Community Partnered Research Network (CPRN)

The mission of the Community Partnered Research Network (CPRN) is to support and catalyze community-partnered and community-driven research, as well as the translation of that research into action that promotes improvements in population health.

The goals of the CPRN include designing and implementing a sustainable structure and processes to encourage and enhance collaboration between academic institutions and community members and organizations as equal partners. This collaboration seeks to understand and address the priority health challenges faced by the community while advancing health.

The CPRN operates under a community-led and governed model, which consists of two administrative components:

• Executive Leadership Committee (ELC): A 13-member governing committee consisting of six academic representatives from Duke University, North Carolina Central University, and Durham Technical Community College, along with representatives from seven community organizations.
• Community Clinical Research Organization (CCRO): A team of clinical research faculty and staff who possess the expertise and resources required to conduct community-partnered research.

What We Do

1. Community Consultation & Collaboration
   • Collaborate with community partners to identify and address obstacles and enablers of community-partnered research participation.
   • Foster enduring partnerships that are mutually beneficial between healthcare service providers, the academic research community, and community-based organizations (CBOs), and the broader community they represent to encourage their involvement in community-engaged research with a focus on community health priorities.
     • Example: Meet with members of the community/CBOs in an ongoing capacity to maintain collaborations
2. Dissemination & Implementation
   • Provide a platform for the consistent dissemination of findings to facilitate translational research into actionable strategies that promote community health
     • Encourage Duke researchers to post clinical research results in lay-friendly language to My Duke Research Study Results .
3. Resource & Capacity Building
   • Support community organizations by facilitating the connection between the needs of the communities they represent and how research can support the needs of that population.
   • Provide essential resources for research operations, including access to electronic platforms, training and toolkits, study coordination, and study design and analysis.
     • Facilitate connections (CBOs and researchers) to Duke resources (trainings, consultation services, etc.), such as: Duke Resources for community partners
4. Project Selection & Support
   • Select community-partnered research projects that address priority issues identified by a community-led board that governs the CPRN: the Executive Leadership Committee.
   • Offer administrative research support to chosen community-partnered research teams in planning
     • Example: Support to identify CBO funding opportunities, Assist CBOs with IRB navigation