Increase health, vitality and quality of life for children and adolescents in South Carolina by increasing positive behaviors and decreasing at-risk behaviors. First Objective:
Identify or develop flagship programs in injury prevention and violence prevention as the first initiatives in modifying behavior of youth and families. | First Related Strategy - Review nationally recognized models to reduce and prevent risky behaviors. | Second Related Strategy - Develop and sustain community partners to build coalitions and advisory groups; define outcome objectives for specific programs; acquire knowledge of how to effectively work with communities. Third Related Strategy - Promote well-developed cultural competence on the part of faculty, staff, and students at MUSC who work with communities. | Second Objective:
Clarify goals for existing programs and develop clear measures of effectiveness for each program, encouraging scholarly review of outcomes as basis for continuation or expansion of specific programs. | First Related Strategy - Institute a model intervention program for violence reduction and prevention in target communities. Establish goal of reducing school dismissals for violence and of arrests of juvenile violent crime by 25% in community targeted by model intervention programs. | Second Related Strategy - Institute a model intervention program for injury prevention in target communities. Establish goal of reducing injuries by 25% in community targeted by model intervention program. | Third Objective:
Develop an overall strategy for impacting health through changing behavior, characterizing the necessary processes rather than assuming responsibility for making the interventions | First Related Strategy - Centralization of appropriate programs, data, and educational intervention within one administrative unit at MUSC. Develop a multidisciplinary group within the Institute of Community Health to integrate all MUSC-based programs and all state programs in which MUSC participates into a clearinghouse so that programs can be developed jointly and reinforce each otherÕs impact on the behavior of child, parents, and community. | Second Related Strategy - Identify and coordinate ongoing programs at MUSC focused on changing behavior of parents and children with regards to parenting, safety, and prevention of violence. | Third Related Strategy - Identify strategies to facilitate communication and coordinate strategies between Colleges at MUSC, since several have programs in relevant areas. | Fourth Related Strategy - Coordinate and integrate activities with other groups, e.g. Children's Hospital Consortium (South Carolina Children's Hospitals focusing on child abuse and neglect), Safe Kids (South Carolina Hospital Association focusing on injury prevention). |
Considerations:
Measuring behavioral outcomes is difficult. Obtaining satisfactory information from schools or state agencies on violence may also be difficult. Without the ability to define measures of success, the ability to solicit assistance and coordinate interdisciplinary programs from existing programs that are service-oriented will be compromised. Within MUSC alone, the Departments of Health Administration and Policy, Pediatrics, Psychiatry, Family Medicine, and various constituent groups within the colleges of MUSC will be held accountable for progress in this area. The University must establish priorities and focus on programs that have highest yield in altering behaviors that produce the greatest reductions in violence and in injuries, Establishing effective partnerships with community groups will be challenged by communities' current view that MUSC may be self-serving or opportunistic. The establishment of a Community Advisory Committee for the Institute for Community Health, consisting of individuals from interested community agencies (e.g., United Way, churches, NAACP, YMCA, YWCA, MayorÕs Commission on Youth and Families, County Departments of Mental Health, School Boards) must be invested in collaborating with MUSC faculty and staff in developing targeted programs. First Goal- Heatlhy Youth and Development Work Group
Third Goal- Heatlhy Youth and Development Work Group |
