Innovative Approaches to Improve COVID-19 Case Investigation and Contact Tracing Among Refugees, Immigrants, and Migrants: Lessons Learned from a Newly Established National Resource Center.

Effective COVID-19 case investigation and contact tracing (CICT) among refugee, immigrant, and migrant (RIM) communities requires innovative approaches to address linguistic, cultural and community specific preferences. The National Resource Center for Refugees, Immigrants, and Migrants (NRC-RIM) is a CDC-funded initiative to support state and local health departments with COVID-19 response among RIM communities, including CICT. This note from the field will describe NRC-RIM and initial outcomes and lessons learned, including the use of human-centered design to develop health messaging around COVID-19 CICT; training developed for case investigators, contact tracers, and other public health professionals working with RIM community members; and promising practices and other resources related to COVID-19 CICT among RIM communities that have been implemented by health departments, health systems, or community-based organizations.

Connecting healthcare professionals in Central America through management and leadership development: a social network analysis.

BACKGROUND: Leadership and management training has become increasingly important in the education of health care professionals. Previous research has shown the benefits that a network provides to its members, such as access to resources and information, but ideas for creating these networks vary. This study used social network analysis to explore the interactions among Central American Healthcare Initiative (CAHI) Fellowship alumni and learn more about information sharing, mentoring, and project development activities among alumni. The CAHI Fellowship provides leadership and management training for multidisciplinary healthcare professionals to reduce health inequities in the region. Access to a network was previously reported as one of the top benefits of the program. RESULTS: Information shared from the work of 100 CAHI fellows from six countries, especially within the same country, was analyzed. Mentoring relationships clustered around professions and project types, and networks of joint projects clustered by country. Mentorship, which CAHI management promoted, and joint project networks, in which members voluntarily engaged, had similar inclusiveness ratios. CONCLUSION: Social networks are strategic tools for health care leadership development programs to increase their impact by promoting interactions among participants. These programs can amplify intergenerational and intercountry ties by organizing events, provide opportunities for alumni to meet, assign mentors, and support collaborative action groups. Collaborative networks have great value to potentiate health professionals' leadership and management capabilities in a resource-constrained setting, such as the Global South.

War and displacement stressors and coping mechanisms of Syrian urban refugee families living in Istanbul.

The overall purpose of this study was to achieve a contextual understanding of war and displacement stressors and coping mechanisms among urban refugee families from Syria living in Istanbul. This study was informed primarily by Walsh's family resilience framework and Weine's Family Consequences of Refugee Trauma empirical model. Qualitative family interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of 30 Syrian refugee families from the Çapa and Esenler neighborhoods of Istanbul. Data were analyzed using a grounded theory approach and Atlas/ti software. The analysis identified a total of 21 war and displacement stressors for families across 3 categories: (a) Surviving war and border crossing; (b) Living as urban refugees, and; (c) Parenting children in refuge. The analysis also identified a total of 16 coping mechanisms for families across 4 themes: (a) Flexible and reciprocal family organization; (b) Hopeful family beliefs and communication; (c) Staying connected with family in Syria and in exile, and; (d) Making the best of living in a new country. These findings underlie the need for several practice and policy priorities including: (a) Increasing the number of children attending Turkish schools and decreasing child labor; (b) Incorporating faith into psycho-social and mental health interventions, and; (c) Developing family focused interventions conducted by community-based lay providers that draw upon empirical models of family stressors and coping. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Management training in global health education: a Health Innovation Fellowship training program to bring healthcare to low-income communities in Central America.

BACKGROUND: Interprofessional education is increasingly recognized as essential for health education worldwide. Although effective management, innovation, and entrepreneurship are necessary to improve health systems, business schools have been underrepresented in global health education. Central America needs more health professionals trained in health management and innovation to respond to health disparities, especially in rural communities. OBJECTIVE: This paper explores the impact of the Health Innovation Fellowship (HIF), a new training program for practicing health professionals offered jointly by the Central American Healthcare Initiative and INCAE Business School, Costa Rica. Launched in 2014, HIF's goal is to create a network of highly trained interdisciplinary health professionals in competencies to improve health of Central American communities through better health management. METHODS: The program's fellows carried out innovative healthcare projects in their local regions. The first three annual cohorts (total of 43 fellows) represented all health-related professions and sectors (private, public, and civil society) from six Central American countries. All fellows attended four 1-week, on-site modular training sessions, received ongoing mentorship, and stayed connected through formal and informal networks and webinars through which they exchange knowledge and support each other. CAHI stakeholders supported HIF financially. RESULTS: Impact evaluation of the three-year pilot training program is positive: fellows improved their health management skills and more than 50% of the projects found either financial or political support for their implementation. CONCLUSIONS: HIF's strengths include that both program leaders and trainees come from the Global South, and that HIF offers a platform to collaborate with partners in the Global North. By focusing on promoting innovation and management at a top business school in the region, HIF constitutes a novel capacity-building effort within global health education. HIF is a capacity-building effort that can be scaled up in the region and other low- and middle-income countries.

Primary Care Screening Methods and Outcomes for Asylum Seekers in New York City.

Effective screening in primary care among asylum-seekers in the US is critical as this population grows. This study aimed to evaluate disease prevalence and screening methods in this high-risk group. Two hundred ten new clients from 51 countries, plus Tibet, who were accepted into a program for asylum seekers from 2012 to 2014 were included. Screening rates and outcomes for infectious, non-communicable, and mental illnesses were evaluated. Screening rates were highest for PTSD, depression, hepatitis B, and latent tuberculosis. Seventy-one percent of clients screened positive for depression and 55 % for PTSD, followed by latent tuberculosis (41 %), hypertension (10 %), hepatitis B (9.4 %), and HIV (0.8 %). Overall screening rates were high. Point of care testing was more effective than testing that required a repeat visit. A large psychiatric and infectious disease burden was identified. These findings can inform future primary care screening efforts for asylum seekers in the US.

The Role of Plasma Triglyceride/High-Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol Ratio to Predict New Cardiovascular Events in Essential Hypertensive Patients.

Triglyceride (TG) to high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) ratio (TG/HDL-C) has been suggested as a simple method to identify unfavorable cardiovascular outcomes in the general population. The effect of the TG/HDL-C ratio on essential hypertensive patients is unclear. About 900 consecutive essential hypertensive patients (mean age 52.9±12.6 years, 54.2% male) who visited our outpatient hypertension clinic were analyzed. Participants were divided into quartiles based on baseline TG/HDL-C ratio and medical records were obtained periodically for the occurrence of fatal events and composite major adverse cardiovascular events (MACEs) including transient ischemic attack, stroke, aortic dissection, acute coronary syndrome, and death. Participants were followed for a median of 40 months (interquartile range, 35-44 months). Overall, a higher quartile of TG/HDL-C ratio at baseline was significantly linked with higher incidence of fatal and nonfatal cardiovascular events. Using multivariate Cox regression analysis, plasma TG/HDL-C ratio was independently associated with increased risk of fatal events (hazard ratio [HR], 1.25; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.13-1.37; P≤.001] and MACEs (HR, 1.13; 95% CI, 1.06-1.21; P≤.001). Increased plasma TG/HDL-C ratio was associated with more fatal events and MACEs in essential hypertensive patients.

Clinical value of ambulatory blood pressure: Is it time to recommend for all patients with hypertension?

Hypertension is a very common disease, and office measurements of blood pressure are frequently inaccurate. Ambulatory Blood Pressure Monitoring (ABPM) offers a more accurate diagnosis, more detailed readings of average blood pressures, better blood pressure measurement during sleep, fewer false positives by detecting more white-coat hypertension, and fewer false negatives by detecting more masked hypertension. ABPM offers better management of clinical outcomes. For example, based on more accurate measurements of blood pressure variability, ABPM demonstrates that taking antihypertensive medication at night leads to better controlled nocturnal blood pressure, which translates into less end organ damage and fewer clinical complications of hypertension. For these reasons, albeit some shortcomings which were discussed, ABPM should be considered as a first-line tool for diagnosing and managing hypertension.

Teaching global health with simulations and case discussions in a medical student selective.

BACKGROUND: Among US medical schools, demand for Global Health (GH) programs continues to grow. At the same time, cultural competency training has become a priority for medical students who will care for an increasingly diverse US patient population. We describe a pilot period for a new GH Selective designed to introduce medical students to global medicine and enhance culturally-sensitive communication skills. METHODS: As a 4-week clinical clerkship, the GH Selective was offered annually over a three-year period to a total of 33 students. Activities included clinical assignments, cultural competency and clinical skills simulations, patient case discussions in tropical medicine, journal clubs, and lectures. Faculty assessments of student performance and student evaluations of course content were focused on 6 course objectives, adapted from standardized GH objectives. RESULTS: For each offering of the GH Selective, at least 40 faculty members and fellows volunteered over 200 teaching hours from 11 medical school departments. Student feedback was consistently positive through competency-based curricular evaluations. As a result of its successes, the course is now offered on a biannual basis. DISCUSSION: Experiential, student-centered teaching employed in this course proved successful as an introduction to delivery of evidence-based and culturally sensitive GH. Special emphasis on working with standardized patients in interdisciplinary and cross-cultural simulations provided students with clinical skills applicable for care provided both locally and on international rotations. CONCLUSION: With a special emphasis on cross-cultural sensitivity, this pilot elective trained future practitioners in fund of knowledge, clinical skills, and service delivery methods in GH.

Health Outcomes of Traumatic Brain Injury Among Refugee Survivors of Torture.

OBJECTIVE: To compare spontaneous reporting of health complaints in a sample of refugee survivors of torture with a history of moderate/severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) with survivors of torture without TBI and analyze the contribution of posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms to health outcomes. PARTICIPANTS: Treatment-seeking refugee survivors of torture with a moderate/severe TBI (n = 85) and a control group (n = 72) of survivors who suffered a physical injury during their persecution but had no history of a head injury. MEASURES: Health outcomes included a self-report of general physical health (scale 1-5), number of medical visits, and a scaled score of the number of health complaints. The Harvard Trauma Questionnaire (HTQ) was used to measure posttraumatic stress disorder. RESULTS: Moderate/severe TBI was associated with more health complaints but not higher HTQ scores. TBI and HTQ scores are independently associated with a greater number of health complaints, and an interaction between TBI and HTQ scores suggests that the relationship between moderate/severe TBI and the number of health complaints strengthened with increased posttraumatic stress disorder symptom severity. CONCLUSIONS: Health complaints may be a common expression of psychological trauma, and service providers should be certain to explore both medical and psychological contributors when assessing refugee survivors of torture.

The global health curriculum of Weill Cornell Medical College: how one school developed a global health program.

Since 2009, a multidisciplinary team at Weill Cornell Medical College (WCMC) has collaborated to create a comprehensive, elective global health curriculum (GHC) for medical students. Increasing student interest sparked the development of this program, which has grown from ad hoc lectures and dispersed international electives into a comprehensive four-year elective pathway with over 100 hours of training, including three courses, two international experiences, a preceptorship with a clinician working with underserved populations in New York City, and regular lectures and seminars by visiting global health leaders. Student and administrative enthusiasm has been strong: In academic years 2009, 2010, and 2011, over half of the first-year students (173 of 311)participated in some aspect of the GHC, and 18% (55 of 311) completed all first-year program requirements.The authors cite the student-driven nature of GHC as a major factor in its success and rapid growth. Also important was the foundation previously established by WCMC global health faculty, the serendipitous timing of the GHC's development in the midst of curricular reform and review, as well as the presence of a full-time, nonclinical Global Health Fellow who served as a program coordinator. Given the enormous expansion of medical student interest in global health training throughout the United States and Canada over the past decade, the authors hope that medical schools developing similar programs will find the experience at Weill Cornell informative and helpful.