Public health and other community-based practitioners have access to a growing number of evidence-based interventions (EBIs), and yet EBIs continue to be underused. One reason for this underuse is that practitioners often lack the capacity (knowledge, skills, and motivation) to select, adapt, and implement EBIs. Training, technical assistance, and other capacity-building strategies can be effective at increasing EBI adoption and implementation. However, little is known about how to design capacity-building strategies or tailor them to differences in capacity required across varying EBIs and practice contexts. To address this need, we conducted a scoping study of frameworks and theories detailing variations in EBIs or practice contexts and how to tailor capacity-building to address those variations. Using an iterative process, we consolidated constructs and propositions across 24 frameworks and developed a beginning theory to describe salient variations in EBIs (complexity and uncertainty) and practice contexts (decision-making structure, general capacity to innovate, resource and values fit with EBI, and unity vs. polarization of stakeholder support). The theory also includes propositions for tailoring capacity-building strategies to address salient variations. To have wide-reaching and lasting impact, the dissemination of EBIs needs to be coupled with strategies that build practitioners’ capacity to adopt and implement a variety of EBIs across diverse practice contexts.
Objective
To determine: (1) What research has been done on health promotion interventions for low-wage workers and (2) What factors are associated with effective low-wage workers’ health promotion.
Data Source
This review includes articles from PubMed and PsychINFO published in or before July 2016
Study Inclusion/Exclusion Criteria
The search yielded 130 unique articles, 35 met the inclusion criteria: (1) being conducted in the US, (2) including an intervention or empirical data around health promotion among adult low-wage workers, and (3) measuring changes in low-wage worker health.
Data Extraction
Central features of the selected studies were extracted, including the theoretical foundation, study design, health promotion intervention content and delivery format, intervention targeted outcomes, sample characteristics, and work, occupational, and industry characteristics.
Data Analysis
Consistent with a scoping review, we used a descriptive, content analysis approach to analyze extracted data. All authors agreed upon emergent themes and two authors independently coded data extracted from each article.
Results
The results suggest that the research on low-wage workers’ health promotion is limited, but increasing, and that low-wage workers have limited access to and utilization of worksite health promotion programs.
Conclusions
Workplace health promotion programs could have a positive effect on low-wage workers, but more work is needed to understand how to expand access, what drives participation and which delivery mechanisms are most effective.
This community-based participatory research project aimed to develop strategies to prevent youth substance use in a rural county. This article (1) describes the project phases, (2) examines unique contributions and considerations of youth involvement, and (3) explores the youths' perspective. Twelve youths, aged 16 to 18 years, joined parents, community leaders, and research specialists on the community-based participatory research team. The youths were integrally involved in all phases including the community assessment, community leader interviews, selection of a substance use prevention program, and program implementation. Youths reported sustained enthusiasm, experiences of authentic leadership, development of research skills, and greater awareness of their community.
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