Presentations shared by this year's East Coast presenters. Topics include:

• STD's
• Outreach
• Pesticides
• Obesity
• Research
• And more...

This fact sheet provides insight into the most common obstacles that people with disabilities in California face when attempting to access health care. Through the administration of a state-wide survey on the accessibility of health care facilities for people with disabilities, many key problem areas were brought to attention. 

A factsheet on "How to prevent cholera" from The Hesperian Foundation. Cholera can be prevented through careful sanitation, careful use and treatment of water before drinking or cooking, and careful handling of food. This Factsheet is written in simple language and heavily illustrated and talks about the importance of sanitation, how to identify cholera and how to make your water safe to drink.

Hesperian’s Cholera fact sheet is illustrated, easy to read and available as a free download in English, Spanish, French, Haitian Kreyòl, and Arabic. The fact sheet talks about the importance of sanitation, how to identify cholera, and how to make your water safe to drink.

Mobile Voices (VozMob) is a platform for immigrant workers and / or low income can create stories about their lives and communities directly from their mobile phones. Each week the team discusses popular media stories, develops and shares knowledge, designs the system, and creates training tools. The communication equipment is made popular by day laborers, domestic workers, and youth volunteers have taken very seriously the role of writing their own history. We also meet every week at USC to develop research on the project.

Poder Sano is a new initiative by Farmworker Justice to help mobilize rural Latino communities around the prevention of HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted infections, and tuberculosis. Through this project, Farmworker Justice will provide free capacity-building assistance and community mobilization tools to strengthen community-based organizations' HIV prevention programs, improve monitoring and evaluation practices, and create partnerships for program support.

Poder Sano aims to mobilize rural Latino communities around the prevention of HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted infections, tuberculosis, hepatitis, and other health concerns relevant to migrant farmworkers.

Over the last three years, we have touched on many topics that we hoped would help you as you work to improve immunization rates in your clinic. For the final edition, we return to the important issue of patient-carried immunization records.

First, we offer an article that provides a convincing yes to the title question: “Are Patient-Held Vaccination Records Associated with Improved Vaccination Coverage Rates?” The authors of the article, James T. McElligott and Paul M. Darden.

As a compliment to the article, and by way of a final thank-you for your participation, MCN, along with CHEC (Community Health Education Concepts), has developed patient-friendly, low literacy, bi-lingual immunization cards for you to use with your clients.  The cards are 5x7, and can be printed from your clinic computers.  There are two versions, a Lifetime Card for adults, and a Child and Teen Card, both in Spanish/English.  We designed the card to be as simple as possible, and to include only the most important information.  If the information is meaningful and understandable to the clients, they are more likely to understand the importance of keeping their shots up to date.

An article that provides a convincing yes to the title question: “Are Patient-Held Vaccination Records Associated with Improved Vaccination Coverage Rates?” The authors of the article, James T. McElligott and Paul M. Darden, conclude that the “Use of patient-held vaccination records is an easily implemented strategy that is associated with increased immunization rates. A greater effect was seen in groups at risk for underimmunization. Methods to incorporate and to ensure effective use of these records should be implemented” The article was published in Pediatrics in February of 2010. The full citation is as follows: Pediatrics 2010;125;e467-e472; originally published online Feb 15, 2010; DOI: 10.1542/peds.2009-0835. The online version of this article, along with updated information and services also available.

This resource from the California Department of Public Health provides facts, information for health professionals,  data and surveillance, vaccine, and prevention.

This resource from the CDC provides an overview of Pertussis, also known as the Whooping Cough. Topics include symptoms, how its spread, Pertussis in the US and prevention measures.

It Takes the Whole Team: Staff Roles in ImmunizationWelcome to Immu-News, the Immunization Initiatives listserv, a monthly resource for the community of participants in this project.Our topic for the month is It Takes the Whole Team:  Staff Roles in Immunization.  As you know, we’ve been calling each of the Project clinics over the last months and wanted to share with you some interesting ideas about who plays what part in immunization at our clinics.Of course, we all think immediately about the providers and nurses, the people most likely to administer the vaccines.  But who orders the vaccines, who checks the supplies, who keeps the logs, who books the appointments, who enters the data, who tracks it, and who encourages the clients to come in to the clinic to get the shot?It could be at some clinics that one or two people do most or all of these jobs, while at other clinics, they may be divided up among three or four or more people.  What works at your clinic and why?  Does the hand that gives the shot know what the other hands are doing?  How is recording and tracking immunization data a team effort? How can the receptionist, the billing clerk, and the outreach worker all be a crucial part of the picture?Read on for information about the following:

1. Experience: A checklist of all the different tasks necessary to arrive at your clinic’s immunization goals, gathered from our recent phone calls to you.
2. Research: the collaborative approach--how successful are systems that incorporate the receptionist or the outreach worker into the immunization goals of the clinic?

Our topic for the month is H1N1 vaccinations.  Dealing with both seasonal flu vaccinations and the constant swirl of information, availability, and updates around the H1N1 vaccine has made this a challenging season flu season for providers.  We offer direct links to several CDC web pages and one patient flyer from the CDC.

 Introductory overview of occupational health policy by Farmworker Justice.

First of all, this month we offer some reminders for resources that are available to help you navigate, with your clients, between immunization requirements in the US and those from neighboring Mexico.   Second, we guide you to a link on the World Health Organization website where you can check other countries’ immunization requirements and schedules.   This may give you a starting point for understanding your migrant clients’ immunization histories. Third, we offer a sample bi-lingual parent-held pediatric vaccine record.  Remember, “the most reliable source of vaccine information on any particular individual is that individual! Contrary to popular belief, parents DO carry portable vaccination records when given them. This is particularly true for immigrant families, who are used to carrying important documents and who realize the potential of revaccination if records are unavailable to the local provider.”  Jennie McLaurin, MD Finally, in the season of giving, our gift offer to the clinics participating in Immunization Initiatives  send us the English patient-held vaccine record you use for your clients, and we will translate it into Spanish. We offer this first to the clinics participating in Immunization Initiatives, and to the first six clinics who contact us.  Email the listserv administrator to make arrangements at kath@healthletter.com