To help promote immunizations, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has a Vaccines & Immunizations site that includes promotional materials, safety information and answers to many common questions about vaccines.
Websites
August is National Immunization Awareness Month
August is National Immunization Awareness Month
With another school year around the corner, August is National Immunization Awareness Month. The CDC and San Antonio’s Metro Health have compiled helpful information, including immunization schedules and specific recommendations.
Best health information sites for English-language learners
Larry Ferlazzo is a former community organizer who now teaches English to both new and native speakers at a high school in Sacramento, California. He also publishes a tremendous guide to online teaching resources for English teachers and learners, and his blog, Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day, has consistently great links to new online resources to support teaching and learning — especially learning English.
About a month ago, he published a blog post with a fantastic list of “The Best Health Sites For English Language Learners”, in which he picks the top 12 sites that best bring together health information literacy with potential English language development. His recommendations are excellent, from EnglishMed‘s animated exercises for medical professionals learning workplace English, all the way up to MedinePlus’s Interactive Health Tutorials. Along the way, he recommends three different sites focused on oral health, one for kids’ health, and much more. Commenters to the post have added some other suggestions as well.
Border Binational Health Week: October 14-19, 2007
“The goal of BBHW is to promote sustainable partnerships to address border health problems. Intended outcomes include increased community and inter-agency networking relationships, increased information sharing and educational opportunities, and increased awareness of the BHC including state and local initiatives.” The BBHW site provides information about programs and activities by state, including conferences for health professionals and health fairs for consumers.
Briscoe Library Participates in the 2nd Annual San Antonio CHW/Promotor(a) Summit
Over 140 Community Health Workers (CHWs) attended the 2nd Annual San Antonio CHW/Promotor(a) Summit held on June 8th. Community Health Workers, also known as Promotores, are widely recognized as a vital part of the public health workforce in part by providing health literacy training and patient navigation services to undeserved populations. Through the many roles played by CHWs, the health disparities that exist in many parts of our nation are more effectively addressed on a community level. Texas is only one of 2 states that currently offer certification programs for CHWs.
The UT Health Science Center Briscoe Library attended the summit to promote resources from the National Library of Medicine (NLM) that support public health workers and health consumers alike with trusted health and research information. Peg Seger, Head of Outreach Services, and Patrick Lemelle, Outreach Library Assistant, provided demonstrations on MedlinePlus and PubMed while distributing and answering questions on many other NLM products and services. Of particular interest were the NLM Mobile Apps and Sites.
Earlier in the year, the Briscoe Library had collaborated with the University Health System CareLink program on a video in which the partnership between the library and the University Health System CareLink program was featured with a focus on the CareLink Patient Education Initiative: Using MedlinePlus Videos to Reach the Underserved. The CareLink Patient Education Initiative depends heavily on student interns from the Northwest Vista College Community Health Program in San Antonio. The video was played for summit attendees during a presentation by Rafael Maldonado, CareLink Education Director. This and a new MedlinePlus exhibit banner created quite a bit of additional interest in the use of NLM resources such as MedlinePlus.
Briscoe Library Outreach Services Assistant Patrick Lemelle and new MedlinePlus exhibit banner
Some Key Texas CHW Facts:
In the state of Texas, 280 individuals graduated from a DSHS-certified community health worker certification training program of at least 160 hours in 2011. A total of 53 instructors were newly certified…As of December 31, 2011, there were 1,583 community health workers, an increase of 37% as compared to 1,153 community health workers at the end of 2010. The number of Texas counties with at least one certified community health worker grew from 82 counties at the end of 2010 to 101 counties as of December 31, 2011, an increase of 23%. In the UT Health Science Center Libraries outreach services area, Hidalgo County has 153, Bexar 106, Cameron 98, Webb 25, Starr 7, and Willacy 0. Bexar county along with Webb, Hidalgo and Cameron are all locations for Promotor(a)/Community Health Worker Training & Certification Programs.
Texas Department of State Health Services, Community Health Workers – Promotor(a) or Community Health Worker Training and Certification Program. 2011 Annual Report: Promotor(a) or Community Health Worker Training and Certification Advisory Committee. Available at: http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/mch/chw/workforce.aspx . Accessed 6/15/12
CDC Epidemiological Statistics Online: WONDER
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) WONDER (Wide-ranging Online Data for Epidemiologic Research) website is a menu-driven system that makes the information resources of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) available to public health professionals and the public at large.
WONDER provides access to statistical research data published by CDC, as well as reference materials, reports and guidelines on health-related topics. It also can query numeric data sets on CDC’s computers, using “fill-in-the blank” web pages. Public-use data sets include mortality, cancer incidence, HIV and AIDS, tuberculosis, vaccinations, births, census data and many other topics are available for query. Data are then readily summarized and analyzed, with dynamically calculated statistics, charts and maps.
CDC’s enhanced Spanish-language site
From the press release:
“The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Spanish”l anguage Web site, CDC en Español, has been re”launched with a new look and new features that will make it more usable and functional.”
“The redesigned CDC en Español represents a vital source of health promotion and information for Spanish speakers,” said Dr. Julie L. Gerberding, Director of CDC. “CDC’s ongoing commitment to public health worldwide is expressed through our efforts to provide translation of vital information into Spanish to better serve all of our audiences for information. About half of the 16 million Hispanics online in the United States have expressed preference for Spanish”language Web sites and we are pleased to offer this improved tool.”
[Thanks to Siobhan Champ-Blackwell at Bringing Health Information to the Community.]
Citing Blogs — according to the NLM
Yes, that’s right, the National Library of Medicine’s style guide Citing Medicine now includes a reference format for citing an Internet blog — not only for citing an entire blog but also for citing specific blog entries or contributions. The guide also includes a wide variety of examples of proper blog citation style, including signed, anonymous, pseudonymous, organizational, foreign-language or governmental blogs.
