Search

Increased cost of chronic illnesses in United States is an urgent call to develop a cost effective approach to improve chronic disease self-management, especially among vulnerable populations. An emerging role for professionals and paraprofessionals is the patient navigator. We present an example of a conceptual framework, Transformation for Health, developed to underpin the training of certified community health workers (CHW) to deliver health care, preventive services, and health education for underserved populations to promote chronic disease self-management. Transformacion Para Salud (TPS), a patient navigation model for chronic disease self-management, was a two year demonstration program to develop a culturally sensitive intervention to facilitate patient behavior changes. Patients involved in the TPS intervention showed improvements in clinical and behavioral outcomes after twelve months of intervention. This article describes the conceptual basis and implementation of the TPS and discusses program evaluation, specific intervention outcomes, and implications for practice. Use of CHWs in the patient navigator role demonstrated a cost effective method to improve access to quality, cost-effective, primary health care services as well as to facilitate chronic disease self-management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article describes lessons learned from a variety of community-based participatory research (CBPR) activities. These activities helped to shape the early development of a childhood overweight prevention program aimed at predominately Hispanic populations in Lubbock and El Paso, Texas. In this context, a background for the full scale program is presented followed by a description of methods and results of the CBPR provided.

Existing clinical ladders established in 2005 at Seton Family of Hospitals were updated and put into place in 2008. They were based on established nursing ladders. Original ladders were first established to keep technologists motivated by giving them more responsibilities and opportunities to grow. Ladders also gave the higher performing technologists more compensation for doing more work. Seton Imaging modified the technologist ladder to include non-technical responsibilities as well as some nonhospital activities to enable technologists who consistently go above and beyond their job duties to be promoted up the ladder. The ladder has 62 pathway options for points, so it allows for tailoring to staff interest or site restrictions.