The Changing Roles of Community Health Workers

Authors

Mary-Beth Malcarney, George Washington University
Patricia Pittman, George Washington University
Leo Quigley, George Washington University
Naomi Seiler, George Washington University
Katie B. Horton, George Washington University

Document Type

Report

Publication Date

2017

Abstract

Community Health Workers (CHWs) have been gaining attention from policymakers because of their unique role in addressing health disparities and socioeconomic drivers of disease, and because of their potential integration into the health care delivery system. To date, there has been limited research specifically describing the variation in CHWs’ roles and relationships, and how that variation relates to management, to financing, to health system integration, and to the competencies CHWs should have in different contexts.

This report provides a snapshot of the varied landscape of CHW programs to better understand how CHWs are integrating with the health system both in terms of the structural elements of these programs, and the relational elements of CHW-health system interaction that make integrated models succeed. Authors suggest that there is no blueprint for success; rather, there are certain unifying structural elements of various integration types, and certain useful mechanisms that enable the preservation of the CHW concept.

Comments

Executive summary and poster are available for download.

This study has been published in: Malcarney M, Pittman P, Quigley L, Horton K, Seiler N. 2017. The Changing Roles of Community Health Workers. Health Services Research, 52(S1): 360-382. doi: 10.1111/1475-6773.12657

APA Citation

Malcarney, M., Pittman, P., Quigley, L., Seiler, N., & Horton, K. B. (2017). The Changing Roles of Community Health Workers. , (). Retrieved from https://hsrc.himmelfarb.gwu.edu/sphhs_policy_workforce_facpubs/5

Open Access

1