Cargando…
A community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities
BACKGROUND: Focus groups and workshops can be used to gain insights into the persistence of and potential solutions for environmental health priorities in underserved areas. The objective of this study was to characterize focus group and workshop outcomes of a community-academic partnership focused...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2021
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8464125/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34560866 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-11799-1 |
_version_ | 1784572555442520064 |
---|---|
author | Wang, Suwei Richardson, Molly B. Evans, Mary B. Johnson, Ethel Threadgill-Matthews, Sheryl Tyson, Sheila White, Katherine L. Gohlke, Julia M. |
author_facet | Wang, Suwei Richardson, Molly B. Evans, Mary B. Johnson, Ethel Threadgill-Matthews, Sheryl Tyson, Sheila White, Katherine L. Gohlke, Julia M. |
author_sort | Wang, Suwei |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: Focus groups and workshops can be used to gain insights into the persistence of and potential solutions for environmental health priorities in underserved areas. The objective of this study was to characterize focus group and workshop outcomes of a community-academic partnership focused on addressing environmental health priorities in an urban and a rural location in Alabama between 2012 and 2019. METHODS: Six focus groups were conducted in 2016 with 60 participants from the City of Birmingham (urban) and 51 participants from Wilcox County (rural), Alabama to discuss solutions for identified environmental health priorities based on previous focus group results in 2012. Recorded focus groups were transcribed and analyzed using the grounded theory approach. Four follow-up workshops that included written survey instruments were conducted to further explore identified priorities and determine whether the priorities change over time in the same urban (68 participants) and rural (72 participants) locations in 2018 and 2019. RESULTS: Consistent with focus groups in 2012, all six focus groups in 2016 in Birmingham identified abandoned houses as the primary environmental priority. Four groups listed attending city council meetings, contacting government agencies and reporting issues as individual-level solutions. Identified city-level solutions included city-led confiscation, tearing down and transferring of abandoned property ownership. In Wilcox County, all six groups agreed the top priority was drinking water quality, consistent with results in 2012. While the priority was different in Birmingham versus Wilcox County, the top identified reason for problem persistence was similar, namely unresponsive authorities. Additionally, individual-level solutions identified by Wilcox County focus groups were similar to Birmingham, including contacting and pressuring agencies and developing petitions and protesting to raise awareness, while local policy-level solutions identified in Wilcox County included government-led provision of grants to improve septic systems, and transparency in allocation of funds. Workshops in 2018 and 2019 further emphasized water quality as the top priority in Wilcox County, while participants in Birmingham transitioned from abandoned houses as a top priority in 2018 to drinking water quality as a new priority in 2019. CONCLUSIONS: Applying a community-engaged approach in both urban and rural locations provided better understanding of the unique opportunities and challenges for identifying potential interventions for environmental health priorities in both locations. Results can help inform future efforts to address locally defined environmental health issues and solutions. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12889-021-11799-1. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-8464125 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-84641252021-09-27 A community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities Wang, Suwei Richardson, Molly B. Evans, Mary B. Johnson, Ethel Threadgill-Matthews, Sheryl Tyson, Sheila White, Katherine L. Gohlke, Julia M. BMC Public Health Research BACKGROUND: Focus groups and workshops can be used to gain insights into the persistence of and potential solutions for environmental health priorities in underserved areas. The objective of this study was to characterize focus group and workshop outcomes of a community-academic partnership focused on addressing environmental health priorities in an urban and a rural location in Alabama between 2012 and 2019. METHODS: Six focus groups were conducted in 2016 with 60 participants from the City of Birmingham (urban) and 51 participants from Wilcox County (rural), Alabama to discuss solutions for identified environmental health priorities based on previous focus group results in 2012. Recorded focus groups were transcribed and analyzed using the grounded theory approach. Four follow-up workshops that included written survey instruments were conducted to further explore identified priorities and determine whether the priorities change over time in the same urban (68 participants) and rural (72 participants) locations in 2018 and 2019. RESULTS: Consistent with focus groups in 2012, all six focus groups in 2016 in Birmingham identified abandoned houses as the primary environmental priority. Four groups listed attending city council meetings, contacting government agencies and reporting issues as individual-level solutions. Identified city-level solutions included city-led confiscation, tearing down and transferring of abandoned property ownership. In Wilcox County, all six groups agreed the top priority was drinking water quality, consistent with results in 2012. While the priority was different in Birmingham versus Wilcox County, the top identified reason for problem persistence was similar, namely unresponsive authorities. Additionally, individual-level solutions identified by Wilcox County focus groups were similar to Birmingham, including contacting and pressuring agencies and developing petitions and protesting to raise awareness, while local policy-level solutions identified in Wilcox County included government-led provision of grants to improve septic systems, and transparency in allocation of funds. Workshops in 2018 and 2019 further emphasized water quality as the top priority in Wilcox County, while participants in Birmingham transitioned from abandoned houses as a top priority in 2018 to drinking water quality as a new priority in 2019. CONCLUSIONS: Applying a community-engaged approach in both urban and rural locations provided better understanding of the unique opportunities and challenges for identifying potential interventions for environmental health priorities in both locations. Results can help inform future efforts to address locally defined environmental health issues and solutions. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12889-021-11799-1. BioMed Central 2021-09-24 /pmc/articles/PMC8464125/ /pubmed/34560866 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-11799-1 Text en © The Author(s) 2021 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. |
spellingShingle | Research Wang, Suwei Richardson, Molly B. Evans, Mary B. Johnson, Ethel Threadgill-Matthews, Sheryl Tyson, Sheila White, Katherine L. Gohlke, Julia M. A community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities |
title | A community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities |
title_full | A community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities |
title_fullStr | A community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities |
title_full_unstemmed | A community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities |
title_short | A community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities |
title_sort | community-engaged approach to understanding environmental health concerns and solutions in urban and rural communities |
topic | Research |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8464125/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34560866 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-11799-1 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT wangsuwei acommunityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT richardsonmollyb acommunityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT evansmaryb acommunityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT johnsonethel acommunityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT threadgillmatthewssheryl acommunityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT tysonsheila acommunityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT whitekatherinel acommunityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT gohlkejuliam acommunityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT wangsuwei communityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT richardsonmollyb communityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT evansmaryb communityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT johnsonethel communityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT threadgillmatthewssheryl communityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT tysonsheila communityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT whitekatherinel communityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities AT gohlkejuliam communityengagedapproachtounderstandingenvironmentalhealthconcernsandsolutionsinurbanandruralcommunities |