Community-Based Research:

William D. Spears, Ph.D., assistant professor of management, policy and community health,
School of Public Health San Antonio Regional Campus

What are the major health concerns in the community, and what health resources are available to help meet those concerns?

William D. Spears, Ph.D.

In the last few years Spears has been involved with community-based participatory research, which involves the community in identifying research questions, assisting in project design and data collection. As a member of the steering committee and an advisor for the Mano a Mano para los Niños (Hand to Hand for the Children) project in San Antonio, he has worked with residents to conduct an assessment of the community, including what the residents think about child abuse and strengthening families and what they think they can do to help that happen.

“Community-based research takes time and patience,” Spears said, “but we have had five teams of four residents each of varying skills and education who have conducted 25 ‘platicas,’ or small community meetings with 10 to 15 participants each, to find out what residents think about community concerns.”

“In the preliminary analysis,” he said. “I have heard that many of the residents are saying, ‘We should have more of these meetings; we don’t talk about these things anywhere else.’ ” Also, in Harris, Bexar and Tarrant counties and in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, Spears has conducted community health assessments, which involve reviewing data from a wide number of sources, including births, deaths, hospital discharges, crime reports and population surveys, as well as information about the supply of physicians, dentists, nurses and other health professionals.

Often for large metropolitan areas it is necessary to have data from units smaller than counties to help with planning for community health needs. So, Spears has worked with data suppliers like the Texas Department of State Health Services to develop sub-county data that previously was not available.

Spears was principal investigator on two projects that made the collected health data available on the Internet: the Saint Luke's Episcopal Health Charities Community Health Information System and the UT School of Public Health Community Health Assessment Resource for Texas.