Advancing Community Research in Rural Communities

Lwala Community Alliance (Lwala), through our community-led health model, unlocks the potential of communities to advance their own comprehensive well- being. To deepen our impact, we aim to strengthen community engagement in our research, namely the Lwala Household Survey (LHS), which provides evidence of impact and informs future programming. The LHS, a repeated cross-sectional survey, tracks key indicators of health and wellbeing over time. Through this project, we will engage diverse knowledge communities throughout the research cycle—from design and implementation to analysis and knowledge management. Key knowledge communities will be: community members and influencers, Lwala staff, academic researchers from Rongo University and North American institutions, local and national government officials, including marginalised populations. We will host workshops to enhance these groups' understanding of the research process, conduct collaborative data analysis, and gather feedback to inform the 2028 survey. We will deliver: a knowledge-sharing framework, learning reports, community data documentation, a draft manuscript, and a knowledge management platform. We will also share this knowledge with peers at the national and global level, including the Centres for Exchange(CfE) cohort. This work will create a new norm for conducting community-engaged research at Lwala, as well as inform the broader health research space.