Community Health Resources
Resource guides for patients
The Worcester Parent/Caregiver Guide to Community Resources is one of the most robust and regularly-updated community resource compilations for the city of Worcester, with many resources also serving the broader region, and now in a digital version in English and Spanish. You can order hard copies in English or Spanish for $4ea. Parents can get a free copy at the Worcester Family Resource Center, 20 Cedar Street, Worcester MA 01609
Grand Rounds Community Health Connections
Each week at the start of Grand Rounds, we introduce community resources that are relevant to the topic being presented. We'll store the presentation slides with links and notes on the UMass Chan FMCH library guide page for easy access. Many thanks to Andrew Haggerty and our whole trusted librarian team for helping us keep so many of our resources up to date. Topics include:
1/2/24: Free STD testing available at AIDS Project Worcester and Planned Parenthood
Data Resources
The Congressional District Health Dashboard, developed by the Department of Population Health at NYU Grossman School of Medicine in partnership with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, is now live! The Dashboard will equip users with first-of-its-kind data on health and the conditions that affect health in every congressional district across the country. This new Dashboard site builds on the experience creating and managing the City Health Dashboard and provides important data on health and equity, but now calculated to the congressional district level.
Worcester Regional Research Bureau almanac of facts and figures about the city of Worcester, reports and resources. Link
Worcester Community Health Improvement Plan/ Community Health Assessment provide access to recent information about our local public health planning processes and community-identified priorities: http://healthycentralma.com/
Boston Area Research Initiative’s Boston Data Portal includes interactive mapping features: Link
MA Public Health Association: https://mapublichealth.org/ is a great source of info about advocacy in our state.
MA Environmental Public Health Toolkit with tracking data: https://matracking.ehs.state.ma.us/
The Kaiser Family Foundation has an interactive tool for state reports on health coverage, access, and costs. Link
Centers for Disease Control: Data and Statistics by topic and with links to tools and other resources: https://www.cdc.gov/DataStatistics/
US Preventive Health Task Force Recommendations: enter facts about your population of interest to identify elevated risks, recommendations and relevant screening forms: Link
Opportunity Atlas: Mapping the Childhood Roots of Social Mobility searchable neighborhood-level data, reports, and articles. Link
US Census American Fact Finder is an easy way to get lots of data by zip code, city, state, etc: Link
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Data & Statistics: Link
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Public Use Data Files: Link
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Disability & Health: Link
CHNA.org / Community Commons: Link
Data.gov: Link
Emory University: Link
National Institutes of Health (NIH): Link
Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU): Link
Partners in Information Access for Public Health Workforce: Link
Society of General Internal Medicine (SGIM): Link
Tulane University: Link
University of California San Francisco (UCSF): Link
University of Rochester: Link
US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS): Link
US National Library of Medicine: Link
National Environmental Public Health Tracking (EPHT): Link
County Health Rankings: Link
Community Health Status Indicators (CHSI): Link
MA Environmental Public Health Tracking (MA EPHT): Link
MassCHIP Community Health Profiles: MassCHIP: Link
Office of Data Management and Outcomes Assessment: Link
Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS): Link
United States Census Bureau’s FactFinder: Link
Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS) Data Navigator: Link
National polling data on public opinion regarding routine childhood vaccinations.
Advocacy and Civic Engagement Resources
Guiding Principles for Civic Advocacy by Medical Students and Prospective Applicants, AAMC 2020
This document was created by the Group on Student Affairs and is intended to aid both leaners and institutions in considering how to engage in and support student advocacy to eliminate police brutality and systemic racism and promote diversity, equity, and inclusion. All content reflects the views of the Group on Student Affairs and does not reflect the official position or policy of the Association of American Medical Colleges unless clearly specified.
AAMC Principles of Trustworthiness. The AAMC Principles of Trustworthiness are a framework and tools for organizations working to become trustworthy partners to their communities. The principles include:
The community is already educated; that’s why it doesn’t trust you.
You are not the only experts.
Without action, your organizational pledge is only performance.
An office of community engagement is insufficient.
It doesn’t start or end with a community advisory board.
Diversity is more than skin deep.
The Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) works with policymakers and other leaders to advance policy priorities that strengthen the nation’s health and well-being. Through policies that affect health care delivery, research, education, health equity, and more, the federal government is a key partner in sustaining the vitality of the nation’s academic medicine ecosystem, which is essential to improving the health of all.
UMass Chan Public Health and Community Advocacy FB Group
Sign up here to share upcoming local and online events relevant to public health and community advocacy.
NCMLP & ACU Partnership to Increase Access to Justice and Health Equity
The National Center for Medical-Legal Partnership (NCMLP) and Association of Clinicians for the Underserved (ACU) have formed a new partnership that aims to shift the culture of health by helping all ACU members use medical-legal partnership (MLP) to improve health equity, increase access to justice, and strengthen the health care workforce.
Community Health Resources
Public Health Communication Collaborative Plain Language Guide - Are you using plain language best practices to convey health messages to public audiences? Here's a handy guide with useful reference links. The Public Health Communications Collaborative (PHCC) creates and amplifies tools, resources, and learning opportunities for communicators designed to address public health issues, build public confidence, and identify and counter misinformation. Initially formed in August 2020 to provide science-based messaging resources on the COVID-19 pandemic, today PHCC supports communicators on a range of timely issues across the field of public health—working toward a world where everyone has access to the information they need to make good decisions about their health. As a collaborative, PHCC draws on the expertise, insights, and on-the-ground knowledge of its partner network and public health leaders. Four Organizing Partners steer the collaborative: CDC Foundation, the de Beaumont Foundation, The Kresge Foundation, and Trust for America’s Health.
The Massachusetts Healthy Aging Collaborative (MHAC) developed an Inclusive Communities Toolkit to help communities engaged in the age- and dementia-friendly movement, centering principles of access, equity, and inclusion in their work. Includes summary stats, and healthy aging "crosswalk" tools based on 8 age- and dementia-friendly domains
Collaboratory Community Engagement Database - Please consider adding your community-engaged activities to our database to help us measure impact https://he.cecollaboratory.com/umms. Groups are encouraged to assign 1 student to list their community-engaged activity in Collaboratory, the new software for tracking the impact of community-engaged activities at UMass Chan Medical School.
To learn how to use this software and find a step-by-step document for listing an activity.
For a general overview and steps on using Collaboratory: Interactive Learning Module
Safe Swim Tips: curated by Matthew Morrow
Interprofessional Education Resources
Humanism in Medicine
The Gold Humanism Honor Society is collecting examples of humanism in medicine throughout the curriculum. If you would like to have the opportunity to share and publish your work on this reflection through social media, our blogs, or other forums. This is optional in addition to the submission for credit for the PCHC clerkship: Link (listed Fall 2022)