Engaging Promotores and Community Health Workers in Public Health Preparedness

The USA Center for Rural Public Health Preparedness has developed and presented a series of bilingual workshops designed to assist Promotores in protecting their communities against the spread of infectious diseases, communicating risk to a vulnerable population, and preparing families for their response to public health emergencies. Promotores are a resource in border communities that can assist in rapidly detecting and reporting bioterrorist events, infectious disease outbreaks, and other public health threats and emergencies along the U.S. southern borders by acting as liaisons between residents and health and human services. Providing preparedness training to this audience equips the Promotora with the knowledge, skills, and abilities to protect at-risk populations along the Texas-Mexico border against emerging infectious diseases and other threats to the public's health. Innovative strategies were utilized to engage this target audience to build relationships with key people within the state and local Promotores network, as well as with community stakeholders prior to the trainings. Ascertaining audience expectations during the first few minutes of each workshop allowed facilitators to adapt delivery to accommodate specific audience needs. Diverse teaching methodologies were used to address the specific learning objectives and learning styles, including providing delivery of training and training materials in English and Spanish, demonstration and replication, and group activities. Upon completion, each participant was presented with a certificate that is recognized by the Texas Department of State Health Services to secure continuing education hours for recertification of Community Health Workers.