Effect of a brief retailer intervention to reduce the sale of single cigarettes.

A surprising finding from the present study was the occasional retailer practice of giving singles away upon confederates' requests to purchase singles. This practice was not expected, and additional data related to its occurrence (i.e., under what circumstances it occurred) were not collected. Although the prevalence of giving away singles was not high (approximately 6% of stores at pretest and 3% at posttest), the practice raises concern in that it may greatly facilitate experimental smoking and undermine cessation attempts. Availability (i.e., sales and giving) of single cigarettes dropped significantly during the four-month period of this study (34% to 10%), suggesting that a brief educational intervention followed by a "booster" mailing of materials effectively reduced single cigarette availability. The overall reduction in availability of singles was also seen for the two store types individually. It is noteworthy, however, that at both assessments, liquor stores were more likely than independent markets to have singles available. The finding that location of singles changed from on top of and behind the counter to exclusively behind the counter indicated that retailers may have become aware that providing singles is illegal, and made attempts to be less obvious about their availability. Although the ultimate goal was to completely eliminate the availability of single cigarettes, the change in location may be positive in that impulse buying could be diminished when singles are hidden.

Facility-based inreach strategies to promote annual mammograms.

Mammography facilities frequently use inreach strategies, such as reminders, to encourage annual returns by asymptomatic women 50 years of age and older. We describe three pilot studies that systematically compared various strategies. In each study, patients seen for a screening mammogram during a specified period were randomly assigned to a novel reminder condition or a comparison condition one year later, and return rates were monitored. In study 1, return rates for subjects receiving a standard mailed reminder (36%) and subjects receiving a mailed reminder plus incentive (32%) were similar. In study 2, return rates for subjects receiving a mailed reminder (44%) and subjects receiving a phoned reminder (48%) also were similar. However, study 3 focused on a mailed reminder on the referring physician's letterhead sent by the mammography facility versus no reminder, and a significant increase in return rates resulted (47% versus 19%). We present the implications of this pattern of findings and discuss the need for a larger trial of the physician-endorsed reminder.

Annual return rates to mammography facilities by women age 50 and older.

Data were collected at multiple mammography facilities to determine the use of inreach strategies for asymptomatic women age 50 and older and the annual return rates for screening by this age group. Interviews with 26 facility managers indicated that the majority use a reminder strategy. Using chart audits in a subset (n = 10) of the facilities of 475 randomly-selected patients, the return rate in 1991 (of patients seen in 1990) averaged 41% within 18 months after the 1990 appointment. Those data suggest that mammography providers, as well as the women they serve, could benefit from interventions to encourage annual mammograms.