Barriers and Facilitators of Implementing a Community and Faith-Based Intervention to Increase Eye Care Utilization in Black Americans.

Purpose To identify the determinants to successfully implement a community-based intervention to increase eye care utilization in individuals at high-risk for glaucoma. Design Qualitative study with semi-structured interviews Methods Semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with community members in Detroit, Michigan at a trusted community site. Participants were Black Americans at least 40 years of age. A codebook of themes was developed through an iterative process and analyzed using Dedoose. Results Narrative themes emerged under two overarching categories: barriers and facilitators. The number of themes identified were 15 and 14 for barriers and facilitators, respectively. All perceived barriers and facilitators fell into one or more domains of the social determinants of health model. Conclusion Identifying facilitators and eliminating barriers to eye care in Black and low-income communities is essential to successful implementation of interventions to increase eye care utilization. Understanding how these determinants align with social determinants of health may be helpful in designing community-based interventions. Community-based participatory research methods are critical to achieving equity in eye care.