Health Impact Ohio Completes the First Year of CDC Funded Community Health Workers for COVID Response and Resilient Communities Grant

By: Brittany Daniels, Director of Operations & Communications, Health Impact Ohio

The end of August signals the conclusion of the first year of Health Impact Ohio’s Community Health Workers for COVID Response and Resilient Communities (CDC CCR) grant. With funding from this three-year grant and support from community partners, Health Impact Ohio has offered 16 CDC CCR trainings to Community Health Workers (CHWs) since December 2021, with 160-200 CHWs across the state attending each training.   

Trainings have continued to cover a wide array of topics surrounding COVID-19, including:  

• Explanations of what COVIVD-19 is, how the virus works, variants, vaccines, boosters, and therapeutics  

• Best practices and safety measures for preventing and managing COVID-19 symptoms  

• Debunking common myths surrounding COVID-19 and vaccines  

• Education on vaccines in pregnant and breastfeeding people and vaccines in children 

• Evidence-based tactics rooted in behavioral economics on approaching and connecting with clients regarding COVID-19 education and vaccination 

• Facilitation of a housing panel to discuss how the COVID-19 pandemic affected and exacerbated issues surrounding housing and access to essential social services during the pandemic 

• Discussion on the impact and outreach in Latinx and Hispanic communities concerning COVID-19 

• Learning about the impact of outreach on populations with intellectual and developmental disabilities 

• Received reflections on the COVID-19 pandemic and CHW impact from managed care organizations 

• Examining the complexities of advanced care planning and considerations amid a pandemic.   

As we begin gearing up for the start of the second year of the grant, we find it important to reflect on the last year to assess the impact of our trainings, share successes stories and examine feedback to appropriately plan out a schedule that will best train this statewide group of CHWs in the future. 

“I think for me personally, as well as for us as an organization, seeing the impact that our Community Health Workers, not only in the Central Ohio Pathways HUB but in all the HUBs across the state, are making, makes all of the work worthwhile. To see the education that they are providing to the communities they serve, to see the hope that they are giving clients, to see all of the connections to care and services, which inevitably means that risks were mitigated, is the most inspiring thing for me, and I think for all of our team, and I hope for everybody that interacts with their Community Health Workers statewide” said Carrie Baker, President and CEO of Health Impact Ohio.    

Since February 2022, Health Impact Ohio has convened six CHW Advisory Council meetings with CHWs from each participating HUB in the state to focus on attaining real-time responses to our training topics, the development and implementation of the Equity Mapping Tool, the development of tools for dissemination such as our P.A.N.D.E.M.I.C fact sheet on COVID-19, and to obtain information about topics on which CHWs need more information. Through our CHW Advisory Council and feedback from CHWs on statewide CCR training, we have identified several topics CHWs want to cover more in-depth in the second year of the grant. These topics include a deeper dive into COVID-19 and housing resources, populations with intellectual and developmental disabilities, incarceration, aging and older adults, and a Managed Care Organization panel. We are excited to say that we have slotted time in the twenty CDC CCR trainings and nine CHW Advisory Council meetings that will be offered this grant year to cover all these topics and more, including a focus on COVID-19 and women’s health, dental health, self-care for CHWs, pediatric and family medicine, stress and chronic disease management among minorities amid a pandemic, Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), and the reemergence of previously thought to be irradicated diseases due to vaccine hesitancy. 

Health Impact Ohio will continue hosting our existing partners as guest trainers that participated in this last year of the grant and will be bringing in new partners to expand the knowledge base provided to participants in the coming year. We will also expand our outreach by adding three new Ohio HUBs to begin participating in CDC CCR trainings and the CHW Advisory Council. To officially round out the first year of this grant, we have created a Statewide CHW Video Interview to capture CHWs perspectives across the state on the value of CDC CCR training, how the pandemic and CDC CCR training has changed or affected their work, and to highlight insights into what it means to be a CHW in your community, especially amid a pandemic. When asked about the CDC CCR trainings, Health Impact Ohio and Central Ohio Pathways HUB Education Director, Dr. Tanikka Price, stated, “The CCR trainings were invaluable for getting us through this year with the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown, and it is going to be so, so vital to continuing to educate our CHWs in the future.” Health Impact Ohio looks forward to releasing our full training schedule for the next year of this grant in September 2022 to our participating HUBs, CHWs, evaluation partners, and community partners.   

CDC CCR Statewide CHW Interview (click play to begin watching)