Cbpr's importance and critical role in research as evidenced in “my sister's keeper”: A CBPR coalition to strengthen maternal mental health and family resilience in a southern, urban, low income community

Depression among women in the US is common, expensive, and often undertreated, reducing significantly one's level of functioning and quality of life. A dearth of relevant programs coupled with heightened stigma in the African American community inhibits depressed mothers from seeking social support and/or treatment. Academic researchers and community residents formed a coalition to address these issues. Formative research methods were used to identify the most salient factors contributing to mental health functioning of women in an urban southern community. The purpose of the proposed presentation is three-fold: (1) describe our successful community-partnered strategy (including guiding framework and principles); (2) illustrate best practices that emanated from our lessons learned through this community-partnered process; and (3) highlight significant local community organizational policy changes that are taking place as a direct result of this community-based participatory research. Examples include: the local health department initiating maternal depression screens; libraries providing significant space for resource and referral information on maternal depression; a county-wide conference planned by the Children's Policy Council to address the mental health needs of mothers. Throughout this process, the importance of and critical role of community partners in community based public health was clear. None of these changes would have happened without the trailblazing efforts of our community partner who served many roles including pioneer (the first ever to have such impact), innovator (the creative new ways of making things happen), initiator (ideas, plans, strategies were from the community), architect (making things happen in the right place at the right time).