OBJECTIVE:To test the feasibility and acceptability of We See You, Sis, a therapeutically grounded virtual sister circle intervention for Black women with depression symptoms. DESIGN:A two-group quasi-experimental design. SETTING:Virtual on the Zoom version 5.13 platform. PARTICIPANTS:Black women who were at least 40 years of age, with current depression symptoms, who had reliable access to Zoom (N = 30). METHOD:We See You, Sis is a virtual sister circle intervention that is therapeutically grounded in the core processes of Pulling Out of Fire, a culturally adapted version of acceptance and commitment therapy. Groups 1 and 2 received the 6-week intervention during Weeks 1 through 6 and 7 through 12, respectively. The main outcomes were feasibility (recruitment, retention, and completion) and acceptability. The theoretical framework of acceptability informed the focus group guide used to assess acceptability. We used thematic analysis to code the qualitative data and to identify salient themes across participants' narratives. RESULTS:Recruitment (70%), retention (83.3%), and completion (82%) rates demonstrated that the intervention was feasible. Participants perceived the intervention to be acceptable, especially because it fit with their personal and collective values. We generated two overarching themes: Becoming More Whole and Having a Trusted Space to Address Depression Symptoms and Related Experiences, which represented the interconnected processes of personal growth and collective healing that occurred throughout the intervention. CONCLUSION:The findings provide evidence to support the delivery of peer-delivered mental health interventions for middle-age and older Black women.
Background: Community input is crucial for identifying characteristics necessary for equitable, sustainable community-academic partnerships (CAPs). A November 2021 conference, honoring the late Dr. Loretta Jones and the Community-Partnered Participatory Research (CPPR) model, was held to gather input for designing a learning institute for community members as co-equal partners with academics in research, program, and policy initiatives. This created an opportunity to explore attendees' perspectives on challenges and opportunities related to CAPs with special focus on promoting equity.Methods: Institutional Review Board approval was obtained. Five break-out discussion group sessions were conducted in November 2021 co-facilitated by both an academic and a community leader. After consent, discussions were recorded and transcribed. An iterative procedure for collaborative-group-thematic-analysis was developed. The six-phase process included rigorous coding, discussion, comparison of data with data, and development and refinement of themes and subthemes.Results: A total of 38 racial-ethnically diverse participants volunteered from the total conference audience of 62 community and academic partners from various sectors including community-based organizations, health care, social services, academia, or policy within Los Angeles County. Analysis led to development of three themes: Being cautious with the extractive tendency of academia and the need for anti-racism within CAPs; Leveraging community power to resist the top-down lens of academia; and bridging two worlds through an equitably structured table.Discussion: Participants described optimism about the future uses of CPPR to enhance CAPs, and the need to address barriers to equitable partnerships owing to unequal social contexts and entrenched power dynamics. Implications include addressing racism, evaluating financial equity in partnerships to promote accountability, and mentoring community leaders to promote equity.Conclusion: Use of a "community lens" for developing sustainable, equitable CAPs is crucial to promote accountability and to responsibly implement authentic CPPR.
Abstract Background Historically marginalized and minoritized families experience disparities in autism identification and access to services. Few interventions are co-designed in partnership with under-resourced families and the service providers who support them to help families successfully navigate the autism services system. Little is known about how to create new network connections between historically marginalized parents and professionals. Methods Using a community partnered participatory research model, we developed Mind the Gap (MTG), a peer navigation intervention that supports historically marginalized and minoritized families in setting goals and engaging in activities to access services for their recently diagnosed child on the autism spectrum. We compared the effects of MTG (n = 53) on randomly assigned participants to a resources-only comparison (n = 59) in a four-site randomized controlled trial. Participants were recruited from lower-resourced communities using partnered participatory research methods, with 92% of families enrolled in the study earned less than USD $50,000 per year. Our primary outcome was caregiver service access over time and our secondary outcomes were caregiver reported family and professional support networks, and family, community, and services empowerment. Results In our intent-to-treat analysis, MTG caregivers did not differ in service access relative to the comparison group; however, MTG caregivers had increased professional networks and improved service empowerment post intervention relative to the comparison group. Conclusion Results suggest this low-cost intervention can improve the support networks and service empowerment for caregivers at high risk of service disconnections and may empower their accessing other services in the future. Clinical Trial Registration NCT03711799; Registration Date: 10/12/2018 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03711799?type=Intr&cond=Autism&intr=Gap&age=0&draw=2&rank=2
“Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.”—Goethe Introduction People and the communities they are a part of—defined as “groups of people affiliated by geographic proximity . . . or similar situations to address issues affecting the well-being of those people”—are deeply impacted by the systems that […]
Background: Social determinants of health (SDoH) affect under-resourced communities. Such communities are seldom involved in defining and prioritizing local SDoH for policy action. Objectives: Apply community-partnered, participatory research (CPPR) to identify community stakeholder priorities for addressing SDoH in South Los Angeles. Methods: Over 10 months, CPPR was applied to develop a multi-sector partnership and working group to plan and host a symposium for community stakeholders. 148 individuals and 16 organizations participated and engaged in focus and symposium-wide discussions. Themes were identified through collaborative inductive content analysis. Results and Lessons Learned: Participants identified ten specific SDoH, such as housing, with structural racism and discrimination as the underlying cause. Conclusions: Using CPPR to gain community members' insight about local factors that drive individual and community health is feasible and viewed by the community as socially responsible, suggesting it holds promise to address root causes of health inequality in under-resourced communities.
