The National Center for Farmworker Health (NCFH) is a non-profit organization located in Hays County, TX which provides training and technical assistance to federally funded health centers across the U.S. For the past 16 years, NCFH has developed and implemented cancer prevention programs with Hispanic communities and provided capacity building to Community Health Worker (CHW) organizations on various health topics, including breast and cervical cancer through its Cultivando La Salud (CLS) Program.

CLS is a nationally recognized, evidence-based program, developed by NCFH, and replicated in many communities around the country. It has been specifically developed to address the need for...

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The National Center for Farmworker Health (NCFH) is a non-profit organization located in Hays County, TX which provides training and technical assistance to federally funded health centers across the U.S. For the past 16 years, NCFH has developed and implemented cancer prevention programs with Hispanic communities and provided capacity building to Community Health Worker (CHW) organizations on various health topics, including breast and cervical cancer through its Cultivando La Salud (CLS) Program.

CLS is a nationally recognized, evidence-based program, developed by NCFH, and replicated in many communities around the country. It has been specifically developed to address the need for education and prevention among low income Hispanic women, through the training and employment of CHWs. In 2006, NCFH was invited by Komen Austin to implement locally the breast cancer portion of the CLS and this partnership continues today, with several successes to its credit.

With this application, we propose to implement the cervical cancer portion of the CLS program in Hays County, leveraging and complementing the successes of the Komen Austin funded breast cancer prevention activities, by expanding provision of professional and public education to include cervical cancer. The overall goal of this proposal is to increase the rate of age appropriate cervical cancer screening among low-income Hispanic women in Hays County and increase the implementation of outreach and education by CHWs on breast and cervical cancer. NCFH will pursue certification of CLS through the TX State Dept. of Health Services and work with several organizations to replicate the model.

The specific breast and cervical cancer education goals of this proposal are: 1. Increase the capacity of 15-20 CHWs from 3 partnering community based organizations through training in the use of the CLS Program. 2. Increase the capacity of 7 NCFH employed CHWs through training in the use of the CLS Program. 3. Increase cervical cancer knowledge of 4,000 Hispanic women through CLS education sessions. 4. Achieve completion of Pap test screening among at least 800 CLS session participants.

This program will have a significant and long-lasting impact on the capacity of CHWs in Hays County and Texas to deliver evidence-based breast and cervical cancer screening outreach and education to low income Hispanic women. Texas organizations serving low income, Hispanic women will have a replicable model of care and a framework for creating a network of partners to strengthen referral systems in the community. Among low income Hispanic women in Hays, this program will increase knowledge, and reinforce early detection behaviors for breast and cervical cancer. NCFH’s experience and strong network of partners demonstrates its capacity to reach the proposed goals and assures that the women served will have full access to both breast and cervical cancer early detection and treatment services.

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