Recruiting and retaining service agencies and public health providers in longitudinal studies: Implications for community-engaged implementation research

Abstract

This article addresses a lack of attention in the implementation science literature regarding how to overcome recruitment and retention challenges in longitudinal studies involving large samples of service agencies and health service providers (“providers”). Herein, we provide a case-illustration of procedures that improved recruitment and retention in a longitudinal, mixed-method study—Project Interprofessional Collaboration Implementation—funded by the US National Institute of Mental Health. Project Interprofessional Collaboration Implementation included counselors, program workers, educators, and supervisors. We present a research-engagement model to overcome barriers that included developing a low-burden study, social gatherings to engage stakeholders, protocols to recruit agencies and providers, comprehensive record-keeping, research procedures as incentives to participation, a plan to retain hard-to-reach participants, and strategies for modifying incentives over time. Using our model, we retained 36 agencies over the life of the project. Between baseline (N = 379) and 12-month follow-up (N = 285), we retained 75% of the sample and between the 12- (N = 285) and 24-month follow-ups (N = 256), we retained 90%. For qualitative interviews (between baseline and 12-month follow-up and between 12- and 24-month follow-ups), we retained 100% of the sample (N = 20). We provide a summary of frequency of contacts required to initiate data collection and time required for data collection. The model responded to environmental changes in policy and priorities that would not have been achievable without the expertise of community partners. To recruit and retain large samples longitudinally, researchers must strategically engage community partners. The strategies imbedded in our model can be performed with moderate levels of effort and human resources. Creating opportunities for research partners to participate in all phases of the research cycle is recommended, which can help build research capacity for future research.

Interprofessional Collaboration Improves the Odds of Educating Patients About PrEP over Time

“…We used longitudinal survey data collected from psychosocial providers in 2014-2016 (baseline) and 2015-2017 (12-month follow-up) from a 5-year longitudinal repeated measure study of 34 community settings in NYC. 14 We adhered to principles of community-engaged research from study conceptualization to data collection, analysis, and dissemination (for details, see Krakower et al 8 ). The study's methods were developed by the Implementation Community Collaborative Board (ICCB), composed of university researchers, providers, managers, and patients.…”

A typology of power in implementation: Building on the exploration, preparation, implementation, sustainment (EPIS) framework to advance mental health and HIV health equity

“…A key to sustaining health equity–focused intervention implementation will be for systems-level leaders to understand the funding needs of equity-focused implementation and champion sustainment ( Aarons et al, 2016 ). In the absence of significant changes to funding structures, organizational networks may be able to leverage partnerships to account for resource limitations and sustain interventions through creative redistribution of material power ( Pinto et al, 2018b ).…”

“…Organizations must recognize when a chosen intervention is not a good fit or adaptation efforts have not successfully met community needs. Emerging research on de-implementation looks at decisions to cease intervention implementation and processes to ethically extract ( Pinto et al, 2018a , 2018b ; Prasad & Ioannidis, 2014 ). When emerging scientific evidence necessitates changes to implementation or de-implementation, implementers will rely on community trust to support the changes and not further dynamics of medical mistrust ( Shelton et al, 2021b ).…”

Nurturing Practitioner-Researcher Partnerships to Improve Adoption and Delivery of Research-Based Social and Public Health Services Worldwide

“…In partnerships, practitioners may serve as “cultural brokers,” negotiating and facilitating relationships between researchers and community members to help researchers gain access to and develop trust with local communities [ 70 , 71 ]. While several studies have referred to the involvement of practitioners in research [ 58 , 61 , 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 ], the scope of such “involvement” is seldom clarified. There is a dearth of empirical data showing specific research tasks and procedures with which practitioners are involved.…”