Capstone Abstract--Evelina DiFranco

Health Communication & Promotion among Individuals with Serious Mental Illness

Evelina DiFranco, M.P.H., Capstone Advisor: Mark S. Salzer, Ph.D.

            People with serious mental illness (SMI) suffer a disproportionate burden of comorbid physical illness. Health promotion can influence healthy behaviors and lifestyles. Health communication is an important aspect of health promotion, relevant in terms of the message promoted and how messages are delivered to a population to achieve the desired health promotion objective. This capstone field project gathered information relevant to developing effective health education efforts for individuals with serious mental illness (SMI). The specific aims of the project are: 1) message determination, or determining the interest of mental health drop-in center clients in receiving health education on a variety of relevant health topics, and 2) communication channel identification, or assessing the modes of communication normally used by drop-in center clients to obtain health information. Seventy-one drop in center clients at three Philadelphia sites completed a self-report survey. Analyses showed a high level of interest in learning about most health topics, and health professionals ranked highest in terms of normal communication channel use. Other social networks and interactions also ranked higher than many of the print materials. This information can be useful to drop-in centers in prioritizing health promotion efforts and resources