Abstract
Adolescents in the southern United States (US) generally have worse health statuses than adolescents in other regions of the country. Additionally, youth from poor, minoritized, marginalized, rural, educationally and economically disadvantaged backgrounds experience health inequities that yield overall poorer health compared to youth from better resourced and advantaged circumstances. The south region remains the poorest region in the US. Teens in the South have higher rates of health conditions such as obesity, adverse reproductive health outcomes, and unmet mental health care needs. There is a critical need for Maternal and Child Health (MCH) professionals and leaders to be trained, in the South, to address these significant health disparities and build a more equitable system for adolescents.
Goals and objectives:
Goal 1: Train a diverse group of AYA health professionals, at the graduate and post graduate levels in the 5 core disciplines of medicine, nursing, nutrition, psychology, and social work as well as MCH pathway students to become MCH leaders in the field of adolescent health, through didactic, experiential, and research-based interdisciplinary education and training.
Goal 2: Incorporate the values and principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion into the training curriculum, clinical and experiential activities, and research.
Goal 3: Develop and disseminate innovative curricula, training activities, and investigative research that yield evidence-based products and practices in primary care, AYA specialty service, and public health.
Goal 4: Improve access to behavioral, emotional, mental, developmental, and psychosocial health services, wellbeing, and support for AYA, particularly youth in the resource poor southern US. Goal 5: Develop, coordinate, and collaborate to implement continuing education (CE), telehealth, tele-education/distance learning, and technical assistance (TA) activities each year that expand and disseminate effective population-based strategies and practices that foster high quality and equitable health services to adolescents.
Methodology:
The UAB LEAH curriculum incorporates biological, developmental, mental health, social, economic and environmental issues that foster development of leadership attributes in trainees and fellows while improving services for adolescents.
COORDINATION:
Alabama MCH Network, State Title V agencies
Evaluation:
The evaluation uses both process and project outcome measures to evaluate and track the project goals and objectives across all program components. CE and TA are evaluated by participants, with advisory boards feedback. Trainees will be assessed at 2, 5, 10 years after training.