Partnerships

The Center has built successful partnerships with local community based organizations serving minority and lower SES older adults.

Seniors in Motion for Health and Always Active Siempre Activo

Building on partnerships that CADC had already developed with Network for Elders and On Lok’s 30th Street Senior Center, Anita Stewart developed a new project to adapt a successful research-based physical activity promotion program to be appropriate for minority and lower income seniors and sustainable within the resources of these two community-based organizations.  With funding from The California Endowment (a portion of which went to each site), the project involved obtaining input from their clientele, adapting the program, identifying community resources for physical activity, developing program materials, training site staff and/or volunteers in program components, conducting an awareness campaign, and recruiting seniors from these two venues to join the program.  Her staff worked closely with administrators, staff, and volunteers at the sites during the 3-4 years of this project.  The program is called “Seniors in Motion for Health” at the Network for Elders location and “Always Active-Siempre Activo” at the On Lok’s 30th Street Senior Center.
Since the project was completed, the connections have continued.  Dr. Stewart helped 30th St Senior Center obtain a new grant to continue the program, and another staff member has been working with Network for Elders to help them coordinate fund raising events to sustain the program and provide more resources for the center. 

Building Community Capacity for Psychosocial Support Services for Latinos with Cancer

A REDES En Acción and Center for Aging in Diverse Communities researcher, Anna Nápoles-Springer, PhD, and Carmen Ortíz, PhD, of Círculo de Vida were recently awarded a California Breast Cancer Research Program Community Collaborative Award for $100,000 for one year, beginning July 2005.  For the grant, a community partnership has formed that includes the two Co-Principal Investigators, oncologists, breast cancer survivors and staff from two community organizations (Círculo de Vida and Una Mano Amiga), representatives from local hospitals and clinics (Samaritan House Free Clinic, San Mateo Medical Center, Mills-Peninsula Hospital, and St. Luke’s Hospital), a grass roots health promotion agency (Nuestro Canto de Salud), and a local community health worker certificate program (Cañada College).  The research questions articulated by the partners on this project are: 1) How can we increase awareness among Spanish-speaking Latinas that psychosocial services are part of the continuum of cancer care? and 2) How can we best identify and train Latinas who have had breast cancer to be effective support counselors?

The two community organizations, one with extensive experience (Círculo de Vida) and the other new to providing support services for women with breast cancer (Una Mano Amiga), will work with a Latina cancer researcher from UCSF to identify optimum outreach and support strategies and develop a training program to prepare Latina breast cancer survivors as peer support counselors.  The training program will be based on an 11-year program, Círculo de Vida, developed by Dr. Ortíz, and formative research to be conducted in this pilot project.  This study will yield a transferable, culturally-appropriate outreach and support intervention to increase participation in psychosocial services, and ultimately improve quality of life among Latinas with breast cancer.  Furthermore, it will also train a core of peer support counselors and increase the capacity of community organizations to provide psychosocial support and referral services to women with breast cancer who might need such services. 

Caring Hands Project Training

United and Active Women, formed in 1990, is a grassroots Latina immigrant women’s community organization and empowerment program with offices in San Francisco and Oakland.  The Caring Hands Workers’ Association and Economic Development Project, is a program of United and Active Women designed to help low-income Latina immigrants achieve better jobs and economic security as home health care providers.  An understanding of illnesses, the health care system, patient care, and workers’ rights are included as part of the Caring Hands annual intensive employment training.  Graduates form the Workers’ Association receive assistance with job placements. 

The Community Liaison Core of the Center for Aging in Diverse Communities collaborated with two 4 hour-workshops during this year’s training.  The first workshop“Human Anatomy and Physiology”, on April 30, provided the participants with educational content, a written booklet and an opportunity to address many issues of this topic.  The second 4-hour workshop, on May 7, was titled: “Cancer and Other Health Conditions and Diseases Related to Aging”.  This topic was provided in collaboration and sponsorship of “Redes en Acción”.  Educational materials about cancer and aging issues were distributed.

The Adult Vaccine Promotion Project

Dr. Nicholas Daniels from the Department of Medicine and other investigators in the School of Medicine, UCSF are conducting a research study to determine whether vaccination programs in churches are effective in reaching adults for whom vaccination is recommended for pneumococcal disease and influenza.  .  The goal of the study is to increase the use of influenza and pneumococcal vaccinations.  The study began 2 years ago with a church recruitment plan in racial and ethnic minority communities inviting them to participate in a health education and adult vaccine promotion program. 

The first goal was to recruit churches in the San Francisco Bay Area to take part in this study.  African American and Latino faith-based churches were targeted for this project.  A total of seven churches were selected to participate in this pilot project.  Of the churches that took part in this study, four churches were African American faith-based and the remaining three were Latino faith-based organizations.  A sum of eighty-five surveys was completed as a result of this study and roughly 160 flu and pneumonia vaccines were administered.  This year, we plan to expand the vaccination program to other Bay Area churches.

This study is funded by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to the University of California, San Francisco