Online Program

280064
Using a community capacity tool to measure capacity building in two low-income neighborhoods in los angles as part of a community based participatory research project


Sunday, November 3, 2013

Kathryn Hillstrom, Ed.D., MPH, RDN, Nutrition Department, California State University, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA
Valerie Ruelas, MSW, Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
Ellen Iverson, MPH, Department of Adolescent Medicine, Children's Hospital Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA
Background: Community Based Participatory Research (CBPR) offers a promising method to understand and address diabetes and obesity in communities. CBPR can result in building community capacity, including individual and community leadership, skills, participation, and reflection. Evaluating community capacity can be used to measure the effectiveness of a CBPR project. Methods: This retrospective analysis assesses capacity built during a CBPR study of a diabetes and obesity in East and South Los Angeles. A validated survey of community capacity was administered to four people involved in the project. Results: There was consensus about the strengths of the project, which included: wide participation across a variety of key community stakeholders, education of community members on the socio-ecological model and integration of their ideas into future interventions, pride of community members in their participation in the project, and the leveraging of funding as a result of the project to provide nutrition education and farmer's markets, which are on-going. Areas that could have been strengthened include generating more chances for community members to learn leadership skills and practice them, and more involvement with the research components of the study. Conclusions: CBPR is an empowering research methodology which can build community capacity and have long-term impacts on individuals and communities. Utilizing a tool to administer to community partners to measure community capacity built as a result of a CBPR project can be useful to strengthen and refine strategies during the project and useful to investigators and communities interested in developing future CBPR research efforts.

Learning Areas:

Administer health education strategies, interventions and programs
Conduct evaluation related to programs, research, and other areas of practice
Diversity and culture
Planning of health education strategies, interventions, and programs
Public health or related research

Learning Objectives:
List the nine sectors that are being measured through the community capacity tool. Describe the mechanisms utilized to build community capacity in this project.

Keyword(s): Low-Income, Participatory Research

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I was involved in the community-based participatory project presented in this abstract. I have a doctorate in education, am a Registered Dietitian, and have been working in underserved communities for my entire 16 year career. I have been the recipient of a number of grants focusing on empowering communities to adopt healthier habits.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.