Evidence Library

Abstract:

Aim: To address the (perceived) need for cervical cancer screening in an under-resourced community in Cape Town, South Africa by exploring the local context for a new health promotion programme.

Method: A CBPR approach was taken to developing the project including field visits and informal interviews and focus groups with community members. Local people were trained and employed as focus group moderators and outreach workers. They were also involved in data analysis.

Findings/recommendations: One important outcome of the community visits was the formation of a community-based reference team that helped shape the rest of the project. Community stakeholders were thus involved at all stages.

The major impact of involving community members was to shift the emphasis of the whole project from the researchers' narrow interest in cervical cancer to a much broader consideration of young women's 'cervical health'. This took into account a much wider range of problems affecting sexual health in the community. As a result the health promotion programme is now more likely to address the multiple anxieties and lived experiences of the target group.

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Related entry: none currently available

Categories: public health
Identifying topics, prioritising and commissioning
Designing research
Undertaking research
Analysing and interpreting
impact on research
impact on implementation and change
impact of public involvement
journal article
Implementation and change

Date Entered: 2009/01/28

Date Edited: 2012/11/21