Building community-campus partnership to understand barriers and exploring strategies to encourage preventive health service utilization among ethnic minority older adults

Introductions: This study describes building community-campus partnerships to understand barriers and exploring strategies to encourage preventive health service (PHS) utilization including cancer screenings among ethnic minority older adults. Methods: Researchers partnered with key community liaisons working with underserved and ethnic minority older adults at places such as at senior center, aging resource service, senior community, and local ethnic churches. A total of 15 individual face-to-face interviews were conducted among both community liaisons and older adults they work with. All participants were interviewed by trained research staffs. Each interview was tape recorded, transcribed, coded and analyzed by two trained researchers. Results: In-depth and rich data were obtained. Information were summarized in four areas: (1) general factors and barriers that influence senior's decision to use PHS, (2) cultural specific utilization barriers, (3) influence of significant others, and (4) strategies to address barriers and encourage utilization. Certain cultural barriers, such as fear, embarrassment, family and cultural values, and providers' cultural competencies were found to be important both for African-American and Chinese-American older adults. Lack of norms of preventive service utilization, language barriers, and reliance on home remedies was more salient among Chinese-American seniors; whereas mistrust, fatalism, and discriminations appeared more significant for African American seniors. Selected quotes will be highlighted. Conclusions: Lessons learned through the partnership with racial / ethnic communities on barriers and senior-tailored strategies can help public health professional better reach and serve ethnic minority older adults.