Building Research Integrity and Capacity (BRIC): An Educational Initiative to Increase Research Literacy among Community Health Workers and Promotores

Abstract

While citizen science is gaining attention of late, for those of us involved in community-based public health research, community/citizen involvement in research has steadily increased over the past 50 years. Community Health Workers (CHWs), also known as Promotores de Salud in the Latino community, are critical to reaching underserved populations, where health disparities are more prevalent. CHWs/Promotores provide health education and services and may also assist with the development and implementation of community- and clinic-based research studies. Recognizing that CHWs typically have no formal academic training in research design or methods, and considering that rigor in research is critical to obtaining meaningful results, we designed instruction to fill this gap. We call this educational initiative “Building Research Integrity and Capacity” or BRIC. The BRIC training consists of eight modules that can be administered as a self-paced training or incorporated into in-person, professional development geared to a specific health intervention study. While we initially designed this culturally-grounded, applied ethics training for Latino/Hispanic community research facilitators, BRIC training modules have been adapted for and tested with non-Latino novice research facilitators. This paper describes the BRIC core content and instructional design process.

Using Self-Study and Peer-to-Peer Support to Change “Sick” Care to “Health” Care: The Patient Perspective

“…While "care" has always been identified within healthcare, in many ways the desires, interests, and active cultivation of a caring community of patients highlights that the professionalization of care may not be adequate, or even appropriate, compared to what people need. This fits with broader trends and interests in peer-to-peer support, such as the work of Susannah Fox 11 in supporting peer-to-peer advice online and Rajiv Mehta advancing an "Atlas of Caregiving 12 , " whereby individuals learn to understand and cultivate care and caring within and across families and communities.…”

“…To provide consistent foundational instruction about the scientific methods and responsible research practices, educational modules were adapted from the Building Research Integrity and Capacity (BRIC) curriculum developed by Dr. Camille Nebeker and made available to the Project Apollo Cohort (12). The adapted BRIC educational modules were made available online for the Cohort members to review in advance of planned face-to-face training sessions, which were designed to apply the concepts introduced via BRIC.…”

Beginning With the End in Mind: Contextual Considerations for Scaling-Out a Community-Based Intervention

“…Based on the results of Stage 1, the research team decided that there was a need for a scalable training protocol (i.e., one that was feasible across the entire 97,818 square miles of Wyoming) designed to target Extension health educators who were less confident in delivering physical activity programs and include hands-on instruction and teach-back. LIFT training was created as a 4 h “live” virtual format based on evidence-based methods on training (24, 25), learner-centered teaching (26), and program adoption rates (27). Training included detailed descriptions of program principles and opportunities for experiential learning (e.g., practicing and receiving feedback on the exercises and fitness assessments).…”

Ten simple rules for open human health research

“…Any interested party, including patients, clinicians, ethicists, policy makers, funding agencies, and individuals from the general public [ 36 ], can and should partner with the research community at the different stages of research—soliciting ideas for funding, designing or coordinating studies, recruiting participants, collecting or analyzing data, interpreting or broadcasting results, participating in the peer review process [ 37 – 39 ], and so on. The website for the Office of Research Integrity provides a resource for learning about responsible scientific methods, the Basic Research Concepts [ 40 ].…”