Rural print media and a tailored advocacy intervention for smoke-free policy

Purpose. To examine frequency, prominence, and content of local print media after a 4-year policy advocacy intervention. Design. This was a controlled community-based trial. Setting. The study took place in 39 rural counties (22 intervention, 17 comparison). Subjects. Subjects consisted of 2525 newspaper articles monitored over 18 quarters (July 2007 to December 2011). Intervention. One key element of the tailored policy advocacy intervention delivered by community advisors was building demand for smoke-free policy via media advocacy strategies. Measures. Media clips were coded to assess number of articles; percent of tobacco-related articles on the front page or bold heading section; percent of pro-health articles; and percent of articles with secondhand smoke (SHS)-relevant topics or themes. Analysis. Coded data were entered into Atlas.ti software. Article frequencies and attributes were compared between groups and over time using negative binomial regression for longitudinal data, with county-level demographics as covariates. Results. In the last 3 years, there were approximately twice as many articles in intervention than in comparison counties. Media clips from newspapers in intervention counties were between 1.4 and 2 times more likely to have front page placement and percent of relevant topic or theme than were those in comparison counties. There was no difference in rate of pro-health articles by group. Conclusion. The policy advocacy intervention to promote smoke-free policy increased media attention to SHS and may have increased public awareness of issues related to smoke-free policy.