Mascarenhas abstract

Mascarenhas abstract

by Maya -

(Sorry for the delay!)

AIM: The aim of this study is to understand perceived barriers and enablers towards healthy behaviors for post partum Latina women at risk for diabetes. In addition, we would also like to understand what strategies have proven successful for incorporating healthy behaviors in the lives of these women. The context of these focus groups is that they are being conducted to in order to inform a narrative based automated telephone intervention.

 

SIGNIFICANCE: There are few primary care or community-based prevention strategies available during the post partum period so it is important to understand how to promote healthy behaviors in Latina women who have an risk of diabetes during this critical period.

 

APPROACH: Four focus groups will be conducted with 4-5 women per group in Spanish and English. The focus groups will last about 2 hours. Questions will be asked about participants understanding of diabetes and associated risks, as well as strategies on how to incorporate healthy behaviors that reduce risk into their lives. Participants will be asked about the differences in their behaviors during pregnancy and post pregnancy, and how family demands have affected those behaviors. They will also be asked to respond to audio recorded ‘healthy’ narratives, e.g. ‘How Maria danced with her toddlers as a form of exercise’.  

All focus groups will be audio recorded, transcribed, and translated. A researcher will code translated transcripts and identify themes using an inductive approach.

 

SUBJECTS AND SITES: Latina women will be recruited from 2 WIC (Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, Children) sites based in San Francisco and Sonoma. Site registries will be used to identify women who are post-partum, speak either English or Spanish, between ages of 18-35 years old, and with recent gestational diabetes or a post partum BMI of >25. The focus groups will take place at the clinic site.

 

ANTICIPATED CHALLENGES AND QUESTIONS:

  1. I have the option of doing follow up in depth interviews and I’m not sure when or how I should make that decision. Do I start working with this data and then decide if I have follow up questions or decide need material once I’ve looked through this?
  2. The focus groups were conducted to inform the development of an intervention. I’m concerned that it might be hard to explain the context and responses to audio narratives that I imagine is not a standard part of focus groups for a paper. How do I approach that in a publication?
  3. Is it important to have another researcher participate in any part of the analysis of transcripts or is it totally standard for me to be the only person reviewing the transcript? It would probably be feasible to get somebody else to do a higher level task after I possible create a codebook.

 

 

 

Re: Mascarenhas abstract

by Wendy Anderson -

Thank you Maya and sorry for the delay in getting comments back to you! I like how you have written your aim and it is clearly worded as a qualitative study using perspectives, facilitators, etc.

I think focus groups are a great way to look at this, as they will get the perspectives of the community about cultural perspectives on post-partum health, barriers, and facilitators

Questions:

How do you define healthy behaviors? Do you have a list or will you supply a list (e.g. diet, exercise). It also could be interesting to ask the groups how post-partum health is defined in Latino culture.

Re: your questions -

1) I think it is fine to reserve the decision whether to do additional interviews until after the focus groups - its nice to have the option, so you could tell the IRB and participants that you "may" be contacting them for an additional interview.

2) It is very standard for focus groups to be in response to something. For publication, you could provide the text of what they were responding to, and describe that the goal was to develop an intervention, no problem.

3) I think its nice to have someone to have a look at things with you, especially early on as you are deciding what the main things that you will be looking at are. Its also good if you are new to qualitative methods to have a methods mentor who can make sure you are following proper procedures. I'd say if you have limited time to get others involved, I'd get them in early on vs later.

Re: Mascarenhas abstract

by Emily -

Sorry for the really delayed comments! Hope this isn't too late to be helpful.

Maya, really interesting project idea. It seems like you have a couple different aims. One is to understand what your study population, postpartum Latina women, define and understand as healthy behavior and what they see as barriers and facilitators to achieving healthy behaviors. Another goal seems more focused on gathering data about the actual behaviors of your study population during and post pregnancy. The last (and it sounds like maybe most important) aim is get input on an intervention your team has already developed. Maybe it would be helpful to break up your focus group into 2 sessions to cover those differing objectives.

It may help to ask the participants how they would feel about a telephone intervention, as well as the content of the narratives.