A recent focus of the Population and Community Health team at Cooper has been vaccine education for the Camden community through online and in-person community forums. Pictured is the Kroc Center in Camden, the site of Cooper’s COVID-19 Vaccination and Education Center.
Last week, April 5-11, was National Public Health Week. Cooper University Health Care has a community outreach team that demonstrates the work done in public health within the department of Population Health. The focus of Population Health is to transform care delivery to empower patients and improve the health of our community.
“Our Community outreach programs provide education, awareness, and health promotion to the communities we serve. We work collaboratively with community partners to educate and increase awareness about conditions that impact our patients and community members. Where appropriate, we address their social determinant of health related needs and connect them with appropriate community based resources,” said Max Kursh, Director for Community and Population Health. Max’s role is to work with Cooper departments and community organizations to develop programming that impacts the health of our community. “Most recently, we have been focusing on vaccine education for the Camden community through online and in-person community forums. Through these sessions we have been able to spread the word about COVID-19 vaccines, enhance access, support registration, and answer community member questions.”
Max’s team includes many different roles and responsibilities. For example:
- The Community outreach coordinator has extensive capacity and community collaboration experience. They work with community organizations to offer Cooper services, screenings, educational forums and coordinate our food distribution events.
- The new Community Health Worker Program is made up of staff who have deep understandings and come from the communities they are serving. This team works closely with patients to address social determinant of health related goals within Camden and Gloucester City.
- The Accountable Health Communities screeners work in the ED to assess and refer patients with community resources and services.
In 2020, the Population Health team helped transform their Teddy Goes to Cooper event, a popular educational field trip to Cooper Hospital for kindergarten students from KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy, from an on-site to an online event.
According to Max, a population health background is not required for being part of his team, but is helpful. “Overall, people who are passionate about improving the health of their communities and people who have the ability to build relationships will do well.”
Thanks Max for giving us more insight into everything your team is doing at Cooper and throughout Camden for the health of our patients and community!