Health Resources and Services Administration
Office of Rural Health Policy Border Work
http://ruralhealth.hrsa.gov/border/
The Health Resources and Services Administration's Border Health Initiative is managed through the Office of Rural Health Policy (ORHP). ORHP facilitates intra-agency border health activities that cut across the bureaus and offices of HRSA. Recent examples include:
HRSA Border Health Summit
On August 22-24, 2006 HRSA and the Federal Office of Rural Health Policy organized the first HRSA Border Health Summit in Tucson, AZ. The theme being “Partners in Action for a Healthy Border”. Approximately 100 attendees participated, representing HRSA grantees located in the border region, other key border health stakeholders, and other Federal agency partners.
Plenary sessions included updates on border initiatives from the Pan American Health Organization, the U.S.-Mexico Border Health Association, the U.S.-Mexico Border Health Commission and State-specific initiatives. Sessions covered the pandemic flu, HIV/AIDS sponsored programs, and border workforce analysis. Primary care and oral health research and education programs were described, including diabetes, the BIDS project, health literacy, and an analysis of diabetes/tuberculosis findings. A presentation on environmental issues and their impact was followed by a comprehensive overview of demographic projections and their subsequent impact along the U.S.-Mexico border.
The presentation of success stories from each State’s prior years’ bi-national border health week celebrations set the stage for the State breakout sessions. State teams met to network and discuss current health care challenges and prioritize identifiable needs and recommendations. Recommendations from these sessions can be accessed below along with the meeting agenda, presentations, participants list, and HRSA fiscal year 2005 awards to grantees along the border.
The summit agenda, participant list, breakout proceedings, presentations, and the HRSA Border Investments, 2005 document can be viewed on the HRSA Border Health Summit page.
ORHP has one additional cooperative agreement:
- Border Environmental Health Coordination Program Cooperative Agreement: The purpose of this program is to fund research to test the hypothesis that environmental education and training is an effective intervention tool for improving public health. The population that has been targeted is lay community health workers, or promotoras, residing along the U.S.-Mexico border, and the communities they serve. This project, jointly sponsored by EPA and HRSA, supports larger Border health efforts including, but not limited to, the U.S.-Mexico Border 2012 program.
HIV/AIDS Bureau Border Work
Demonstration and Evaluation Models that Advance HIV Service Innovation Along the U.S. - Mexico Border
http://hab.hrsa.gov/special/border_index.htm
The overall goal of this initiative is to develop models of community-based health care networks that effectively reduce barriers to early identification of HIV disease and assure entry to high quality primary health care for individuals who live and/or work in the U.S. region of the U.S./Mexico border area.
Border Special Projects of National Significance (SPNS)
This program was ended in 2005, but the following is a link to the final report from the project: ftp://ftp.hrsa.gov/hab/border_innovative.pdf
HRSA Geospatial Data Warehouse
http://datawarehouse.hrsa.gov/
The HRSA Geospatial Data Warehouse and its associated applications provide HRSA with access to a broad range of information about HRSA programs, related health resources, and demographic data useful for planning and policy purposes. A data warehouse is a centralized store of an organization's data resources implemented specifically for query, reporting, and analysis purposes.
The HRSA Geospatial Data Warehouse captures grants, scholarship and loan programs, designation of underserved areas, and service demonstration programs and integrates these with data acquired from external sources. For a comprehensive list, refer to the list of data sources under Help Resources.
Bureau of Primary Health Care
http://bphc.hrsa.gov/
HRSA’s Bureau of Primary Health Care is working with EPA to identify common health and environmental problems along the border. These projects include the US/Mexico Border Bi-National Environmental Health Conncections E-Group, which has been created to establish a mechanism for communication among and between U.S. and Mexico's Health Professionals who have a special interest in border and bi-national environmental health issues. The purpose of this E-Group is to identify common health and environmental problems which impact the status of public health along the border region; identify needs which can be addressed through collaboration; and share information about successful solutions and intervention models in order to facilitate the resolution of problems and address needs.
The Assessment of Assets and Needs of Federally Funded Community Health Center's Ability to Address Respiratory and Cardiovascular Illness Related to Air Pollution Project is another partnership with EPA. The purpose of this project is to assess the resources currently available in selected Community Health Centers along the border and to determine their level of knowledge and need for additional information in order to provide appropriate promotion of respiratory health, and prevention of contaminants and disease as a result of exposure to airborne contaminants.
Also the Bureau of Primary Health Care is collaborating with NIH's National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute to establish a training center to train three Texas health centers located near the U.S.-Mexico Border on several integral components of diabetes/cardiovascular diseases, utilizing the promotora model as an extender of the medical team. The goal of this project is to develop the framework for a model of best practices by creating a consistent self-management clinical process, using trained promotoras to serve as an extension of the medical team.
Bureau of Health Professions
http://bhpr.hrsa.gov/
The United States - Mexico Border Centers of Excellence Consortium was developed by the Bureau of Health Professions. The consortium core members consist of representation from the Centers of Excellence Programs in each of the border states; University of Arizona Health Science Center, University of Texas Health Science Center of San Antonio, University of New Mexico Health Science Center, University of California at Los Angeles, School of Medicine, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, School of Medicine, and Texas Tech University Health Science Center at El Paso.
The U.S. Mexico Border Centers of Excellence Consortium has identified and implemented strategies to improve the health professional workforce shortages along the U.S.-Mexico border. The COE Consortium has developed partnerships and collaborations with various agencies and programs along the U.S. -Mexico border including, the Pan American Health Organization, Area Health Education Centers, United States Mexico Border Health Association and several others. The consortium has identified programs and activities that deliver cultural competent care to border health residents. A U.S. Mexico Border COE web site was developed to identify currently funded research projects addressing health care disparities along the border and current programs on the U.S. - Mexico Border. The consortium is currently in the developmental stage of developing a Resources Guidebook of Model Programs along the U.S.-Mexico Border that will increase the number of disadvantaged and minority students into the health professions and improve women, infant and children's health, oral health, environmental and public health.
