The best way to prevent Zika is to prevent mosquito bites.  It’s important that everyone, not just pregnant women, take steps to avoid getting bitten.  That’s because even if a healthy, non-pregnant person contracts Zika and doesn’t become sick (or doesn’t even know they are infected), that person could make it possible for a mosquito to spread the virus to people who are vulnerable to a Zika infection.

There are several ways mosquitos can be controlled around the home, including these:

• Use window and door screens
• Empty and scrub, turn over, cover, or throw out any items that hold water
• Use outdoor flying insect spray
• Repair cracks or gaps in septic tanks

All of the confirmed cases of Zika in the U.S. are travel-related (that is, the infected person contracted Zika outside of the U.S.), so it is important to make every effort to prevent the transmission of Zika this summer.  This is especially true in Florida.  As Dr. Antonio Crespo, an infectious disease specialist at Orlando Health, told the Tampa Bay Times, “we are a major tourist destination for visitors from the epidemic areas…. someone who is infected could come here to Orlando, for example, making it possible to spread the virus to (Florida).”

Here is where you can go to learn more.  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Florida Department of Health and the Office of Minority Health have produced resources around several relevant topics:

• What is the ZIka virus disease?
• What is microcephaly?
• Where is Zika present?
• What are the symptoms of Zika?
• How can Zika be prevented?
• How is Zika transmitted?
• What do pregnant women need to know about ZIka?
• What do men need to know about Zika?
• What do healthcare providers need to know about Zika?
• What do travelers need to know?
• What multilingual resources are available?

An additional component of AOHE’s work this year is partnering with oral health stakeholders across the state to align our work.  Last month, a group convened in Tampa to share their perspectives on the state’s oral health challenges and ideas on how to collectively address them. TBHC, and our fellow DentaQuest grantee, Catalyst Miami, reported on successes and challenges in their community engagement efforts.   SCOPE introduced and facilitated a power mapping analysis to further inform the group’s strategy moving forward. From there, attendees sought to narrow down areas for alignment and collaboration between a very diverse cross-section of stakeholders. A group consensus developed around the need to coordinate messaging.

Carrie Hepburn, TBHC, and Santiago Bunce, Catalyst Miami, at the state convening in Tampa

Last week, the conversation continued at the regional level in Atlanta. Florida oral health stakeholders, including TBHC, heard reports from peers across the southeast on their successes and lessons learned. Rotating work groups were formed to share strategies and state progress in areas including Medicaid expansion, person-centered health care, public perception of oral health, and many other relevant areas. Meeting attendees also updated the Oral Health 2020 roadmap to include community-level tactics for leveraging successes.

Email Terence Truax, AOHE Program Coordinator, for more information on our oral health community assessment or our involvement in the Oral Health 2020 network.

We also know that in order to best serve patients and clients who belong to diverse racial and ethnic groups, we must ensure we are able to provide services in a culturally and linguistically competent way.  According to the federal government, cultural and linguistic competence refers to the ability of healthcare providers and healthcare organizations to understand and respond effectively to the cultural and linguistic needs brought by the patient.

Not only is this the right thing to do, it is also an important strategy for mitigating health disparities and moving towards health equity.  It is well documented that people who belong to diverse racial and ethnic groups have increased incidence of illness and death as compared with the national population as a whole.  This is also true for our region.  Did you know that Black infants are nearly three times more likely to die as White infants before their first birthday in Hillsborough County?  And that non-White people in Pinellas County are about two and half times as likely to die from diabetes as White people?

The Tampa Bay Healthcare Collaborative believes now is the time to address these health disparities, and strengthening culturally and linguistically competent (CLC) services is an important way to do so.  As such, we came together with Community Tampa Bay and Collaborative Labs at St. Petersburg College to offer CLC for Health & Human Services Providers: An Active Learning Collaborative.

CLC for Health & Human Services Providers aims to increase the CLC of participating organizations through an active learning, assessment and action planning process.  The first phase of the program kicked off last month with these participating organizations: Alpha House of Tampa, Bon Secours St. Petersburg Health System, LUNA and the Seventh Mom Project.

Inaugural cohort participants from Alpha House of Tampa, Bon Secours St. Petersburg Health System and the Seventh Mom Project.

Over the next 9 months, this inaugural cohort will have the opportunity for training, dialogue and cross-cultural interactions – both with their internal organizational stakeholders and with peers in the field.  These conversations are intended to examine bias, assumptions and the individual frameworks from which we make decisions that impact those whom we serve.  In addition, participants will conduct an organizational self-assessment to learn more about their own organization’s strengths and opportunities for providing CLC services. They will then develop an action plan to leverage their strengths and address their areas for growth.

We are nothing short of ecstatic about CLC for Health & Human Services Providers and working with our inaugural cohort on these critical issues!

Tampa Bay Healthcare Collaborative staff Lori James, Erin Sclar, Carrie Hepburn and Terence Truax.

At TBHC, we’ve gone in a slightly different direction regarding our New Year’s Resolutions.  We want to “help you do what you do better”.  Our focus is all about increasing connections, expanding opportunities and providing more and better resources.

So, I am super excited to finally introduce you to the new TBHC website and the Collaborative’s new look.  We hope you’ll agree that the brandmark and website are both vibrant and engaging.  We believe it will give you – our members and partners something to rally around.  While developing the new brand, it was important to have the visual representation of the organization match the mission and goals set forth by TBHC in the minds of our members and partners alike.

The brandmark itself represents an overhead view of a round table with the four colored shapes representing the members. The members are equally collaborating at that the table with a focus to healthcare, represented by the cross that is made through negative space.  The colors have been chosen to represent the different organizations represented by our members, the cultural differences between those we are focused on helping and the different initiatives that TBHC has embarked upon.

Now, in true collaborative fashion, I have to be totally transparent and let you know – we need your help.  We’ve tried our best to work out all the bugs and kinks but it is possible that we didn’t catch everything.  Please take a little time to review our website and give us your feedback.  Drop us a line at info@tampabayhealth.org to share your thoughts.