Examining the Feasibility of Implementing a Hypertension Storytelling among African Americans with Hypertension

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT Storytelling interventions for chronic disease, are described as personal narratives of living with the health condition. Previous storytelling interventions have been effective in promoting healthy behaviors and lifestyle change. For hypertension, storytelling interventions have contributed to reductions in blood pressure among and increased uptake of lifestyle and behavioral change. Groups traditionally underrepresented in health research and interventions, may not have access to innovative lifestyle interventions, but these communities often have the greatest need for access to health interventions. Our preliminary work includes the Penn State Clinical and Translational Science KL2 funded project titled Developing a Storytelling Intervention for African Americans with Hypertension. During the KL2 project, nine African Americans with hypertension receiving care at a Federally Qualified Health Center, were filmed sharing their stories of managing hypertension and sharing helpful tips for lifestyle changes to manage hypertension. Our proposed intervention will consist of three groups: 1) usual care 2) Storytelling (storytelling + educational information) accessed using a study website 3) Storytelling Plus (group storytelling sessions + peer-led educational sessions and goal setting). Peer health coaching has been a successful approach for promoting healthy behaviors and can be easily integrated into a safety-net setting. We hypothesize that incorporating Peer Health Coaches into the storytelling intervention will bolster the engagement with a storytelling intervention. Delivering the intervention using a study website increases the accessibility of the intervention and allows the participant to view study materials at their convenience. The outcomes for the proposed study are 1) to assess the feasibility of implementing the Storytelling and Storytelling Plus interventions by assessing recruitment, retention, acceptability, and fidelity and 2) the preliminary impact on self-reported medication adherence and blood pressure. The long-term goal of this project is to develop storytelling interventions that can be integrated into the clinical workflow of a FQHC and can potentially be disseminated to other FQHC and safety-net settings to promote healthy behaviors and lifestyle change among African Americans with hypertension.