From engagement to co-creation: sustaining place-based public health partnerships in low-resourced urban settings
1
Global Health, Stellenbosch University, Tygerberg, South Africa
2
Bishop Lavis, Public Health and Social Innovation Hub, Cape Town, South Africa
Popul. Med. 2026;8(Supplement Supplement 1):A1496
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
Community participation is widely recognised as a cornerstone of public health practice, yet in many settings it remains limited to consultation or short-term engagement activities with weak continuity and shared ownership. Co-creation offers an alternative by positioning communities and institutions as partners in jointly defining problems, designing responses, and learning over time. 1,3 However, practitioners are often uncertain how to operationalise co-creation in practice or how to navigate challenges that emerge across the process, particularly in low-resourced urban settings. 2,4 This abstract describes an organised workshop that guides participants through the co-creation process using a long-term university–community partnership in Cape Town, as an anchoring case.
METHODS:
The workshop is structured as a facilitated walk-through of the co-creation process between a faculty of medicine and health sciences, community leadership structures, civil society organisations, and local health actors. A brief case input introduces the co-creation umbrella and illustrates how community-led wellness initiatives emerged through relationship-building, shared priority-setting, co-design, and iterative adaptation. Participants then engage in hands-on small-group exercises to map their own engagement practices, identify where participation commonly weakens, and redesign these as co-creation pathways rather than one-off interventions. Facilitated reflection explicitly surfaces common challenges, including sustaining participation, negotiating roles and power, aligning institutional expectations, and maintaining momentum over time. 2,4
RESULTS:
Participants will develop a draft co-creation pathway tailored to their own public health initiative, alongside a clearer understanding of where and why co-creation efforts often falter. Collective discussion generates shared learning on practical strategies for strengthening continuity, shared ownership, and adaptive learning across diverse public health contexts. 1,3
CONCLUSIONS:
By taking participants through the co-creation process step by step, this workshop builds practical capacity for participatory public health practice. Equips participants with actionable tools and reflective insights for designing, adapting, and sustaining community-led initiatives in complex, resource-constrained settings. 2,4
Community participation is widely recognised as a cornerstone of public health practice, yet in many settings it remains limited to consultation or short-term engagement activities with weak continuity and shared ownership. Co-creation offers an alternative by positioning communities and institutions as partners in jointly defining problems, designing responses, and learning over time. 1,3 However, practitioners are often uncertain how to operationalise co-creation in practice or how to navigate challenges that emerge across the process, particularly in low-resourced urban settings. 2,4 This abstract describes an organised workshop that guides participants through the co-creation process using a long-term university–community partnership in Cape Town, as an anchoring case.
METHODS:
The workshop is structured as a facilitated walk-through of the co-creation process between a faculty of medicine and health sciences, community leadership structures, civil society organisations, and local health actors. A brief case input introduces the co-creation umbrella and illustrates how community-led wellness initiatives emerged through relationship-building, shared priority-setting, co-design, and iterative adaptation. Participants then engage in hands-on small-group exercises to map their own engagement practices, identify where participation commonly weakens, and redesign these as co-creation pathways rather than one-off interventions. Facilitated reflection explicitly surfaces common challenges, including sustaining participation, negotiating roles and power, aligning institutional expectations, and maintaining momentum over time. 2,4
RESULTS:
Participants will develop a draft co-creation pathway tailored to their own public health initiative, alongside a clearer understanding of where and why co-creation efforts often falter. Collective discussion generates shared learning on practical strategies for strengthening continuity, shared ownership, and adaptive learning across diverse public health contexts. 1,3
CONCLUSIONS:
By taking participants through the co-creation process step by step, this workshop builds practical capacity for participatory public health practice. Equips participants with actionable tools and reflective insights for designing, adapting, and sustaining community-led initiatives in complex, resource-constrained settings. 2,4
| eISSN: | 2654-1459 |
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