CHW Central

A global resource for and about Community Health Workers

North America (U.S. and Canada)

Texas’ Community Health Workforce: From State Health Promotion Policy to Community-level Practice

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In 1999, Texas became the first state in the nation to recognize these workers and their contributions to keeping Texans healthy. This paper examines a state health promotion policy that culminated in a training and certification program for promotores and the impact of this program on the lay health education workforce in Texas. In 1999, the Texas legislature established the … [Read more...] about Texas’ Community Health Workforce: From State Health Promotion Policy to Community-level Practice

CHWs get credit: a 10-year history of the first college-credit certificate for community health workers in the United States.

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Community health workers have become increasingly important in the U.S. health care system, playing a significant role in basic health promotion and care coordination; however, their status and visibility have not kept pace with their wider use. A major impediment has been the absence of systematic preparation-the field needs standardized education in programs that emphasize … [Read more...] about CHWs get credit: a 10-year history of the first college-credit certificate for community health workers in the United States.

Encouraging Vietnamese-American women to obtain Pap tests through lay health worker outreach and media education.

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Five times more Vietnamese-American women develop cervical cancer than white women. Few studies have examined whether community-based participatory research can effectively address Asian immigrants' health problems. This article reports the preliminary evaluation of 1 such project. At post-intervention, significantly more LHWO+ME women understood that human papillomavirus … [Read more...] about Encouraging Vietnamese-American women to obtain Pap tests through lay health worker outreach and media education.

The Healthy Connections project: a community-based participatory research project involving women at risk for diabetes and hypertension.

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The Healthy Connections (HC) project was a community health worker (CHW) intervention that built upon existing social networks to encourage African American and Latina women to obtain screening for type 2 diabetes and hypertension. This community-based participatory research (CBPR) project involved identifying and training CHWs, known as HC Advocates (HCAs). The HCAs … [Read more...] about The Healthy Connections project: a community-based participatory research project involving women at risk for diabetes and hypertension.