Conducting a participatory community-based survey for a community health intervention on Detroit's east side

This article describes a participatory action research process that brought together community members, representatives from community-based organizations and service providers, and academic researchers to collect, interpret, and apply community information to address issues related to the health of women and children in a geographically defined urban area. It describes the development and administration of a community-based survey designed to inform an intervention research project; discusses the establishment of a community/research partnership and issues that the partnership confronted in the process of developing and administering the survey; and examines the contributions of participants, and implications for research and collective action.