Optimizing Community Bioethics Dialogues: Reflections on Enhancing Bi-directional Engagement on Health Care Concerns.

This article reviews our experience and observations from conducting six Community Bioethics Dialogues (CBD) with elderly residents in diverse communities in Galveston, Texas, from 2014 through 2016. CBD is a mixed method that combines focus groups, instruction, ethnography, and community-based research. CBD brings together select community members for 3 hours once a week for 6 weeks to identify values. We employed CBD to investigate how participants think about and react to issues surrounding Patient-Centered Outcomes Research (PCOR), Comparative Effectiveness Research (CER), and mental health. We offer a methodological approach for conducting and optimizing meaningful dialogues with community groups.