Experiences among a diverse state coalition working towards the recognition of community health workers as an official workforce in Arizona

Community Health Workers are effective in community health outcomes, low cost and valuable in community health promotion in general. In spite of this, community health workers lack full recognition as a professional workforce in Arizona. The window of opportunity for the acknowledgment of community health workers as a professional workforce in Arizona is primordially open. Engaging a diverse spectrum of stakeholders can be a powerful advocacy tool for building greater momentum and pushing for policy change.  

In this presentation we will discuss the experiences within the Arizona Community Health Workforce Coalition in working towards the recognition of community health workers as viable and reimbursable workforce in Arizona. We will also describe the four work areas that the coalition developed in order to be able to build the groundwork needed to be able to push for policy change. The developed work areas include: core competencies and scope of practice, credentialing, advisory group and sustainability. This presentation will also describe the role that community health workers have taken in this process towards the creation of an officially recognized workforce, the challenges and the lessons learned from this process.