Pilot study for the cultural adaptation of Communities That Care prevention system in Brazil

• Grant number: 19/27460-8
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: February 01, 2021
• End date: July 31, 2023
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Psychology - Psychological Treatment and Prevention
• Agreement: Foundation for Research and Innovation of the State of Santa Catarina (FAPESC)
• Principal Investigator: Ana Regina Noto
• Grantee: Ana Regina Noto
• Host Institution: Escola Paulista de Medicina (EPM). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus São Paulo. São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Danilo Polverini Locatelli ; Elaine Lucas dos Santos ; Liz Paola Domingues
• Associated scholarship(s): 21/14649-5 - Monitoring of a community coalition in Sao Paulo for a pilot study of the Communities That Care Prevention System in Brazil, BP.TT

Abstract

The present study consists in a pilot trial for cultural adaptation of the prevention project Communities That Care (CTC) to Brazil. It will take place in two communities, one at Florianópolis and another one at São Paulo. The evaluation instruments and training material will be adapted through an international multicenter project that involves UFSC, UNIFESP and the University of Miami. CTC is one of the most applied prevention systems based on public health model, and it applies epidemiological evaluations of risk and protection factors specific from the target population. Moreover, it promotes knowledge, objectives and community values survey in order to guide the prevention programs choice to the one that best adapt to the pointed necessities. The program is implemented throughout 5 steps. The first one consists on community evaluation over its capacity to face changes and identification of resources to implement the prevention system. The second refers to community council organization, where trainings on prevention culture and community coalition first take place. On third phase, epidemiological data is collected in order to diagnose the community profile through Communities That Care Youth Survey (CTCYS) aiming risk and protection factors survey on young adults' use of substances, violence and bullying. The fourth step involves the design of a strategy plan, when community council defines measurable goals and objectives, focusing on changing risk factors and problematic behaviors. At this point, the program selection is based on evidences produced for each country's reality and in Brazil there are some available programs that already attends to this demand. On the fifth and last step, the program's implementation and evaluation take place and community coalition is requested to accompany prevention strategies supervision. CTC efficacy was evaluated in several countries and is in process of cultural adaptation to other Latin-American countries, such as Colômbia, Chile and Panamá. To data statistical analyses, it will be used mixed models and triangulation, what implies the combination of multiple research strategies able to grasp the qualitative and quantitative dimensions of the object. Results may ground public politics implementation for scholar and community use of substance and violence prevention on two communities. Therefore, the main aims of this project is to contribute to Santa Catarina and São Paulo's governments to building a strategy agenda regarding psychosocial vulnerability prevention and health promotion and to support Brazil's prevention science consolidation. The project has been submitted to ethics committee of UFSC (CAAE: 02776818.2.0000.0121; technical advice: 3.037.293). An addendum will be made in order to add new technical details to it and the project will also be submitted to UNIFESP ethics committee. The pilot trial is foreseen to happen between 2020 August and 2022 July. (AU)