Digital CEASE

Communities Engaged and Advocating for a Smoke-Free Environment

The Digital CEASE Program is a Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) project involving Communities Engaged for a Smoke-Free Environment (CEASE), housed within the Morgan CARES (Community-Aligned REsearch Solutions) Program funded through the Center for Urban Health Disparities Research and Innovation at Morgan State University (RCMI@Morgan). CEASE is a longstanding community-driven smoking cessation initiative that evolved through a collaboration between the Prevention Sciences Research Center (PSRC) at MSU and several communities in Baltimore City, with a mission to educate, encourage, and support individuals to choose a smoke-free lifestyle. CEASE especially focuses on underserved and low-income populations who may lack affordable, consistent, or accessible community health-related resources. CEASE received funding and implemented four phases of tobacco cessation programming over the span of ten years, and provided cessation support and services to over two thousand Baltimore City residents.

Tobacco is a significant public health problem, particularly among residents of low-income communities, partly due to the lack of active participation of these communities in research, and insufficient use of modern technologies. Group counseling and support, in addition to health education and nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) have been shown effective in significantly increasing the odds of long-term smoking cessation, while also reducing the cost of providing services in clinical settings. In an effort to capitalize on new online communication technologies, this Digital CEASE project will build upon the established foundation developed in previous CEASE phases, and will both further refine our model, and improve the incorporation of communication technologies in health interventions.

Contact Us:

Email: ceasedigital@morgan.edu
Phone: 443-885-3626
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Digital CEASE Team

Dr. Payam Sheikhattari, Principal Investigator
Dr. Shiva Mehravaran, Co-Investigator
Emma Mitchell, Project Coordinator
Cynthia Nosiri, Web Developer
Rifath Ara Alam Barsha, Research Assistant
Adriana Foster, Research Assistant

Youth Cease

A smoking cessation intervention for youth termed “Youth CEASE” is set to emerge in collaboration with the ALA N-O-T (Not On Tobacco) Program; the overarching goal of the proposed study is to apply Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) to reduce tobacco use among youth and young adults (14-21 y/o) in Baltimore City through a mixed-method randomized community-based trial adapted to the needs of the target population. This alliance primarily aims to compare tobacco cessation rates among two intervention arms (peer-facilitated and self-navigated groups) to determine whether there would be better outcomes (tobacco cessation and retention) in the peer-facilitated arm compared to the self-navigated arm. The secondary objective is to explore potential predictors and identify factors associated with better utilization and effectiveness of each intervention. The study's primary hypothesis is that the tobacco cessation rate will be equal or higher in the peer-facilitated (non-inferiority trial) than in the self-navigated arms. The secondary hypothesis is that the retention rate will be equal or higher in the peer-facilitated arm than in the self-navigated arm.

For More Information

Study Information Sheet

CEASE Today Program Manual

Read more about the previous phases of CEASE

CEASE Publications

CEASE Chapter in Researching Health Together Textbook

Dissertation: Examining Factors Related to Smoking Cessation in Underserved populations: Lessons Learned from the CEASE Initiative, Dr. Jummai Apata, Dr.P.H., May 2018

Youth Cease Information Sheet