Florida Program to Train Residents of Mayan Descent to Be Health ‘Promoters’
Planned Parenthood of Palm Beach and Treasure Coast in Florida is launching a new health care outreach and education program aimed at South Florida's Guatemalan immigrants of Mayan descent -- a community generally "not accustomed to Western medicine," the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reports. The program, modeled after similar projects in Guatemala, Mexico and other Latin American countries, will train 25 community leaders as health care promotoras, or promoters, to talk to other immigrants about health-related issues including nutrition, self-esteem, sexually transmitted diseases and prenatal care. The program also will include a study to determine other areas of health care that concern Guatemalan families. Jeannette Corbett, CEO of the Quantum Foundation, said her organization awarded the program a $150,000 grant in part because of a recent study that found "a major gap in access to health care and health care quality among Guatemalans." For instance, the Sun-Sentinel reports that about 14% of Guatemalan women of Mayan descent receive little or no prenatal care, twice the average in Palm Beach County, and the mortality rate among Guatemalan infants of Mayan descent is 17 deaths per 1,000 births, three times the county's average (Chavez, South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 5/13).
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