On Friday, August 23rd, Care Resource medical providers and staff participated in a round table to engage in meaningful discussion about “Ending the HIV Epidemic: A Plan for America” – a major goal of the President of the United States and his administration. Notable attendees included Congresswoman Frederica Wilson and Dr. Robert Redfield, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), along with other federal, state, local officials and representatives of community-based organizations, and the private sector. This round table afforded the opportunity to share best practices, address challenges, make recommendations and implement the initiative. At the end of the session, Dr. Redfield commented that this is time to be “disruptively creative.”
Participants were invited to provide their feedback about:
• Successes that can be viewed as best practices
• Challenges addressing HIV/AIDS to elevate to the CDC’s attention
• Recommendations for CDC/HHS related to implementing the “Ending the HIV Epidemic” initiative, including thoughts about how funds from this initiative can best be spent in our community.
Douglas Steele, RN, Interim Director of Medical Care Services, Hudes Desrameaux, MPH, Chief Development Officer and Ron Ledain, MBA, Director of Marketing, Health Promotion and Linkage meeting with Dr. Robert Redfield, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Resources from the CDC will be distributed for planning, the development of strategic plans and the refinement of community needs to further local ownership of the development processes, the consideration of broader environmental or systems factors, the integration and coordination of program initiatives between different stakeholders such as government and private sector partners.
Care Resource serves communities that otherwise confront financial, geographic, linguistic, cultural, or other barriers to accessing healthcare. As a Federally Qualified Health Center, it provides comprehensive primary medical and preventive care, including medical, dental, and behavioral health/substance abuse care in addition to social and nutritional support services to all individuals in our community.
