UC Researchers Partner With Latino Community Members to Address Healthcare Issues

University of Cincinnati researchers are improving healthcare for the Cincinnati Latino community.

Farrah Jacquez, associate professor of psychology in the McMicken College of Arts & Science, and Lisa Vaughn, educator associate professor in the College of Medicine (Pediatrics) and the College of Education, Criminal Justice and Human Services (Educational Studies), have worked together for six years to address the needs of the local Latino community.

When Vaughn and Jacquez met, they knew instantly they would find ways to work together in a cross-disciplinary collaboration.

“We started collaborating on two grant opportunities, and we realized we were a good match not only personally, but professionally,” Vaughn said. “Through years of doing this work, the community knows we’re a team.”

The two are an academic team, but are also a part of a larger team dedicated to addressing health disparities among Cincinnati Latinos, Vaughn said. The Latino community in Cincinnati is particularly vulnerable because it is a nontraditional migration destination.

With no infrastructure in Cincinnati set up for immigration, the immigrant Latino community suffers, Vaughn said. Combined with “a huge anti-immigration sentiment in the area,” the researchers identified a serious need for change in the community.  

Jacquez and Vaughn, along with Camille Graham at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, developed Latinos Unidos por la Salud (LU-Salud), a community research team made up of Latino women who are now trained as health researchers.

LU-Salud has completed the largest survey of Latino immigrants in Cincinnati. They asked more than 500 Latinos about their healthcare experiences. LU-Salud is now leading the effort to develop an intervention plan with the community.

The women involved with LU-Salud collected all of the data through verbally administered surveys.

“I am most proud of the partnerships ww have made with LU-Salud members because health research needs to include the Latino immigrant voice,” Jacquez said.

Jacquez and Vaughn use community-based, participatory research methods, which necessitates building strong partnerships and trust with community members.

“We have a shared decision-making framework,” Jacquez said. “We partner with the community to figure out how we can best serve them in the healthcare spectrum.”

Through LU-Salud, the Latino women “feel empowered, and feel like they are part of social change that will benefit their larger community,” according to Vaughn. The Latino women were able to gain entry into the community in ways that traditional academic researchers wouldn’t be able to do.

Despite long and often evening and weekend hours spent on their project, both women said the type of work they’re doing with LU-Salud is their passion.

“We think this is the best quality of research we’ve ever done,” Jacquez said. “I have more faith this research will actually make a difference in Cincinnati than any other work I’ve done before. We’re all really proud of the partnership and its bigger influence.”