TREATING CHINESE SMOKERS WITH INTERACTIVE EXPERT SYSTEMS

这一K23指导下的以患者为导向的研究应用程序将支持候选人在尼古丁依赖和烟草控制领域的职业发展，特别是针对少数民族人口的戒烟努力。加州大学旧金山分校的莎伦·霍尔博士和尼尔·本诺维茨博士将担任主要和次要导师。这项为期5年的拟议计划的目标是提供设计和实施临床试验、跨文化研究和方法学以及临床药理学知识和应用方面的培训和实践经验。这项研究的总体目标是设计和测试有效的戒烟方案，成功地治疗一个庞大的少数群体--华裔美国吸烟者。本研究将把交互式戒烟专家系统技术转移到华裔吸烟者身上，并在这一人群中进行随机临床试验，以检验干预的效果。它还将检查主动与被动招募方法的有效性，这将指导在这一人群中实施戒烟干预。参与者将被随机分为两组，一组是接受标准自助手册的对照条件，另一组是实验条件，接受为期6个月的阶段匹配手册和3份个性化的专家系统报告。评估将在基线、3个月、6个月、12个月和18个月随机进行之前进行。假设接受实验性戒烟干预的研究参与者在12个月和18个月时比对照条件下的参与者更有可能戒烟，报告至少一次戒烟尝试，并显著降低吸烟率(由可控碱验证)。据推测，积极主动的招募方法在接触不准备戒烟的吸烟者方面更有效。在中国人群中，抑郁症状、消极情绪、文化适应和性别差异与吸烟行为和尼古丁依赖的关系将被考察。将根据拟议的临床试验的结果，开展以加强对这一人群的吸烟干预为重点的试点工作。这项研究和职业发展计划将为有效治疗华裔美国吸烟者提供重要的知识，并将为候选人成为独立的临床研究科学家奠定坚实的基础。

This K23 mentored patient-oriented research application will support the career development of the candidate in the area of nicotine dependence and tobacco control, particularly targeting smoking cessation efforts to the ethnic minority populations. Drs. Sharon Hall and Neal Benowitz of the University of California, San Francisco will serve as the primary and secondary mentors. The objective for this 5-year proposed program is to provide training and hands-on experience in designing and conducting clinical trials, cross-cultural research and methodology, and clinical pharmacology knowledge and applications. The overall goal of this research is to design and test efficacious smoking cessation programs that can successfully treat a large minority group, Chinese American smokers. This study will transfer the interactive expert system technology in smoking cessation to Chinese American smokers and test the efficacy of the intervention using a randomized clinical trial in this population. It will also examine the effectiveness of proactive versus reactive recruitment approaches, which will guide implementation of smoking cessation intervention in this population. Participants will be randomized to either to a control condition receiving a standard self-help manual, or experimental condition receiving a stage-matched manual and 3 personalized expert-system reports over 6 months. Assessments will occur before randomization at baseline, 3, 6, 12, and 18 months. It is hypothesized that research participants receiving the experimental smoking cessation intervention will be more likely to be abstinent, report at least one quit attempt, and to significantly reduce in smoking rate (verified by continine) than those in the control condition at 12 and 18 months. The proactive recruitment approach is hypothesized to be more effective in reaching smokers who are not ready to quit smoking. Depression symptoms, negative affect, acculturation and gender differences in association with smoking behaviors and nicotine dependence in the Chinese population will be examined. Pilot work focusing on enhancing smoking intervention for this population will be conducted based on the findings of the proposed clinical trial. This research and career development program will yield significant knowledge for effectively treating Chinese American smokers, and will build a solid foundation to prepare the candidate to be an independent clinical research scientist.