Using Talanoa, a Pan Pacific Indigenous Approach, To Identify Solutions to Public Health Issues

The COVID-19 pandemic was a public health emergency that required various public health policies and programs at the state and federal level to be established to protect the health and safety of the nation. These mainstream policies and programs proved to be inadequate in addressing the specific needs of Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (NHPI) communities as evidenced by the high case counts and low vaccination rates in these communities. In an effort to better understand and address the high case counts and low vaccination rates, a partnership was developed between the Hawai'i State Department of Health (HDOH), medical providers, and a network of NHPI-serving organizations. After the failure of Western approaches for data gathering, leaders of the partnership used an Indigenous qualitative interview method called Talanoa situated within a cultural safety framework to learn reasons for low vaccine uptake and identify NHPI-specific solutions. Findings suggest that the use of Talanoa and its ingrained cultural safety framework allowed us to gather richer data, identified solutions grounded in community, and assisted with building sustainable trusting partnerships.