Office of Minority Health

Grantee Information

Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services
301 Centennial Mall S., Lincoln, NE 68509
http://dhhs.ne.gov/

The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services provides important and, oftentimes, life-sustaining services to Nebraskans. Its mission is to help people live better lives and to find ways to effectively address health issues.

Grant Project Information

NE State Partnership Grant – Eliminating Health Disparities and Equalizing Health Outcomes in Nebraska
$140,000
Dr. Raponzil Drake
(402) 471-0161
raponzil.drake@nebraska.gov

Abstract

The purpose of this State Partnership project is to address premature death and preventable diseases among racial and ethnic minorities in Nebraska. There is a lack of both language interpretation services and culturally competent care. There are also problems with health education outreach to minorities. This project will provide training to health care providers on cultural competency, create a structured mechanism for the department staff and representative of the College of Public Health to liaise and identify collaborative opportunities for gathering, collecting, analyzing and reporting on minority health data. It will work with minority health data stakeholders to improve data collection and analysis methods, work toward legislation changes and monitor state health department's data collection for inconsistencies in assessing minority health disparities. The intended outcomes include improving knowledge, attitudes and skills about minority health among health providers, increasing access to culturally competent health services for minority patients, increasing public awareness about the social determinants of health and improved racial and ethnic minority data collection and dissemination. An evaluation will be conducted to determine if the outcomes are reached. Data that will be collected include the number of partners with strategic plans and processes for reducing health disparities, the number of doctors, nurses and other clinical staff with improved communication skills with racial and ethnic minorities, and the number of practices addressing individual, policy and systems level factors that contribute to health equity. The project will conduct cultural competency pre/post tests, collect post-training data through follow up telephone surveys, use electronic forms to document project-related activities and employment records and conduct web-based assessment of project partners.

OMH objective(s) toward which the project's results most contribute:

• 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)
• Strengthened leadership and coordination to leverage resources and enhance effectiveness and efficiency of individual and collective efforts (including, but not limited to, research and data)

Key Healthy People 2010 objectives or subobjectives toward which your project's results most contribute (see Appendix 3 of OMH's Evaluation Planning Guidelines):

Healthy People objectives were not identified.