Major Projects
Evaluation of the National Diabetes Education Program (NDEP)
Evaluation is an integral part of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases' (NIDDK) strategic plan for the National Diabetes Education Program (NDEP). NDEP represents a national partnership that includes Government, nonprofit, professional, and private sector organizations and develops and carries out communication programs to improve treatment and health status of people with diabetes. Social & Scientific Systems serves as the evaluation contractor and provide evaluation expertise to the program. We work with NDEP's Evaluation Work Group to provide an overall framework for process and impact evaluation of the program. NDEP's progress report was published in 2004 to reflect the program's efforts and includes illustrations of both process measures and impact measures of the program.
Formative Evaluation of National Diabetes Education Program (NDEP) Materials
Social & Scientific Systems conducts formative communication research to ensure that NDEP's messages and materials have the potential to be received, understood, and accepted by the intended audience. One example is the study of the guide, Helping the Student with Diabetes Succeed: A Guide for School Personnel. We conducted six telephone focus groups with school nurses, principals, and teachers to obtain their reactions to the school-based diabetes management plan presented in the guide.
Surveys of National Diabetes Education Program (NDEP) Target Audiences
As part of the outcome or impact evaluation activities of NDEP, we analyze data gathered from such existing national surveys as the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. However, there are some evaluation measures of the program for which no data currently exist. The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) successfully requested funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) One Percent Evaluation Set-Aside Program to evaluate NDEP program performance. To fill this gap, NIDDK contracted with us to conduct surveys of the public's and the health care providers' knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to the prevention and management of diabetes. We conducted a survey of 1,600 members of the public, 45 years of age and older, including people with diabetes and their families and people at high risk for diabetes. The survey was conducted in English and Spanish; special sampling methods were used to oversample racial and ethnic groups that are at especially high risk for diabetes.
Evaluation of National Cancer Institute (NCI) Clinical Trials Promotion Campaign
An important goal of NCI's Cancer Clinical Trial Promotion Campaign is to increase awareness of clinical trials as a potential treatment option for cancer patients. The target of the campaign is the public and particularly those touched by cancer. When NCI was to test market the campaign in Baltimore, Maryland, and eastern North Carolina, we developed the evaluation plan and collected the baseline survey data.
Support Services for Communication Research and Program Evaluation for the Office of Cancer Communication
Social & Scientific Systems served as the research and evaluation contractor for the Office of Cancer Communication (OCC) of the National Cancer Institute (NCI). We applied quantitative and qualitative research methods to carry out evaluation studies of OCC's communications program. Qualitative research techniques included focus groups, in-depth interviews, and mall intercept studies. Target audiences included cancer patients and persons at high risk for cancer, the public and those members of the public touched by cancer, primary care physicians, cancer specialists, and other experts. We conducted four surveys from our Telephone Research Center under this contract and a number of journal articles presenting the results of the studies were published in the Journal of Health Communication and the Journal of Cancer Education.
Survey to Assess Effectiveness of Cancer Information Service (CIS) Outreach Program
This survey was conducted to evaluate the overall effectiveness of the CIS Outreach Program. Project directors and principal investigators from more than 650 national and regional partner organizations were interviewed. Results of the study were featured in a special issue of the Journal of Health Communications.