Facilitating community engagement: Researchers’ lived experiences in rural communities in the KwaZulu-Natal Ecohealth Program, South Africa

Community engagement approaches are case-specific, enabling communities to address health and well-being challenges. The stages of community engagement are progressive, and particularly, the early stage of community engagement ensures researchers have access to potential participants and research sites. This study aimed to document the processes, challenges and lessons learned by KwaZulu-Natal Ecohealth Program researchers in engaging with the Ingwavuma community. We used a phenomenological qualitative approach to document the KwaZulu-Natal Ecohealth Program research team’s lived experiences during community engagement process. In-depth, semi-structured interviews with researchers, staff, and the project investigator were conducted and thematically analysed. The findings revealed that the issue of language and cross-cultural interactions, which resulted in misunderstanding and incorrect interpretation of the data being communicated with communities, appeared to be a recurring issue that caused dissatisfaction in the community engagement process. Therefore, informing the community about the research study is a subjective experience that necessitates mindfulness when interacting and engaging with communities. We recommend an inclusive framework for a higher level of engagement that would give guidance to both researchers and communities to ensure active participation and a collaborative decision-making process.