Conducting community health research in tropical countries: reflections from Melanesia

Abstract

Conducting community health research in the tropical counties of Melanesia can be filled with reward, frustration, satisfaction, exasperation and exhilaration - and that's just the first day! This presentation will reflect on lessons learned by a nurse educator from Solomon Islands and a public health researcher from Australia who have collaborated over the past two decades in community health service delivery and research. From their respective standpoints, these two men will discuss successes and challenges experienced when working with community leaders, faith-based organisations, government and non-government donors, health services and research institutions to implement community health research in remote locations across Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea. Emphasis will be given to the importance of participatory methodologies with diverse and often disparate groups. Successes and challenges of working with and for people and communities not on or to people and communities will be discussed. Examples of how enduring relationships and mutually negotiated methodologies with community partners have enabled a range of projects to succeed will be discussed from the areas of culturally appropriate health care, tuberculosis treatment and management, soil transmitted helminth detection and control, and HIV prevention.