224532 Key considerations for collaboration: Lessons we are learning- the NAO and the APHA CHW Section

Monday, November 8, 2010

Donald E. Proulx, MEd , Arizona Area Health Education Centers Program, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ
Lee Rosenthal, PhD, MPH , Dept. of Public Health Sciences, College of Health Sciences, University of Texas at El Paso, El Paso, TX
Sergio Matos, BS, CHW , Community Health Worker Network of NYC, New York City, NY
Leslie Hargrove, CHES , Coastal AHEC, La Marque, TX
Dalton Skerritt, BS, FPC, MHE , Whittier Street Health Center, Roxbury, MA
As the community health worker (CHW) field grows, many different groups have emerged that have an interest in playing a role in the development of the CHW field. Specifically, participants in the American Public Health Association (APHA) CHW Section have been invited by the National Area Health Education Center (AHEC) Organization (NAO) to examine collaboration options. The NAO holds a mission-centered interest in CHWs targeted to the advancement of a diverse and accessible health care workforce to promote public health. As the NAO and the CHW Section consider more formalized collaboration opportunities for work together on CHW workforce development, several issues and opportunities have arisen. This presentation explores those issues as well as the benefits and risks of collaboration; it also explores approaches to collaboration to ensure positive outcomes. The importance of CHWs as members of the U.S. health and human services team is increasingly being recognized and current trends in CHW training, credentialing, and utilization of CHWS, call for examination as do approaches that the NAO and APHA CHW Section are considering to help build that growing national recognition. CHWs serve to improve access to culturally appropriate and quality primary care, to increase health literacy, and to promote social justice for people living and working in America's most disadvantaged neighborhoods; collaboration can help increase their capacity and sustainability.

Learning Areas:
Administration, management, leadership
Advocacy for health and health education
Other professions or practice related to public health
Public health or related public policy
Systems thinking models (conceptual and theoretical models), applications related to public health

Learning Objectives:
Learning Objective 1: Describe current trends and practices in CHW workforce training, competency recognition, and utilization that move the field closer to broad national workforce identity and recognition. Learning Objective 2: Delineate how the APHA CHW Section and National AHEC Organization (NAO) can effectively collaborate in advancing CHWs to reach our most vulnerable populations. Learning Objective 3: Articulate common interests between APHA CHW Section mission and that of the National AHEC Organization. Learning Objective 4: Identify benefits and risks of collaboration as well as mechanisms to promote positive outcomes of collaboration for all involved.

Keywords: Community Health Advisor, Community Collaboration

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am active with NAO and work regualrly with the APHA CHW Section leaders
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.