Community grand rounds: re-engineering community and academic partnerships in health education-a partnership and programmatic evaluation.

BACKGROUND: Community participation in population health improvement can assist university researchers in targeting intervention resources more effectively and efficiently, leading to more effective implementation of interventions, because of joint ownership of both process and product. Two academic health centers partnered with community based organizations to develop a bidirectional educational seminar series called "Community Grand Rounds" (CGR), which identified health concerns of Chicago's South Side residents and provided information regarding university and community resources that addressed community health concerns. OBJECTIVES: We evaluated the community consultants' perceptions of the quality and effectiveness of the planning and implementation of the seminars that resulted from the partnership. METHODS: We conducted one-on-one interviews and focus groups with community consultants to assess their perceptions of the partnership using a tailored version of a previously developed individual and focus group interview instrument. Analysis of the interview text was conducted using grounded theory where themes were coded as they emerged. CONCLUSIONS: CGR is an effective mechanism for providing needed community health information in an easily accessible format. Additional work is needed to determine whether this format represents a sustainable community-university partnership.