  Creation of or enhancing access to places for physical activity involves the efforts of worksites, coalitions, agencies, and communities as they attempt to change the local environment to create and promote opportunities for physical activity. Such changes include creating walking trails, building exercise facilities, or providing access to existing nearby facilities. This session seeks abstracts of successful programs/initiatives that have improved opportunities for physical activity within their communities.
• Politics and public health: The influence of election campaign contributions and lobbying on health promotion
  Billions of dollars are spent each year to influence election campaigns and to lobby legislatures and government administrative officials. Such campaign financing and lobbying may influence policy decision makers in establishing health regulations and research and program funding. The 2010 U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to allow corporations to spend unlimited amounts of the corporate treasury has expanded the influence of campaign contributions on elections. This session seeks abstracts about recent research that examine what, if any, influence campaign contributions and lobbying have had on local, state or federal policy, programs or funding for health education and promotion issues such as tobacco or alcohol control, access to reproductive services, restaurant menu labeling, sale of sugary beverages, occupational safety, HIV/AIDs, school health education
• Social determinants and environment
  Social determinants of health are societal conditions that affect health and can potentially be changed by social and health policies and programs. Abstracts are sought for interventions/programs that address health issues through social institutions (including cultural and religious institutions, economic systems, and political structures) and/or surroundings – (including neighborhoods, workplaces, towns, cities, and built environments).
• Social marketing and health communication campaigns (organized by HCWG)
  Focus on evaluation or implementation of social marketing and health communication campaigns that promote healthy behavior.
• State budget crunch: Health education doing more with less
  
• Suicide prevention in youth
  Suicide is the third leading cause of death for young people aged 15 to 24 years. This session seeks evidence-based abstracts that focus on reducing risk factors for suicide, suicidal ideation, and sadness among youth.
• The role of foundation funding in setting the health promotion agenda
  Due in part to decreases in government funding, health education and promotion organizations and researchers are relying more on grants from foundations. Foundations call for proposals and fund projects that often are targeted to health priorities set by foundation officers and staff rather than by community consensus. This session seeks abstract submissions about policy analysis or research that examines what role foundations are playing and should be playing in setting national or global agendas for health education and promotion programs.
• Tobacco use cessation
  Tobacco use is responsible for more than 430,000 deaths each year and is the largest cause of preventable morbidity and mortality in the United States. It is recognized as a cause of multiple cancers, heart disease, stroke, complications of pregnancy, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. This session seeks abstracts of effective health education and promotion interventions/activities shown to reduce tobacco use and/or increase tobacco use cessation.
• Tobacco use initiation in youth
  Each day in the United States, approximately 3,450 young people between 12 and 17 years of age smoke their first cigarette, and an estimated 850 youth become daily cigarette smokers. After a period of decline, an increasing number of U.S. high school students have reported using smokeless tobacco products in recent years. This session seeks abstracts of interventions shown to reduce tobacco use initiation including mass-media and social marketing campaigns, comprehensive school-based tobacco-use prevention policies and programs , community-based interventions, and legislative actions.
• Tobacco: Reducing exposure to environmental tobacco smoke
  Despite progress in reducing secondhand smoke exposure in the United States, serious risks still exist. According to the 2006 Surgeon General's report on involuntary smoke exposure, more than 126 million nonsmokers in the United States continue to be exposed to environmental tobacco smoke in homes, vehicles, workplaces, and public places. Children, in particular, are at risk for involuntary exposure: an estimated 60% of U.S. children are exposed to environmental tobacco smoke. This session seeks abstracts of interventions and activities that reduce exposure to environmental tobacco smoke, including those that target individual behavior, smoking bans/restrictions in the workplace and community settings, etc.
• Training public health students: Innovative methods
  A strong academic foundation is crucial to developing students who are well-prepared to enter the public health workforce. This session seeks abstracts for innovative classroom and curricular approaches to building competencies within academic programs.
• Underserved populations: Innovative health promotion/health communication programs
  Effective health promotion/health communication has been in existence for several decades for a variety of populations. However, persistent and in some cases growing health disparities present a challenge to program planners to develop effective, evidence-based programs for underserved and marginalized groups. This session seeks creative applications of theoretical frameworks and methodologies that have been utilized to create programs for diverse populations in traditional and non-traditional settings.
• Vaccinations to prevent diseases
  Diseases that can be prevented by vaccines remain major causes of illness and death for people of all ages in the United States. This session seeks abstracts of successful strategies to increase non-seasonal vaccination rates among children and adolescents, older adults, and other risk populations by enhancing access to vaccination services, provider- or system-based interventions (eg. , provider education, provider reminders, etc.) , and increasing community demand (eg; incentives, reminder and recall systems; vaccination requirements; etc.)
• Vaccinations: Improving influenza vaccine acceptance
  Each year in the U.S., influenza causes 36,000 deaths and 226,000 hospitalizations. Vaccinations are an effective way of reducing influenza morbidity and mortality, but most Americans remain unvaccinated. This session seeks abstracts of health education and health promotion programs/interventions that increase influenza vaccine acceptance and rates.
• Violence: School-based programs to reduce bullying and other violence
  Universal school-based programs to reduce violence are designed to teach all students in a given school or grade about the problem of violence and its prevention. This session seeks abstracts on one or more of the following topics or skills intended to reduce aggressive or violent behavior: emotional self-awareness, emotional control, self-esteem, positive social skills, social problem solving, conflict resolution, or team work.
• Worksite health promotion
  Worksite policies and programs may help employees reduce health risks and improve their quality of life. This session seeks abstracts for effective employee-health interventions, be they delivered at the worksite (e.g., signs to encourage stair use, health education classes), at other locations (e.g., gym membership discounts, weight management counseling), or through the employee health benefits plan (e.g., flu shots, cancer screenings)
• Youth health: Interventions to improve caregivers' parenting skills
  Parenting interventions have the potential to affect a variety of youths’ risk behaviors and associated health outcomes. This session seeks interventions/programs designed to modify youths’ risk/protective behaviors and health outcomes by improving their caregivers’ parenting skills
• Other: Context specific
  Submit context-specific abstracts that do not fit into other topic areas.
• Other: Disease/health outcome specific
  Submit disease/health outcome specific abstracts that do not fit into other topic areas.
• Other: Population specific
  Submit population specific abstracts that do not fit into other topic areas.

1. Session organizer’s name and contact information


2. Session title


3. Session overview: 3 – 4 sentences describing the scope of the session


4. Session learning objectives: 2 – 3 measureable learning objectives that reflect the scope of the session


5. APHA-assigned abstract numbers for each of the five individual abstract submissions,


6. Expanded description: No more than one page describing the session in greater detail.

Program Planner Contact Information:
Marilyn Gardner, PhD
Department of Public Health
Western Kentucky University
1906 College Heights Boulevard
Bowling Green, KY 42101
Phone: 270-745-5864; 270-779-2767
Fax: 270-745-4437
marilyn.gardner@wku.edu

and
Keiko Sakagami, EdD, CHES
Communications
New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene
125 Worth St., Rm1047
New York, NY 10013
Phone: 2126768436
Fax: 2127885196
ksakagam@health.nyc.gov