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Background Qualitative research studies are becoming increasingly necessary to understand the complex challenges in the healthcare setting. Successfully integrating interdisciplinary teams of investigators can be challenging, as investigators inherently view data through their disciplinary lens. Thus, new methods, such as focused conservation, are needed to facilitate qualitative data analysis by interdisciplinary teams. The purpose of this manuscript is to provide a clear description of how we implemented the focused conversation method to facilitate an organized data-driven discussion that responded to our study objectives and ensured participation of our interdisciplinary team. The focused conversation method has not, to our knowledge, been utilized for this purpose to date. Methods To better understand the experience of healthcare personnel (HCP) during preparations for the 2014–2015 Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) outbreak, we interviewed HCP who participated in decision making about EVD preparations and training of workers in the use of enhanced personal protective equipment ensembles in the metropolitan Chicagoland area of Illinois to attain a priori research objectives. We identified a systematic method – the focused conversation method – that enabled our interdisciplinary team to interactively contribute to the framing, analysis and interpretation of the data that would enable us to focus on our research objectives. Results The focused conversation developed to support our a priori research objective about the training of HCP in preparations included objective, reflective, interpretive and decisional questions. These questions grounded the conversation in the data, while leveraging discipline-specific lenses and professional experience in the analysis and interpretation. Insights from the conversation were reviewed later against interview transcripts to ensure validity. The conversation identified areas for future research directions and deficiencies in the interview instrument. Conclusions The focused conversation is an efficient, organized method for analysis of qualitative data by an interdisciplinary team.

OBJECTIVES/GOALS: In 2022, Chicago created the COVID-19 Response Corps, a cohort of community health workers (CHWs), trained to conduct contact tracing and vaccine outreach. Through an Earn and Learn program, corps members studied community-engaged participatory research, and co-led a rapid assessment with researchers to assess vaccine hesitancy in communities. METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: The Chicago COVID-19 Community Response corps worked to mitigate COVID-19 transmission in disadvantaged neighborhoods by activating CHWs, a diverse public health workforce from communities most affected by health and economic inequities. The Earn and Learn Program allotted 600 corps members up to 7.5 hrs/week of paid capacity building opportunities to learn new skills, pursue training programs, or college courses. Embodying a praxis of participatory action research and intergenerational organizing, corps members co-designed research questions and survey instruments, pilot tested the tools, trained other corps members on how to recruit and collect data, and contributed to the analysis and interpretation of the results. They generated evidenced-informed solutions to address future real-world problems. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: Corps members brought insight, cultural literacy, and lived experience that was invaluable in reaching the priority population of unvaccinated Chicagoans. They enhanced all aspects of the rapid assessment while conducting their work safely and comfortably in neighborhoods that outsiders consider challenging. Community member responses as to why they had not yet received a COVID-19 vaccine included being unable to risk putting what they saw as a rushed or improperly tested product into their bodies, to not being able to risk becoming ill even temporarily due to the potential for lost wages, as well as having other priorities in their lives which took precedence over concern about COVID-19, such as paying bills and feeding their families. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE: Research and evaluation benefits from the inclusion of CHWs. They are agile agents of change with the potential to replenish and repair trust in a fractured public health system. Engaging CHWs in evaluation work can strengthen community-academic partnerships and enhance the understanding of challenges and solutions to improving community health.

The working poor are situated in a very powerful context—the nexus of poverty and low-wage work. Our central premise is that this context represents a “strong situation” that powerfully affects work-related outcomes, but it has been largely overlooked by organization science, even as the working poor comprise a sizable segment of the workforce. In this paper we briefly review categorical, compositional, and relational theories of poverty from other disciplines, and we describe three key mediators from organizational research that may explain how the working poor are adversely affected in terms of job attachment, career attainment, and job performance. Our goals are to encourage further thinking about the working poor among organizational scholars, encourage future research in this domain, and call attention to the need for research-based interventions.

Community-based trusted messengers were vital actors, bridging the gap between public health recommendations and community member decisions about the COVID-19 vaccine, particularly in areas hardest hit by the pandemic. However, less is known about the tactics they use to do their work. This study reports results from five focus groups of outreach workers to understand: (1) their perceptions of vaccine confidence and hesitancy; (2) their specific tactics for rebuilding trust and delivering clear, consistent messages about the COVID-19 vaccine; and (3) the external environmental factors shaping their community's perceptions of the pandemic. Three key themes emerged around trusted messengers' perceptions of factors influencing vaccine uptake, their tactics in the community, and other environmental factors influencing vaccine decisions. We report these factors and practical suggestions for training and supporting trusted messengers.

The working poor are situated in a very powerful context—the nexus of poverty and low-wage work. Our central premise is that this context represents a \"strong situation\" that powerfully affects work-related outcomes, but it has been largely overlooked by organization science, even as the working poor comprise a sizable segment of the workforce. In this paper we briefly review categorical, compositional, and relational theories of poverty from other disciplines, and we describe three key mediators from organizational research that may explain how the working poor are adversely affected in terms of job attachment, career attainment, and job performance. Our goals are to encourage further thinking about the working poor among organizational scholars, encourage future research in this domain, and call attention to the need for research-based interventions.

Employers have been challenged by low employee participation rates in health-related programs, and have often relied on incentives and other engagement approaches to overcome this difficulty. One of the apparent barriers to employee engagement in health-related activities is represented by social determinants of health. According to some, these factors comprise as much as 40% of an individualʼs health status, and while they have been the focus of attention in the public health domain, their role in the workplace has not been broadly recognized. In this manuscript, we provide an overview of the significance of social determinants of health in the workplace, addressing their influence on employee involvement in health-related offerings. We also acknowledge the unique role of the workplace as both a physical and social determinant of worker health.

As part of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Prevention Research Center (PRC) Vaccine Confidence Network (PRC VCN), 26 academic institutions were funded to increase COVID-19 vaccine confidence and uptake in their communities. Six sites (in communities located in Alabama, Illinois, Massachusetts, New York, South Carolina, and Texas) formed a workgroup to identify emergent themes, and share challenges and opportunities across projects. This essay describes their efforts to engage trusted messengers in vaccine activities, and discusses strategies to develop and sustain these types of partnerships in the future. All sites recruited trusted messengers with strong community relationships to engage in multiple activities to promote COVID-19 vaccine confidence and uptake. CDC and the PRCs provided data-driven, evidence-based training and support to enable trusted messengers to fully participate in the projects. We posit that trusted messengers are essential partners for informing public health campaigns, developing effective messages, and building trust with local communities. Flexible federal funding and local coordination are essential for creating and sustaining trusted messenger approaches that combine community needs and data-informed evidence to promote timely public health responses.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, vaccine uptake was slower than expected, with some people experiencing concern about the safety and effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccine even after being vaccinated. This manuscript explores a phenomenon called lingering hesitancy, or the concern that people experience even after receiving an initial dose of a vaccine. Leveraging survey findings from three individual Prevention Research Centers (PRCs) in Alabama, Illinois, and Texas, we compare the attitudes of individuals across three vaccine status groups: those who received their complete COVID-19 vaccine series, those who received an initial dose but no subsequent doses (lingering hesitancy), and those who remained unvaccinated. We compare these three groups using the 3C model, examining differences in their attitudes around concern, complacency, and convenience. We control for contextual factors, including geographic location, political view, rural/urban setting, and racial/ethnic composition, as we examine the relationship between vaccine status and lingering hesitancy. We find that the partially vaccinated individuals do not differ significantly from fully vaccinated individuals in their perceptions of social responsibility to get the vaccine or the vaccine's importance. However, there is a statistically significant difference between the fully and partially vaccinated individuals regarding their perceptions of vaccine safety. This suggests that partially vaccinated individuals may have different attitudes toward the vaccine than either fully or unvaccinated individuals. We offer recommendations for public health professionals as they develop messaging for ongoing and future vaccination efforts.