Strategic Health Equity
The Strategic Health Equity Grant will provide a second year of a two-year grant to the Public Health Institute of Western Massachusetts (PHIWM) to lead a place-based community engagement process to improve health and health disparities in Chicopee.
This grant program aligns with the Foundation's principles and strategic goals to advance health equity, and also supports the Advancing Health Equity in Massachusetts (AHEM) initiative, led by Massachusetts' Executive Office of Health and Human Services (EOHHS).
Over the first year of this project, PHIWM convened and coordinated a diverse set of stakeholders in Chicopee to collaborate on (1) identifying and understanding current community capacities, needs, and priorities related to disparities in maternal health and social drivers of cardiometabolic health, and (2) planning for the implementation of specific interventions to respond to the identified disparities.
During the second year of the grant, PHIWM will continue to convene and facilitate conversations to develop a prevention-based community coalition in Chicopee. PHIWM will support the coalition as it continues to identify and understand community needs/interests and best practices/strategies related to maternal health or the social drivers of health that impact cardiometabolic conditions and maternal-perinatal morbidity.