Bridging Health Gap: Empowering Rural and Underserved Georgia through the Health Equity Navigator Initiative
Abstract
Background: The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic underscored the urgent need to address health disparities in underserved and vulnerable populations. Minority and rural populations faced challenges accessing healthcare and trustworthy information. The Annex 737 COVID-19 Health Equity Navigator Program (HENP) was implemented to address pandemic-driven health disparities in underserved and vulnerable populations in Georgia.
Purpose: To Investigate the perception of the utility of health navigators in bridging healthcare gaps among rural and underserved Georgians.
Methods: After obtaining IRB approval, we employed the Survey Monkey platform to distribute surveys to adult residents in 12 Georgia Public Health District 4 counties. The surveys gauged their awareness of local health facilities and resources, encountered access barriers, and experiences with healthcare navigation. The Mercer University School of Medicine HENP staff educated the community on their roles and connected them to relevant health resources during health fairs and other events, including summer youth camps and the MUSM teddy bear clinic. Data was summarized using descriptive statistics.
Results: Out of the 269 individuals who took part in the survey, the majority were women (86%), identified as Blacks/African Americans (59%), had a university or college education (72%), and lived in rural areas (67%). While 55% of respondents used face masks for protection against COVID-19, and 65% believed in the benefits of being vaccinated, only 18% perceived their families to be at a high risk of COVID-19 infections. Despite high reliance (88%) on primary care providers for health information, participants recognized the potential of health navigators to improve their health resource awareness (72%), streamline healthcare utilization (73%), and positively impact perceptions of healthcare access (70%)
Conclusion: Overall, our findings suggest that health equity navigators could be crucial in reducing healthcare disparities and enhancing population health among Georgians.
Keywords
Health Equity Navigators, Healthcare gaps, resources, inequality, rural, underserved, minority equity
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Bridging Health Gap: Empowering Rural and Underserved Georgia through the Health Equity Navigator Initiative
Background: The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic underscored the urgent need to address health disparities in underserved and vulnerable populations. Minority and rural populations faced challenges accessing healthcare and trustworthy information. The Annex 737 COVID-19 Health Equity Navigator Program (HENP) was implemented to address pandemic-driven health disparities in underserved and vulnerable populations in Georgia.
Purpose: To Investigate the perception of the utility of health navigators in bridging healthcare gaps among rural and underserved Georgians.
Methods: After obtaining IRB approval, we employed the Survey Monkey platform to distribute surveys to adult residents in 12 Georgia Public Health District 4 counties. The surveys gauged their awareness of local health facilities and resources, encountered access barriers, and experiences with healthcare navigation. The Mercer University School of Medicine HENP staff educated the community on their roles and connected them to relevant health resources during health fairs and other events, including summer youth camps and the MUSM teddy bear clinic. Data was summarized using descriptive statistics.
Results: Out of the 269 individuals who took part in the survey, the majority were women (86%), identified as Blacks/African Americans (59%), had a university or college education (72%), and lived in rural areas (67%). While 55% of respondents used face masks for protection against COVID-19, and 65% believed in the benefits of being vaccinated, only 18% perceived their families to be at a high risk of COVID-19 infections. Despite high reliance (88%) on primary care providers for health information, participants recognized the potential of health navigators to improve their health resource awareness (72%), streamline healthcare utilization (73%), and positively impact perceptions of healthcare access (70%)
Conclusion: Overall, our findings suggest that health equity navigators could be crucial in reducing healthcare disparities and enhancing population health among Georgians.
