2011 - 2012 ISCOPES Annual Overview

Collaborating for Health 2011 - 2012 Iscopes Annual Overview

“coming together is a BEGINNING. staying together is PROGRESS. working together is SUCCESS.”

---Henry Ford

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2011 - 2012 Annual Overview

“Everything you guys did was very interesting, helpful, and I feel really blessed to be a part of it.” - Sibley Plaza Resident, A Wider Circle Team

Contents

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Mission, Values, & Goals 06

Annual Overview Introduction 07

Teamwork: We Depend On It 09

Team Projects 10

Our New Blog 18


The mission of ISCOPES is to provide students* with a service-learning experience while addressing community-identified needs in the Washington, DC metropolitan area. Interprofessional teamwork and community partnerships make ISCOPES a unique approach to promoting health in DC and reducing barriers to accessing health information and care.

Mission, Values, & Goals

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We Value:

1. Universal health care access 2. Authentic collaboration between

university and community 3. Service Learning as a core

strategy 4. Evidence-based, research-

informed, and/or science-based resources enhanced with culturally appropriate adaptation options

5. Interprofessional Teamwork 6. Culturally Competent Health

Services 7. Sustainable, outcomes-driven

project development, implementation, and evaluation

GOAL 1: GW students effectively engage in intensive, health promotion experiences. GOAL 2: GW faculty/staff effectively serve as community health promotion coaches. GOAL 3: Community leaders facilitate capacity building through university- community health promotion partnerships. GOAL 4: High priority target populations in the DC Metro area participate in health promotion experiences. GOAL 5: University-community partnerships are strengthened.

*2011-2012 included students from the Physician Assistant (PA), Physical Therapy (DPT), Medicine (MD), and Public Health (MPH) Programs.

Anyone who has ever been involved in community health and/or service knows from experience that our work is not easy. Limited resources, little (wo)man power, insufficient time in everybody’s schedules, and managing expectations of 200+ participants are just some of the challenges that the ISCOPES program faces each year. Despite some of these barriers, we have seen success year after year. With every “thank you” we hear strangers say to a student at a team event, with every e-mail we read praising a team’s efforts and progress, and with each End of Year Celebration that highlights true team collaboration and achievement, we feel better about the efforts that we all put into to making ISCOPES possible. This work is not easy, but it’s well worth it thanks to the committed people we have the pleasure of learning from and serving with as we seek to improve health for all in the DC Metro area.

This year in particular, ISCOPES has evolved with the addition of a few new outcomes-focused activities – rotating team leadership roles, a student-driven blog, and the diligent use of evidence-based materials from our Resource Library. None of that compares, however, to how students, coaches, partners, and consumers have built each other up, circumvented challenges together, and seen 17 different projects through even if it meant sacrificing extra time, resources, and energy. We have seen teams – big and small – persevere against all odds. The “We Are All in This Together” spirit is very much alive and present as we celebrate the close of 2012! This year reconfirmed our belief that we accomplish more when we learn about, with, and from each other. We serve more effectively when we collaborate. Success for one is success for all and challenges are lessened when they are shared.

As we move forward, we know change is inevitable. Our social, physical, and political environments are constantly moving and shifting. Our program will be growing and we hope this team spirit will remain strong for many years to come. We look forward to having you with us on our collective journey as we continue to come together, progress together, and succeed together. Thank you!

Warmest Regards,

Angie Hinzey & Donna JavellanaISCOPES Leadership Team

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[Our faculty coach] genuinely cares not

only about our target population, but

about humanity as a whole.

[Our faculty coach] has a tremendous

passion for serving this population.

[Our community coach] is a great

role model and provided some great

information about the community

and the city as a whole.

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[Our faculty coach] has a tremendous

passion for serving this population.

“Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision...the ability to direct individual

accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people

to attain uncommon results.”

One of the four main competency domains in ISCOPES relates to teams and teamwork. Being a team player is not just a theory described on paper or talked about as a part of intellectual discourse, however; in ISCOPES, being a team player is lived out by our coaches, our students, and our community partners. In fact, ISCOPES is its people. Without each of them and their commitment to one another, there would be no program.

“No member of our team, as an individual, could have completed our goal, but because we were able

to combine our experience, knowledge, and creativity, the finished project was truly greater

than the sum of its parts.” -- Community of Hope Marie Reed Team

Teamwork: We Depend On It

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Team Projects

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“Interprofessional teamwork is hard work but pays dividends.” Academies at AnacostiaThis year at the Academies at Anacostia – a DCPS high school in Ward 8 – this team had the opportunity to get to know students with interests in health-related careers. While spending time with these students, the team realized that there was a lack of extra-curricular organizations geared toward a future in health and healthcare. When consulted, the young people at Anacostia voiced an interest in forming a Red Cross Club, a school-based student organization that would house both community service opportunities and events that would help them learn about working in health and public service. After much planning and adapting the plan, the team met with the founding group of Anacostia students several times, assisted with elections for officer positions, hosted the local Red Cross representative, and planned an upcoming field trip to a local Fire/EMS Station. The team learned the importance of sustainability, regular communication, and adaptation to the needs of the population served; as such, they relied on Facebook, Twitter, and Skype, and some team members have committed to assisting the Club beyond the end of the ISCOPES year.

A Wider Circle (New Partner!)This team collaborated with A Wider Circle to serve and learn from the community at Sibley Plaza, a DC Housing Authority site in Ward 6 dedicated to older adults and individuals living with disabilities. Assessment interviews revealed a need for activities that would reduce stress, decrease social isolation, and increase knowledge about various health issues. As a result, the team planned, implemented, and evaluated six themed events in the Sibley community room for the residents including an Intro Party with Bingo, Laughter Yoga, Healthy Heart Day, Stroke Awareness, Falls Prevention, and an Easter Party. Exercise – like chair aerobics and dance – was routinely incorporated into the activities. A core group of 15-20 residents regularly participated. The team learned that quick, 30-minute educational presentations, and positive, friendly interaction goes a long way!

A Wider Circle

Bread for the City - Food For Health

“Visiting poorer areas of the city and interacting with the community there has been an eye-opening experience. It makes you appreciate the life and opportunities you have.” -- PA studentBread For the City –Food For HealthAt Bread for the City (BFC) – a nonprofit in Ward 2 – the Food for Health team worked with the Community Engagement and Advocacy Department to develop a survey to assess client’s awareness and utilization of as well as satisfaction with the or-ganization’s food-related activities. These activities include nu-trition education classes, free farmers markets, orchard glean-ing, rooftop gardening, and computer health literacy classes. Survey development led to collaboration with each activity’s program director. In addition to assessing the visibility and utility of these resources, the team learned about BFC’s com-mitment to soliciting client feedback about how to improve each of the extant activities. In that vein, survey drafts were submitted for rewrite and approval to the Client Feedback Committee at BFC. The team learned that while the collabora-tion model of care is challenging to execute, the final product will more closely reflect the organization’s values and capacity. Most importantly, this evaluation tool will better capture the met and unmet needs of BFC’s clients, ultimately leading to programs that are more effective and sustainable.

Bread For the City –Health Resource RoomThe Bread for the City (BFC) Health Resource Room (HRR) team set out to provide free, age and literacy-appropriate health resources to BFC’s clients through the dedicated health education space in the NW medical clinic located in Ward 6. Prevention, treatment, and/or management of diabetes, can-cer, heart disease, and stroke through increased physical activ-ity, correct prescription drug use, cessation of smoking, and healthier eating were the primary focus points. One-on-one sessions were conducted with clients at BFC using Prezi pres-entations developed by the team. Each of these sessions was followed by a summative formal assessment. BFC clients sug-gested the presentations were appropriate in length and worth their time; they described the content as informative and fun, and reported learning novel information. The team learned that tailored discussions with clients using standardized tools were an effective strategy to client empowerment in personal health maintenance. They also learned that limited personnel and limited awareness about available evidence-based materials in health education spaces tend to render resources underuti-lized and client potential underdeveloped.

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“We discovered that ‘health’ is about more than just treating the disease or

condition you see immediately in front of you. Health is about the

whole person, as influenced by their community,

lifestyle, activities, ideals, and beliefs.”

-- DC Parks and Recreation Team

Bread for the City - Health Resource Room

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Community of Hope - Girard Street

DC Parks & Recreation

Emery House

Community of Hope - Marie ReedThis team collaborated with a DC Public School in Ward 1 – Marie Reed Elemen-tary – through a health education part-nership with Community of Hope, a local nonprofit with a District-wide reach. The team first learned about how the growing epidemic of childhood obesity has affect-ed the young people of Marie Reed. They also learned that the school has a par-ticularly important asset: monolingual classes taught in English as well as dual language classrooms offering content in English and Spanish, critical in providing culturally competent education to this largely Hispanic community. Given the aforementioned, the team decided to cre-ate a program that would integrate fun physical activity into the kids’ everyday routine while simultaneously reflecting the values of the school and neighbor-hood. With a grant the team received from the Public Service Grant Commis-sion at GW, the team introduced Excita-dores de los Niños to five classrooms at the school. Program materials included energizer kits for teachers based on a na-tional evidence-based physical education program, Spark. With a scalability plan intact, this team’s efforts are on track to mold the school into a physically fit en-vironment!

Community of Hope - Girard StreetThis team began their year by conduct-ing a needs, resources, and interest as-sessment in tandem with a potluck at one of Community of Hope’s transitional houses located in Ward 1. This assess-ment guided the team to build on a past ISCOPES project wherein families would complete tailored health histories called “Health Passports” with one-on-one as-sistance. Additionally, the team planned

three themed life skills workshops: 1) physical activity and hypertension, 2) parent-child communication regarding love, sex, and relationships, and 3) devel-opmental milestones. Pre-and Posttest evaluation results indicated the work-shops were effective in increasing knowl-edge and self-efficacy on the topics dis-cussed. Through this process, the team learned the importance of user-friendly health materials, relationship building, health marketing, and advance planning. The team also learned how to better meet the needs of transitioning populations as well as the value of community experts.

DC Parks and RecreationThe DC Parks and Recreation team be-gan their year learning about commu-nity gardens and food access issues in various parts of the District. Then, after researching evidence-based programs involving community gardens and child-hood nutrition, the team designed and implemented several after-school work-shops focused on growing and eating healthy food. The Seeds of Change pro-

ject involved female youth, ages 4 – 12 living near the Trinidad Recreation Cent-er (TRC) in Ward 5. The primary goal of the project was to improve healthy eat-ing behaviors by increasing awareness of the community garden located at TRC, increasing knowledge about a balance diet, and increasing access to fresh fruits and vegetables. The team learned effec-tive techniques for empowering young people to choose healthier food options, but also learned the importance of in-cluding parents in future efforts in order to modify family norms and reinforce workshop health messages.

Emery HouseThis team had the opportunity to serve and learn from the staff and residents of Emery House, a transitional work-bed facility for men in Ward 5 operating within the DC Coalition for the Home-less network. After conducting an initial needs, resources, and interest assess-ment, the team developed health logs to use in one-on-one health education sessions with the men. Topics covered in the sessions focused on chronic disease prevention, diagnoses, and treatment especially related to diabetes and hyper-tension. Healthy behaviors – including eating a nutritious diet and getting ad-equate exercise – were also highlighted in these sessions. To reinforce individual session messages as well as reach those men who were not able to participate in the sessions, the team created an up-dated health resource table complete with materials from federal and national agencies.

“[My teammate] is going to be a great professional wherever he ends up.”

“[My teammate’s] dedication was inspiring.”

“This was very motivating and it

taught me that young people do not give up on you and that they

believe in you and will fight with you to the

end.”

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“Onsite…attempting to convey health info to residents, I experienced cultural humility in realizing that not all “commonly known” health info is common.” --DPT Student

Department of Mental HealthThe Department of Mental Health team served on a larg-er team of mental health professionals working through-out the District to implement Primary Project, an evi-dence-based, early intervention and prevention program designed to reduce social, emotional, and school adjust-ment difficulties in children kindergarten through third grade. Learning from direct service providers in the field, this team first focused their efforts on learning about child-centered play. After honing their skills and travers-ing the difficulties of finding the young people most in need, this team had the opportunity to provide services through the child development center at Martha’s Table in Ward 1. Additionally, the team planned a book drive to benefit the many locations served by Primary Project. The team learned the importance of early intervention and tailored care, as well as the usefulness of estab-lished, evidence-based, funded programming. The team also witnessed firsthand the importance of collaborative partnerships between government and nonprofit enti-ties in delivering effective health-related services.

Health Information PartnersThe Health Information Partners (HIPS) team quickly integrated themselves into the established initiatives of this local nonprofit via a variety of health educa-tion activities at various sites throughout Wards 7 and 8. They conducted street outreach to increase aware-ness about HIV/AIDS, diabetes, and cancer prevention, care, and treatment; they implemented computer-based workshops at Whitman Walker’s Max Robinson Health Center to improve computer health literacy; they taught workshops at Stoddert Terrace – a DC Housing Author-ity site – where they focused on HIV stigma reduction and diabetes prevention; and they conducted health education sessions at Ballou High School about healthy versus unhealthy relationships and alcohol, tobacco and other drug (ATOD) abuse . They used a mix of evalua-tion techniques for all of their formal workshops. The team also used their SMART objectives to direct their collaborations with each of these partner organizations. Throughout these experiences, the team reported that community collaboration and input were critical to their overall success.

Cultural Humility is Key

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Health Information Partners

A Wider Circle

Mary’s Center

La Clinica Community Health ActionThis team was housed within the Community Health Action (CHA) department at La Clínica del Pueblo, a federally qualified health center (FQHC) serving immigrants in Ward 1 as well as throughout the entire metro region. Given the CHA’s priorities of conducting health outreach and connecting clients to health-related resources in the community, the team was charged with creating a database of accessible physical activity resources. Accessibility in this case was defined as resources that meet the language, affordability, and transportation needs of the client population. Child-care provisions, gender-specific options, and age appropriate resources were also considered. After extensive research that involved visiting each of the sites, the team found 18 accessible locations in Ward 1 alone where people could and might be more likely to engage in physical activity including parks, gyms, and community centers. Fortunately, this resource can be used and adapted over time by La Clínica clinicians and Promotores de Salud of the CHA department to complement their culturally appropriate health education efforts!

“Having meetings onsite… allowed me to see patients utilizing the health services available. The clinic was almost always full and busy. Seeing these patients helped me realize the stereotypical

patient with HIV I had in my mind was wrong.” --DPT Student

La Clinica Immigrant Patient RightsBuilding on the efforts of previous ISCOPES teams, the La Clínica Immigrant Patients’ Rights (IPR) team began by learning about limited or non-English proficiency (LEP/NEP) people who utilize language services while seeking healthcare, as well as their direct/indirect service providers within the DC metro area. The team saw a need for an updated cross-sectional snapshot of barriers LEPs and their providers are facing that prevent healthcare facilities from providing optimal access to language services in hopes of finding solutions to those barriers. After reviewing the way La Clínica currently evaluates LEP patient access to language services, the team developed two population-specific surveys. Pilot testing of the surveys is underway. Throughout the year, the team has reflected on the importance of building on the work of others as well as the importance of self-sustaining evaluation methods. They are hopeful La Clínica can use their project to compound the success of the ISpeak campaign as well as maximize the use of their limited medical interpreter resources.

“It can take a lot of time and effort to truly be accepted into a community that is culturally different, but ISCOPES gave us the chance to begin to break down these barriers and begin to

impact the community.” --MPH Student

Mary’s CenterThis team had the opportunity to serve through Mary’s Center, a federally qualified health center with locations in Wards 1, 2, and 4. This team’s project was crafted around the need for targeted health messaging in Mary’s Center’s multiple waiting rooms. To maximize reach with limited resources, the team employed edutainment principles and focused on creating engaging, informative, medically accurate, and culturally appropriate videos. The team also chose video content that would be easy to absorb by viewers of varying health literacy levels. The final product is a combi-nation of sourced health education videos from high-quality sources like Unicef and health tips from Mary’s Center providers. Next steps at this site will include evaluating the impact of these videos and adding to the series as needed.

“During ISCOPES, I have experienced cultural humility when implementing [our project]. I think when discussing important and sometimes personal health topics, a lot can come out in

conversation to make you realize how different your upbringing/background is.” --MD Student

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N Street VillageN Street Village (NSV) is a nonprofit located in Ward 2 that serves nearly 900 homeless and low-income women from all over the District. The NSV team started off by learning about these women and the case-management, res-idential, medical, and crisis support services NSV offers to them. Then, the team decided to address some of the unmet needs of the nonresidential women who access crisis care. Specifically, they decided to develop single-step Smart Start guides for circumventing some of the most commonly reported bar-riers these women face. The guides focus on housing, employment, transportation, legal services, legal documents (birth certificates, social security cards, identification cards), SNAP, health insurance (DC Healthcare Alli-ance and Medicaid), and TB testing. The pro-ject serves as an important starting place for returning women to a state of physical, emo-tional, spiritual, and mental well-being.

“I learned that just because you might identify with the same race as your service population does not mean that you know everything about that culture or group of people. What it comes down to is that if you are not an actual member of that community, it is hard to fully relate and understand all of the community characteristics.” --MPH Student

Understanding those we serve

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“Understanding the challenges faced

by the women of N Street Village and how our ISCOPES team could make a difference was an

incredible experience which we could never get in a

classroom.” -- N Street Village

Team

Southeast Children’s Fund

Southeast Children’s Fund (New Partner!) This team collaborated with Southeast Children’s Fund (SCF), a nonprofit serv-ing families in Wards 7 and 8. Specifi-cally, they focused on SCF’s early learning center in the Solomon G Brown Corps Community Center that serves children ages birth to three years old. First, the team conducted an informal needs assess-ment among the parents and staff of SCF, and discovered that the required District of Columbia Universal Health Form is challenging and overwhelming for both groups. As such, the team created compre-hensive binders including best practices materials on child health, development, and healthcare navigation tools. They then walked through these binders with parents at a mandatory PTA meeting. This experience gave the team the chance to share their individual expertise on vari-ous health topics and gave them the op-portunity to learn about the importance of parent empowerment when it comes to children’s healthcare.

Transitioning Veteran’s CollaborativeThe Transitioning Veterans Collaborative involved many levels of partnerships, in-cluding GW Student Veterans, the Office of Veterans Services, and ISCOPES stu-dents, many of whom are also veterans. After surveying current student veterans, the team ultimately decided to put to-gether a welcome packet of resources par-ticularly geared toward successfully tran-sitioning from military service to student and civilian life. The final welcome packet included information about the following: maps (of Foggy Bottom and Mount Ver-non Campus), Office of Veteran Affairs, GW Student Veteran Organization, stu-dent academic success, transportation in DC, off-campus housing, Tri-Care provid-ers, dental health, mental health, military family resources, and social activities in DC. The team also helped coordinate two inaugural activities on navigating the VA Medical System and Effective Resume Writing at the new campus Veteran’s Center.

Whitman Walker ClinicThis team served through Whitman-Walk-er Clinic, a Federally-Qualified Health Center look-alike with locations in Wards 2 and 8. After learning about the impor-tance of medical adherence and viral load among patients living with HIV, the team was asked to explore options for return-ing patients to care who were lost to fol-low up as a part of a larger, national cam-paign. The team created a list of 61 high priority patients based on a database of various clinical factors including low CD4 count, high viral load, co-morbidities, and time out of care greater than 6 months. Using a script the team developed, each team member called patients to encour-age them to return to care. Each conver-sation was documented and return-to-care rates were then calculated. Of the 61 patients contacted by phone, 36% of individual cases were resolved and 21% of patients returned to care. The team reflected that while phone calls are very effective for some people, other commu-nication means are necessary for discon-nected numbers. Moreover, finding out more about why patients are lost to follow up will set the stage for future efforts.

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“I was developing a cover for a client

binder and realized that I

couldn’t find any clip art of African Ameri-

can people. It made me step back and

think about how that would feel to not be acknowledged as a

worthy citizen.” -- PA Student

Transitioning Veterans Collaborative

Whitman Walker Clinic

“I would say our greatest success was the discussion we had about “them” and “us”. Throughout the meeting these terms were used often, until one of the group members pointed out that ‘we’ are ‘them.’” – TVC, first blog post

“We started to create a collective

identity as a team.” -– Transitioning

Veterans Collaborative (TVC) Team

“It’s great to feel that we may start these kids off to

a healthy routine that could help them lead long and

healthy lives.” --Community of Hope Marie Reed Team

Interprofessionalism Teamwork Comfort Zone Sustainability Empowerment

“We take many things for granted. As young, educated, privileged students of a private university we are sometimes sheltered from the harsh realities of the communities around us. Through work with Health Information Partners (HIPS), I became aware of the various health disparities in and around the Anacostia community of Washington, DC.

One of the disparities we fight is the issue of varying levels of health literacy. The small group training session on November 15, 2011 presented by Professor Tamara S. Ritsema discussed the importance of being cognizant of health literacy in the work that we do through ISCOPES. It was astonishing to learn that the nation’s capital has a mean reading level of a 9 year old. There is a fundamental and institutional problem we need to address when 40% of DC residents have no more than a high school degree. In my opinion, it doesn’t necessarily have to do with the physical ability or capacity level of these individuals as much as it has to do with system/institutional issues.

Health literacy dictates whether or not a person will access or seek medical care. Medical adherence and patient/physician communication are also dependent on the level of health literacy of the patient. The capacity to obtain, process, critique and apply basic health information and services is compromised when an individual has low literacy. Unfortunately, an array of social and behavioral

Institutional Passive Indifference: A Call to Mobilize

Our New Blog

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“Our time with WWC this month has been focused on developing a way to identify patients who have fallen out of care, who is at most risk for poor health outcomes when out of care and a way to return those patients to care. Additionally our group has been looking into the future at developing a way to identify risk factors for poor retention and find a way to prevent fall out all together.

Our large group will be dividing this undertaking into 2 subsets of our project. One will be using clinic data to analyze the patient’s lost to follow up and the characteristics surrounding that, as well as finding which patients are most in need of return to care. The second group will be developing a script to use in order to talk to these patient’s about returning to care and getting feedback from actual WWC clients regarding the efficacy and cultural competency of our methods.

Our group is hoping to empower this community and use all the assets WWC has to offer to create something that is meaningful and sustainable.” – Whitman Walker Clinic Team (WWC), 2nd blog post

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determinants impacts the ability to maximize a person’s health utility or capacity.

Through street outreach and personalized weekly training courses, we are trying to fight this disparity on the grassroots level. Collectively, we try to educate community members on the health disparities associated with their cohort and help them advocate for better health care for not only themselves but for their communities. Furthermore, we want to ideally help individuals make lifestyle changes to improve their personal health so that the high prevalence of chronic, communicable, and mental illnesses can be addressed. As a coalition of young professionals bound together by a common interest, we need to galvanize and excrete morality back into the health arena. There is a need to create and organize a system where there is a fair distribution of access to health. Look around you; DC is a great place to grow academically but it is riddled with racial and socio-economic stigmas that have consequently marginalized many of the people that we work with.

Through social justice initiatives and advocacy work, we can potentially alter discourse and promote education and responsibility to help combat some of the societal and political problems that pervade our local, state, and federal government currently. In order to make a systematic and vital contribution to health reform at least in the DC area, somehow we need to ground reform back to a moral issue. Perhaps we will move one step closer in the new year…” --Asha Cesar, Health Information Partners (HIPS) Team

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2011 - 2012 Annual Overview ISCOPES

2300 I Street, NW #316AWashington, DC. 20037

Website: www.gwumc.edu/iscopesEmail: [email protected]

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2011 - 2012 ISCOPES Annual Overview

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