[PA-14] The Bayfront African American Health Forum
Dawn E. Jones, MS, Bayfront Medical Center, St. Petersburg, FL
The Bayfront African American Health Forum, founded in '98, focuses on health care issues - identified by the Comprehensive Assessment for Tracking Community Health - in African Americans living in St. Petersburg, Florida. The forum's core components include a physician-led health care discussion, a question/answer session, and free screenings. In '00 the forum reached 250 community members; in '01, the participation doubled. The '01 forum screened 273 people for diabetes and hypertension, and 176 for elevated cholesterol. Twenty-five women received clinical breast exams.
To increase participation in the African American Health Forum the committee, comprised of physicians, nurses, health educators and community leaders from various organizations, concentrated on marketing and public relations. The committee examined common themes, beliefs, and traditions in the African American community and united them with a health care prevention and early detection message. The African American Health Forum evolved into a Celebration of Health. In addition to the forum's core components, the committee added a family barbecue and entertainment.
The 2001 African American Health Forum committee agreed on a Celebration of Health design and then created posters, mailers, and cardboard displays with this theme. The mailer was sent to residents living in zip codes, identified by the Comprehensive Assessment for Tracking Community Health results, with a racial and ethnic healthcare gap. The committee distributed African American Health Forum marketing and public relations pieces. to places of worship, and beauty and barbershops. Marketing efforts also targeted predominately African American readership publications.
Increased participation at the 2001 African American Health Forum is attributed to the Celebration of Health theme and activities, and aggressive marketing efforts
