Health Education
In order to keep our communities healthy, our faculty, staff, and community partners are constantly striving to educate and serve those who need care most. We know that good health relies on a number of societal and environmental factors– that’s why we are involved with, or have funded, programs to foster greater wellness. From running food drives within the department for PORCH, to offering patient self-management classes like “Living Healthy” for those with chronic illness, we making efforts to look out for our communities.
Honduran Health Alliance
The mission of this alliance is To collaborate with local communities in order to provide annual cervical cancer screenings, give health education charlas, and provide family planning resources. The ultimate vision is “To eliminate cervical cancer and to create universal knowledge of and access to family planning resources in the underserved communities with which we collaborate. Read more here.
Reach Out and Read
Reach Out and Read is an national organization that works with UNC Family Medicine to obtain books for our pediatric patients. More than 300 books are given away every year at the Family Medicine Center. To learn more about why programs such as this one matter, click here.
Living Healthy
Living Healthy is a 6 week course designed for people who are dealing with a chronic disease. It can be anything from asthma to arthritis to diabetes, the program doesn’t exclude any type of chronic illness. We mainly host classes in Orange, Chatham and Alamance Counties. The class would meet 1 time a week for 6 weeks. Each participant will receive a free book when they join the class and will also receive an incentive that correlates with the chapter each time they attend the class. Read more here.
Tobacco Treatment Program
The Tobacco Treatment Program (TTP) program provides leadership for implementing comprehensive tobacco use treatment services, education and training, and disseminating resources for promoting tobacco free communities. The organization’s primary goal is to support tobacco-free individuals and communities. We are here to help with the support that you need to live tobacco free. Click here to read more.
Proyecto Puentes de Salud
PPS was founded in 2006 by a group of UNC Medical students with an interest in providing screenings for chronic disease in rural Mexico. The project began in Juventino Rosas, a small working class city in Guanajuato State. Juventino Rosas was selected as initial migration from Mexico to the Chapel Hill region of North Carolina was largely from central Guanajuato and a sister city collaboration had been established with the Catholic Church in Juventino Rosas and St. Thomas Moore Catholic Church in Chapel Hill. Each year medical students, now working with faculty from the UNC Department of Family Medicine, spend the fall and winter planning for performing health fairs and doing community based research for 5-6 weeks during the summer. Research projects have included topics on childhood obesity, effects of taxes on sugar sweetened beverages, incidence of depression and dietary habits among others. The program expanded in 2011 to serve rural communities surrounding San Miguel de Allende. To read more click here.