The 131st Annual Meeting (November 15-19, 2003) of APHA

Abstract #57723

Elizabeth A. Baker, PhD, School of Public Health, Saint Louis University, 3545 Lafayette Ave, St. Louis, MO 63104, 314-977-3218, bakerpa@slu.edu, Laura K. Brennan, PhD, Prevention Research Center, Saint Louis University School of Public Health, 3545 Lafayette Ave., Salus Center, St. Louis, MO 63104, and Freda Motton, Bootheel Heart Health Coalition, PO Box 552, Caruthersville, MO 63830.

This session will present strategies employed to develop and implement a participatory assessment tool to determine the protective social factors/community capacities necessary to engage in community change as part of a 4 site collaborative funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This session will describe: the participatory strategies used to develop the tool (representing cross site and site specific themes), the interviews conducted, the methodology used to compare types of protective social factors/capacities available and type and level of community change activities, and the limitations and challenges in conducting this work. The results from local participating and comparison sites indicate that with a basic level of protective social factors/capacities it is possible to have regular activities, but that a wider range of protective social factors/capacities need to be available both within and outside of the local community in order to create new and innovative activities and to influence policy. Some of the limitations and challenges include: 1) the development of measurement tools that allow insiders and outsiders to work together to assess community history in such a way as to accurately reflect years of institutionalized racism and classism that pervasively affect all efforts to create community change and 2) the importance of relationship building to enhance the likelihood that our inquiries will provide access to enough of the real, yet often "hidden", perspectives that are so critical to understanding how to enhance capacity, particularly in disadvantaged communities.

Learning Objectives:

• At the conclusion of the session the participants in this session will be able to:
• 1.Identify key steps in developing the assessment in a participatory fashion
• 2.Identify key steps in utilizing the participatory assessment
• 3.List the protective social factors/ capacities that were most important in these communities in creating regular activities, new/innovative activities; and creating policy changes (and recognize that these may not be the most important in other communities)
• 4.Discuss potential limitations and challenges in conducting this work

Keywords: African American, Community Health

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.