Faculty in the Oregon Masters of Public Health Program have collaborated on a pilot project with the Wasco-Sherman Health Department, the Oregon Geriatric Education Center, the Portland Veterans Administration Center, and the Oregon Health Division to develop a student/faculty/practitioner project to improve the health of rural elderly. The specific focus of the project has been on identifying immunization rates of rural elderly, and working with providers and consumers to increase immunizations. The project team has applied principles of continuous improvement to identify opportunities and to learn from repeated cycles of improvements. Work has been conducted through a project team and through a community-based coalition of providers. Students have been actively involved in all aspects of this project as part of their MPH course work, and learning opportunities have been identified in several courses in the MPH curriculum. This work has been conducted as a pilot project for the State Health Division, with the intent of disseminating the model through other counties in Oregon. During this session, faculty will illustrate some of the barriers and challenges to successful collaboration, and will demonstrate how methods of continuous improvement can be integrated into daily work to identify opportunities for improvements.
Learning Objectives: The learning objectives for this session are: to describe a model for collaboration to improve health; to identify strategies for effective academic/practitioner collaboration; and to create opportunities for session participants to identify situations in their own environments where they can apply this model of collaboration to improve specific health outcomes
Keywords: Developing Countries, Community-Based Partnership
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.