Learning Objective #1: identify barriers and facilitators to frontline worker participation in workplace health research. | |||
Learning Objective #2: gain some insight into improving the participation/return rate from frontline staff when conducting research in the workplace. |
The Workplace Health department in Fraser Health conducts program evaluations and research studies that involve the collection of subjective data from frontline staff in order to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions delivered to care areas and work groups. Ensuring adequate representation from frontline staff is critical to allow reliable conclusions to be drawn regarding program or intervention effectiveness. Participation rates among frontline workers for these evaluations have been low, regardless of the data collection method employed. Given this experience, and the paucity of information available in the literature, it is essential to explore and understand the frontline workers' willingness to participate in workplace-based research.
This research project involves a participatory action research methodology involving two groups of workers from acute care and extended care environments. Focus groups were held to discuss how they perceive research, particularly occupational health and safety research, and to identify and explore the perceived barriers and facilitators to their ability or willingness to participate in such research. Findings from the thematic analysis will be presented.