Public Health
Our public health initiatives are targeted strategies – formed by collaborating with health experts and local stakeholders – that address specific threats to the health of communities and their residents.
Active Projects
Cardiovascular Disease
This is a NACHC-led project to improve blood pressure control for African Americans through a data-driven, rapid cycle improvement approach. AllianceChicago coaches partner health centers through 1:1 meetings, larger workgroups, and NACHC guidance to support provider training, medication adherence, medication intensification, and self-monitored blood pressure initiatives to improve hypertension in this patient population. Funder: NACHC
This project was initiated by Alivio Medical Center as a community-driven research question. The study developed from the initial question aims to understand the trajectory of patients who screened at high risk of cancer during the COVID pandemic at an AllianceChicago network Community Health Center (CHC), who subsequently received care at a CAPriCORN data contributing site. The results will be critical in understanding what, if any, care the cohort of patients received post-abnormal screening result at the community health center. Funder: NHLBI
NACHC has contracted with AllianceChicago to test and a protype a system to analyze cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors, patient demographics, and social determinants of health (SDOH) with the goal of improving CVD outcomes in at-risk patients. In collaboration with health center representatives, MENDS collaborators, technical experts and public health stakeholders, the AllianceChicago team has preliminarily tested this prototype and continues to scale its application.
Diabetes
The purpose of this project is to improve diabetes control among health center patients while also tackling diabetes prevention. This program follows the CDC’s approved lifestyle management program by addressing healthy eating, physical activity, and stress management through regular group meetings and support over the year. This approach targets individuals at-risk for diabetes as well as those with diabetes. The curriculum can effectively help participants lose weight, improve healthy behaviors, and cut their risk of diabetes in half. In addition, the program provides participants with a set of self-care tools to assist with healthy living and diabetes control and prevention, as well as education and training that includes attention to health equity and social support. Funder: NACHC
This study will test a technology-based strategy to promote preconception care and diabetes self-management among English and Spanish-speaking women with type 2 diabetes in primary care. Aims 1. Test the medication reconciliation (MedRec) tool and deliver low literacy print tools to support diabetes self-care as well as post-visit text messaging to encourage healthy lifestyle behaviors to eligible patients 2. Analyze EHR data (e.g., HbA1c, blood pressure) on enrolled participants 3. Request feedback (via brief electronic survey) from 10 CHC personnel on their experience with the project. Funder: NIH
The purpose of the project is to expand a central repository of data available to diabetes researchers and collaborators in order to improve diabetes for adult patients in CHCs and to engage CHC clinicians and staff in training and other activities to catalyze diabetes research in their settings. Funder: NIH/NIDDKD
This project leverages and expands on a pioneering collaboration between The University of Florida and two Health Center Controlled Networks (HCCNs), Health Choice Network (HCN) and AllianceChicago, to better understand characteristics of people living with T1D and insulin-requiring diabetes and providers serving within these settings. This needs assessment is the first national effort to understand the experiences and perspectives of PCPs within FQHC settings as a richly diverse cohort of medical providers delivering care to people with diabetes facing the highest health risks.
Emerging Public Health Issues
The Public Health Initiatives team at AllianceChicago supports ongoing monitoring and response to emerging public health issues to inform community health center staff in partnership with state and local public health agencies. Recently issues addressed by the public health team include measles, mPox, mercury poisoning, H5N1, and COVID-19.
Reproductive and Sexual Health
The objective of this study is to implement strategies to increase uptake and support PrEP persistence among Black cisgender women in community health center (CHC) settings. AllianceChicago and Health Choice Network will partner with University of Chicago for this 5-year NIH-funded project. This study will take place at 12 locations of care within 3 CHCs, including 4 sites in the Midwest and 8 in the Southern U.S.
OPTIMIZE aims to address inequity perinatal healthcare, particularly for African American women. The OPTIMIZE checklist is a strategy to facilitate coordination and integration of efforts to improve perinatal care for AA women. Aims 1. Develop the OPTIMIZE checklist with interviews and/or focus groups with AllianceChicago CHCs staff and patients 2. Conduct pragmatic, randomized trials in CHCs to evaluate the effectiveness and implementation of the OPTIMIZE checklist strategy 3. Conduct process evaluation, including conducting organizational surveys and interviews with clinic staff and patients. Funder: NIH
This project was initiated under the CDC goal to reduce the number of new HIV infections by 90% by 2030. As the recipient of the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHCs) funding for this endeavor, AllianceChicago incorporated a form and workflow in the format of a Clinical Decision Support (CDS) tool in order to improve health centers ability to impact HIV prevention, diagnoses, care, and treatment to improve health outcomes.
Substance Use
This multi-disciplinary collaboration uses evidence-based quality improvement strategies to improve capacity of small primary care practices in IL and WI to implement Patient-Centered Outcomes Research (PCOR) evidence into the delivery of care for the unhealthy alcohol use. Unhealthy alcohol use affects 38 million adults in the United States and is a leading cause of preventable mortality and a risk factor for an array of economic, social and health problems that has an estimated annual economic impact of $249 billion. Funder: AHRQ
Surveillance
The Outpatient Influenza-like Illness Surveillance Network, or ILINet, is a CDC program which collects influenza surveillance data from healthcare providers. As a part of their work, Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) provides data through their own network to CDC. For this effort, AllianceChicago (AC) was asked by a partner health center to determine if they could provide support to streamline this reporting. AC subsequently identified an opportunity to ease the burden on both CDPH and its Chicago-based member health centers by streamlining reporting from each individual health center into an aggregated report.
This project was initiated by Alivio Medical Center as a community-driven research question. The study developed from the initial question aims to understand the trajectory of patients who screened at elevated risk of cancer during the COVID pandemic at an AllianceChicago network Community Health Center (CHC), who subsequently received care at a CAPriCORN data contributing site. The results will be critical in understanding what, if any, care the cohort of patients received post-abnormal screening result at the community health center.
Supporting Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) surveillance work by providing information on infants born to mothers with COVID-19 who were then seen for well childcare at an AllianceChicago Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC).
AllianceChicago was awarded the eCR Now Challenge award to pilot the implementation of eCR Now Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) in partnership with our EMR vendor, athenahealth (athenaPractice and athenaOne). This pilot was focused on COVID-19 case reporting with the goal of using the lessons learned to expand FHIR API across AllianceChicago’s network for additional diseases over time. Community Health Centers often perform double entry between local health departments and other reporting agencies. Additionally, some case reports may be missing or incomplete, as well as there may be high volumes of case reports at times. These issues are resolved by effective use of eCR.
Immunizations
This study leverages the Electronic Health Record (EHR) to improve the security of vaccination programs by improving the quality and efficiency of adverse vaccine event and reporting to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) by using a FHIR-based communication to identify possible vaccine adverse events and engaging clinicians into the feedback loop on VAE reports to ensure validity. Funder: CDC
Youth and Pediatrics
The goal of this study is to better understand the landscape of pediatric overweight and obesity in populations served by Community Health Centers. The initiative will use quantitative data and a comprehensive, stakeholder driven approach to inform the development of new Clinical Quality Measures (CQMs) for use in clinical settings. Funder: NACHC
Completed Projects
Care Optimization
| Partnership with the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC) and National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) to develop a more in-depth occupational health EHR data collection tool to support health centers in identifying essential workers and those at risk to illness and/or injury due to their occupation. |
Reproductive and Sexual Health
This National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC) funded project sought to apply the human centered design framework to develop a rapid cycle intervention to improve screening, testing, diagnoses, treatment and sustained virological response (SVR) achievement within the Hepatitis-C Care Cascade. AllianceChicago worked in partnership with 2 health centers to pilot the dashboard and workflows iteratively created for this project to enable the closure of care gaps related to Hepatitis-C.
Substance Use
The IMPACT project implemented a bidirectional referral tool to the Illinois Tobacco Quitline (ITQL) at two Community Health Centers (CHCs) in Chicago, Heartland Alliance Health (HAH) and Howard Brown Health (HBH), and expand utilization at a third CHC, Near North Health Services Corporation. The eReferral system targeted all smokers with a primary care visit during the grant period who were deemed by the provider to be ready to make an attempt to quit smoking. The goal of the project was to increase the number of referrals to the ITQL, increase smoking cessation counseling, and ultimately increase smoking cessation rates.
Surveillance
Partnership with the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC) to collect COVID-19 data to support surveillance and health center workflows around managing COVID-19 testing, vaccines, and treatments
Immunizations
Patient-centered approach to develop education materials for COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy for elderly Black/African American and Hispanic/Latin populations, disseminated through the EHR and through patient text messaging.
Youth and Pediatrics
The CHEC-UP project aimed to reduce disparities in well child-care and immunization completion in vulnerable communities through real-time, bi-directional digital communication with patients using AI chatbots and smartphone-based virtual care. CHEC-UP provided an all-in-one patient innovative chatbot technology and coaching to 1) remind parents of upcoming well child visits and immunizations at their medical home; 2) promote dialogue around age-based recommendations; 3) connect families directly to healthcare staff for further questions or concerns; and 4) facilitate targeted outreach for easy scheduling/rescheduling appointments. Funder: Unfunded