This research fulfills the NIAAA's mission to address health disparities by reducing unhealthy drinking among a high-risk and underserved population of Latino immigrant men. Latinos are the fastest growing racial/ethnic group in the country and immigration to the United States (US) has increased dramatically over the last ten years. Latino men are more likely to engage in unhealthy drinking than men in other racial/ethnic groups and their alcohol use increases with time spent in the United States. Despite these disparities, Latino immigrant men are unlikely to receive evidenced-based screening and brief intervention for unhealthy drinking due to their limited access to health care. We have culturally adapted a brief intervention for this population in order to broaden its reach and increase its efficacy. This stud will test the feasibility and efficacy of offering a culturally adapted intervention to reduce unhealthy drinking among Latino day laborers, who are particularly vulnerable to unhealthy drinking given their economic and social context.
The specific aims of this study are to: 1) evaluate the feasibility of offering screening and brief intervention to Latino day laborers delivered by community health workers (Promotores) at a day labor worker center; and 2) test the initial efficacy of the intervention to reduce unhealthy drinking using a randomized control group study design. Feasibility will be assessed through qualitative and quantitative assessments of recruitment, retention, reach, intervention fidelity, and participant satisfaction. We will assess changes in unhealthy drinking from baseline to eight weeks in both the intervention and the control group. We hypothesize that levels of unhealthy drinking will be lower in men in the intervention than the control group. The study uses several innovative approaches to address a significant health disparity in a high-risk and underserved population, including offering the intervention at a day labor worker center, using community health workers to deliver the brief intervention, and adapting the brief intervention to be more culturally relevat, and using tablets for data collection and providing personalized feedback. Findings will help determine the best methods for optimizing recruitment, data collection and intervention fidelity in a hard to reach population. If effective, screening and brief interventions could be implemented by community health workers in day labor worker centers nationwide, as well as a variety of other community settings. Given that Latinos are the fastest growing racial/ethnic group in the country, reducing unhealthy drinking in this population could have a significant public health impact by lowering rates of morbidity due to alcohol abuse and mortality due to cardiovascular disease, cancer and unintentional injury. Furthermore, this novel intervention approach may also be generalizable to other health issues prevalent in the Latino immigrant community.
This study will test the feasibility and efficacy of screening and brief intervention to reduce unhealthy drinking among Latino immigrant men in a community setting. Reducing unhealthy drinking in the growing population of Latino immigrant men could have a significant public health impact by lowering rates of morbidity due to alcohol abuse and mortality due to cardiovascular disease, cancer and unintentional injury.
| Serrano, Samantha E; Serafini, Kelly; Eller, Nikki et al. (2018) Vida PURA: An assessment of the fidelity of promotor-delivered screening and brief intervention to reduce unhealthy alcohol use among Latino day laborers. J Ethn Subst Abuse 17:519-531 |
