Health promotion in barbershops: balancing outreach and research in African American communities.

Promoting health and preventing illness among African American men, who die disproportionately from preventable diseases, is a challenging health disparity that has seen limited progress. However, focusing our efforts in places outside of traditional clinical and community settings such as the barbershop has shown promise for ameliorating these disparities. In particular, barbershop-based health promotion as conducted by the Black Barbershop Health Outreach Program has successfully reached nearly 10,000 men nationwide through a grassroots, volunteer-driven effort. At the same time, researchers have begun to conduct formal clinical trials in barbershops in order to explore interventions targeting this at-risk population. Herein, we describe, in brief a review of barbershop-based health promotion and the experience of this novel community-based organization. We argue for continuing to integrate evaluation and research using community-partnered principles into successful grassroots initiatives without dulling the practical impact of these programs is a crucial next step as we move beyond simply acknowledging health disparities and seek to find solutions.

Cardiovascular disease control through barbershops: design of a nationwide outreach program.

OBJECTIVES: To review the success of barbershops as vehicles for health promotion and outline the Black Barbershop Health Outreach Program (BBHOP), a rapidly growing, replicable model for health promotion through barbershops. METHODS: BBHOP was established by clinicians in order to enhance community level awareness of and empowerment for cardiometabolic disorders such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease. At coordinated events utilizing existing infrastructures as well as culturally and gender-specific health promotion, BBHOP volunteers screen for diabetes and hypertension and reinforce lifestyle recommendations for the prevention of cardiometabolic disorders from the Seventh Report of the Joint National Committee on Prevention, Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Pressure. Patrons with abnormal findings are referred to participating physicians or health care facilities. We performed a selective review of the literature in order to place this model for health promotion in the context of previous efforts in barbershops. BBHOP is among several successful programs that have sought to promote health in barbershops. Combining a grassroots organization approach to establishing a broad-based network of volunteers and partner agencies with substantial marketing expertise and media literacy, the BBHOP has screened more than 7000 African American men in nearly 300 barbershops from more than 20 cities across 6 states. CONCLUSIONS: The BBHOP is an effective method for community level health promotion and referral for cardio-metabolic diseases, especially for AA men, one of the nation's most vulnerable populations.