Strategies for Training and Supporting Community Health Workers in Multi-Service Organizations

Problem:

Community Health Workers (CHWs) handle a broad range of issues in their work, and their training and supervision need to provide support for general and problem-focused work. Both need to be responsive to the evolving challenges faced by CHWs.

Approach: Our NYC-based childhood asthma coalition, WIN for Asthma, developed a partnership approach to CHWs, with 4 CHWs recruited by partner community based organizations (CBOs) to work in collaboration with a hospital's in-patient and out-patient services and with community pediatric providers. We developed a comprehensive month-long training including core competency skills and asthma-specific educational skills to provide a solid foundation, which is then supplemented by additional bi-monthly training. Training is interactive, with extensive use of role-plays. CHWs meet regularly with their CBO and hospital supervisors to ensure integration of CHWs within both institutional contexts. CHW supervisors at both organizations also meet regularly to coordinate case management and support services. In the context of this supervision, CHWs have asked for and received on-going training on communication skills, social service referrals, motivational interviewing, and other topics of concern, such as child abuse and domestic violence. CHWs receive frequent education on the latest advances in asthma care and medications.

Lessons Learned: The regular add-on training has helped CHWs improve the quality of work and strengthen their skills, while simultaneously enhancing their voice and effectiveness. Shared supervision has enabled the CHW training and roles to remain responsive to the community needs and has facilitated integration of CHWs in the organization and the hospital environments.