Capturing and Documenting the Wider Health Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic Through the Remember Rebuild Saskatchewan Initiative: Protocol for a Mixed Methods Interdisciplinary Project (Preprint)

Abstract

BACKGROUND In the Canadian province of Saskatchewan the global COVID-19 pandemic appeared amidst existing social health challenges in food insecurity, housing precarity and homelessness, poor mental health, and substance misuse. These chronic features intersected with the pandemic producing a moment in time when the urgency of COVID-19 brought attention to underlying shortcomings in public health services. OBJECTIVE The objectives of the program of research are: 1) to identify and measure relationships between the pandemic and wider health and social impacts, namely, food insecurity, housing precarity and homelessness, and mental health and substance use in Saskatchewan; and 2) to create an oral history of the pandemic in Saskatchewan in an accessible digital public archive. METHODS We use a mixed methods approach to identify impacts of the pandemic on specific equity-seeking groups and areas of social health concern by developing cross-sectional population-based surveys and producing results based on statistical analysis. We augmented the quantitative analysis by conducting qualitative interviews and oral histories to generate more granular details of people’s experiences of the pandemic, and we focus on frontline workers and other service providers and individuals within equity-seeking groups. We capture digital evidence and social media posts, we collect and organize key threads using a free open-source research tool, Zotero, to trace the digital evidence of the pandemic in Saskatchewan. This study is approved by the Research Ethics Board at the University of Saskatchewan (Beh-1945). RESULTS Funding for this program of research was received in March and April 2022. Survey data was collected between July and November 2022. Oral histories began to be collected in June 2022 and are ongoing. Thirty oral histories have been collected at the time of this writing. Qualitative interviews will begin in April 2022. Survey analysis began in January 2023 and results are expected to be published mid-2023. Qualitative interviews will begin in April 2022. Survey analysis began in January 2023 and results are expected to be published mid-2023. Data and stories collected in this work are archived for preservation and freely accessible at www.RememberRebuild.ca. We will store findings from the project in the archive, and share results in academic journals and conferences, townhalls and community gatherings, social and digital media reports, and through a collaborative exhibition with Public Library systems. CONCLUSIONS The pandemic’s ephemeral nature poses a risk of us “forgetting” this moment, and the attendant social inequities. These challenges inspired a novel fusion among health researchers, historians, librarians, and service providers in the creation of a Remember Rebuild Saskatchewan project, which focuses on preserving the legacy of the pandemic and capturing data to support an equitable recovery in Saskatchewan. CLINICALTRIAL Not applicable.