American journal of preventive medicine
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Follow-up services are an important component of a comprehensive, national strategy for suicide prevention. Increasing our knowledge of effective follow-up care has been identified as an Aspirational Goal by The National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention's Research Prioritization Task Force. ⋯ This paper identifies several breakthroughs that would be helpful for advancing this area of research and describes a comprehensive research pathway for achieving both short- and long-term research objectives.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
A randomized trial of Text2Quit: a text messaging program for smoking cessation.
Text messaging programs on mobile phones have shown some promise in helping people quit smoking. Text2Quit is an automated, personalized, interactive mobile health program that sends text messages to offer advice, support, and reminders about quitting smoking. ⋯ These results provide initial support for the relative efficacy of the Text2Quit program.
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The goal of the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention is to reduce suicide and suicide attempts in the U. S. by 40% in the next decade. In this paper, a public health approach is applied to suicide prevention to illustrate how reductions in youth suicide and suicidal behavior might be achieved by prioritizing research in two areas: (1) increasing access to primary care-based behavioral health interventions for depressed youth and (2) improving continuity of care for youth who present to emergency departments after a suicide attempt. Finally, some scientific, clinical, and methodologic breakthroughs needed to achieve rapid, substantial, and sustained reductions in youth suicide and suicidal behavior are discussed.
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Suicide is an important public health problem. Although there have been advances in our knowledge of suicide, gaps remain in knowledge about suicide risk factors and prevention. Here, we discuss research pathways that have the potential to rapidly advance knowledge in suicide risk assessment and reduction of suicide deaths over the next decade. ⋯ Using quasi-experimental methods or sophisticated analytic strategies such as propensity score-matching techniques, the impact of large-scale interventions on suicide can be evaluated. Furthermore, such partnerships between policymakers and researchers can lead to the design and support of prospective RCTs (e.g., cluster randomized trials, stepped wedge designs, waiting list designs) in high-risk groups (e.g., people with a history of suicide attempts, multi-axial comorbidity, and offspring of people who have died by suicide). These research pathways could lead to rapid knowledge uptake between communities and have the strong potential to reduce suicide.
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The objective of this systematic review was to determine the costs, benefits, and overall economic value of communication campaigns that included mass media and distribution of specified health-related products at reduced price or free of charge. ⋯ Economic merits of the intervention could not be determined for health communication campaigns associated with use of recreational helmets, child car seats, and pedometers, primarily because available economic information and analyses were incomplete. There is some evidence that campaigns with free condom distribution to promote safer sex practices were cost-effective among high-risk populations and the cost per quit achieved in campaigns promoting tobacco cessation with nicotine replacement therapy products may translate to a cost per quality-adjusted life-year less than $50,000. Many interventions were publicly funded trials or programs, and the failure to properly evaluate their economic cost and benefit is a serious gap in the science and practice of public health.