Christi Patten, Ph.D., receives NIH grant to develop Facebook smoking cessation tool for Alaska Native smokers

Christi Patten, Ph.D. (CIM ’98), Department of Psychiatry and Psychology, Mayo Clinic Rochester, was awarded a three-year NIH grant to develop and pilot test a culturally relevant, Facebook-delivered intervention to promote smoking treatment uptake and cessation among Alaska Native smokers.

With geographic remoteness, climate and travel costs being barriers to smoking treatment delivery for Alaska Natives, social media provides a promising scalable intervention strategy. Dr. Patten and her team will use a digital storytelling approach for the Facebook content and promote the use of evidence-based treatment (state quitline and tribal-based cessation programs) while using cultural variance and surface/deep structure frameworks to address the influence of culture in designing health messages.

Dr. Patten is a professor of psychology in the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science and a steering committee member of Mayo’s Office of Health Disparities Research.