Using community-based participatory research methods to reach women with health messages: results from the North Carolina BEAUTY and Health Pilot Project.
This pilot study used a community-based participatory research approach to recruit and train five licensed cosmetologists from two beauty salons to deliver health promotion messages to their customers. Stylists attended a 4-hr workshop to develop skills for delivering targeted health messages. Educational displays in the salons reinforced these messages. Qualitative and quantitative methods assessed satisfaction, readiness to change, and self-reported health behavior changes in customers immediately postintervention and at 12 months. Trained stylists reported they would continue delivering health messages after the 7-week pilot was completed; 81% of customers read the educational displays, and 86% of customers talked with their cosmetologist about the Bringing Education and Understanding to You Project. At 12 months, 55% of customers reported making changes in their health because of the conversations they had with their cosmetologist. Customers who spoke more often with their cosmetologists about health also reported a higher percentage of self-reported behavior changes. It appears that trained licensed cosmetologists are effective in promoting health messages to their customers.
Linnan
Laura A
LA
School of Public Health University, North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA.
Ferguson
Yvonne Owens
YO
Wasilewski
Yvonne
Y
Lee
Ann Marie
AM
Yang
Jingzhen
J
Solomon
Felicia
F
Katz
Mira
M
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001505:Beauty Culture; D003256:Community Participation; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000517:prevention & control*; D009657:North Carolina; D010865:Pilot Projects; D014932:Women's Health Services