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Many children now are no longer at serious risk of contracting vaccine-preventable diseases to the detriment of their schools that educate them and the community they live in.

info@latinosunidosforvaccines.org

In Colorado, 31% of Latinos are without health insurance. Almost 30% of Latino children lack a health care home because of documented barriers of time, cost, transportation in getting to health clinics. 19% of Latino families struggle to afford their children’s health care costs and are much more likely to have ER visits than white children. It’s not hard to understand the higher rates of mortality, hospitalization and vaccine-preventable diseases that Latinos and their children experience. Covid-19 really exposed this inequity.

Now with so many new unvaccinated newcomer families who’ve come to Denver and Colorado the problem is worse.  That’s why you see me constantly pushing for better vaccination strategies. Like going to where the community is, the schools, when Latinos are available and administering as many vaccinations to adults and children as we can in safe, cost effective ways that build trust in health.

We put those strategies into action at two school vaccination clinics last week. “One School, One Vaccine at a Time”

At Denver’s McGlone Academy, we worked most of the outreach with strong support from school staff, including Principal Cifuentes, who encouraged us to reach out to migrant families at a nearby shelter. He told me that they were his families too! So we reached out. We even enlisted a migrant gentleman to go door to door at the shelter to tell people of the opportunity for vaccinations.

And they came! Like the other schools the past couple months, in overwhelming numbers. The fabulous Public Health Institute at Denver Health (PHIDH) vax staff worked as best they could even short staffed and with online registration difficulties that slowed throughput. For those we had to turn away as time ran out we apologized profusely and provided referrals to the next clinics nearby. The school was delighted with the results.

Here’s what school nurse, Ms. Darene Faulker said:

Thank you so much for coming to our school and coordinating this vaccine clinic. Your competency and experience is evident when watching you manage the large group of recipients and those who were providing the immunizations.  I especially love how you put your heart into your mission to reach out to those who cannot or have great difficulty getting this service elsewhere.  This is a valuable gift to the community.  You were so effective in persuading the DH staff (actually PHIDH)) to stick around just a little longer to provide services for those who were waiting in the auditorium at 6 pm.  I am sure they were also very grateful.  

Thank you so much for your promise to return in a week or so and again until those who were not able to receive immunizations tonight are cared for.  There was a very large turnout due to all the pre clinic outreaching…I feel your plan to reach out to the adults with multiple vaccines and then again to the families as a whole with emphasis on the children, will help to provide greater immunity to the surrounding communities. 

Recently we have seen a large influx of refugees who are in ominous and unfortunate circumstances.  Many are greatly in need of multiple vaccinations.  Our closest DH School Based Health Clinic that is within walking distance (the one I have been referring our students to) is currently booked  for immunizations until April. 

You have been so wonderful to work with and I look forward to continuing our partnership to serve our community.

The next day at Montview Elementary School in Aurora, Regis University nursing/pharmacy students led by Ms. Holly Vali, assistant professor of nursing, Platt College of Nursing volunteers, and the CAHEP team under Mr. Alok Sarwal worked diligently and professionally to vaccinate as many students and family as they could. Due to school issues, our set up was delayed and our 3:30pm start had to be pushed to 4:00pm. We worked feverishly, but so many families came we ran out of most vaccines by 5:20pm. So again we had to apologize to community that we couldn’t see them all. Like at McGlone Academy, the vaccination demand was overwhelming.

Two days, two school clinics. The clinics came with new complexities to overcome and learn from. It was a tough and exhausting two days for the teams, but at the end, over 350 vaccines were put into arms because of those teams. Even with the complexities, when all said and done, what a success for the 2 schools and the community! Many children now are no longer at serious risk of contracting and spreading serious adult and childhood diseases to the detriment of their schools that educate them and the community they live in. Also, the Big Plus for this hard work: We gained both established and migrant communities buy-in for health. See what I mean in the pictures below.

Also,

Because of my Cultural Validation training program, I was asked by leaders at Rifle Co’s Grand River Hospital to help explore Latino perception of its services. They asked me to talk with hospital provider, administration, interpreter and general staffs respectively on any issues to resolve. Last weekend, Ms. Amber Perez, an MSU student with a passion for community health, and I spent a weekend in Rifle to explore the hospital experience with Latinos there. Where do Rifle Latinos regularly gather? At St. Mary’s Parish, where they feel safe. With the permission of the pastor, we were able to conduct key informant interviews with dozens of community members after Masses, exploring with them what they felt was good and not so good at Grand River Hospital.

This work with community put cultural validation into action. Action to not only find ways to strengthen access to care but also promote positive long-term changes within marginalized community that will increase trust in public health and vaccines.

I was honored last week to receive the Disruptor of the Year Award from the African Chamber of Commerce Colorado. What? Me a disruptor? Yes, I was proud and humbled that the African Chamber recognized me as an equal opportunity disruptor for equity in Black Health too.  We recognize disruption is necessary where systems are failing but the status quo is not changing.  When health departments are not collaborating, when community health events have poor outreach, when BIPOC majority schools are not adequately addressing vaccination non-compliance but seem content with exemptions, when hospitals dare to ask why BIPOC patients are unhappy with them. Disruption must happen.

Cultural Validation, as part of the strategy to build cultures of health in Latino/BIPOC communities, is building in Colorado, nationwide, Internationally pretty soon Globally!  Here are some of the events I’ll be speaking at:

Health departments, Universities, schools of health science, clinics, hospitals, public schools, let’s step up! Stop the competition and resisting needed changes as if things are normal and new ways of clinic operations are not needed. With the arrival of thousands of migrants in Denver/Aurora and throughout Colorado over the past year, we need to find more efficient and cost effective ways to address serious health care challenges that have resulted. Let’s work closely in partnership with each to get the most bang for the buck. The strategies we’ve talked about in these reports focus on the large new numbers of marginalized people left out of health care. Let’s not ignore that we’re in a war to defend public health under assault, especially in the Denver metro. As we’re finding out in schools and churches here, the battles in this war are not going to be easy.  But if we don’t fight them, public health and our communities lose.