ABOUT THE PROJECT
Partners: This project is a partnership between the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT) Health Department and the University of Montana School of Public and Community Health Sciences.
Purpose: To increase routine physical activity and walking among community members living on the Flathead Reservation, with a focus on older adults.
Why physical activity and walking?
Small changes can improve health and longevity. Routine physical activity helps to improve mental and physical health (decrease risk for chronic diseases such as depression, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, some cancers, and Alzheimer's disease), and preserves functional independence and mobility among older adults.
Individual, social, environmental impacts for all community members. Across all ages, physical activity is a simple, non-pharmaceutical strategy to maintain personal wellbeing, engage in neighborhood and social activities, connect with the outdoors, and is an excellent form of alternative transportation.
For more information on the benefits of walking, follow the link below:
PROJECT TEAM MEMBERS
(left to right)
Mattea Grant
Role: Graduate Research Assistant. Mattea is a current graduate student in the Master's in Public Health program at UM. She previously worked for CSKT Health at the Elmo Fitness Center.
Chelsea Kleinmeyer
Role: CSKT Health Project Lead. Chelsea is the CSKT Health Division Director for Community Health.
Ashley Glass
Role: CSKT Health Team Member. Ashley is the CSKT Health Program Manager for Community Health.
Niki Graham
Role: Community Research Navigator. Niki is a representative of the American Indian and Alaska Native Clinical and Translational Research Program at the University of Montana.
Maja Pedersen
Role: University of Montana Project Lead. Maja is a PhD candidate in Public Health at the University of Montana.
More about the project:
(1) How our team does research
We utilize a community-based participatory research (CBPR) approach to ensure the research activities are ethical and align with community priorities. The CBPR partnership is formalized through a Memorandum of Understanding between CSKT Health and the University of Montana. All project research activities are approved by the Salish Kootenai College Institutional Review Board (Approval # 2019_6_Pederson).
This form of research is responsive to community needs, and connects project findings to meaningful, actionable outcomes and long-term change to promote public health for community members of the Flathead Reservation.
(2) Conceptual foundation
The Social Ecological Model in American Indian and Alaska Native Communities is the guiding conceptual foundation for the project. This model suggests that health and healthy behaviors are influenced by multiple forces, including individual influences, social influences, and broader environmental, organizational, community, and societal influences. Each level of influence (individual, social, environmental) impacts behavior. This conceptual framework moves away from thinking about health behavior as a solely personal issue, and instead recognizes how personal factors interact with social surroundings and environmental structures and policies to influence decisions and form patterns.
Applying the social and ecological model to learn about physical activity and walking. In the first stage of our project, we sought to learn stories, beliefs, knowledge, attitudes, and experiences about physical activity and walking from community members.
To learn, we interviewed twenty-two American Indian older adults (age range 50 to 82 years old, average age was 66 years old ) living on the Flathead Reservation. We interviewed older adults living in Ronan, Elmo, Hotsprings, Pablo, Dixon, Arlee, St Ignatius, and Evaro. We asked open-ended questions to make sure all perspectives and knowledge could be included. As a team, we read all the interviews and used qualitative research methods to group common ideas or perspectives into themes.
FINDINGS
This links below share the themes, grouped by the Social Ecological Model levels of influence - Individual, Social, and Environmental.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
We are currently in the process of sharing the findings from interviews with community members, organizations, and leadership. Feedback from the community will inform how this project moves forward to increase physical activity and walking among community members (with an emphasis on older adults) living on the Flathead Reservation. Stay tuned!
This project is supported by a grant from the National Institutes of Health (#U54GM115371), and the interviews were conducted by a collaborative partnership between CSKT Tribal Health and the University of Montana School of Public and Community Health Sciences. Project oversight was provided by Salish Kootenai College Institutional Review Board (IRB # Pedersen_6_2019). Questions or comments can be directed to project lead Maja Pedersen at maja.pedersen@mso.umt.edu.