Community-Based Organizations Leading Research Efforts: Preliminary Findings from the Chicagoland CEAL Program's COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake and Intention Survey

Paris Thomas; Jessica Bishop-Royse; Sarah Lomahan; Abigail Silva; Anne Marie Murphy; Molly A Martin

doi:10.1007/s40615-023-01846-5

Community-Based Organizations Leading Research Efforts: Preliminary Findings from the Chicagoland CEAL Program's COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake and Intention Survey

J Racial Ethn Health Disparities. 2024 Feb 21. doi: 10.1007/s40615-023-01846-5. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Paris Thomas¹, Jessica Bishop-Royse², Sarah Lomahan¹, Abigail Silva³, Anne Marie Murphy⁴, Molly A Martin⁵

Affiliations

¹ Equal Hope, Chicago, IL, USA.
² Dept. of Adult Health and Gerontological Nursing, College of Nursing, Rush University, Chicago, IL, USA. jessica_bishop-royse@rush.edu.
³ Parkinson School of Health Sciences and Public Health, Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA.
⁴ School of Public Health, Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA.
⁵ Department of Pediatrics, University of Illinois Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA.

PMID: 38383838
DOI: 10.1007/s40615-023-01846-5

Abstract

Background: To foster community engaged research in the communities most impacted by COVID-19, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) formed 21 teams of Community Engagement Alliance Against COVID-19 Disparities (CEAL). The national CEAL initiative developed a Common Survey to investigate attitudes and behaviors to the COVID-19 vaccine and clinical trials. This article describes survey implementation at the Chicagoland CEAL Program (CCP).

Methods: This community-based participatory research project was the result of a strong collaboration between academic institutions, and a community-based non-profit health equity-focused partner organization. The survey implementation was developed and refined with strong input from CHWs, participants, and staff in the partner organizations and institutions. Survey data were collected with Qualtrics, a web-based survey tool.

Results: Survey implementation resulted in data collection for 852 participants during the period 12/18/2021-02/18/2023. Excluding participants on the basis of missing data resulted in a sample of 690, 601 of which (87.10%) indicated that they had received at least one dose or intended to get vaccinated. Overall, 54 (7.83%) respondents reported that they had not received the vaccine and were not planning to.

Conclusion: Hard to reach populations present two unique challenges in emerging infectious disease events. Reaching populations vulnerable to poor outcomes with vaccines was essential to addressing the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, learning about barriers and hesitancy toward vaccine uptake is difficult in these communities. CCP's partnership of five academic institutions, a community research center, and a community-based non-profit health equity-focused organization shows what is possible when traditional models of research and inquiry are reconsidered for community-based participatory research. Results shown here are drawn from a collaboratively designed and implemented survey, collected in person, with over 90% completion.

Keywords: COVID-19; Community-based participatory research; Health equity; Racism; Vaccine hesitancy.