Community engagement for early recognition and immediate action in stroke (CEERIAS): Pre and post COVID-19

Knitasha V. Washington, Neelum T. Aggarwal, Shyam Prabhakaran, Desiree Collins Bradley, Kellie Goodson, Alexis Malfesi and Theresa Schmidt
Additional contact information
Knitasha V. Washington: ATW Health Solutions, USA
Neelum T. Aggarwal: Rush University Medical Center, USA
Shyam Prabhakaran: The University of Chicago, USA
Desiree Collins Bradley: ATW Health Solutions, USA
Kellie Goodson: ATW Health Solutions, USA
Alexis Malfesi: Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, USA
Theresa Schmidt: Real Chemistry, USA

Management in Healthcare: A Peer-Reviewed Journal, 2023, vol. 8, issue 1, 85-98

Abstract: Engagement science can help healthcare providers understand promising practices that address health disparities. The Community Engagement in Early Recognition and Immediate Action in Stroke (CEERIAS) study began in 2014 with the aim of improving health outcomes related to stroke and addressing racial inequities among at-risk South Side Chicago neighbourhoods by engaging community members called ‘Stroke Promoters’ in designing and implementing a stroke preparedness programme. Launched in 2020, Phase II (2CEERIAS) furthered this aim by developing a replicable virtual platform for the programme in response to challenges prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The CEERIAS community engagement programme results provided meaningful data to South Side Chicago communities; nearly 40,000 ‘Pact to Act FAST’ pledges were collected over 11 months, and although early hospital arrival and emergency medical services (EMS) usage for confirmed stroke did not increase overall, early arrivals for suspected stroke increased significantly for men, younger people and black community members along with EMS usage for suspected stroke. The 2CEERIAS virtual programme collected nearly 3,800 new pledges in a 90-day window during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The engagement of trusted nonclinical laypeople during both phases of the CEERIAS study demonstrates that community engagement can positively influence clinical outcomes and increase reach and sustainability for such efforts. The use of engagement science can also generate a deep sense of co-creation among community members, and the ‘social contract’ approach can effect behavioural change. The virtual adaption reinforced important engagement science principles for interventions aimed at eliminating stroke disparities. To this day, eight years after research support ended for the CEERIAS programme, community members trained as ‘Stroke Promoters’ remain connected to the researchers and continue to educate family and neighbours about stroke preparedness.

Keywords: equity; health disparities; stroke; community engagement; improvement; quality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I1 I10 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://hstalks.com/article/7962/download/ (application/pdf)
https://hstalks.com/article/7962/ (text/html)
Requires a paid subscription for full access.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aza:mih000:y:2023:v:8:i:1:p:85-98

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Management in Healthcare: A Peer-Reviewed Journal from Henry Stewart Publications
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Henry Stewart Talks ().