New Narratives
Feb 24, 2021, 11:21 AM
Archive for: February 2021
Community Health Workers: Walking In The Shoes of Those They Serve
Feb 2, 2021, 10:30 AM, Posted by Dwayne Proctor
It didn’t take long last Spring for Dr. Shreya Kangovi to realize that the COVID-19 pandemic would create a tsunami of inequity where inequity already long existed. Then the murder of George Floyd led to a national racial reckoning, too. Kangovi knew that community health workers (CHWs)—a field she is helping to pioneer and advance—are first responders on all those fronts.
A recipient of a 2019 RWJF Award for Health Equity, Kangovi is a primary care doctor in Philadelphia, a health policy researcher, and a professor who works to improve health equity. Kangovi developed IMPaCT, a community health worker program that relies on trustworthy individuals to help their community members improve their health and well-being. In randomized controlled trials, IMPaCT has improved chronic disease control, primary care access, mental health, and quality of care while reducing hospital admissions. It is the nation’s most widely disseminated CHW program.
Kangovi shared insights about the ways CHWs advance equity and better health, and the role they can play as we cope with and recover from the coronavirus pandemic.