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Context: Engaging underrepresented communities in health research priority setting could make the scientific agenda more equitable and more responsive to their needs. Objective: Evaluate democratic deliberations engaging minority and underserved communities in setting health research priorities. Methods: Participants from underrepresented communities throughout Michigan (47 groups, n = 519) engaged in structured deliberations about health research priorities in professionally facilitated groups. We evaluated some aspects of the structure, process, and outcomes of deliberations, including representation, equality of participation, participants' views of deliberations, and the impact of group deliberations on individual participants' knowledge, attitudes, and points of view. Follow‐up interviews elicited richer descriptions of these and also explored later effects on deliberators. Results: Deliberators (age 18‐88 years) overrepresented minority groups. Participation in discussions was well distributed. Deliberators improved their knowledge about disparities, but not about health research. Participants, on average, supported using their group's decision to inform decision makers and would trust a process like this to inform funding decisions. Views of deliberations were the strongest predictor of these outcomes. Follow‐up interviews revealed deliberators were particularly struck by their experience hearing and understanding other points of view, sometimes surprised at the group's ability to reach agreement, and occasionally activated to volunteer or advocate. Conclusions: Deliberations using a structured group exercise to engage minority and underserved community members in setting health research priorities met some important criteria for a fair, credible process that could inform policy. Deliberations appeared to change some opinions, improved some knowledge, and were judged by participants worth using to inform policymakers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policy PointsEngaging and involving underrepresented communities when setting research priorities could make the scientific research agenda more equitable, more just, and more responsive to their needs and values.Groups and individuals from minority and underserved communities strongly prioritized child health and mental health research, often choosing to invest at the highest possible level.Groups consisting of predominantly Native American or Arab American participants invested in culture and beliefs research at the highest level, while many groups did not select it at all. The priority given to culture and beliefs research by these groups illustrates the importance of paying special attention to unique preferences, and not just commonly held views, when getting public input on spending priorities for research. Context: A major contributor to health disparities is the relative lack of resources—including resources for science—allocated to address the health problems of those with disproportionately greater needs. Engaging and involving underrepresented communities in setting research priorities could make the scientific research agenda more equitable, more just, and more responsive to their needs and values. We engaged minority and underserved communities in informed deliberations and report here their priorities for health research. Methods: Academic‐community partnerships adapted the simulation exercise CHAT for setting health research priorities. We had participants from minority and medically underserved communities (47 groups, n = 519) throughout Michigan deliberate about health research priorities, and we used surveys and CHAT software to collect the demographic characteristics and priorities selected by individuals and groups. Findings: The participants ranged in age (18 to 88), included more women than men, and were overrepresented by minority groups. Nearly all the deliberating groups selected child health and mental health research (93.6% and 95.7%), and most invested at the highest level. Aging, access, promote health, healthy environment, and what causes disease were also prioritized by groups. Research on mental health and child health were high priorities for individuals both before and after group deliberations. Access was the only category more likely to be selected by individuals after group deliberation (77.0 vs 84.0%, OR = 1.63, p =.005), while improve research, health policy, and culture and beliefs were less likely to be selected after group deliberations (all, p <.001). However, the level of investment in many categories changed after the group deliberations. Participants identifying as Black/African American were less likely to prioritize mental health research, and those of Other race were more likely to prioritize culture and beliefs research. Conclusions: Minority and medically underserved communities overwhelmingly prioritized mental health and child health research in informed deliberations about spending priorities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]