Using the Delphi and snow card techniques to build consensus among diverse community and academic stakeholders for identifying health and research priorities to foster shared research collaborations

Background: The NYU-HHC Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) used a community-based participatory research (CBPR) and consensus-building approach among its community advisory board (CAB) members and faculty steering committee members to formulate research priorities to foster shared research collaborations.

Methods: The Delphi technique is a methodology used to generate consensus from diverse perspectives and organizational agendas through a multi-method and iterative approach of collecting quantitative and qualitative data. A series of on-line surveys was conducted with CAB members (N=20) to identify health and research priorities from the community perspective. Subsequently, CAB and faculty steering committee members were brought together and the Snow Card approach was utilized to narrow to 2 priority areas for shared research collaborations based on the results of the Delphi technique.

Results: Obesity and mental health were identified as health disparity areas for shared research collaborations within a social determinants framework. In response, 2 workgroups were formed with leadership provided by 3 co-chairs representing the 3 constituents of the NYU-HHC CTSI: CAB, NYU faculty, and HHC providers.

Conclusions/Discussion: The Delphi approach fostered ownership and engagement with community partners as it was an iterative process that required stakeholders' input into decision making. The Snow Card technique allowed for organizing of a large number of discrete ideas. Results have helped inform the overall CTSI research agenda by defining action steps, and setting an organizing framework to tackle 2 health disparity areas. The process helped ensure that NYU-HHC CTSI research and community engagement strategies are congruent with community priorities.