Teen Tobacco Use Prevention Project

Inspired by the success of the Northeastern Partnership’s Touch No Tobacco (TNT) Teen Tobacco Initiative prevention project, the South Central Partnership partnered with the NC Institute for Public Health to develop a regional approach to tobacco use and prevention in its region.  In order to do this, project coordinator, Jennifer Ersek, was hired to identify the current gaps and needs in the region, locate potential and existing resources within schools and communities to address youth tobacco use, determine best practices used in youth tobacco prevention control, locate additional funding sources, recommend next steps, and present this to the partnership.  The report written by Jennifer is provided below.

To complement this initiative, the partnership established the South Central Youth Tobacco Prevention Task force and charged it with meeting to determine barriers to youth tobacco prevention and cessation programs. 

Back to partnership page

Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative

Though data and experience shows that the South Central region of has a rate of teen pregnancy higher than the state average, little is known about the true scope and scale of this problem. Graduate Research Assistant, Abigail Haydon, was brought on board to interview staff to gain insight on the scope of the problem, assess resources that are available for programmatic efforts, and obtain information about anticipated opportunities and barriers related to a regional approach for addressing issues of adolescent pregnancy, in addition to conducting telephone interviews with other community agency representatives and community stakeholders.  The report is provided below. The South Central Partnership is currently working to plan next steps for implementation and funding.

Back to partnership page

 

Teen Health Initiative Established to Combine Efforts from Teen Pregnancy and Tobacco Use Cessation Initiatives

Based on report recommendations provided by both the Teen Pregnancy Prevention and Tobacco Use Cessation Initiatives, a joint tobacco and teen pregnancy prevention initiative was established to address the partnership’s priority on youth issues from the perspective of a “teen health” program, thus diffusing some of the potential controversy surrounding tobacco and teen pregnancy issues.  Activities recommended for this initiative were to host a youth forum, use peer-based tobacco prevention as the service learning component of a teen pregnancy prevention program, create an after school youth club, and sponsor teen pregnancy and teen tobacco prevention trainings.  A detailed recommendation report is provided below.  Since these recommendations were provided, two Youth Forums were held, one in Montgomery county and one in Scotland county.  Evaluations were conducted for both forums.

Back to partnership page

Health Care Access Expansion

A model for innovation in public health, the mission for health care access expansion is to build on the Lee Primary Care Plus (LPCP) program and adapt the concept in other counties within the South Central Partnership. LPCP is a grassroots effort to provide affordable basic primary and preventative care and workplace health promotion plans to low wage employees of small businesses within the region. Based on marketing research recommendations and additional primary care clinic pilot testing, a new site will be established at the Anson County health department.

SC Partnership Primary Care & Worksite Wellness Task Force

To complement this project, a Primary Care Access and Worksite Wellness Expansion Task Force comprised of South Central Partnership health department staff will hold a forum to highlight examples of successful county employee based primary care clinics.

The forum, to be held in the South Central region in June, 2008, will include health directors, county commissioners, county managers, and others who will benefit from hearing what works and what challenges exist in offering a primary care clinic for county employees.

After the forum, a report outlining the findings from the region will be compiled and presented at a November statewide worksite wellness symposium at the Friday Center in Chapel Hill. After November, the task force will focus on implementing what works best in both primary care access and worksite wellness for county employees.

Back to partnership page

HPV / Cancer Prevention Social Marketing Campaign

With a new vaccine available to address cancer prevention among women who could contract Human Papillomavirus (HPV), a cervical cancer precursor, the South Central Partnership seeks to be part of the solution to preventing cervical cancer and promoting health and wellness in young adults. This project, called The HPV Vaccine Project, is a collaborative public health effort that aims to prevent cervical cancer by increasing HPV vaccination among adolescent girls in the thirteen-county partnership region. For this two year initiative, the partners will identify specific needs of the target audience, and develop a feasible and effective implementation plan for the educational campaign. This project will be the product of a research and practice partnership between the South Central Partnership for Public Health, UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health, UNC School of Journalism and Mass Communication, Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, the North Carolina Division of Public Health and several local and regional partners. Read below to learn more about the project.

This project would not have been successful without the knowledge, energy, and commitment of Project Coordinator, Heather K. Gates, and three student interns: Sabrina Boyce, Terence Ng, and Autumn Shafer (from right to left).

Back to partnership page

Environmental Data Collection Automation

For this continued initiative, the South Central Partnership will move to completely automate its environmental health data collection systems in order to improve capacity to better respond to community needs. Partnership counties used year-end funds to purchase software and training for food and lodging modules, in addition to a limited number of tablet personal computers and printers to initiate the automation of these activities. In moving forward, the Partnership will provide much needed hardware and software for all participating counties. Training and implementation of onsite wells and wastewater applications for environmental health will also be provided as a next step. The South Central Partnership anticipates the complete automation of its environmental health data collection systems by Summer 2008.

Back to partnership page