Strengthening the Community Health Worker Practice

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About this Research Topic

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Background

As a continuation of the successful first volume of their Research Topic, the Topic Editors would like authors to contribute to this second volume surrounding Community Health Workers (CHW). The focus of this Research Topic is on strengthening the CHW workforce through capacity building, organizational/systems readiness, championing CHW professionals and preserving the profession, CHW program evaluation methods, CHW credentialing opportunities, and other work recognizing CHWs’ contributions to improvements of population health and community wellness.

The Topic Editors would like to see submissions around the following subjects:

Capacity Building
- CHW workforce capacity building: education, professional development (specialty trainings, topic specific trainings, comprehensive core trainings, college-credit education)
- CHW leadership development and capacity building opportunities: CHW networks, associations, coalitions, alliances, and collaboratives
-CHW program capacity: financing and sustainability, recruitment and retention, program outcome evaluation/quality improvement

Organizational/system readiness for CHW integration
- Training for supervisors, managers, CHWs in leadership roles
- Integration of CHWs into interdisciplinary teams, leadership positions, committees/advisory boards
- CHW leadership development in CHW education and capacity building
- CHW supervision: training; CHW program management

Championing CHW professionals and preserving the profession
- Who are recruited as CHWs?; commitment to recruiting CHWs who have lived experiences as part of the communities served and who demonstrate key CHW qualities and attributes
- Creating career pathways
- Understanding CHW core competencies and scope of practice
- CHW safety and boundaries
- Understanding CHW integrated practice dynamics

CHW program evaluation methods
- How IRB or quality improvement evaluation methods are implemented
- Best practices and challenges related to IRB approval of CHW interventions and programs
- Quality improvement approaches and documentation

CHW credentialing opportunities
- Certification
- Certificates
- Registry
- Voluntary and mandatory options
- Requirements/qualifications

CHWs, CHW allies, and researchers will be invited to review manuscripts. Please contact the Editors if you would like to be considered as a Reviewer.

Important notes to author(s):
CHW inclusion: CHWs/Ps are strongly encouraged to be directly involved in the authorship, formulation, and/or review of the content of the abstract and manuscript. Articles must clearly show direct involvement of CHWs/Ps in the focus of the article. CHWs/Ps will be involved in the review of manuscripts.

IRB disclosure: If the manuscript is submitted as original research, clearly include information on the Institutional Review Board (IRB) and the IRB study protocol number (as applicable). If the work does not require an IRB review, please describe how participants' privacy and rights were protected (for example, the project was conducted as a quality improvement project–then describe what you did to ensure quality improvement).

Article types: Original Research, Brief Research Report, Case Study, Curriculum, Instruction, and Pedagogy, Methods, Policy and Practice Reviews, Policy Briefs, Opinion/Perspective. While all article types listed above are welcomed, we are especially interested in manuscripts that bring to life practice experiences within the topic focus areas.

Writing quality: Please see samples and seek editorial support to ensure your writing is clear and follows a logical sequence and adheres to the article format selected (https://www.frontiersin.org/about/author-guidelines). A traditional research article format may serve as a good starting point for what typically is included in any manuscript: 1. Introduction, 2. Methods, 3. Findings, 4. Discussion, and 5. Conclusions/Recommendations. Consult Article Type guidelines for specifics.

Keywords: Community Health Workers, Promotores, Community Health Representatives, education, capacity building, practice, leadership, networks/associations, organizational readiness, evaluation, certification

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

Topic editors

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