Health Education Research Advance Access originally published online on March 23, 2009
Health Education Research 2009 24(5):760-771; doi:10.1093/her/cyp010
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A qualitative exploration of the community partner experience in a faith-based breast cancer educational intervention
1 Department of Health Behavior, School of Public Health and Health Professions, The State University of New York at Buffalo, 3435 Main Street, 321 Kimball Tower, Buffalo, NY 14214, USA
2 Department of Health, Behavior and Society, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, 624 North Broadway, Room 743, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
3 Department of Health Policy and Management, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, 624 North Broadway, Room 545, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
4 Department of Health, Behavior and Society, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, 624 North Broadway, Room 554, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
* Correspondence to: E. M. Rodriguez. E-mail: emr4{at}buffalo.edu
Although community partner engagement is a key component in faith-based health promotion/disease prevention intervention research, the perspective of community partners on their experiences in the intervention process has been infrequently investigated. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 12 African-American community partners [i.e. four pastors and eight lay health co-ordinators (LHCs)] from eight churches in greater Baltimore, MD, USA, that engaged in a breast cancer educational intervention that followed a community-based participatory research (CBPR) approach. Audiotaped interviews were transcribed, coded and content analysis was used to identify themes across the codes. Findings show that pastors support a holistic approach to health and that LHCs act as a link between the pastors, participants and academic researchers. In addition, pastors and LHCs emphasized that the religious and/or spiritual program elements should not overpower the importance of reaching participants with critical health information regardless of their religious or spiritual beliefs. Study findings suggest that faith-based educational intervention efforts that follow a CBPR approach are important in promoting cancer awareness in the African-American community. Including community partner assessment can further elucidate critical intervention impacts and helps to address health disparities in underserved communities.
Received on July 14, 2008; accepted on January 28, 2009