Helping teens make healthier choices

This program is being conducted by the Center for Innovative Public Health Research, a non-profit research organization dedicated to developing unique technology-based research and health education programs to improve the lives of young people. This program is sponsored by the National Institutes of Health.

As long as the teen receiving the text messages has an unlimited text messaging plan, their time in the program costs absolutely nothing!

We have worked closely with our ethical review board to make sure that we have designed a program that best protects the safety of the teens in our program. This includes allowing them to make their own decision about whether to take part in the research and not tell their parents if they do not want to.

There has been a lot of compelling research showing how effective text messages can be at improving healthy behaviors but one or two texts won’t do the trick – more are needed to fully discuss important issues. That’s why we send about 6-10 messages a day for about 8 weeks. This may seem like a lot – but for the average teen who sends and receives about 40 messages per day. Navigating day-to-day life while receiving many messages per day is not uncommon for young people. Ultimately, we want to make sure our program has a significant impact on young people’s health.

This is one of the great things about this program – it’s designed to respect school policies. Text messages will only be sent during times they have specified as being non-school hours.

They can always text “snooze” to the program and the messages will stop for the time period they request.

We take the needs of our participants very seriously. This program isn’t intended to assist in an emergency. In a crisis, participants should always call 9-1-1 or a crisis hotline like 988. At the same time, we fully understand that working with adolescents means that stress, trauma, mental illness, violence, and other issues can be present in the lives of our participants, and our team is prepared to provide appropriate resources and referrals to participants as needed.

We’ve tailored this program to only focus on health issues of teens. As you’re probably aware, teens and adults have many different concerns and behaviors regarding their health, so it makes sense to tailor programs for them separately.

You can contact Michele Ybarra, the Program Manager at the Center for Innovative Public Health Research, with additional questions. Feel free to contact her by email at michele@InnovativePublicHealth.org or by phone at 877-302-6858, ext. 801.