Recognizing the need for community outreach coordinators (coordinators) to effectively target minority and special populations for enrollment in Florida KidCare, researchers at the University of South Florida, Lawton and Rhea Chiles Center collaborated with the Florida Department of Health on developing a data toolkit to identify special populations for outreach. Used as the basis of an intensive training workshop, the toolkits hold information on small area demographics, economic conditions, public school enrollment, live births, and other population variables. Researchers acquired data from several sources, including: Florida KidCare; 1990 US Census; Florida Department of Education; Florida Department of Health; Regional Planning Councils; and the Florida Health Insurance Study. Using census tracts, geographic information system (GIS) personnel drew county-level census tract maps, zip code boundary maps, and maps of minor civil divisions using MapInfo (v. 3.0), a GIS program. The purpose of the project was to train coordinators to identify and locate various sub-populations of families whose income qualifies the children as eligible for Florida's child health insurance program (CHIP). Ethnically and racially diverse populations tend to be difficult to locate, to communicate with due to language or cultural barriers, and the children are less likely to have health insurance than the general population. For coordinators, the kit and attendant training, encourages the use of data to design and implement new outreach efforts, to plan culturally sensitive and appropriate outreach strategies, to employ data for local grant applications, and to evaluate current outreach programs.
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Learning Objectives: Participants will learn to apply small area data to community outreach strategies; develop outreach plans that are evidence-based; identify racial inequities in child health insurance enrollees; create spreadsheets for indentifying the location of special population; identify and use web-based data for their localities.
Keywords: Community Outreach, Special Populations
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I have a significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.
Relationship: Employed by the University of South Florida, Faculty administrator