NEW RECRUITMENT MODEL MAY IMPROVE HEALTH OUTCOMES INFORMATION
Since the days of Tuskegee, recruiting African Americans into clinical trials and other medical studies have met with justifiable resistance and skepticism. Researchers have devised many approaches to dispel the fear that today's standards and ethics would simply be a repeat of the past. Perhaps one group of researchers is getting closer to eliminating the distrust and successfully recruiting African Americans.
At the ISHIB2000 conference in July, Sharon Wyatt, PhD, professor of nursing at the University of Mississippi Medical Center and co-principal Investigator for the Jackson Heart Study (JHS) Examination Center, unveiled a newly devised Community-Driven Model of Recruitment. To design the model, Wyatt and colleagues first conducted a multi-method Participant Recruitment Study to determine participation barriers and facilitators that need to be addressed in recruitment strategies. The study involved 126 survey participants; in-depth interviews involved 34 individuals and 10 groups of 10-12 participants. The survey assessed the likelihood of participation according to participant, organization, protocol, and community involvement factors. Wyatt found that family and community support, health, research beliefs, recruiter characteristics and media coverage were among the important factors that influenced participant recruitment and retention. The in-depth interviews focused on the meaning of participation in research for African Americans.
With participant input, the researchers built the Community-Driven Model of Recruitment, using three strategies to strengthen enrollment in the JHS. First, efforts toward "Safeguarding Moral and Political Community Concerns" were initiated to engage the community in developing and overseeing culturally sensitive study protocols, including genetics. Next, for building community partnerships, the "Friends of JHS" was launched. And finally, specific strategies of recruiting based on communal values for "Gathering the JHS Family" will assist in recruiting and retaining participants.
According to Dr. Wyatt, "The foundation of the Community-Driven Model of Recruitment for the JHS is the cultivation of respectful and reciprocal partnerships among researchers, participants and the community as co-investigators." The model closely looks at the issues of diversity that affect recruitment: Black vs White, patient vs health care provider, as well as, participant vs researcher. "This integrated approach offers one possible solution that allows scientists to fulfill Ghandi's charge to 'be the change we want to see in the world'," Dr. Wyatt concluded.
The Jackson Heart Study is unprecedented in its comprehensive look at cardiovascular disease in African Americans. The study, with headquarters based in Jackson, Mississippi, was launched in September 2000. More information about the Jackson Heart Study can be found at
www.ccaix.jsums.edu/~jhs/
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