Grant Partners

MLCHC submitted this proposal on behalf of the Health Equity Compact. The Health Equity Compact is a group of Black and Latinx healthcare leaders with lived experience who seek to dismantle systemic barriers to equitable health outcomes by transforming care delivery and influencing health policy.

The Health Equity Compact will conduct 20-24 stakeholder interviews with leaders from state and municipal agencies, health care provider organizations, health insurers, employers, unions, and advocacy groups. These interviews will support the Compact to better understand these different stakeholders' current health equity-related interests and priorities, work, and desires for change at the state level. The interviews will also assess the reactions of these stakeholders to the policy proposals currently being formulated by the Compact. The Compact will then develop a report on stakeholder perspectives on the health equity policy proposals identified by the Health Equity Compact.

True Alliance Center will meet with individuals and families to help determine their health needs and connect them with resources and services that meet those needs. Its population of focus will be immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in communities across the Commonwealth. It will also coordinate closely with other community-based organizations and local and state agencies to ensure that its services are additive and not duplicative. 

Brazilian Women’s Group will meet with individuals and families to help determine their health needs and connect them with resources and services that meet those needs. Its population of focus will be immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in communities across the Commonwealth. It will also coordinate closely with other community-based organizations and local and state agencies to ensure that its services are additive and not duplicative. 

FamilyAid will pilot a Behavioral Health Navigator program focusing on cutting through the red tape and gaining access to behavioral health services for FamilyAid children. This pilot will occur through a partnership with Boston Children's Hospital to expand access to behavioral health services to 400 children in the coming year. It will hire a Behavioral Health Navigator to build on established relationships and forge new collaborations with counseling services, school-based behavioral health staff, community health centers, and hospitals.

Resilient Sisterhood Project will create an evidenced-based protocol for health practitioners and community-based advocates to address the broad spectrum of reproductive health needs of formerly incarcerated Black women. This protocol will guide health care practitioners, community organizations, and formerly incarcerated women to ensure that women can access the reproductive medical services they need and mitigate the trauma of prison medical treatment.

Volunteers in Medicine Berkshires will meet with individuals and families to help determine their health needs and connect them with resources and services that meet those needs. Its population of focus will be immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in communities across the Commonwealth. It will also coordinate closely with other community-based organizations and local and state agencies to ensure that its services are additive and not duplicative. 

Centro Presente will meet with individuals and families to help determine their health needs and connect them with resources and services that meet those needs. Its population of focus will be immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in communities across the Commonwealth. It will also coordinate closely with other community-based organizations and local and state agencies to ensure that its services are additive and not duplicative. 

This project has been developed by two Associate professors at UMASS Amherst and will be implemented in collaboration with the Ascentria Care Alliance, based in West Springfield.

This project will implement an evidence-based intervention to reduce stress, anxiety, and depressive symptoms and improve coping skills, self-efficacy, social support, and family well-being among Ukrainian and Afghan refugees resettled in Hampden County. Reducing their mental health burden by promoting community strengths and utilizing culturally tailored support will help these refugees to adjust to their new environment and actively engage in the community and employment.

East Boston Neighborhood Health Center (EBNHC) will develop and pilot a culturally adapted health education and nutrition intervention program to improve rates of controlled blood pressure for economically marginalized Latinos with hypertension in East Boston. The pilot will help EBNHC assess the feasibility and effectiveness of this approach and identify ways to improve the program, such as adapting the program to a virtual format.

Immigrant Family Services Institute, Inc. will meet with individuals and families to help determine their health needs and connect them with resources and services that meet those needs. Its population of focus will be immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in communities across the Commonwealth. It will also coordinate closely with other community-based organizations and local and state agencies to ensure that its services are additive and not duplicative. 

We Are Better Together Warren Daniel Hairston Project will provide comprehensive emotional and mental health services in a leadership development framework designed specifically for women who are the relatives and caregivers of perpetrators of community violence. This program will help support these women to contend with the realities of their grief and anger while providing support to their relatives - who are victims or incarcerated or about to re-enter society.

Massachusetts Health Quality Partners (MHQP) will partner with community leaders from the Chinese, Indian, and Vietnamese communities in Massachusetts to better understand factors related to Asian patients reporting lower patient experience scores compared to other populations. MHPQ will develop a report and propose recommendations to improve Asian subpopulation patient care experiences. Recommendations will include ways to improve access to quality care or mitigate/eliminate healthcare disparities.

International Institute of New England will meet with individuals and families to help determine their health needs and connect them with resources and services that meet those needs. Its population of focus will be immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in communities across the Commonwealth. It will also coordinate closely with other community-based organizations and local and state agencies to ensure that its services are additive and not duplicative. 

Central Massachusetts Agency on Aging will provide coordinated behavioral health services to older adults of color and their families by linking them to clinicians of the same race and ethnicity, focusing on families in which grandparents are raising grandchildren.

The Public Health Institute of Western Massachusetts (PHIWM) will plan and assess the Massachusetts State Behavioral Health Roadmap through an equity lens for Hampden County. This project will involve engaging diverse stakeholders: families, youth, care providers, health care staff, and leadership. The findings will inform local, regional and statewide action through potential organizational policies and practices, state regulations, and legislation.