Awarded Grants

Program to Increase Assess to Mental Health: Grant will help intitiate a new program in Nashua to increase access to mental health care for Nashua's Latino community by building on an established program in Manchester. The program provides outreach and education about mental illness (including interpreter services), and incorporates cultural competency outreach to mental health providers.

Access to Assistive Technology: Grant will help ATECH Services collaboratively provide access to assistive technology (AT) products and services by individuals with severe disabilities. Project will provide a pool of AT equipment, a mobile service delivery unit (for on-site rural outreach), and a resource pool of business and community members to support AT users within local communities.

Deaf People Accessing Health: Grant will help build a system of support and comprehensive services statewide to allow full and equal access to deaf residents, focusing on the expansion of medical interpreting and health care advocacy in the state.

Respite Child Care: Grant helps the Respite Child Care Coalition collaboratively implement, evaluate, and disseminate a pilot model of respite child care for vulnerable families (families that include children with developmental disabilities, mental illness, and other developmental or mental challenges). Program includes education, outreach, and financial assistance.

To develop a statewide training program for medical interpreters; a program to broker interpreter services as a pilot in Manchester with later expansion to Nashua & Portsmouth; a training program to educate health professionals on cultural competency and use of a medical interpreter as well as an education and outreach to health care consumers with limited English proficiency about medical interpretation in same three communities; and a continuing education program for trained medical interpretors.

Bringing Children Home: Grant will help VNA's collaboratively develop a new pediatric home care model in Belknap, Cheshire, Grafton, Hillsborough, Merrimack, Rockingham and Sullivan counties. The new program will address the gap between the acutely ill pediatric patients' needs and current home care delivery capabilities.

Dental Access on the Seacoast: Grant will help expand Seacoast Healthy Grins, a model school-based screening, cleaning and referral program for children in Portsmouth elementary schools (currently K-3); expand screenings at Families First well-child clinics and Head Start; and expand referral and dental case management network of Seacare Dental Services. Grant will also help plan for a model Dental Center at Families First to serve more low-income patients in the Seacoast area.

Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Project: A one-year planning grant to develop (and obtain school board approval for) a program to screen 7th grade females in the Manchester school system who are identified as high risk for becoming pregnant and then provide pregnancy prevention programs and follow up through high school.

To collaboratively design and implement a pilot care coordination model that covers the entire continuum of health care including the integration of ancillary and social services.

Dental Health Works: Grant will help provide educational, preventive, and restorative dental services in Cheshire County by creating Dental Health Works, a model comprehensive full time dental clinic, in Keene. The Clinic will serve Medicaid clients, referrals from Cheshire Smiles in-school program, referrals from eight area health and human service agencies, and others (both children and adults) who are unable to access dental care.

Meeting the Oral Health Needs of the Lakes Region and Twin Rivers Region: Grant will help the Healthfirst Family Care Center and Lakes Region Health Care collaboratively develop a model comprehensive system of oral health services for the low income population of the Lakes and Twin Rivers Region Dental Health Provider Shortage Area (DHPSA), while also training student interns from the Tufts University School of Dentistry.

Creating Systemic Changes to Strengthen and Sustain NH's Community Health Centers: Grant will help initiate the creation of more effective funding systems for the eight Community Health Centers in New Hampshire. The project will create model systems of financial sustainability to ensure the delivery of primary and preventive care to the uninsured and underinsured New Hampshire residents.