DP24-004, PRC Core: Arizona Prevention Research Center

University Of Arizona, Tucson AZ

Investigators

Abstract

Project Abstract: For 25 years the Arizona Prevention Research Center (AzPRC) has served as a pivotal platform for collaborative research, training, capacity building, and translation to address health disparities. The overall goal of the Arizona Prevention Research Center (AzPRC) is to use innovative community-engaged approaches to expand knowledge, tools, strategies, and resources to achieve greater adoption, implementation, and wide scale use of EBIs to reduce health inequities. The AzPRC and our partners are committed to championing community health worker effectiveness in Arizona and beyond. Community health workers (CHWs), inclusive of promotoras de salud in Latine and community health representatives in American Indian (AI) communities, are frontline public health workers with a deep understanding and trust within the communities they serve. Given extensive experience and ties to CHWs, the AzPRC is well-positioned to address social isolation and loneliness (SIL) through promoting intergenerational connections (IGC). The AzPRC will conduct a core research project to understand the implementation, translation, and dissemination of CHW supported, evidence-based strategies to reduce SIL through intergenerational connection. The "Together Across Generations" core research project will address knowledge gaps surrounding SIL, particularly among rural border Latine and AI populations, who face severe health inequities in the state and nation. This project is guided by the Practical, Robust, Implementation, and Sustainability Model and The Transcreation Framework for Community-engaged Behavioral Interventions to Reduce Health Disparities. Collaborating with community-based organizations, local health departments, and Tribal nations, the first phase of the study will assess current social connectedness services and implement evidence-based intergenerational programs. Mixed methods data from organizations, CHWs, and 120 participants age >55 will be collected in four rural, border and Tribal sites to examine contextual factors, identify barriers and facilitators, and contribute to the evidence- base on the cost-effectiveness of these programs. Workshops to support CHW self-care and promote the sustainability of the workforce will be integrated. Implementation findings will be translated and disseminated throughout Arizona in the second phase of the project, achieved through partnerships with statewide, local and Tribal entities that promote equitable public health practices. Dissemination goals, including increases in IGC programming and improved surveillance of SIL throughout Arizona, will be evaluated through data from county health departments, federally qualified health centers, and Tribal health organizations. The impact of IGC services statewide will also be examined with propensity score matching from over 11,000 older adults who respond to the Arizona Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, with SIL and IGC assessments to be added. The AzPRC will take leadership in the PRC Network to promote evidenced based practices, national SIL programming and surveillance, and in promoting the health of the CHW workforce.