Puentes de Salud: Providing culturally appropriate care to South Philadelphia's Mexican community

Improving the health of recent Hispanic immigrants demands creative solutions that increase healthcare access and improve health literacy in a culturally appropriate manner. One example is provided by Puentes de Salud, a public-health model of disease prevention and health promotion created through sustained partnership between the University of Pennsylvania and South Philadelphia's new Mexican community. This collaboration began in 2004 with focus groups aimed to identify barriers facing this vulnerable population and learn its priorities for promoting health. Guided by continued community input, our clinic satisfies two important and previously unmet needs—providing access to culturally-appropriate primary care services and empowering community members with health-related knowledge. Puentes de Salud's collaborative nurse-managed model has succeeded both in providing longitudinal primary care, and securing access to specialty services. All Puentes de Salud staff and volunteers conduct medical visits in Spanish with a focus on Mexican cultural and health beliefs. Student volunteers accompany our patients to their specialty appointments to interpret and advocate for them in the mainstream healthcare system. Our education initiatives in the community range from ESL and exercise classes to promotora programs centered on diabetes care and cancer prevention. The inability of many recent Hispanic immigrants to access quality health care demonstrates a systematic failure to respond appropriately to this rapidly growing population. In order to meet our community's complex needs, Puentes de Salud serves as an innovative model to provide high-quality health care and improve health literacy—-both cornerstones for promoting health and reducing disparities in this vulnerable population.