American journal of preventive medicine
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Preventing obesity requires maintenance of healthy eating behaviors over time. Food labels and strategies that increase visibility and convenience of healthy foods (choice architecture) promote healthier choices, but long-term effectiveness is unknown. ⋯ A traffic-light and choice architecture cafeteria intervention resulted in sustained healthier choices over 2 years, suggesting that food environment interventions can promote long-term changes in population eating behaviors.
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Characterizing the smoking patterns for different birth cohorts is essential for evaluating the impact of tobacco control interventions and predicting smoking-related mortality, but the process of estimating birth cohort smoking histories has received limited attention. ⋯ A novel method of generating smoking histories has been applied to develop smoking histories that can be used in micro-simulation models, and has been incorporated in the National Cancer Institute's Smoking History Generator. These aggregate estimates developed by age, gender, and cohort will provide a complete source of smoking data over time.
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Leukocyte telomere length (LTL) is an indicator of general systemic aging, with shorter LTL being associated with several chronic diseases of aging and earlier mortality. Identifying factors related to LTL among African Americans may yield insights into mechanisms underlying racial disparities in health. ⋯ Results suggest that multiple levels of racism, including interpersonal experiences of racial discrimination and the internalization of negative racial bias, operate jointly to accelerate biological aging among African-American men. Societal efforts to address racial discrimination in concert with efforts to promote positive in-group racial attitudes may protect against premature biological aging in this population.
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Previous cross-sectional studies found that positive beliefs about electronic nicotine delivery systems (commonly known as electronic cigarettes or e-cigarettes) were associated with use of these products. However, the prospective association between these beliefs and subsequent use of e-cigarettes is unclear. ⋯ Given that young adults are still developing their tobacco use behaviors, informing them about the lack of evidence to support e-cigarettes as quit aids and the unknown health risk of e-cigarettes may deter young adults from trying these products.
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There are sparse data showing the extent to which evidence-based public health is occurring among local health departments. ⋯ This research on the patterns and predictors of administrative evidence-based practices in health departments provides information on gaps and areas for improvement that can be linked with ongoing quality improvement processes.