Engaging Underserved Communities in COVID-19 Health Equity Implementation Research: An Analysis of Community Engagement Resource Needs and Costs.

Background: Meaningful community engagement is instrumental to effective implementation and sustainment of equitable public health interventions. Significant resources are necessary to ensure that community engagement takes place in culturally sensitive, trusted ways that optimize positive public health outcomes. However, the types and costs of resources best suited to enable meaningful community engagement in implementation research are not well-documented. This study's objectives are (1) to describe a pragmatic method for systematically tracking and documenting resources utilized for community engagement activities, (2) report resources across phases of implementation research, and (3) provide recommendations for planning and budgeting for community engagement in health equity implementation research.

Methods: Community engagement partners completed a tracking log of their person-hours for community engagement activities across three phases of community engagement (startup, early, maintenance) in two implementation research projects to promote equity in COVID-19 testing and vaccination for underserved communities. Both projects completed a six-session Theory of Change (i.e., a facilitated group discussion about current and desired conditions that culminated with a set of priorities for strategic change making) over 4 months with respective Community Advisory Boards (CAB) that included community organizers, promotores, federally qualified health center providers and administrators, and public health researchers. The reported person-hours that facilitated community member engagement were documented and summarized within and across project phases.

Results: For both projects, the startup phase required the highest number of person-hours ( = 60), followed by the maintenance ( = 53) and early phase ( = 47). Within the startup phase, a total of 5 community engagement activities occurred with identifying and inviting CAB members incurring the greatest number of person-hours ( = 19). Within the early phase, a total of 11 community engagement activities occurred with coordinating and leading live interpretation (Spanish) during CAB sessions incurring the greatest number of person-hours ( = 10). The maintenance phase included 11 community engagement activities with time dedicated to written translation of CAB materials into Spanish incurring the greatest number of person-hours ( = 10).

Conclusions: Study findings indicate that the most significant investment of resources is required in the startup period. Needed resources decreased, albeit with a greater diversity of activities, in later phases of community engagement with Spanish language translation requiring most in the later stage of the study. This study contributes to the community engagement and implementation science literature by providing a pragmatic tracking and measurement approach and recommendations for planning for and assessing costs to facilitate meaningful community engagement in public health implementation research.