CPIMP211278

Building a Health Literate Community: Toward an Equitable Response to COVID - The Need for Systemic Change to Address Racism as a Public Health Crisis is Shown by Racial and Ethnic Minority Disparities in COVID.

A strategy for community-level change is embodied in Healthy People 2030 (HP 2030)'s historic combination of personal and organizational health literacy (HL) as a foundational equity principle. There is a need for organizations to become health literate to equitably enable individuals to achieve HL - the ability to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others.

To build a health literate community, the racial and ethnic minority population of focus is 204,000 persons in Franklin County's (FC's) top 25% Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) census tracts geographic area. This area is characterized by an SVI of .87, poverty, poor health, education, and employment, and a high neighborhood-level COVID risk within a county with a highly elevated risk. Approximately 14% of FC residents are new Americans. Non-white FC populations are disproportionately affected by COVID in higher confirmed cases and deaths, lower vaccine uptake, misinformation, and vaccine hesitancy.

To reduce FC COVID-related health disparities and improve health outcomes among racial and ethnic minorities, we will develop and implement a health literate community HL plan incorporating and sustaining HL-informed approaches into COVID-related communication and healthcare system practices. The first step, the Disparity Impact Statement, will determine racial, ethnic, cultural, language, and other disparity group focus, establish performance plans, set quality improvement goals, and provide a framework for ongoing monitoring and determining the impact of HL interventions on adherence to COVID public health recommendations.

FC Public Health, with key collaborators Columbus Public Health and Nationwide Children's Hospital, and diverse committed partners, including community health centers (FQHCS), hospitals, and social service and community health worker organizations serving Blacks, Hispanics, and new Americans, will convene and collaborate to create a community HL plan with a commitment to addressing national standards for culturally and linguistically appropriate services (CLAS).

Integrating consumer voices, we will build a health literate community through developing, implementing, evaluating, and sustaining evidence-based approaches for health literate healthcare organization (HLHCO) capacity-building and HL application. The goals are to create (1) an array of community- and HL-informed COVID messaging and modalities to increase availability, acceptability, and use of COVID public health information and services by racial and ethnic minority populations, and (2) a sustainable FC community organizational HL model and infrastructure to reduce COVID-related and other health disparities and promote health equity.

Public health, FQHCS, hospitals, and others serving populations of focus will address organizational HL, and a diverse cross-sector team of engaged HL capacity-building champions will complete HL expert training and certification, with partner team members attaining core HL skills through HL and CLAS-related awareness, skill-building, and training. Establishing organizational HL expertise and using the train-the-trainer model will create a sustainable infrastructure and supporting resources.

New or improved policy recommendations based on the HL plan will be developed with state and national partners. The University of Hawai'i at Mānoa (UHM) will provide quality improvement guidance to refine interventions and create data-driven efforts to improve organizational HL, COVID health information and service access and use, and related project outcomes. The UHM evaluation team will support protocols, policies, and procedures for sustaining improved engagement and trust across relevant community populations and overall population-based outcomes, and expansion.

Franklin County Board Of Commissioners

NOT APPLICABLE

93.137 - Community Programs to Improve Minority Health Grant Program

HHS Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health (OASH) [HHS]

Office of Minority Health (OMH) [HHS - OASH]

Columbus, Ohio United States

City-Wide

Advancing Health Literacy to Enhance Equitable Community Responses to COVID-19 (MP-CPI-21-006)

Amendment Since initial award the End Date has been extended from 06/30/23 to 06/30/24 and the total obligations have decreased from $3,999,169 to $3,981,701.