Study of a Community Health Worker and Mobile App Program to Help Women Quit Tobacco in Low-Income Areas

What this Trial Is About

Researchers are evaluating a culturally- and gender-relevant tobacco cessation program designed for low-income Brazilian women. This program is delivered by Community Health Workers CHWs and is being adapted to incorporate mobile health mHealth support through an interactive app for participants and a tracking system for CHWs. The study aims to compare the effectiveness of this integrated CHW-mHealth intervention against the standard approach of scheduling participants to attend tobacco cessation programs at neighborhood public health clinics. The study has two phases. Phase I focuses on adapting the CHW-delivered tobacco cessation program to include mHealth support, testing its feasibility through assessments, pretesting, and pilot testing with stakeholders. Phase II involves a group randomized trial with eight towns and 344 participants, where one group receives the integrated CHW-mHealth intervention and the comparison group receives a home visit by a CHW with scheduling to attend the public health system program. Participants will be evaluated for tobacco use abstinence at 6 months, defined as no cigarette use in the past 7 days, verified by exhaled carbon monoxide in a subset of participants. Researchers will monitor participant engagement with the app and CHW interactions. The study is designed to assess the potential of this integrated approach as a model for tobacco cessation in low-resource settings, including rural and disadvantaged populations.

Adaptation and Evaluation of a Tobacco Cessation Program: An Integrated mHealth Approach