Erie Niagara Area Health Education Center

In a state as large as New York, a steady stream of smart, innovative work is coming from NYHealth grantees and non-grantees alike that is relevant to NYHealth’s priority areas of Building Healthy Communities and Empowering Health Care Consumers and its focus area on Veterans’ Health.

These organizations should be elevating their work and informing key stakeholders at regional, statewide, and national conferences, meetings, and other convenings. Yet, because of a lack of resources, they are often unable to do so. To address this issue, NYHealth awarded grants through its Sponsoring Conference Participation in Support of Healthy Communities, Consumer Empowerment, and Veterans’ Health Request for Proposals (RFP). Through this RFP, NYHealth sponsored low-resource organizations to attend and present at local, State, and national conferences related to these areas. In 2017, NYHealth awarded the Erie Niagara Area Health Education Center (ENAHEC) a grant to participate in this initiative as part of its efforts to empower health care consumers.

With NYHealth funding, two ENAHEC staff members attended the joint International Conference on Communication in Healthcare and Health Literacy Annual Research Conference. Staff members gained important insights into how to reduce health disparities in at-risk populations through better patient-provider communication by addressing cultural and health literacy barriers. In addition, ENAHEC staff made professional connections with other organizations, both within the United States and the internationally, that could result in future partnerships and new health literacy projects that will positively impact the Western New York region.

View a complete list of conference participation grantees.