Urban Health Initiative Fall 2018 

 Local International Conference, just to name a few of our accomplishments.

My deepest thanks to all of you who attended and contributed this year as participants or volunteers. Our successes would not have been possible without your efforts. As director of Urban Health Initiative, my hope for the new year is that we continue to help our community soar.

 ~ Charles Moore, MD, Director

Emory School of Medicine, Urban Health Initiative, and local partners awarded five-year $3.25 million grant to establish academy for disadvantaged students

Emory University School of Medicine has received a five-year, $3.25 million grant from the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) to establish a National HCOP Academy, which will provide educational opportunities for disadvantaged high-school students interested in pursuing health careers.

The National Health Careers Opportunity Program (HCOP) at Emory is a collaborative partnership among Emory University School of Medicine, Laney Graduate School, Atlanta Metropolitan State College, Atlanta AHEC and the Urban Health Initiative. You can read more about this exciting project here.

UHI Fall Orientation October 1, 2018:
A Room Full of Community Champions

A huge thank you to all who attended! This was a wonderful evening full of storytelling, recognition, public health insight, and organization capacity-building to further UHI's mission to advance equity in underserved communities of Atlanta.

Thank you to our presenters who told inspiring stories about their field work. It helped us realize how united we are in the common mission to meet people where they are—to serve them with the education and resources they need. And we all learned that the work we set out to do is not easy, but so worth it when we find like-minded individuals and organizations willing to do whatever it takes to achieve more holistic health equity victories.

Charles Moore, MD, talked about UHI’s Tobacco Use Prevention program which assists Grady Hospital staff, patients, and children to stop smoking by studying perceptions of  alternative smoking devices such as e-cigarettes. He also talked about what led him to create the HEAL (Health Education Assessment and Leadership) Coalition, whose work is now housed at the HEALing Community Center (a FQHC) in four locations.

Jennifer McCants, DDS, shared the importance of proper nutrition relative to oral and systemic health. Stop by and say hello to her and the other “HEALers” at the HEALing Community Center.

We honored the work of our certified volunteer doulas who support low-resourced pregnant teens and are trying to lay more groundwork for their Healthy Pregnancy Spacing Messages Campaign.

Michele Brown, Training and Curriculum Specialist from community partner Our House, shared the triumphs she has observed among 18 families to whom the organization provides free room and board, early childhood education, employment training, and housing services. 

Nicole and Victor Smith shared that they are continuing to build communities up with family-oriented clubs, educational workshops that include debate and public speaking competitions, tutoring, physical activity, support services, and training family members up to become entrepreneurs.

We also talked about some plans to integrate our project resources to create an even more sustainable healthcare access network for the communities we serve.

It is not too late to sign up to become a community champion with UHI! Email cmccune@emory.edu, our Volunteer Coordinator, with your project interests. And mark your calendar for February 8th, 2019, because we want to see you at the Rollins Spring 2019 Public Health Career Fair.

Pictured below: Our 2018-2019 UHI Community Champions
 

Doulas: Protecting Georgia Women One Birth at a Time

Georgia leads the U.S. in maternal deaths and the risk is highest for black women. UHI is actively working to reduce the maternal mortality rate by supporting the training and availability of doulas in metro Atlanta. Doulas aid women during childbirth by providing physical, educational, and emotional support and also by acting as an advocate for women during labor and delivery. The presence of a doula improves the overall childbirth experience, reduces the number of interventions during childbirth, and helps mothers feel more involved in the process.

Doulas serve women from every background and socioeconomic status; however, the cost of doulas can be up to $1000, which makes it difficult for women from lower income communities to afford them. UHI is continually seeking avenues to help connect volunteer doulas with women from lower income communities. UHI also funds the training of doulas from lower-income communities and works with hospitals to increase provider knowledge and acceptance of doula practices. For more information about this program, contact Carolyn Aidman, PhD.

Meet our Community Garden Partners:
Cruz's Fishermen and Grow Where You Are 

One of the most important aspects of UHI projects is the involvement of our amazing, dedicated community partners. This month, we want to highlight our Community Garden Partners: Cruz's Fishermen and Grow Where You Are.

Brandon Young is a long-standing leader and partner in the UHI community garden initiatives. In addition to directing and managing the garden initiatives with UHI, Young runs a non-profit organization he started over 30 years ago called Cruz’s Fishermen, Inc. Cruz’s Fishermen aims to inspire young people from all walks of life in order to encourage upward mobility and goal development. Through his non-profit, Young has developed tailored programs, mentorship, and youth-friendly activities that use a platform of fishing and gardening as an opportunity for development. Cruz’s Fishermen also encourages young people to consider ways to develop solutions for their own communities through personal entrepreneurship projects. His nonprofit collaborates with local businesses, health and faith leaders, and organizations, including UHI.

The motivation behind Young’s non-profit comes from a personal place. Having lived with Hemophilia most of his life, as well as witnessing several of his family members struggle with the disorder, Young wanted to find ways to help young hemophiliacs cope and thrive. After spending 15 years in the financial industry, he decided to move back to where his brother and sister were living in NW Atlanta. His desire to help individuals feel a part of a community and give a voice to young people eventually led him to start Cruz’s Fishermen.

Young’s work in the community doesn’t stop there. Since collaborating with the UHI Community Teaching garden initiatives, he has become like a father to many of the youth involved in the Young Entrepreneurs program. Whether giving advice, teaching gardening skills, helping secure employment, bringing kids on fishing trips, or even finding someone a place to stay, Young has been an invaluable advocate and support system for young people in this community. Thank you, Brandon, for being an exceptional community partner!

*****

Grow Where You Are (GWYA) is a grower-led collective producing food on multiple mini-farms utilizing veganic agroecology. GWYA encourages growers to create their own enterprises in the food system. Each of these enterprises is incubated and supported by other enterprises in the collective. To date, 4 members of the collective, all women and majority of color, have created and are running local food-based enterprises.

Maynard Jackson High School is a unique space that is built into a hill with a green roof.  MJHS was renovated in 2014 and a garden was installed on a portion of the roof, but it eventually became overgrown and neglected. GWYA is working to revitalize this vision and engage youth in growing food at an urban school. The primary driving force behind the current revitalization of the farm is Andrea Stephens, who teaches Environmental Science and Anatomy at MJHS.  GWYA has been invited to re-establish a mini-farm site that will expand Atlanta’s ability to be an active member in Georgia's statewide agricultural education programs. Initial funding from the Urban Health Initative made it possible for GWYA to begin this project. Thank you, Grow Where You Are, for being an outstanding community partner!

Volunteer Reflection: UHI's Dental Diversion Program at HEALing Community Center - by Yasmin S. Kashfipour

Before coming to Rollins, I had always wanted to go to dental school. My mission in life was to serve low and impoverished communities and like many other science majors in college, I assumed being a doctor was the best way to give back to my community. Rollins taught me that public health was a way to give back on a much larger scale by educating communities about the importance of oral health and conducting research that could forever change dental practice.

I learned about Urban Health Initiative from a coworker who thought I would be a great fit for UHI’s Dental Diversion Program through the HEALing Community Center. After meeting Drs. Moore and McCants, Ms. Wright and the hygienists, and all the staff, I understood why their patients called the HEALing Community Center “home.” I had the pleasure of conducting a mini research study as well as my Master’s Thesis at HEAL, and it has truly been an honor to serve amongst compassionate individuals who share the goal of health for all, regardless of background, financial status, gender, age, and education level.

In the state of Georgia, we face a dental crisis. Lack of insurance or a low-paying job puts dental care out of reach for many Georgians. Neglecting oral health can lead to many other diseases, including heart disease, kidney disease, respiratory infections, dementia, diabetes, pregnancy complications, and cancer. The Dental Diversion Program helps our patients understand the importance of good oral health and that there are affordable options for care.

During my time as the project coordinator for the Dental Diversion Program, we have visited local hospitals to educate physicians and nursing staff about the dangers of inadequate dental care and the necessity of counseling patients to seek care not at an ER, but at a dental office with the appropriate equipment and specialists. Over the course of the past two years, the number of our dental patients has grown exponentially. Our partnerships with Grady have been particularly successful. Additionally, for the past year, we have been targeting pregnant women because they are often not aware that they are eligible to receive dental care during their pregnancy with the help of Medicaid. Disease, infections, and bleeding gums can affect not only the expectant mother’s oral health, but also the health of her unborn child.

HEALing Community serves all of Metro Atlanta; patients travel from all over the state to receive the care they need at an affordable cost. I have listened to patients cry about the pain they have endured, not having a beautiful smile, and not being able to afford dental care. They are thankful for the care that HEALing Community Center provides and they appreciate that someone has taken the time to talk with them about their health. They are eager to learn about the best ways to take care of themselves and spread awareness and education to others.

My time as a student is ending and as I move into the professional, world, I understand the valuable skills and knowledge that I possess as a public health professional trained in Behavioral Sciences and Health Education.  I hope my research will improve best practices for dental professionals and improve dental health for underserved communities. This experience has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my academic and professional career, and I will always feel that the HEALing Community Center is “home.” I am grateful to Drs. Moore and McCants for being wonderful mentors through this process and to Dr. Carolyn Aidman for allowing me the opportunity to serve alongside this community.

UHI Staff news

Staff Spotlight: Chelsea McCune

with numerous opportunities for networking, professional development, and obtaining hours for my practicum.

What was your first impression of Urban Health Initiative?
I was super excited to see that there was an organization fostering health equity through academic-community partnerships. Usually I hear about private nonprofits and churches doing this kind of work. And I thought that whoever started this organization was strategic to do it at Emory, the public health hub of the U.S.

What do you find most challenging about being a Volunteer Manager?
Trying to discern various project needs with so many project leaders and community partners, then trying to disseminate those needs to interested volunteers.

If you could change one thing about Urban Health Initiative, what would it be?
I would improve how we collaborate remotely and effectively as leaders and team members. One golden saying I heard recently from a public health community outreach professional is that most people don’t know what public health people do because we don’t do a very good job of articulating/sharing what we do in an easily digestible way. UHI does amazing work, and so far we have done an outstanding job of reaching so many people and maintaining greater relationships with communities and community partners. But I think we can amp the effectiveness of our internal and external communications through more engaging real time, streamlined, digital storytelling tailored to the academic community (the people serving) and the people being served. I think volunteer management and academic-community partner relations, public health equity advocacy, and funding support would improve tremendously with this change.

What is your favorite quote and why?
“People don’t care how much you know until you show them how much you care.” I hear this saying all the time in the customer service industry, but this fits the public health world as well. It really motivates me to go beyond my knowledge to mobilize resources and information to people who need it most.

Where do you see yourself after graduation?
Doing direct impact education capacity-building work with a nonprofit I’ve been a part of since 2015, and leading direct impact work as a project manager or director at an organization with a mission to advance health and education equity for underserved communities.

 Sciences and Health Education department at the Rollins School of Public Health. 

Ms. Adams is working towards a career where she can help decrease generational disparities due to controllable risk factors, positively impact the health and well-being of child and adolescent populations, and to help foster health equity in urban communities. Her interests include maternal and child health, minority health, and health education,  drew her to the Urban Health Initiative. 

strengths in math and science to help people. She says, "To me, public health is providing people with suitcases, but it could also be working on vaccines, or biostatistics. I love how broad this field is!"

non-profit directors in her home state of South Dakota develop cross-cultural outreach strategies to Native American women seeking services for intimate partner violence.  This project helped Ms. Buchloh find and name her passion for improving access to high-quality care for low-income families, as well as improving health system performance and outcomes. She is excited to help connect families with appropriate dental providers and improve the use of emergency department resources. She will be balancing this work with her Global Health courses at the Rollins School of Public Health, where she is pursuing a certificate in Maternal and Child Health. 

Charles Moore, MD awarded 2018
Atlanta Champion of Health Award 

“It is truly an honor to be recognized by an organization that has diligently worked to increase the number of underrepresented minority physicians and other professionals in the healthcare workforce.  I have focused my efforts in support of this work. In this manner, the goal is to improve access to quality healthcare in medically underserved communities.”- Charles Moore, MD

Read more about the National Medical Fellowships and Dr. Moore's award here.

Upcoming Events & Announcements

Emory's Urban Health Initiative, the  Emory Center for Ethics and the Emory Schools of Public Health, Nursing, and Medicine will launch an exciting new interprofessional course this Spring 2019, “GRAD 700R: Leadership Seminar in the Social Determinants of Health and Healthy Equity”. The course will be held Mondays 6:00-7:50pm from January 28-April 15. Some sessions will meet on a weekday / Saturday to align with the GA legislative session. More information, including course topics and registration instructions, can be found here.

Rollins School of Public Health Career Fair 

Date: Friday, February 8, 2019
Time: 10am-2pm
Location: Emory Conference Center Hotel, 1615 Clifton Road
More information available here.