Evaluation of Tak Community Advisory Board

A popular form of community engagement is for the researchers to interact with a Community Advisory Board. The Shoklo Malaria Research Unit has been working on the Thai-Burmese border for many years and has been informally engaging with the community for its healthcare and research initiatives, especially in the area of ethics and consent. In January 2009, community engagement was formalised with the establishment of the Tak Province Border Community Ethics Advisory Board (T-CAB). The T-CAB is the first of its kind as the investigators have not come across any set up of similar nature involving mobile and unstable populations residing along a porous border. Three years on, SMRU questions if the T-CAB has been "successful" and if the current T-CAB model is the best model for this community. In order to evaluate the T-CAB, first an evaluation tool has to be developed as there are no off-the-shelf evaluation tools for CABs, then the evaluation will be carried out.