Background
Methods
Study setting
Development of semi-structured interview
Q. | Main Questions | Additional Questions | Clarifying Questions / Prompts |
---|---|---|---|
1. | Describe your organization, its mandate, and responsibilities | ||
2. | Who (what population/community) is the focus of your activities? | ||
3. | Is there a larger system that your community is a part of? | How does the work of your organization fit into this larger system? | What are the links? How do they connect in a public health context? |
4. | Who are the stakeholders in your community? | How do you identify these stakeholders? | |
5. | Are there unique or marginalized groups within your community? | ||
6. | Are they represented in your programming? Why or why not? | ||
7. | How does your organization work with stakeholders? | Are stakeholders directly involved with any aspect of your work? | Communication, direct involvement, program development, conducting research/running programs, analysis/evaluation or dissemination |
8. | Are your stakeholders directly represented within your organization? | If so, how? | Structurally (peer researchers, board membership, etc.) or through your programs (directly engage stakeholders, represent interests)? |
9. | Are there any barriers to working with stakeholders? | How does your organization try to overcome these barriers? | |
10. | How do you define “health”? | How do you define “health” in your community? | |
Are there other definitions of health in your community? | |||
11. | How do you define the environment of your community? | What are/Are there links between your community and the environment? | |
12. | Do you believe that the health of your community is linked to its environment? | If so, how? | |
Is this reflected in your programming? | |||
13. | How do you define a “healthy” environment? | ||
14. | Do you believe that the health of your community is linked to the health of its environment? | If so, how? | |
15. | Is this reflected in your programming? | Why or why not? If not, what are the barriers to doing so? | |
16. | How do you measure health (of your community and the environment)? | ||
17. | How do you know if you’ve improved the health of your community? | Their environment? | |
18. | Are your perspectives on the connection between environment and the health of your community, shared by your partners? | Your community? | |
19. | If so, how are your programs/policies supported by your partners? By your community? | ||
20. | If not, what are the barriers towards a shared understanding? | Can you elaborate or give specific examples? | |
21. | In the context of the health and the environment, is there an individual / policy / program / organization that has shaped the practices of your organization? | ||
22. | Can you identify a model of good public health practice with respect to health and the environment? | ||
23. | How are public health problems first identified by your organization? | How are they prioritized? | |
24. | When developing your programs and policies, what types of evidence do you collect? | How do you collect this evidence? | For example, scientific/formal literature, expert-driven, community level, local or individual knowledge |
How do you prioritize evidence? | |||
25. | What are the challenges to integrating evidence into your programming? | ||
26. | Who is involved in developing programs and policies? | Individuals? A team approach? If a team, who would typically make up this team? | |
27. | Do team members have different perspectives on the links between human health and the environment? Do you incorporate perspectives from outside the organization? If so, how? | From individuals, from the community, other groups? | |
28. | How do you reconcile conflicting perspectives or pieces of evidence? | ||
29. | How do you disseminate or share your work? With whom is your work shared? | ||
30. | Are your programs and policies adaptive? If so, how? | Responsive to changing environments? | |
31. | At what scale (temporal or spatial or otherwise) are your policies and programs developed? |
Identification and recruitment of participants
Participant interviews
Qualitative content analysis
Code | Definition | Sample Text |
---|---|---|
Barriers | Challenges or obstacles encountered by the participant |
“I think it can be overwhelming to think about how much you have to bring in to solving a problem”
|
Crossing Sectors and Silos | Practices or approaches that cross boundaries/jurisdictions of sectors, organizations, or other silos |
“I would say that each project has a core group of stakeholders – that group of stakeholders is rarely within the context of one discipline or one sector”
|
Environment | Discussion of the environment - defining it, environmental health issues, its connection to public health | “It’s kind of a systems focus on how changing one piece changes all of those nested hierarchies of environments that are sitting within each other”
|
Equity | Discussion of issues of equity especially around health |
“Photovoice was a really powerful way of hearing the most vulnerable within our community. And really engaging them as well. Not just hearing them but helping them to develop skills and advocacy”
|
Governance | Discussion of current and possible models of governance, and their implications to public health |
“So there are a lot of times, as a community our hands are tied […] So sometimes we can’t do anything because of bureaucracy”
|
Health | Discussion of health - defining it, important health issues |
“if we’re focusing on human health and well-being, often we forget about broader ecosystem and ecological issues […] sustainability issues, energy”
|
Important Need | An identified need or important issue for public health practice |
“a real recognition that we need to reach out to stakeholders and other jurisdictions if we have a broader systems based approach and learn how to work with them and learn how to bring them into the tent“
|
Indicators | Discussion around measurement tools or indicators for health |
“People across North America have been struggling with this idea about how do you develop indicators for a so-called healthy food system or community food security” |
Methods | Discussion of innovative or interesting approaches in public health |
“deliberative policy analysis […] it’s the idea that through reflection and deliberation on policy issues, we actually develop some policy learning and that’s what can move change forward”
|
Participatory Approaches | Discussion of participatory approaches in public health practice. Also includes peer research, community-based research, community engagement and community involvement. |
“Community engagement - how do we have those conversations with community members for them to understand and be a part of this process?”
|
Perspectives, Context | Discussion of other perspectives or other contexts, and their role in public health. |
“What we’re really trying to do is to have those sectors that we haven’t traditionally partnered with. I think traditionally […] we’ve had like-minded people at the table and so those people who have a different point of view from us, not necessarily are we hearing their voices”
|
Support System | Support systems or facilitators for the work of the participant. |
“There’s been lots of support definitely within the community”
|
Sustainability | Discussion of sustainability, self-sustaining systems, or visioning for the future. |
“So what are we doing to our biophysical environment both in terms of resource use, resource extraction? So how much are we consuming that we are taking away from future generations?”
|
Systems Thinking | Consideration of smaller/larger systems, drawing connections, recognizing nested scales |
“a broader understanding that if you’re thinking from an ecosystem perspective, if you’re changing something in any of those environments, it’s going to affect what’s happening in the others”
|
Inter- or Transdisciplinary Practices | Practices which engage multiple disciplines and/or transcends disciplinary thinking to explore different types of knowledge and ways of knowing |
“It’s a wide variety of evidence. It’s qualitative and quantitative. It’s peer-reviewed literature but also policy literature […], it includes stakeholder perspectives on the issue, it includes gathering evidence about the experience of jurisdictions“ |