Wellshare International

“Reviewed by board of directors prior to filing.”

“Monitored and enforced by board of directors annually.”

“Approved by board of directors annually.”

“Governing documents are made available to the public upon request.”

“The mission of wellshare international is to advance sustainable community health around the world. Wellshare international focuses its resources where it can have the greatest impact on the health of individuals living in developing countries and on the health of underserved and vulnerable populations, including refugees and immigrants in minnesota, where its headquarter office is located. Wellshare international works in close partnership with communities and health care providers to ensure their joint efforts are defined by local needs and are sustainable. Because of its extensive overseas community health experience, including 35+ years in east africa as well as significant experience in southeast asia and central america, wellshare is uniquely positioned to work both internationally and domestically with the growing immigrant and refugee communities in minnesota. Over the past 16 years in minnesota, wellshare has worked on public health initiatives with somali, oromo, hmong, and karen (burmese) immigrants and refugees and is now extending its community-based health work to reach additional vulnerable and underserved communities.”

“Culturally appropriate approaches and tools to support at-risk individuals and communities in the twin cities. Wellshare chws work with the community to promote behavior changes that will reduce the risk of diabetes. Activities in 2015 included conducting three trainings for chws related to preventive health including pre-diabetes, diabetes and using appropriate nutrition tools for clients with chronic disease. A six-week series of chronic disease self- management workshops (a stanford university evidence-based curriculum) was offered twice to elders in the somali community, training over 30 participants. Other activities included holding culturally appropriate cooking classes for somali and hmong community members. These classes included grocery store tours and were coupled with 100 farmers' market tours to promote healthy food choices conducted in the native language of the participant. Our ehdi program also works with healthcare providers to build capacity for supporting patients along their path to optimal health. By offering training to physicians and community health workers, wellshare's ehdi program is helping to build the workforce capacity needed to reduce health disparities and improve culturally competent care. Another component of the eliminating health disparities initiative (ehdi) funded by the minnesota department of health's office of minority and multicultural health (mdh-ommh) is the minnesota community health worker peer network (see below for more information). Community health workers - bridging the cultural divide in 2015, wellshare expanded its work through the chw peer network. The peer network was created by wellshare in 2005 and consists of a statewide group of community health workers serving diverse communities. Wellshare hosts the network mailing list and provides in-service professional development training opportunities to chws. The network sends out electronic (email) updates including chw job announcements, training information, and advocacy opportunities provided by chws and other stakeholders. Each year, wellshare surveys chw members about their educational needs in order to determine trainings that are most relevant to their work. Based on survey results, wellshare hosts bi-monthly professional development trainings for chws in the peer network. Currently the network reaches over 500 chws, employers, and key stakeholders. Trainings are recorded, archived, and posted online for later viewing by chws and other stakeholders who live in greater minnesota or out of state. East african smoke free program wellshare international's tobacco free communities east african smoke free program, funded by the minnesota department of health, aims to reduce the harm caused by tobacco and secondhand smoke among somali and east african children, youth, and young adults. The program's objectives are to: 1) implement innovative community awareness and health education activities to decrease secondhand smoke exposure and change social norms around tobacco use and exposure among somali and east african children, youth, and young adults; 2) assist in the implementation of multi-unit housing smoke-free policies; 3) assist in the adoption and implementation of tobacco free grounds policies at somali- or east-african- owned businesses and events to decrease secondhand smoke exposure and change social norms around tobacco use and exposure among somali and east african children, youth, and young adults; and 4) engage and work with community clinics to conduct assessments of their tobacco cessation strategies and assess use of clinical practice guidelines set forth by the u.s. Department of health and human services. The program is currently in its fourth year, and has to date directly reached more than 3,000 somali- and east african-community residents and indirectly reached more than 77,800 through innovative community outreach activities since 2013. The program has reached 2,377 individuals in 2015 through 46 outreach”

“An average ugandan woman will have six children in her lifetime. A lack of knowledge about and access to family planning services contributes to this high fertility, which leads to high rates of maternal and infant mortality. There is a high-unmet need for family planning in uganda. Wellshare international continued its long-term work in reproductive health and continued two usaid-funded projects in 2015. Through advancing partners & communities (apc), wellshare's advancing community-based access to injectable contraceptives in uganda project worked to scale up access to both intramuscular and subcutaneous injectables in eastern uganda (iganga and kumi districts). In 2014, a new cascade model of training was developed in partnership with the two district health teams, 10 district health team staff were trained as master trainers, and 30 health center staff and 161 village health team members (vhts) were trained to provide comprehensive community-based family planning. These district staff and volunteers supported activities in 2015. During 2015, six two-day sayana press trainings for 86 vhts were conducted, 6 district work planning meetings were attended, 8 district-based on-the- ground support supervisions were conducted, 11 quarterly vhts and health center staff review meetings were conducted, 6 family planning implementation team (fpit) meetings were conducted, 7 client satisfaction surveys with 60 clients were carried out (20 clients in kumi and 40 clients in iganga), 18 national-level meetings, including: a reproductive maternal neo-natal child and adolescent health (rmncah) stakeholders meeting, 5 family planning working group meetings, 4 maternal and child health cluster meetings, and 8 other related reproductive health/family planning meetings attended, couple years of protection (cyp) data for four quarters was collected, 2 technical assistance meetings were held by the donor in country, and a structured learning visit was carried out for the salvation army in iganga district. Wellshare hosted the advancing partners and communities executive director for a site visit in may 2015. In collaboration with the fhi360 obalamu campaign, 450 vhts and 18 dhts were trained in two districts. The wellshare program manager conducted 30 key informant interviews in the 4th quarter to document the cascade training model. Wellshare presented program findings at one national adolescent reproductive health conference in july 2015 and shared results of the emergency contraceptive pills assessment during one maternal and child health cluster meeting at the uganda ministry of health in september 2015. Wellshare supported the districts by distributing 1,500 moon beads and re- stocked health facilities with buffer stocks of sayana press, microgynon and condoms through the alternative distribution strategy (via uganda health marketing group). Wellshare also distributed 210 obalamu campaign posters. The arua district partnership for hiv/aids and family planning integration project, also funded by apc through usaid, trained 50 village health teams in arua district (west nile region, uganda) to provide integrated family planning (fp) counseling and methods along with hiv/aids prevention education with a focus on out-of-school youth and hiv-discordant couples. The project also worked with health center staff to improve youth-friendly services and promoted community dialogues around gender, family planning, and hiv/aids. Key achievements of the project included: training and equipping 50 community owned resources persons (corps) to integrate fp services, including injectable contraceptives, into community-based hiv prevention services; training 17 health workers in support supervision of corps and in adolescent youth friendly services; facilitating three district family planning implementation team (fpit) meetings; conducting four client satisfaction surveys-each survey with 15 clients; development and printing of the district health services refe”

“UGANDA”