228942 Strengthening Regional Asian and Pacific Islander American Health Collaboratives through a Statewide Framework

Tuesday, November 9, 2010 : 1:15 PM - 1:30 PM

Michael Byun, MPA , Asian Services In Action, Inc., Akron, OH
BACKGROUND: Mid- to small- size Asian and Pacific Islander communities across the country face unique challenges. Communities, especially in Midwest states are geographically fragmented, they are smaller in population relative to other racial groups in their region, and they also have limited access to health and human services that are greatly afforded to their counterparts in larger cities (e.g. ethnic enclaves which concentrate businesses, social service agencies, schools, etc.). These challenges become more acute when it comes to organizing around grassroots health policy change.

OBJECTIVE: The creation of the Ohio Asian American Health Coalition as a possible strategy to organize effectively around grassroots health policy change (e.g. hepatitis B).

METHOD: To work with six pan-Asian organizations who represent six different regions in the State of Ohio. To provide capacity-building assistance and to facilitate a "learning community".

RESULTS: Annually organize statewide media campaign for World Hepatitis Day; helped change administrative guidelines to ensure API are included in high-risk populations for the purpose of hepatitis B vaccination; increased the availability of free to low-cost testing and screening in regions where services were not available.

CONCLUSIONS: The OAAHC has helped APIs in Ohio to better engage policymaker (i.e. state legislators), especially for API-serving organizations. It has also increased the availability of linguistically and culturally accessible hepatitis B prevention, education and screening resources.

Learning Areas:
Advocacy for health and health education
Diversity and culture
Systems thinking models (conceptual and theoretical models), applications related to public health

Learning Objectives:
Describe a statewide model or structure for organizing around Asian and Pacific Islander health. Discuss the unique challenges and opportunities of utilizing a statewide framework to address API health. Define community level of readiness model to assess individual API community-base organization and their readiness to work in a coalition. Analyze how diverse API regional partner organizations with varying capacities and work together in a unified way.

Keywords: Asian and Pacific Islander, Hepatitis B

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am qualified to present because I oversee programs focused on health policy, hepatitis B, and health disparities.
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.