Exploring experiences among adopters during the diffusion of a novel dance intervention in Sweden.

There is a demand for interventions aimed at adolescent girls with psychosomatic problems. In 2013, positive results were reported from a dance intervention programme addressing girls with internalizing problems. The research team behind the intervention immediately received requests from municipalities and county councils interested in using the intervention. From an implementation point of view it is unclear what made the intervention spread without an active plan. The aim of this study was to explore adopters' experiences about the diffusion and initiation of a public health intervention targeting adolescent girls with internalizing problems. Interviews were conducted with 12 people who were engaged in initiating the intervention in different settings. Data were analysed using conventional content analysis, yielding three categories: perceived appeal and trustworthiness, convenient information, and contextual factors. The results reflected that the participants found that there was a need for an intervention and found the dance intervention to be evidence based and not too complex to perform. Further, there was available information on the project which could easily be distributed to decision makers and others. When initiating the intervention, factors related to economy, possibility for collaboration and recruitment were of importance.

Parents' experiences of participating in an intervention on tobacco prevention in Child Health Care.

BACKGROUND: Child health care is an important arena for tobacco prevention in Sweden. The aim of this study was to describe parents' experiences from participating in a nursebased tobacco prevention intervention. METHODS: Eleven parents were interviewed using semi-structured interviews. The material was analysed in a qualitative content analysis process. RESULTS: The analysis emerged four categories; Receiving support, Respectful treatment, Influence on smoking habits and Receiving information. The parents described how the CHC nurses treated them with support and respect. They described the importance of being treated with respect for their autonomy in their decisions about smoking. They also claimed that they had received little or no information about health consequences for children exposed to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS). The findings also indicate that both the questionnaire used and the urine-cotinine test had influenced parents' smoking. CONCLUSION: The clinical implication is that CHC is an important arena for preventive work aiming to minimize children's tobacco smoke exposure. CHC nurses can play an important role in tobacco prevention but should be more explicit in their communication with parents about tobacco issues. The SiCET was referred to as an eye-opener and can be useful in the MI dialogues nurses perform in order to support parents in their efforts to protect their children from ETS.

How to minimize children's environmental tobacco smoke exposure: an intervention in a clinical setting in high risk areas.

BACKGROUND: Despite the low prevalence of daily smokers in Sweden, children are still being exposed to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), primarily by their smoking parents. A prospective intervention study using methods from Quality Improvement was performed in Child Health Care (CHC). The aim was to provide nurses with new methods for motivating and supporting parents in their efforts to protect children from ETS exposure. METHOD: Collaborative learning was used to implement and test an intervention bundle. Twenty-two CHC nurses recruited 86 families with small children which had at least one smoking parent. Using a bundle of interventions, nurses met and had dialogues with the parents over a one-year period. A detailed questionnaire on cigarette consumption and smoking policies in the home was answered by the parents at the beginning and at the end of the intervention, when children also took urine tests to determine cotinine levels. RESULTS: Seventy-two families completed the study. Ten parents (11%) quit smoking. Thirty-two families (44%) decreased their cigarette consumption. Forty-five families (63%) were outdoor smokers at follow up. The proportion of children with urinary cotinine values of >6 ng/ml had decreased. CONCLUSION: The intensified tobacco prevention in CHC improved smoking parents' ability to protect their children from ETS exposure.

"Smoking in Children's Environment Test": a qualitative study of experiences of a new instrument applied in preventive work in child health care.

BACKGROUND: Despite knowledge of the adverse health effects of passive smoking, children are still being exposed. Children's nurses play an important role in tobacco preventive work through dialogue with parents aimed at identifying how children can be protected from environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure. The study describes the experiences of Child Health Care (CHC) nurses when using the validated instrument SiCET (Smoking in Children's Environment Test) in dialogue with parents. METHOD: In an intervention in CHC centres in south-eastern Sweden nurses were invited to use the SiCET. Eighteen nurses participated in focus group interviews. Transcripts were reviewed and their contents were coded into categories by three investigators using the method described for focus groups interviews. RESULTS: The SiCET was used in dialogue with parents in tobacco preventive work and resulted in focused discussions on smoking and support for behavioural changes among parents. The instrument had both strengths and limitations. The nurses experienced that the SiCET facilitated dialogue with parents and gave a comprehensive view of the child's ETS exposure. This gave nurses the possibility of taking on a supportive role by offering parents long-term help in protecting their child from ETS exposure and in considering smoking cessation. CONCLUSION: Our findings indicate that the SiCET supports nurses in their dialogue with parents on children's ETS exposure at CHC. There is a need for more clinical use and evaluation of the SiCET to determine its usefulness in clinical practice under varying circumstances.

Parents' attitudes to smoking and passive smoking and their experience of the tobacco preventive work in child health care.

The purpose of this study was to describe parents' attitudes to smoking and their experience of the tobacco preventive work in antenatal care and in Child Health Care (CHC) in Sweden. A population based survey in which 62 percent of 3000 randomly selected parents with 1- and 3-year-old children answered a questionnaire. Fifty-six percent stated that smoking was registered in the health record of the child yet no further discussion regarding passive smoking took place. The parents' educational level and smoking status was related to the attitudes and experiences of the tobacco preventive work. The results indicated that the dialogue with parents regarding children and environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure has to be redesigned and intensified in order to meet the needs of parents with different backgrounds.

Child health nurses' roles and attitudes in reducing children's tobacco smoke exposure.

AIM: To investigate and analyse the attitudes to tobacco prevention among child healthcare nurses, to study how tobacco preventive work is carried out at child healthcare centres today. To evaluate how the tobacco preventive work had changed in child health care since the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare's national evaluation in 1997. BACKGROUND: Exposure to environmental tobacco smoke has adverse health effects. Interventions aiming at minimising environmental tobacco smoke have been developed and implemented at child healthcare centres in Sweden but the long-term effects of the interventions have not been studied. DESIGN: Survey. METHODS: In 2004, a postal questionnaire was sent to all nurses (n = 196) working at 92 child healthcare centres in two counties in south-eastern Sweden. The questionnaire was based on questions used by the National Board of Health and Welfare in their national evaluation in 1997 and individual semi-structured interviews performed for this study. RESULTS: Almost all the nurses considered it very important to ask parents about their smoking habits (median 9.5, range 5.1-10.0). Collaboration with antenatal care had decreased since 1997. Nearly all the nurses mentioned difficulties in reaching fathers (70%), groups such as immigrant families (87%) and socially vulnerable families (94%) with the tobacco preventive programme. No nurses reported having special strategies to reach these groups. CONCLUSIONS: Improvement of methods for tobacco prevention at child healthcare centres is called for, especially for vulnerable groups in society. However, the positive attitude among nurses found in this study forms a promising basis for successful interventions. RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE: This study shows that launching national programmes for tobacco prevention is not sufficient to achieve sustainable work. Nurses working in child healthcare centres have an overall positive attitude to tobacco prevention but need continuous education and training in communication skills especially to reach social vulnerable groups. Regular feedback from systematic follow-ups might increase motivation for this work.