Physician Investigator (NonCl) General Internal Medicine, Mass General Research Institute

community health services; ecigarettes; electronic cigarettes; electronic health records; outpatient clinics hospital; patient discharge; patient participation; preventive health services; reimbursement incentive; smoking cessation; tobacco treatment; treatment refusal

Gina Kruse, MD is a general internist who practices primary care at Massachusetts General Hospital's Revere Health Center. She earned her medical degree from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston and completed her residency in internal medicine and primary care at Mass General. Her research focuses on preventive medicine and tobacco cessation for underserved populations. She has a broad background working in diverse settings. Her research training includes a Masters degree in Health Services Research studying rural populations in the United States, two years of international research experience through fellowships in Zambia and Russia, the Harvard Medical School General Internal Medicine Fellowship at Mass General and a post-doctoral fellowship in cancer prevention in the Department of Social and Behavioral Science at the Harvard  School of Public Health.

Her research agenda includes both quantitative and qualitative analyses of observational data and initiatives to improve the delivery of preventive services. Her projects include an evaluation of an electronic health record-embedded referral to an internal tobacco treatment coordinator in local community health centers, the effect of financial incentives on documentation of smoking status in our electronic health record (EHR), an evaluation of overuse of colonoscopy in a local group practice, a measure of the prevalence of tobacco use among a cohort of patients starting treatment for HIV in Uganda, a study of the implementation of a structured field on the hospital admission order set to measure the prevalence of secondhand tobacco smoke exposure among inpatients, and an international survey about how providers are being trained to deliver tobacco treatment around the world.

She is currently working as part of the Mass General Tobacco Research and Treatment Center together with the Center for Connected Health to pilot test a text messaging program for smoking cessation for community health center patients. The text messaging program includes content for smokers ready to set a quit date and novel motivational messages for smokers not ready to quit. We are evaluating the feasibility of the program including two different recruitment methods: (1) patients who are identified as smokers during visit intake are provided with information about the program including how to enroll by text message, and (2) a proactive population-based recruitment approach in which patients identified as smokers in the electronic health record system are invited by text message to try the program.