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Fighting cancer is difficult enough, but living with it is even tougher - and that's where the Cleaning for A Reason Foundation steps in.  This nonprofit offers free professional housecleaning, and maid services to improve the lives of women undergoing treatment for cancer - any type of cancer.

From Health Reources and Services Administration this resource is available in Spanish and english. In an accessible, easy-to-read format, the Seasonal Flu guide provides: flu facts; every day prevention steps; and ways that community leaders can contribute to the flu prevention effort. This guide is an important fight the flu resource for our Spanish-speaking community and faith-based partners.

Order printed copies of the Seasonal Flu guide (in English or in Spanish) from the HHS Partnership Center by emailing partnerships@hhs.gov. Please include # of copies requested, mailing address (or interoffice mail stop) and person of contact in the email. Please specify if you are ordering the English or the Spanish version.

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The Diabetes and Healthy Eyes Toolkit helps community health workers provide sight-saving information to people with diabetes. The Toolkit is available in Spanish and English and includes a:

  • Diabetes and Healthy Eyes Flipchart to help community health workers educate people with diabetes about eye diseases in a small group setting.
  • Diabetes and Healthy Eyes Module for background information and materials to assist community health workers in using the flipchart.
  • Watch Out for Your Vision! Brochure to distribute to people with diabetes to educate them about eye disease and the importance of getting a dilated eye exam at least once a year.
  • Medicare Benefits Card to promote the glaucoma and diabetic eye disease benefit under Medicare and inform the public about eligibility.
  • Publications Order Form to obtain diabetic eye disease materials and resources for distributing to people in your community.
  • Evaluation Form to share your thoughts and experiences using the Diabetes and Healthy Eyes Toolkit.
  • CD-ROM with copies of the module, flipchart and handouts.

Additional materials include a:

  • TRACK Diabetes Magnet (English only) to provide tips to people with diabetes about keeping their health on TRACK.
  • Lo bello entra por los ojos...no deje que la diabetes cierre esa ventana (Beauty enters through the eyes. Don't let diabetes close the window.) Poster (Spanish only) to remind people with diabetes about receiving an annual dilated eye exam and offer tips about how to control diabetes.

Presentations shared by this year's East Coast presenters. Topics include:

  • STD's
  • Outreach
  • Pesticides
  • Obesity
  • Research
  • And more...

Community health workers, educators and individuals from around the world use Where There Is No Dentist to help people care for their teeth and gums. This book's broad focus makes it an invaluable resource.

The author uses straightforward language and careful instructions to explain how to: examine patients; diagnose common dental problems; make and use dental equipment; use local anesthetics; place fillings; and remove teeth. There is also a special chapter on oral health and HIV/AIDS, which provides the dental worker with a detailed, well-illustrated discussion of the special problems faced by people living with HIV/AIDS, and appropriate treatment.

This fact sheet provides insight into the most common obstacles that people with disabilities in California face when attempting to access health care. Through the administration of a state-wide survey on the accessibility of health care facilities for people with disabilities, many key problem areas were brought to attention. 

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From the CDC, complete background on cholera including: General information, resources for health professionlas, epidemiology and risk factors, diagnosis and testing, treatment, prevent & control and more.

A factsheet on "How to prevent cholera" from The Hesperian Foundation. Cholera can be prevented through careful sanitation, careful use and treatment of water before drinking or cooking, and careful handling of food. This Factsheet is written in simple language and heavily illustrated and talks about the importance of sanitation, how to identify cholera and how to make your water safe to drink.

Hesperian’s Cholera fact sheet is illustrated, easy to read and available as a free download in English, Spanish, French, Haitian Kreyòl, and Arabic. The fact sheet talks about the importance of sanitation, how to identify cholera, and how to make your water safe to drink.

Global Health Pathway includes online training in global health, Global Health Open Access Lecture Library, Tanzania Education Exchange, In-person Global Health Course, Community Activities, and Resident Training.

Mobile Voices (VozMob) is a platform for immigrant workers and / or low income can create stories about their lives and communities directly from their mobile phones. Each week the team discusses popular media stories, develops and shares knowledge, designs the system, and creates training tools. The communication equipment is made popular by day laborers, domestic workers, and youth volunteers have taken very seriously the role of writing their own history. We also meet every week at USC to develop research on the project.

Program information for counties of Wicomico, Somerset, or Worcester residents. Supported by a Grant from the Maryland Affiliate of Susan G. Koman for the Cure this presentation outlines eligibility for the Koman Program, what the Koman Program provides, documentation, and who to refer clients to.

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Poder Sano is a new initiative by Farmworker Justice to help mobilize rural Latino communities around the prevention of HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted infections, and tuberculosis. Through this project, Farmworker Justice will provide free capacity-building assistance and community mobilization tools to strengthen community-based organizations' HIV prevention programs, improve monitoring and evaluation practices, and create partnerships for program support.

Poder Sano aims to mobilize rural Latino communities around the prevention of HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted infections, tuberculosis, hepatitis, and other health concerns relevant to migrant farmworkers.

The first website in Spanish of its kind to help consumers take control of their health care by connecting them to new information and resources that will help them access quality, affordable health care coverage. President Obama wrote an op-ed in La Opinion and El Diario La Prensa today that highlights the website and the importance of health reform to the Latino community.

Over the last three years, we have touched on many topics that we hoped would help you as you work to improve immunization rates in your clinic. For the final edition, we return to the important issue of patient-carried immunization records.

First, we offer an article that provides a convincing yes to the title question: “Are Patient-Held Vaccination Records Associated with Improved Vaccination Coverage Rates?” The authors of the article, James T. McElligott and Paul M. Darden.

As a compliment to the article, and by way of a final thank-you for your participation, MCN, along with CHEC (Community Health Education Concepts), has developed patient-friendly, low literacy, bi-lingual immunization cards for you to use with your clients.  The cards are 5x7, and can be printed from your clinic computers.  There are two versions, a Lifetime Card for adults, and a Child and Teen Card, both in Spanish/English.  We designed the card to be as simple as possible, and to include only the most important information.  If the information is meaningful and understandable to the clients, they are more likely to understand the importance of keeping their shots up to date.

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Special Bulletin: Outbreak of pertussis (whooping cough) in California
For Immediate Attention:
There is a critical outbreak of pertussis (whooping cough) in California: it is classified now as an epidemic. Five infants, all Latino, have died. This is due to unrecognized pertussis in older children and adults which then infects babies before they’ve had a chance to get their shots. PLEASE spread the word through every mechanism you have that it is critical to get Tdap in adolescents and adults and to get children immunized properly. This months ImmuNews includes a number of resources on Pertussis (Whopping Cough).

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An article that provides a convincing yes to the title question: “Are Patient-Held Vaccination Records Associated with Improved Vaccination Coverage Rates?” The authors of the article, James T. McElligott and Paul M. Darden, conclude that the “Use of patient-held vaccination records is an easily implemented strategy that is associated with increased immunization rates. A greater effect was seen in groups at risk for underimmunization. Methods to incorporate and to ensure effective use of these records should be implemented” The article was published in Pediatrics in February of 2010. The full citation is as follows: Pediatrics 2010;125;e467-e472; originally published online Feb 15, 2010; DOI: 10.1542/peds.2009-0835. The online version of this article, along with updated information and services also available.

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A Shot of Quality Improvement!

Welcome to Immu-News, the Immunization Initiatives listserv, a monthly resource for the community of participants in this project.

All health care delivery organizations are required to have quality assurance and quality improvement programs, but it is often difficult to make these efforts really meaningful in the everyday practice of serving patients. This month’s Immu-News suggests a number of immunization quality measurements that you can adapt to your local setting. We are finding from our site visits that many of you really struggle with understanding who is getting immunized, who is missed, and what the root causes are for the gap between your goal of full immunization and the present reality at your center. Additionally, immunization data gathering is often very time consuming, often duplicated several times over for various outside agencies, and often not in step with the ways changes are made in other parts of your organization. Here are a few ideas from us, and we welcome responses back from you that will continually improve immunization practices.

Addressing the Big Four: On-Time Immunizations, Knowing Your Baseline, Making Improvement, and Accurate Records

Our four quality topics will cover:

  • Immunization reminder systems
  • Baseline immunization rate audits
  • Measuring success
  • Patient self-management in record retrieval

Resources

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This resource from the California Department of Public Health provides facts, information for health professionals,  data and surveillance, vaccine, and prevention.

Este recurso del CDC ofrece una visión general de la tos ferina , también conocida como Whooping Cough. Los temas incluyen síntomas , propagación, la tos ferina en los EE.UU. y las medidas de prevención.

This resources provides an overview of Pertussis, also known as the Whooping Cough. Topics include symptoms, how its spread, Pertussis in the US and prevention measures.

This resource from the CDC provides an overview of Pertussis, also known as the Whooping Cough. Topics include symptoms, how its spread, Pertussis in the US and prevention measures.

This brochure was created by the Migrant Clinicians Network Diabetes Program with funding from the Texas Department of Health Diabetes Program / Council. Brochure details basic information on Acanthosis Nigricans. Available in Spanish and English.

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It Takes the Whole Team: Staff Roles in ImmunizationWelcome to Immu-News, the Immunization Initiatives listserv, a monthly resource for the community of participants in this project.Our topic for the month is It Takes the Whole Team:  Staff Roles in Immunization.  As you know, we’ve been calling each of the Project clinics over the last months and wanted to share with you some interesting ideas about who plays what part in immunization at our clinics.Of course, we all think immediately about the providers and nurses, the people most likely to administer the vaccines.  But who orders the vaccines, who checks the supplies, who keeps the logs, who books the appointments, who enters the data, who tracks it, and who encourages the clients to come in to the clinic to get the shot?It could be at some clinics that one or two people do most or all of these jobs, while at other clinics, they may be divided up among three or four or more people.  What works at your clinic and why?  Does the hand that gives the shot know what the other hands are doing?  How is recording and tracking immunization data a team effort? How can the receptionist, the billing clerk, and the outreach worker all be a crucial part of the picture?Read on for information about the following:

  1. Experience: A checklist of all the different tasks necessary to arrive at your clinic’s immunization goals, gathered from our recent phone calls to you.
  2. Research: the collaborative approach--how successful are systems that incorporate the receptionist or the outreach worker into the immunization goals of the clinic?
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The Immunization Action Coalition (IAC) has recently released its fall issue of Needle Tips, http://www.immunize.org/nt with news and information for all health professionals who give vaccines.  Also available is Vaccinate Adults, http://www.immunize.org/va  a condensed version ofNeedle Tips for those who work only with adult patients. 

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Our topic for the month is H1N1 vaccinations.  Dealing with both seasonal flu vaccinations and the constant swirl of information, availability, and updates around the H1N1 vaccine has made this a challenging season flu season for providers.  We offer direct links to several CDC web pages and one patient flyer from the CDC.

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Again, Dr. Deborah Wexler, the Executive Director of the Immunization Action Coalition provides further reading and research on the topic of parental hesitation.  In the second half, we take a brief look at adults specifically:  why do adults hesitate to receive vaccines?  Are these barriers the same as for parents on behalf of their children?  Please feel free to send responses, comments, thoughts, and ideas to the listserv administrator atkath@healthletter.com. If you send comments, we will follow up with your responses and ideas in the next listserv.

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 Introductory overview of occupational health policy by Farmworker Justice.

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There has never been a better time to recruit and retain clinicians through the National Health Service Corps(NHSC). Clinicians working in NHSC‐approved sites with HPSA scores as low as zero have greater opportunities and access to funding than ever before in the history of the program.

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"The National Summit of Clinicians for Healthcare Justice was very different from any conference I have attended before. I feel privileged to have attended. I hope this summary imparts some of the passion I gained from this event to both clinicians and staff in community health centers who did not attend, and serve as catalyst for achieving a vision of health equity and justice in our health care system. Here are some highlights." Robert Moore, MD, Medical Director Clinical Ole, Napa, CA
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A complete list of questions and answers on HPV Vaccine from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

First of all, this month we offer some reminders for resources that are available to help you navigate, with your clients, between immunization requirements in the US and those from neighboring Mexico.   Second, we guide you to a link on the World Health Organization website where you can check other countries’ immunization requirements and schedules.   This may give you a starting point for understanding your migrant clients’ immunization histories. Third, we offer a sample bi-lingual parent-held pediatric vaccine record.  Remember, “the most reliable source of vaccine information on any particular individual is that individual! Contrary to popular belief, parents DO carry portable vaccination records when given them. This is particularly true for immigrant families, who are used to carrying important documents and who realize the potential of revaccination if records are unavailable to the local provider.”  Jennie McLaurin, MD Finally, in the season of giving, our gift offer to the clinics participating in Immunization Initiatives  send us the English patient-held vaccine record you use for your clients, and we will translate it into Spanish. We offer this first to the clinics participating in Immunization Initiatives, and to the first six clinics who contact us.  Email the listserv administrator to make arrangements at kath@healthletter.com

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