Engaging Historically Excluded Women in Health Research: Addressing Intersectional Barriers to Advance Equitable...

Area of Science:

• Health Services Research
• Qualitative Health Research
• Health Disparities

Background:

• Inclusive patient recruitment is vital for health equity and generalizable research findings.
• Underrepresented populations face persistent recruitment challenges due to language, culture, sociohistorical factors, and technology.
• Addressing these barriers is crucial for accurate and equitable health research outcomes.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present recruitment strategies and lessons learned from engaging a diverse, multilingual postpartum patient sample.
• To utilize an intersectional lens to inform recruitment approaches in qualitative health research.
• To advance equitable participation in health research by addressing specific barriers.

Main Methods:

• Employed an intersectional framework to guide strategy development.
• Engaged a diverse, multilingual postpartum patient sample in qualitative research.
• Documented and analyzed recruitment strategies and lessons learned.

Main Results:

• Key strategies included: responding to participant needs, using a multilingual research team, ensuring social identity congruence, cultural humility training, advisory board collaboration, provider referrals, flexible digital platforms, and text messaging outreach.
• Successfully recruited a diverse, multilingual postpartum sample by addressing intersectional barriers.
• Demonstrated the effectiveness of tailored, culturally sensitive recruitment methods.

Conclusions:

• Applying an intersectional lens expands recruitment approaches for equitable health research participation.
• An ethical imperative exists to include marginalized communities in research to ensure findings reflect their experiences.
• This framework promotes meaningful representation of diverse populations in scientific inquiry.