Community Engagement Core

Ochin, Inc., Portland OR

Investigators

Abstract

Summary. U.S. communities that are marginalized as a result of historic and ongoing injustices experience persistently inequitable rates of adverse health outcomes. These communities will also disproportionately experience climate-induced health impacts as climate change causes extreme temperatures, weather events, and poor air quality. The community health centers (CHCs) serving these communities are uniquely positioned to intervene to address these impacts. The perspectives of CHC patients, providers, and staff and other community organizations working for climate impact mitigation are critical to developing strategies that CHCs can implement to prepare for and mitigate climate-induced health impacts in the populations they serve. To solicit these perspectives, the Community Catalyst CCHRC’s Community Engagement Core (CEC) will conduct extensive community engagement activities foundational to the CCHRC’s central theme of identifying effective CHC-led interventions to address climate-induced health impacts. The CEC will create, engage, and continuously evaluate a transdisciplinary multidirectional learning community with expertise in diverse domains relevant to such impacts, through a Community Advisory Board (CAB) comprised of three interactive advisory committees (health system stakeholders, scientific experts, and community organizations focused on climate change mitigation and environmental justice). CAB committees will collaborate to identify interventional strategies that CHCs may implement to prepare for and mitigate climate-induced health impacts. Concurrently, we will collect and analyze observational, interview, and focus group data from patients and staff at six diverse CHC organizations to identify the mechanisms through which CHC-led interventions could mitigate these impacts. The CEC will work closely with the Research Program Core (RPC), as the CAB members and CHC patients and staff will react to the RPC’s Aims 1-2 results on asthma and hypertension exacerbation associated with extreme climate events in CHC populations, and their emergent questions will inform the RPC’s Aim 3 analyses. CEC activities will yield a community-generated agenda for future CCHRC research on CHC interventions to mitigate climate-induced health impacts and the support that CHCs need to sustainably implement proven interventions. The CEC will disseminate and advance this agenda in collaboration with the CAB and the RPC using diverse mechanisms, including supporting the development of proposals for external funding led by CCHRC-cultivated community-researcher partnerships. This agenda, together with the results of the RPC Aim 3 analyses, will inform the development of CHC-prioritized future CCHRC research.