Oral

An emphasis on preventive care and health promotion is essential to public health planning and effective healthcare delivery. This session will focus on diverse aspects of health promotion, starting with a discussion of an innovative way to strengthen the financial and operational stability of community health clinics to secure the safety net for vulnerable patients. Next we will focus on efforts in Georgia to increase the options children make healthy food choices in park and recreational facilities. Our next presentation will discuss an innovative program to educate, motivate, and empower urban and rural African American adults to make proactive decisions about their health care and alleviate access barriers to cancer screening. This will be followed by the description of a strategy to enhance public health advocacy skills and influence public policy on issues like medical errors, childhood lead poisoning, and health insurance coverage. Finally, we will have a discussion of the use of social network analysis to evaluate partnerships aimed at improving public health promotion activities including smoking cessation and preventing teen pregnancy.

Session Objectives: At the end of this session, participants will be better able to: • Understan the role of associations in strengthening the provider safety net • List three strategies that could be used to reinforce a healthy eating resolution • Describe the factors that have contributed to increased participation in cancer screening among African American men • List three achievable strategies for building non-profit policy advocacy skills • Identify three key components of social network analysis

CE Credits: CME, Health Education (CHES), Nursing