ANTHC Tobacco Prevention increases program reach to North Slope Borough
April 1, 2016Categories: Healthy People and Prevention
In July, ANTHC’s Tobacco Prevention Program was awarded a State Partnership Initiative grant from the Office of Minority Health to reduce tobacco use among Alaska Native adults in the North Slope Borough. To accomplish the objectives in this grant, key strategies for the ANTHC Tobacco Prevention Program are working with the North Slope Borough Health Department (NSBHD) and Arctic Slope Native Association (ASNA) to: 1) integrate tobacco screening, education and treatment into routine health care practices, 2) develop two culturally relevant community awareness campaigns to increase knowledge of the health effects of smoking and, 3) to support current tobacco prevention efforts in the region. Through collaboration with ASNA and the NSBHD, four health care professionals have been trained as tobacco treatment specialists; a regional tobacco disparities profile has been completed; a survey of tobacco attitudes, opinions and behaviors has been completed; and most recently two community listening sessions were held in Barrow to share information and gather ideas from the community for the two media campaigns. The project team is now in the beginning stages of transforming ideas from the listening sessions into campaign messages that will be later focus tested in the region. As the work continues, the Tobacco Prevention Program continues to focus on collaboration with partners to reduce smoking among Alaska Native adults in the North Slope region. To learn more about projects within the ANTHC Tobacco Prevention Program send an email to tobacco@anthc.org or visit www.anthc.org/what-we-do/wellness/tobacco/.