The Healthy Community Neighborhood Initiative: Rationale and Design.
OBJECTIVE To describe the design and rationale of the Healthy Community Neighborhood Initiative (HCNI) a multi component study to understand and document health risk and resources in a low income and minority community. DESIGN A community partnered participatory research project. SETTING A low income, biethnic African American and Latino neighborhood in South Los Angeles. PARTICIPANTS Adult community residents aged >18 years. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Household survey and clinical data collection; neighborhood characteristics; neighborhood observations; and community resources asset mapping. RESULTS We enrolled 206 participants (90% of those eligible) of whom 205 completed the household interview and examination, and 199 provided laboratory samples. Among enrollees, 82 (40% were aged >50 years and participated in functional status measurement. We completed neighborhood observations on 93 street segments; an average of 2.2 (SD=1.6) study participants resided on each street segment observed. The community asset map identified 290 resources summarized in a Community Resource Guide given to all participants. CONCLUSIONS The HCNI community academic partnership has built a framework to assess and document the individual, social, and community factors that may influence clinical and social outcomes in a community at high risk for preventable chronic disease. Our project suggests that a community collaborative can use culturally and scientifically sound strategies to identify community centered health and social needs. Additional work is needed to understand strategies for developing and implementing interventions to mitigate these disparities.
Ethnicity disease