Using a People-Centred Participatory Approach to Explore Community and Stakeholders’ Perceptions to Enable Research Teams to Design Plans that Meet Community Needs

Abstract

Background and Challenges to Implementation: Community stakeholders’ perceptions can influence community members participation in clinical research trials or support the research. It is for this reason that research teams need to have a deep understanding of the communities they research. The Aurum Klerksdorp CRS engages in a people-centred participatory process with the community and stakeholders before engaging in active recruitment activities.

Intervention or Response: The process involves a bottom-up learning process and not a top-down blueprint approach. The diversity and complexities of people and communities were respected and taken into consideration when designing community engagement, recruitment, and retention plans in collaboration with identified key stakeholders. During this process the key stakeholders, as result of established trust, felt comfortable sharing their inputs on the most effective strategies for reaching the community. Research teams enable communities to tailor their own responses to the research, meeting their specific need.

Results/Impact: The co-created plans had a high degree of fit where the research fits into the lives of the people, resulting in better recruitment, accrual, and retention outcomes.

Summary: Adopting a people-centred participatory approach contributes to the enhancement, quality and relevance of the research and increases research literacy in communities.