Research Publications

Research and training on suicide is critical given the fact that the majority of suicide deaths are preventable with accurate identification of risk and intervention by trained individuals. However, implementing and evaluating training is difficult because of the multiple factors involved, including, but not limited to, the heterogeneity of trainees, their diverse roles in suicide prevention, absence of clear guidelines for training content across settings, and limited methods for assessing outcomes.

We examined the longitudinal effects of community risk and protective factors on asthma morbidity and healthcare utilization. Three hundred urban caregivers of children with poorly controlled asthma were enrolled in a randomized controlled trial testing the effectiveness of a behavioral/educational intervention and completed measures of exposure to community violence (ECV), social cohesion (SC), informal social control (ISC), child asthma control, child asthma symptom days/nights, and healthcare utilization.

Factors contributing to the lower likelihood of urologist follow‐up among African American (AA) men diagnosed with prostate cancer may not be strictly related to patient factors. The authors investigated the relationship between crime, poverty, and poor housing, among others, and postdiagnosis urologist visits among AA and white men.

As the largest provider group of outpatient mental health services, social workers are at the forefront of suicide prevention, yet lack formal education to recognize and respond to client suicide risk. The Question, Persuade, and Refer (QPR; Quinnett, 1995) gatekeeper training teaches basic suicide prevention skills, focusing on suicide risk factors, warning signs, and response. Eight advanced MSW students, who completed the QPR training, participated in a face-to-face interview to share perspectives of the training and how they applied skills learned within their social work field placement. Study results provide crucial information about suicide prevention education for social workers.

This study uses the Life Course Model for Spina Bifida (SB) to advance knowledge of factors associated with change in quality-of-life (QOL) among emerging adults with SB.