Background. Interventions designed to prevent tobacco and alcohol use targeting high-risk adolescents are limited. In addition, few studies have attempted to improve parent–child communication skills as a way of improving and maintaining healthy youth decision-making. Methods. A total of 660 Hispanic migrant families participated in a randomized pre–post control group study that was utilized to...

Background. Fires cause 1% of the global burden of disease. Fire (includes explosion) disasters have immense health, social, and environmental costs. We will provide initial estimates of overall U.S. and global fire tolls from smoking. Methods. We tabulated and summarized smoking-related fire and disaster tolls from published documents. We compared those tolls to U.S. fire, burn, and fire death...

Background. A significant number of Dutch older adults can be considered sedentary when it comes to regular participation in leisure-time physical activity. Sedentariness is considered a potential public health burden—all the more reason to develop a strategy for stimulating older adults toward becoming more involved in leisure-time physical activity. The Groningen Active Living Model (GALM) is...

In the summer of 19701 felt it would be interesting to follow-up patients in my practice and to record any change in their smoking habits, in an attempt to determine the possible effectiveness of a general practitioner in stopping smoking. Between June 1970 and March 1971,100 patients were recruited. The patients were smokers with whom I had had no previous discussion of their smoking habits. P...

Background. The overweight population may benefit from Transtheoretical Model-based interventions focusing on regular moderate exercise. Current stages of change measures assessing regular moderate exercise specific to an overweight population (BMI $25) are lacking. This study examined the validity of a staging algorithm for moderate exercise for the purposes of healthy weight management. Metho...

Public health guidelines primarily focus on the promotion of physical activity and steady-state aerobic exercise, which enhances cardiorespiratory fitness and has some impact on body composition. However, research demonstrates that resistance exercise training has profound effects on the musculoskeletal system, contributes to the maintenance of functional abilities, and prevents osteoporosis, s...

Background. This study was undertaken to examine whether acupuncture treatment may have a long-term effect on smoking cessation or reduction. Methods. Altogether 46 healthy men and women who reported smoking 20 6 6 cigarettes per day (mean 6 SD) volunteered in the study. They were randomly assigned to a test group (TG) or to a control group (CG) in which presumed anti-smoking acupoints were sti...

1Research Division, Institute of Mental Health 2University of Melbourne, ORYGEN Youth Health 3University of Melbourne, ORYGEN Research Centre Address for Correspondence: A/Prof Chong Siow Ann, Institute of Mental Health, Buangkok Green Medical Park, 10 Buangkok View, Singapore 539747. Email: [email protected] Preventive Psychiatry Siow Ann Chong,1MMED (Psychiatry), MD, FAMS, Mythily Sub...

Background. The transtheoretical model (TTM) and computer technology are promising technologies for changing health behavior, but there is little evidence of their effectiveness among adolescents. Method. Four thousand two hundred twenty-seven Year 9 (ages 13–14) pupils in 26 schools were randomly allocated to control and 4,125 in 26 schools were allocated to TTM intervention. TTM pupils receiv...

Background. Tobacco use remains the leading cause of preventable death in the United States. Although comprehensive tobacco control has a number of essential components, support for cessation services can yield the largest short-term public health benefit. While effective treatments for tobacco dependence do exist, they are not currently available to many of the tobacco users who want and need ...