Goal 1Universal Livability: A Dream for Tomorrow, A Plan for Today
Goal 4: Community Outreach and Education
Improve access to health care and health promotion by providing educational opportunities to people with disabilities and their circles of support on how to take charge of their health care and promotion decisions.
Rationale:
Research shows that when people with disabilities lack good access to health care, they often develop preventable health problems or secondary conditions. Goal 3 of this Plan focuses on changing the physical and social environment of California's health care and health promotion systems to increase access to services and programs. In conjunction with changing the systems, helping individuals learn how to manage their own health care and health promotion will help them effectively use the systems. Many state and local groups already provide education to people with disabilities on how to take charge of their health and navigate the confusing systems involved. DHS should support the work of these groups and facilitate their access to training and resources they need.
Recommendations for Action:
4.1 ODH in coordination with people with disabilities and their families, regional centers, independent living centers, disability training schools/centers, culturally and linguistically diverse resource agencies, and local service providers, will identify existing community agencies and programs appropriate for integration of health-related empowerment and system's change training for people with disabilities and their families. e
Timeframe: One year.
Cost: $10,000 for staff time and travel.
4.2 ODH, in coordination with aforementioned partners, will identify existing curricula, methodologies, and tools to incorporate into the empowerment and systems' change training program for the community agencies.
Timeframe: Two years.
Cost: Indeterminate.
4.3 ODH, in collaboration with other state and local public and private partnerships, will develop and release a series of RFPs which will provide resources to build the local infrastructure needed to support incorporating empowerment and systems' change training into existing educational opportunities. This process will connect traditional disability resources with non-traditional public health resources to strengthen community networks. These RFPs will seek to:
- Connect with health systems change (Goals 1 and 3) and provider training (Goal 3) initiatives to ensure that the social and physical environmental changes within the health systems are consistent with the empowerment and system's training messages, which will prepare consumers to effectively navigate their health care and health promotion experiences.
- Modify, implement, and evaluate the community-based model created by ODH, DOR, CRIL, Independent Living Center, BHAWD, and partners to conduct breast and cervical cancer prevention through community outreach and education for women with disabilities.
- Produce a public health, community-based model for improving access to information, services, and health interventions for women with disabilities, who have experienced violence, including domestic and sexual violence.
- In connection with the DHS Nutrition and Physical Activity Action Team and other regional and local partners, create or strengthen community networks to increase social and physical access to health promotion opportunities for people with disabilities. Begin by connecting with partners to create local networks, which will develop joint plans to change the social and physical environments and create active and livable communities. This action may include creating an Accessible Sidewalks and Street Crossings Informational Guide, based on a national model.
Timeframe: Three years.
Cost: $1 million for local assistance grants.
- Empowerment/System's Change Training includes education on (1) effective health care access, system navigation, rights and choices; (2) health promotion - physical activity, healthy eating, stress reduction; (3) primary and secondary conditions; injury (unintentional and violence) and secondary disease prevention; (4) disability itself; personal safety and prevention of abuse (including sexual abuse); (5) age-related issues; policy and media advocacy; (6) web-based telehealth (National Center on Physical Activity and Disability) and telemedicine; (7) using the web as a resource tool; (8) effective management of personal assistants; and (9) effective assistance (e.g., properly trained personal assistants; peer support groups, and other assistance as defined by persons with the disability) for persons with disabilities.
