Tacloban City — The EVHRDC Capacity Building Committee (CBC) in coordination with the Research Management Committee (RMC) spearheaded the Orientation on Participatory Action Research (PAR) last October 10, 2023, at Hotel Alejandro, Tacloban City, and via Zoom platform. This activity is an initiative of the Consortium to add another aspect of health research to consider in next year’s Call for Proposals. PAR, which involves the participation of the personnel from partner Local Government Units (LGUs) and other stakeholders, aims to develop evidence-based interventions and health policies for the identified community.
The morning session focused on the discussions of the resource speakers- Dr. Gloria E. Fabrigas, the Assistant City Health Officer of Tacloban City, and Mr. Leonido P. Olobia, Chairperson of RMC and Research and Development Program Coordinator of the Department of Health- Eastern Visayas Center for Health Development (DOH-EV CHD).
Dr. Fabrigas highlighted that the results of the PAR studies are presented to the partner community for validation and are transformed into program designs or health promotion awareness programs. Also part of her discussion are the three elements of PAR, namely: People, Power, and Praxis. PAR is people-centered, in the sense that it considers the needs of the community involved. PAR is also about power as power is knowledge that creates truth and is crucial to reality construction. Lastly, PAR is all about Praxis which is practicing and realizing the results of the study in the partner community.
Mr. Olobia emphasized that even though PAR is a low-cost study with a short implementation duration and only involves one to two research locales, its impact is crucial to the health status of the community. He discussed the funding opportunities provided by EVHRDC as well as the 2023-2028 Regional Unified Health Research Agenda (RUHRA) which could serve as a basis for researchers in selecting topics for PAR.
A workshop was conducted in the afternoon wherein the on-site and virtual participants were divided into groups and were asked to identify and present at least 2 health gaps that could qualify as PAR topics. The session was moderated by RMC member and University of the Philippines Manila- School of Health Sciences Professor and Research Coordinator Dr. Meredith D. Labarda.
