Engaging community partners for knowledge to action translation of personal preparedness

Given the likelihood of Americans being impacted by disasters, organizations emphasize mitigating vulnerabilities through personal preparedness.  Despite messaging, studies show limited growth in becoming personally prepared and questions remain as to the most effective strategies for increasing personal preparedness.  Grounded in the Trans-theoretical stages of change theory, Ready CDC, an intervention to encourage staff to become personally prepared, was piloted.  Ready CDC engaged community stakeholders from Georgia and local emergency management agencies and American Red Cross to foster community partnerships and garner subject matter expertise to inform development of the intervention.  The resulting product consisted of a pre-survey, a 1-hour partner-led workshop with an optional question and answer session, three behavioral reinforcements, and a post-survey.  During Sept., 2013 to Dec., 2014, 7 workshops of conveniently sampled staff (n=179) were held to increase awareness and self-efficacy and advance the stage of readiness towards personal preparedness.  Pre- and post-data were collected from 87 (47%) staff.   Analyses showed a 21% increase in awareness of local/county warning sirens and a 7% and 13% increase in self-efficacy for assembling an emergency kit and developing a written plan, respectively (all p<0.001). For participants not in the ‘maintenance’ stage at baseline (n=80), readiness progression for assembling a kit was determined for 44% (n=35, p<0.001).  Similarly, 36 of 84 (43%) participants increased readiness for developing a written plan (p<0.001).

Ready CDC is an effective model that can be readily implemented by other organizations.  Additional analyses suggest community partner engagement is an effective strategy for increasing personal preparedness behaviors.