Oral

Consistent with the message in President Obama’s inaugural address regarding the need for government programs to work on behalf of the American people, the Office of Minority Health (OMH), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), has been engaged for several years in systematic and concerted efforts to effect a more “results-oriented” approach to its mission. This mission -- to improve the health of racial and ethnic minority populations through the development of health policies and programs that will help eliminate health disparities – cannot be accomplished by OMH alone, but requires the active engagement and sustained efforts over time of all stakeholders working together to effect the necessary changes at every level and across all sectors. The purpose of this session is four-fold: (1) to present a brief overview of the Strategic Framework for Improving Racial/Ethnic Minority Health and Eliminating Racial/Ethnic Health Disparities (the Framework) developed and released by OMH in January 2008; (2) to illustrate how regional and State health officials are using the Framework to promote “systems thinking” and a systematic way to address racial/ethnic minority health problems for greater effectiveness and efficiency; (3) to describe how OMH has used the Framework as the basis for establishing a Performance Improvement and Management System (PIMS) and its components to drive greater effectiveness and efficiency in OMH-funded programs; and (4) to share PIMS-related products, tools, and resources that are or will be available to OMH grantees and other stakeholders within and beyond HHS to improve individual and collective efforts relative to OMH’s mission (e.g., a searchable performance measures database to identify and select indicators for outcomes or impacts identified in the Framework; an evaluation protocol to promote systematic program planning, performance measurement and data collection, and evaluation to assess the effectiveness of minority health-/health disparities-related interventions).

Session Objectives: At the end of this session, participants will be able to: 1. Describe the logic model approach used by OMH to develop the Strategic Framework and identify the major levels and components of the Framework; 2. Discuss the work being done in Federal Region IV to illustrate how leaders, partners, and other stakeholders can apply the Framework to their efforts to address racial/ethnic health disparities; 3. Describe design features of the OMH Performance Improvement and Management System (PIMS) and how development of its components was informed by elements of the Framework; 4. Identify different tools and resources available to guide program planning and evaluation purposes, including the incorporation of outcomes-based performance measures.

CE Credits: Medical (CME), Health Education (CHES), Nursing (CNE), Public Health (CPH)