The Great Lakes Center for Occupational and Environmental Safety and Health at the University of Illinois Chicago, planned, conducted, and evaluated a conference titled: Caring for Others, Taking Care of Ourselves: A Health and Safety Conference for Community, Outreach and Home Care Workers. We had 106 participants for the conference held at the Illini Union, on October 15 and 16, 1998. Our purpose was to build the skills of community workers, employers and public health professionals to identify the occupational risk factors, to create solutions to occupational hazards and to create strategies to implement the solutions in community settings. Our target audience of participants included nurses, therapists, health and personal care aides, social workers, employers, advocates, and public health professionals.
I propose to present the process of planning, conducting and evaluating the conference. The planning committee represented GLC, the Midwest AIDS Training and Education Center, the Chicago Department of Public Health, the Illinois Nurses Association and OSHA Region V. I will describe the areas of work related hazards identified and the outcome of the workshops. I will also present the key materials developed from the workshops: 1) an environmental inventory of hazards, and 2) training scenarios and summary points in the areas of biological, chemical, physical and traffic hazards. The materials are presented as a printed fact pack and also available on the GLC web site at www.uic.edu/sph/glakes/ce. I will close with a summary of the evaluation of the conference and a discussion of future program initiatives and research.
Learning Objectives: Participants will describe the process of developing conference programming related to the occupational health needs of community based workers. Participants will identify health hazards for community based health workers. Participants will describe assessment tools for community based health worker health and safety hazards
Keywords: Occupational Health Programs, Community Health
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: University of Illinois at Chicago, School of Public Health, Great Lakes Center for Occupational and Environmental Safety and Health
I have a significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.
Relationship: Employment, Associate Director of Continuing Education and Outreach