CURRENT PROJECTS

For the last seven years, we have been working with several health systems, including hospitals, primary care clinics, and public health agencies, as well as intermediate organizations, in understanding, evaluating, and supporting their population health strategies to support preventive care or care transition post-hospital discharge.

With social, economic, and cultural determinants influencing the effectiveness of care, as well as the type of care that reaches underserved population groups, our work extends to understanding the efficacy of community engagement strategies, as healthcare systems seek active collaboration with community organizations to engage and empower the population to self-manage their health, often using new technology.

Projects we have been involved in the last few years include:

Assessing the efficacy of a community engagement strategy that educates African American families on nutrition, physical activity, and mental health and engages them using personal technologies (Fitbit, weight scale, and blood pressure cuff) and community facilities.
Understanding the use and efficacy of mobile apps to address the needs of caregivers of chronic care patients.
Exploring the potential use of blockchain technology to support care providers and community organizations as they improve communication in referral processing for supporting smoking cessation.
Understanding the health screening and referral services provided to rural Hispanic American population using mobile health units and adapting to challenges during COVID 19.
Analyzing social determinants in patients as a primary care unit assesses the efficacy of using tele-medicine services to support primary care of African American population during COVID 19.
Developing web and virtual learning modules to educate global care providers in addressing anti-microbial resistance.
Understanding several community engagement strategies used to address the health needs of an Indigenous population in Western Ontario, Canada (see link).

NOTE: Many of these projects are incorporated as a part of an experiential learning model used to educate public health students on population health in the digital age.