Office of Minority Health

Grantee
Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services
Lincoln, NE 68509-5026

Project: Nebraska State Partnership Grant Program
Amount: $146,753

The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) provides important and, oftentimes, life-sustaining services to Nebraskans. The mission of the Nebraska DHHS is "helping people live better lives," with the motivation to find ways to effectively provide these services and make a difference in the lives of so many people.

Project Abstract

This project focuses on two goals:

• Increase knowledge and awareness of culturally and linguistically appropriate services and programs, and increase access to health care services via improving the adoption and implementation of the National Standards for Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services in Health and Health Care (The National CLAS Standards); and providing cultural intelligence training in the 15 Nebraska counties with the largest minority populations
• Increase access to health care services via provision of health education, screenings and referrals or linkages to additional services for minorities in Nebraska counties with 5 percent or greater minority populations 

This project is being implemented to address one of the reasons for health inequities in Nebraska—communication and lack of access to health care among residents with limited English proficiency — and will target minority populations in 15 Nebraska counties. Project activities include but are not limited to:

• Develop or adopt external and self-assessment tools for use in collection of baseline data on the health care and public health organizations in the targeted 15 counties regarding adoption of the National CLAS Standards
• Create or adopt educational materials for use in improving the adoption and implementation of the National CLAS Standards by public health and health care organizations in the targeted communities
• Provide technical assistance with plans for adoption and implementation of the National CLAS Standards by public health and health care organizations in the 15 counties
• Organize and schedule at least 30 education and screening events about diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular disease targeting at least 300 people in minority populations per project year

Intended outcomes include: 

• At least 80 percent of participants will demonstrate increases in knowledge of the National CLAS standards
• At least 75 percent of the participants in the trainings will increase their knowledge of cultural intelligence each quarter
• At least 60 percent of participants will indicate behavior change at six to 12 months post-training

The project’s structure, process and outcomes evaluation will include measures, indicators, methods and anticipated outcomes for each activity.

Objectives:

• Increased awareness, education, and outreach to address racial/ethnic minority health and health disparities problems
• Improved access to, and appropriate utilization of, health and other community-based services and systems through user-centered design for racial/ethnic minorities (e.g., health IT, culturally/ linguistically appropriate services, service provider education/ training, workforce diversity)

Healthy People 2020 objectives toward which the project’s results contribute:

• Reduce the diabetes death rate
• Increase the proportion of local health departments that have established culturally appropriate and linguistically competent community health promotion and disease prevention programs
• Increase overall cardiovascular health in the U.S. population
• Reduce the proportion of children and adolescents who are considered obese