Developing a health screening questionnaire for women in welfare transition programs in the United States

Women in United States Welfare Transition Programs (WTPs) have high rates of chronic health problems that might present significant barriers to obtaining and/or maintaining employment. Inadequate, standardized health screening in WTPs across the United States contributes to the problem of achieving self-sufficiency for disadvantaged women. Using community-based participatory research as a framework, the study's purpose was to develop a culturally relevant and sensitive health screening questionnaire that would be acceptable for use with women enrolled in WTPs. Three rounds of focus groups (n = 10) were conducted with a total of 61 women. Analysis of focus group interviews revealed not only content areas identified as important to health, but critical process issues involved in administering the tool. The distinction between process and content was a critical finding because it stressed the importance of not only what women were asked, but how, when, and by whom they were asked.