165: New Healthy Aging Program

ROBERT JOHNSON:

This is Public Health Review Morning Edition for Tuesday, April 26th, 2022. I'm Robert Johnson.

Now, today's news from the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials.

The Trust for America's Health has unveiled a new program to give agencies credit for their commitment to healthy aging in their jurisdictions.

Megan Wolfe is a senior policy development manager at The Trust. She explains the program in today's morning conversation.

What is the Age-Friendly Public Health Systems Recognition Program?

MEGAN WOLFE:

Well, this is a program that we designed to honor and recognize the great work that state and local health departments are doing to improve the health and wellbeing of older adults in their states or their jurisdictions.

So, for many health departments who are not yet engaged in healthy aging, it's really a way for them to think about and take some first steps in older adult health and hopefully incentivize some healthy aging actions that are framed by our six C's framework—the six C's being roles for public health like connecting and convening multi-sector stakeholders or collecting data on older adults, those kinds of things. So, the recognition program is designed to recognize and incentivize that work.

JOHNSON:

Can you tell us how the program actually works? How does it roll out?

WOLFE:

So, folks get enrolled in the program on our website at afphs.org under the Recognition Program tab, or send an email to us from the website as well.

And there are three basic tiers in the program. The first is for individuals: so, for those who view or attend six of our healthy aging trainings, we designate them as champions, AFPHS champions—AFPHS is age-friendly public health systems.

And then, for departments of health that complete and submit an action plan that outlines an activity within each of the six C's of our framework, we designate them as AFPHS-recognized, and then that's it really. It's just the action plan is an indication of commitment to actions to address older adult health.

JOHNSON:

What's the value, then, of this recognition to a public health department?

WOLFE:

Well, Robert, you know, the growing older adult population in our country is going to impact every single state over the coming years. In fact, there are 10,000 people every day that turn 65, and we learned during COVID the importance of recognizing the health and social challenges of this growing population.

So, at this point, we know that healthy aging work can be really trailblazing in a state or in a health department, and we want to recognize the efforts of those willing to champion this work. Becoming recognized as an age-friendly public health system we hope will bring more value to departments or will help them to engage with other agencies in this work in their state, and as well as stakeholders and potentially funders who are interested in healthy aging projects.

Ultimately, we want to honor those who are undertaking this important work.

JOHNSON:

Get more details about the program using the link in the show notes.

ASTHO will deliver a report later this week detailing strategies to improve youth behavioral outcomes. There's a webinar planned to outline the report on April 28th.

Anne Bowles is with the Council of Chief State School Officers and joins the panel discussion on Thursday. She explains how ASTHO members can work with educators in their states and territories.

ANNE BOWLES:

So, members can collaborate on a comprehensive mental health framework to guide student wellbeing, such as a multi-tiered system of supports framework. Creating a shared and inclusive language such as person-first language that incorporates the lived experiences and voices of youth and families is also critical to the formation of cross-sector collaborations. This can be achieved by creating youth and family networks to inform all the stages of program implementation.

JOHNSON:

Sign up for the webinar using the link in the show notes.

Also today, two public health professionals enrolled in a new leadership program share their experiences in an ASTHO blog article now online.

Andrea Lowe and Harold Gil work in public health in Nebraska and Washington state. They are two of many scholars in the Diverse Executives Leading in Public Health Program hosted by ASTHO and the Satcher Health Leadership Institute at the Morehouse School of Medicine. The blog article is linked in the show notes.

Finally, the ASTHO Public Health TechXpo has a new gold sponsor: Guidehouse Health works with government agencies, health systems, and others to solve unique market challenges.

You can meet the Guidehouse team if you register for the Xpo, planned for May 10th and 11th online. There's a link to the Xpo website in the show notes.

Before we go, we want to remind you to follow the show on your podcast app. And if you're on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn, we'd love a shout out.

That'll do it for today's newscast. We're back tomorrow morning with more ASTHO news and information.

I'm Robert Johnson. You're listening to Public Health Review Morning Edition. Have a great day.