HEALTHY HERE
We all want to be healthy but that can be hard if the right supports aren’t in place. For example, it can be hard to eat healthy when it’s too expensive to buy fresh and local fruits and vegetables, they’re not sold in your neighborhood, or they’re not offered in the schools. It can be hard to be physically active when places like streets, sidewalks, and parks aren’t easy, safe, and enjoyable to use. And it can be hard to manage a chronic disease, like diabetes, when you aren’t connected to a system that helps you do so.
That’s why Healthy Here exists. We’re working to change systems and environments to make it easier for Hispanic, Latino, and Native American residents of the International District and South Valley to access healthy foods, be physically active, and manage chronic disease. We do this with the help of a large network of partners, all of which have years of experience and expertise working in communities. Collectively our impact is stronger than when we work alone.
Healthy Here is an initiative of the Health Equity Council. It’s funded through the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s REACH (Racial and Ethnic Approaches to Community Health) award and managed by Presbyterian Healthcare Services.
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Be Physically Active
Walking is one of the best ways to connect with friends and family, spend time in the fresh air, and see your neighborhood. Short on time? No problem, just walk close to home. Healthy Here partners are proud to be in collaboration with a grant from the National Association of Chronic Disease Directors to make walking the easy choice for our communities through the Walk with Ease program.
To sign up please visit the site: http://www.bchealthcouncil.org/Walk-with-Ease
Additionally, Healthy Here partners are proud to be a part of the annual open streets event, ABQ CiQlovía. Learn more about this community building event promoting safe, accessible streets by visiting the Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/abqciqlovia/.
Eat Healthy
The Healthy Here Mobile Farmers’ Market is a collaborative focused on improving health equity for low-income individuals and families in Bernalillo County by supporting local farmers and increasing access to and education about affordable, healthy, locally produced foods. The Healthy Here Mobile Farmers’ Market, a farmer’s market on wheels, provides Albuquerque’s International District and South Valley with healthy, affordable, organically grown fruits and vegetables, and educational resources for how to prepare the market’s offerings in cost-effective, delicious and easy ways.
This effort is part of the Healthy Here initiative that includes Presbyterian Healthcare Services, Bernalillo County Community Health Council and 14 other community partners. The Healthy Here Mobile Farmers’ Market made stops at various health clinics, middle schools and community centers on Mondays and Tuesdays between June and October during the season. The 2020 market season is pausing operations for the duration of the 2020 season. Thank you to everyone who has made this season special. Please emailnenoah@phs.org with any questions.
Be Well
Healthy Here Community and Clinical Linkages: The Wellness Referral Center (WRC)The Wellness Referral Center (WRC) was born in REACH Year 2 as a way to increase connections between community members and available health care and wellness resources (i.e., “community and clinical linkages). To achieve this goal, the WRC engages providers in referring their patients to community-based programs to prevent and manage chronic disease (e.g. chronic disease self-management classes, cooking and nutrition education, and walking groups).
Led by Adelante, First Choice and Presbyterian Center for Community Health–and beginning with a pilot program at First Choice–the WRC currently engages a majority of the clinics in both the South Valley and International District. The WRC continues to grow deeper roots in these provider organizations, as well as expanding outside of these communities. There are currently wait-lists as we grow the opportunities of community program schedules to accommodate the demand. Amid the COVI19 Pandemic the WRC continues to fill chronic disease workshops and schedule hundreds of patients in wellness programs. The WRC seeks to embed the referral process as a lasting and beneficial systemic change.
Funding for the Walk with Ease program is supported by the Grant or Cooperative Agreement Number 5NU58DP006261-03, funded by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or the Department of Health and Human Services.