Week 2- 1/22-1/26

Daily Descriptions

Monday 1/22

• Today I met at the HR building to help reorganize materials and resources from the Health Fair, which took about an hour and a half. Then, I worked remotely researching health education topics for each month’s health resource handout. The ACC Wellness theme for the year is “Health Evolutions: Era to Era.” Each month corresponds to a different time period, including prehistoric, medieval, renaissance, victorian, the roaring 20s, 30s/40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s. I am tasked to create a five page handout that relates a health phenomenon to each of these eras. So, today I researched various public health and medical achievements that characterized each time period. I also spent a good amount of time looking through health education handouts from previous years to gauge which topics would be more beneficial and how to formulate these handouts. This proved to be quite helpful. This research took approximately 3 hours in order to gain sufficient information.

Tuesday 1/23

• Today I joined a mindfulness zoom with various ACCUG employees, which is held every Tuesday morning of the year from 8:00 to 9:00 am. I also attended a meeting with our Health Designs biometric screening vendor to go over participants' cumulative data report from the December screening. This lasted roughly 45 minutes, but was very insightful. We went over participants BP, glucose, HDL, LDL, triglycerides, alcohol consumption, tobacco use, physical activity, and BMI and compared the 384 participants to their general population. It was encouraging to see that many percentages of individuals engaged in the Wellness program had better numbers than the population. For example, 84% fell in the no health risk category, which is definitely something to champion. Kendra explained that since 2020, ACCUG has had an astronomical turnover rate and has rehired over 1500 employees, which makes biometric comparisons challenging. It also makes it more difficult to prove the effectiveness of the program, however a majority of employees heavily support the program. The data also indicated that many participants are in favor of the programs currently being offered and have gained a great deal of information to improve their overall health and well-being. I also met with Kendra for roughly 2.5 hours to discuss and finalize each month's health topic. Since February corresponds with the Medieval Ages for this year's health theme, I decided to do a health education handout on various spices that can be incorporated into the diet to improve one’s health. During this era, spices were regarded as highly valuable, extremely lucrative to trade, and were used to treat various ailments, which is why I chose it for this month. I researched various studies and websites to compile notes that will enable me to develop the handout in a facilitated manner.

Wednesday 1/24

• Today I worked on creating the health education handout on the health benefits of spices. I used Canva to create a 5 page handout that includes a brief overview of what the spice trade was and why certain spices were so highly regarded for their medicinal and culinary properties. Spices were very expensive and most often only awarded to the wealthy, so not only were they seen as a status symbol, but also as a status of well-being. Spices became linked to the notion of “wellness,” a sense of spiritual and physical well-being. I also included some health benefits related to the following spices: cinnamon, clove, garlic, ginger, pepper, and turmeric. For each of these spices, I also included two simple meal tips for audience members to include in their diet. Taking the information I researched yesterday, compiling it into sections, and creating the Canva handout took roughly 5 hours. Then, I created a corresponding quiz for ACCUG employees to take in the ACC Well portal to receive a health credit. Health credits are incentives for employees to partake in a program or activity to receive credits to lower their insurance premiums and lower the cost that the government spends on that individual's health insurance. This took me roughly an hour to complete.

Thursday 1/25

• Today I met at the ACCUG Planning Department to go over my final health education resource handout on the health benefits of spices with Kendra. I also learned how to enter the corresponding quiz I created into the ACC Well portal so that employees and retirees can access the quiz to receive a health credit. We held our monthly Caregiver Support Group meeting at the Planning Department from 12-1 pm. The Wellness program hosts this caregiver support meeting once a month for ACCUG employees who are taking care of loved ones experiencing cognitive decline or disabilities. We had a speaker from the Cognitive Aging Research and Education Center (CARE Center) which is a part of the UGA Institute of Gerontology. She presented information on the role that diet plays in neurological functioning as well as the importance of sleep, physical exercise, and stress management in preventing the onset of cognitive decline. I took notes throughout the presentation and on all of the handouts she disseminated. Then, I worked remotely on the feedback that Kendra gave me about the handout. This took roughly an hour. 

Friday 1/26

• Today I went to the Solid Waste Department at 8 am for their safety training. Each month, Kendra goes to this meeting to engage in health promotion activities with Solid Waste Department employees. A majority of the employees were unable to come to the Health Fair last week, so we were able to bring the health fair to them today. I conversated with many employees and got to know some of them, all of whom were so friendly and appreciative. I was there for an hour and half. Then, Kendra and I met at the Landscape Management building for the Anti-Inflammatory Lifestyle Healthy Hour, which was from 12- 1 pm. I got there at 10:45 and we finalized everything for February’s health education resource handout and corresponding quiz. We also started planning some of the events for next week, including creating an excel sheet for Friday’s cooking demo. The speaker for the Anti-Inflammatory Lifestyle Healthy Hour unfortunately did not show up, however we still conversed with the ACCUG employees that came and were discussing their health needs. I learned about the departments that each of the participants worked in and learned about how their chronic disease impacts their daily lives. This healthy hour is for employees and retirees with arthritis and encourages them to promote activities into their lifestyle to manage arthritis symptoms and alleviate pain. Healthy Hours provide employees with an opportunity to enter their attendance into the ACC Well portal to receive credit that will lower their health insurance premiums. 

Weekly Summary

This week I researched, developed, and disseminated my health education resource on the health benefits of spices and created a corresponding quiz for employees to receive a health credit. Since I am tasked with creating the health education resources for each month this year, I have decided to work on one each week of my internship. Since this was my first time creating one, I learned a great deal about translating health information to various health literacy levels that I will utilize in the future. It is a time-consuming and tedious task, however I truly enjoyed creating it and look forward to producing more. I helped ensure that each of the programs and meetings I went to this week ran efficiently, which included programs surrounding caregiver support, arthritis management, and health and safety. At each of these meetings, I was able to meet and converse with various ACCUG employees, ranging from the Solid Waste Department to the Elections Office. It is fascinating to see the inner workings of local government and how the county provides goods and services to residents. I have learned about upcoming ACCUG projects to improve the functioning of the county and how much work goes into long term, city wide projects. 

Responsibilities & Competencies

• 1.1.1- Define the purpose and scope of the assessment

• I met this competency by ensuring that I had adequate information on the purpose of health education resources so that I could effectively create a handout that promotes health and well-being. 

• 1.2.1- Identify primary data, secondary data, and evidence-informed resources. 

• I met this competency by researching various studies, articles, and websites about the health benefits of spices and how one of the main purposes of the spice trade was for medicinal benefits of spices. 

• 1.3.4- Assess existing and available resources, policies, programs, practices, and interventions. 

• I met this competency by going through all of Kendra’s previous health education handouts to gauge which health topics should be covered this year and seeing which health topics would be most beneficial for employees based on current resources and practices.

• 1.3.1- Determine the health status of the priority population

• I met this competency by seeking out information to gauge which chronic conditions ACCUG employees are facing and seeing which chronic conditions are impacting various populations in different departments. 

• 2.1.3- Establish the rationale for the intervention

• I met this competency by including historical information on spice trade and reasons for the use of spices in order to establish the connection between the month’s “health era” and the associated health benefits. 

• 1.3.2- Determine the knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, skills, and behaviors that impact the health and health literacy of the priority population(s). 

• I met this competency by discussing with Kendra the most effective way to create a health education handout based on the knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, skills, and behaviors of ACCUG employees so that I could write at the correct health literacy level. 

• 1.4.2- Prioritize health education and promotion needs. 

• I met this competency by developing and disseminating the health education resource on the health benefits of spices. 

• 3.2.5- Employ an appropriate variety of instructional methodologies. 

• I met this competency by providing information on the historical significance of spices, the health benefits of spices, and examples of how to incorporate them into audience members' daily lives. 

• 6.5.3- Use facilitation skills with large and/or small groups.

• I met this competency by helping host the Caregiver Support Group monthly program. 

• 6.1.2- Identify the assets, needs, and characteristics of the audience(s) that affect communication and message design (e.g., literacy levels, language, culture, and cognitive and perceptual abilities).

• I met this competency after I received feedback from Kendra about how to write at a level for populations with lower health literacy levels and the importance of engaging in this identification when working with various departments. 

• 5.1.1- Examine the determinants of health and their underlying causes (e.g., poverty, trauma, and population-based discrimination) related to identified health issues.

• I met this competency by conversing with ACCUG employees about how their backgrounds and lifestyle choices impact their current health status, which poverty and discrimination were brought up. 

• 5.1.3- Identify factors that facilitate and/or hinder advocacy efforts (e.g., amount of evidence to prove the issue, potential for partnerships, political readiness, organizational experience or risk, and feasibility of success).

• I met this competency by engaging with ACCUG employees where I learned about the reasons the government is not as well-functioning as it could be, which impacts advocacy efforts for health promotion. 

• 6.4.2- Select communication channels and current and emerging technologies that are most appropriate for the audience(s) and message(s).

• I met this competency by disseminating the health education resource on the website as well as uploading the corresponding quiz into an accessible format on the ACC Well portal for employees to gain health credits. 

Reflection

I have absolutely loved working with Kendra and have gained valuable knowledge of how to effectively meet people where they are in order to promote their health needs, as well as the importance of being a figure that others can depend on. The most successful individuals in leadership positions are the ones who provide a safe and open atmosphere for all employees because promoting a sense of trust enables leaders to get the job done. I have learned how to effectively create health promotion educational materials for an audience with varying health literacy levels, which is a beneficial and transferable skill that I know will benefit me in the future endeavors. I think the foremost reason I have loved this internship thus far is because I am engaging in meaningful work that positively impacts the daily lives of so many individuals. Employees rave about Kendra and the work she accomplishes, which has been quite an awesome sight to see. I did not come across many challenges this week, however I gained  sufficient knowledge about the functioning of the Wellness program, and Athens-Clarke County Unified Government overall, that will enable me handle any future challenges that may arise. I think the main successes of the week include engaging with numerous ACCUG officials and employees in respective ways, and learning how to work with different populations within each department. I believe that these lessons will equip me to work alongside various types of people and for contrasting populations in my future career.