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PubMed2000

Coaches' attitudes toward smokeless tobacco and intentions to intervene with athletes.

Smokeless tobacco use among athletes is alarming. Most of these athletes report beginning smokeless tobacco use in middle or high school. West Virginia has significantly higher rates of smokeless tobacco use among adolescent and adult males than the general population. Since West Virginia athletes may be particularly vulnerable to smokeless tobacco use, West Virginia coaches can be critical agents in smokeless tobacco prevention and intervention. This study surveyed West Virginia middle and high school coaches' 1) attitudes toward smokeless tobacco, 2) actions toward athletes who use smokeless tobacco, 3) intentions to provide intervention for users, and 4) tobacco use history. Results indicated coaches had unfavorable attitudes toward smokeless tobacco, perceived it as a problem, and were willing to help athletes quit. These findings provide support for development of training programs for middle and high school coaches to act as smokeless tobacco intervention agents.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2000

Longitudinal tracking and retention in a school-based study on adolescent smoking: costs, variables, and smoking status.

Methods used to track a cohort of Grade 6 students through Grades 8 and 11, and costs involved for survey completion in school and by mail for ever and never smokers from the original group are detailed. At baseline, 1,598 students in Scarborough, Canada, completed a questionnaire on smoking, drinking, and health, and again in Grade 8 (N = 1,543/1,598) and Grade 11 (N = 1,454/1,598). In Grades 8 and 11, tracking and administering the questionnaire was more costly per participant when the survey was administered by mail than in school. Average completion costs were highest for Grade 11 students who used tobacco at baseline ($52.44). Students categorized as ever smokers in Grade 6 were harder to locate at each phase of testing, which suggests that this group should be identified at baseline so that closer tracking procedures may be employed between data collection points.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2003

Promoting pneumococcal immunizations among rural Medicare beneficiaries using multiple strategies.

CONTEXT: Vaccine-preventable diseases among adults are major contributing causes of morbidity and mortality in the United States. However, adult immunizations continue to be underutilized in both urban and rural areas. PURPOSE: To evaluate the effectiveness of a community-wide education campaign and mailed reminders promoting pneumococcal immunizations to rural Medicare beneficiaries. METHODS: We implemented a community-wide education campaign, and mailed reminders were sent to Medicare beneficiaries in 1 media market in Montana to increase pneumococcal immunizations. In a second distinct media market, mailed reminders only were sent to beneficiaries. FINDINGS: The proportion of respondents aged 65 years and older aware of pneumococcal immunizations increased significantly from baseline to follow-up among respondents both in the education-plus-reminder (63% to 78%, P = 0.04) and the reminder-only (64% to 74%, P = 0.05) markets. Overall from 1998 to 1999, there was a 3.7-percentage-point increase in pneumococcal immunization claims for Medicare beneficiaries in the education-plus-reminder market and a 1.5-percentage-point increase in the reminder-only market. Medicare beneficiaries sent reminders in the education-plus-reminder market compared to those in the reminder-only market were more likely to have a claim for pneumococcal immunization in 1999 (odds ratio 1.18, 95% confidence interval 1.08 to 1.28). The results suggest that these quality improvement strategies (community education plus reminders and reminders alone) modestly increased pneumococcal immunization awareness and pneumococcal immunization among rural adults. Mailed reminder exposure was associated with an increased prevalence of pneumococcal immunizations between 1998 and 1999 and was augmented somewhat by the education campaign.

Aged↗
PubMed2000

Response and nonresponse bias in oral health surveys.

Oral health surveys are undertaken to provide estimates of the dental health and behaviors of populations or population subgroups. However, the integrity of the data from sample surveys may be compromised by one or more sources of sampling and nonsampling error. An important source of nonsampling error is the failure to collect data from some of the individuals comprising the sample. Consequently, the response to a sample survey, and the direction and magnitude of bias induced by nonresponse, need to be taken into account when using estimates derived from sample surveys. Although the response rate to a survey is usually used as an indicator of the quality of the data it provides, nonresponse error is a function of nonresponse and the extent of differences in the characteristics of responders and nonresponders. Nonresponse may be managed in two ways. The first is to reduce nonresponse to a minimum using response-enhancement strategies. The second is the post-survey adjustment of data using weighting or imputation techniques to produce estimates that correct for nonresponse. This paper discusses issues concerning response and nonresponse bias in oral health surveys and provides guidelines on the management and reporting of nonresponse. It describes response-enhancement strategies to reduce noncontacts and refusals, sources of data to facilitate the comparison of responders and nonresponders, methods of assessing the degree of bias induced by nonresponse, techniques for producing adjusted survey estimates, and the assumptions on which these procedures and processes are based.

Bias↗
PubMed2003

Comparing different methods to detect and correct nonresponse bias in postal questionnaire studies.

OBJECTIVES: This study compares methods for detecting and correcting the bias associated with nonresponse to postal questionnaires. METHODS: Questionnaires were sent out in three sequential stages to parents of all 5-year-old children examined in a clinical survey. Each stage progressively targeted nonresponders. Data on dmft and area measures of socioeconomic status were available for all children. Estimates for whole population dmft were produced by different methodologies comparing the relationship between dmft and stage of response and three area measures of socioeconomic status. RESULTS: A total of 1,776 children were examined and 1,437 questionnaires were obtained, a response rate of 80.9 percent. The mean dmft of the total population (1.49) was 17.3 percent more than responders (1.27). The dmft of the nonresponders was 2.41, 89.7 percent more than responders. There were significant linear trends in dmft and socioeconomic status across the mailing stages. The methodology using mailing stage regressed against dmft produced the most accurate adjusted dmft value (1.42). The methods using area measures of socioeconomic status produced nearly identical adjusted dmft values ranging from 1.31 to 1.32. CONCLUSIONS: Even with an "acceptable" response rate, nonresponse bias can still be present. Researchers should report the outcomes of analyses to detect nonresponse bias when publishing questionnaire studies.

Bias↗
PubMed1994

Participation in breast cancer screening: randomised controlled trials of doctors' letters and of telephone reminders.

The study used a randomised controlled trial to find out whether supporting letters from general practitioners accompanying the invitations from a screening centre affected participation in a population-based breast cancer screening program for women aged 50 to 64. A further randomised controlled trial compared the effect of postal reminders with telephone reminders for women who did not respond to an initial invitation to participate in the program. There were 482 women in the first trial and 641 in the second. Excluding women who were ineligible or could not be contacted, participation in screening was 71 per cent in the group which received letters from their general practitioners compared with 62 per cent in the group which did not receive letters (P = 0.059). In the group that received letters, 56 per cent were screened without a reminder compared with 43 per cent of the group that did not receive letters (P = 0.01). Fewer women who received letters from their general practitioners declined the invitation to be screened (P = 0.048). In the second trial, there was no difference in participation between the group receiving telephone reminders and the group receiving postal reminders. As in breast cancer screening programs in other countries, general practitioner endorsement of invitations increased participation in breast cancer screening. Postal reminders were as effective as telephone reminders in encouraging women who did not respond to an initial invitation to participate in screening.

Breast Neoplasms↗
PubMed1995

Recall, retention, utilisation and acceptability of written health education materials.

The effects of two distribution strategies on the recall of receipt, retention, utilisation and perceived acceptability of written health education materials were investigated in two semirural communities. We randomly selected 512 people, 212 from general practitioners' surgeries, who received the materials from their general practitioners at the end of a routine consultation, and 300 from the electoral register, who received it through the mail in a personally addressed envelope. Of all those who received the materials, 55 (10.7 per cent) were not contactable and 386 (84.5 per cent) of those contacted consented to the survey. Structured interviews were conducted with consenting individuals two weeks after distribution to assess recall of receipt, retention, utilisation and perceived acceptability. Of those receiving the material by mail, 77.4 per cent recalled receiving it, 75.4 per cent reported keeping the booklet and 66.7 per cent reported reading it. Of those receiving it from a general practitioner, 90.9 per cent recalled receiving it, 93.3 per cent reported keeping the booklet and 56 per cent reported reading it. Perceived acceptability of the material was high, with over 80 per cent of respondents finding it very or fairly eye-catching, believable, interesting and easy to read. Although general practitioner distribution led to higher rates of receipt and retention, mail-out distribution led to higher utilisation rates and allowed access to a larger proportion of the population, resulting in more people being exposed to the education message.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2000

Maximizing response rates to a survey of dentists: a randomized trial.

Dentists currently practising within the Central Sydney Area were surveyed (n = 179). A randomized controlled trial was conducted to evaluate the effect of an advance telephone prompt (intervention group) compared with an advance letter prompt only (control group) in maximizing the response rate to a self-administered questionnaire. While the overall response rate was 83 per cent, the final response rate (89 per cent) from dentists in the intervention group was significantly higher than that from dentists in the control group (78 per cent) (chi 2 = 4.14, df = 1, p = 0.04). Advance telephone prompts are effective in maximizing the response rates from dentists and are recommended in future surveys of this professional group.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMed1991

Empathy, effectiveness and donations to charity: social psychology's contribution.

Charity organizations often use mailed requests to solicit donations from the public. This is not an efficient way to raise large amounts of money. The challenge addressed in this study was to use social psychology's knowledge of helping processes to make mailed requests more effective. Two constructs were identified as possibly useful: empathy and perceived effectiveness of helping. These were manipulated in a field experiment in a 2 x 2 x 2 factorial design (two levels of empathy, two of need extent, and two of need persistence--the last two factors operationalized perceived effectiveness). Letter soliciting donations to a well-known charity were mailed to a random sample of 2648 people in Perth, Western Australia. Manipulations of the three variables were embedded in the letters. The two effectiveness manipulations produced significant main effects, whereas the empathy manipulation was ineffective. We argue that social psychology's knowledge of helping processes is too confined to narrow, theoretical, laboratory-based phenomena to be directly and immediately applicable to the practices of charities.

Charities↗
PubMed1991

[Usefulness of the mailed specimens for mass examination of Chlamydia trachomatis and Neisseria gonorrhoeae with EIA].

The infections with C. trachomatis and N. gonorrhoeae have recently been determined routinely with the commercial kits for detecting the antigens of these organisms in both the clinical and mass examination laboratories. In mass examination, a change during transporting the specimens must be avoided. Hence, a study on whether the antigens were changed with atmospheric temperature was carried out. As for C. trachomatis, no change in antigen was found on the enzyme immunoassay (EIA) absorbance of the antigen quantity corresponding to the cell of 4.8 x 10(4), 2.4 x 10(4) and 6.0 x 10(3) (IFU/ml) until 5 days at 4, 25 and 37 degrees C respectively after sampling. The coefficient variation was found out to be ca. 10%. In a test on antigen stability of N. gonorrhoeae, similar results to that of C. trachomatis were obtained on the following antigen quantity: 2.4 x 10(3), 3.3 x 10(2) and 9.0 x 10 (CFU/ml) under the same conditions as in the above. The coefficient variation was found out to be 10% or less. To investigate whether there is any difference on the stability of C. trachomatis antigen between mailing and hand carrying, a total of 133 specimens collected from many clinics were subjected to the detection of antigen with the commercial EIA kits. The results of comparison on both transport methods were as follows: agreement rate 96.2%, positive rate 100% and negative rate 95.2%. The highly correlation between the both transportation was confirmed in the detection of antigen; that is, Y = 1.03X + 0.03, r = 0.936.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Antigens, Bacterial↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Mailed thermoluminescent dosimetry reviews in radiation therapy.

The six Centers for Radiological Physics performed periodic thermoluminescent dosimetry (TLD) reviews for photon beams at 276 facilities across the country. The purpose of the reviews and the techniques in use are briefly described. Results from 2413 mailed reviews of megavoltage units indicate that, in 92% of the reviews, a specified dose was delivered within +/- 5% of the TLD-measured dose. A comparison is made to other mailed TLD review systems.

Postal Service↗