Public/private partnerships impact policy and improve access to care

Through the Philanthropic Collaborative for a Healthy Georgia, family, corporate, and community foundations joined forces to enhance the ability of philanthropic organizations to identify, fund, and evaluate health grant-making opportunities throughout the state, and respond to health-related challenges facing Georgia. As the administrative and research home for the Collaborative, the Georgia Health Policy Center (GHPC) provides research, programmatic, and administrative support for its efforts. Through this partnership, GHPC serves as the liaison between the foundations and the state public health-related agencies, translates secondary research, coordinates primary research, monitors and provides technical assistance to multiple school health and rural health Collaborative-funded communities, and prepares and disseminates publications to foundations around the state. Just as national philanthropy makes evidence-based investments to inform national and state policy, Georgia's philanthropic community comes together to examine the academic literature, understand the scale and scope of the problem, learn about best practices, and identify opportunities to inform Georgia policy and collectively and individually fund grantmaking activities. By combining forces of private foundations, government, and universities, Georgia is a national model of utilizing public/private partnerships to address major health issues facing its citizens.