Healthcare Equity
Increasing Access to Prevention-oriented Services within Healthcare,
and Advancing Workforce Development for Community Health Workers,
Promotoras, and Other Asthma Professionals
We know prevention plays a fundamental role in asthma management. The National Clinical Guidelines highlight the importance of education and environmental control measures to avoid or eliminate factors that contribute to asthma onset and severity. There are many best and promising practices supported by robust scientific literature. Yet prevention-oriented services are not systematically accessible to the low-income communities and communities of color who need them most. Additionally, many of the services that are available are not provided with the cultural humility and understanding needed to reach historically marginalized communities of color.
At RAMP, we advocate for sustainable financing to support the integration of prevention-oriented services into the healthcare system, focusing on Medi-Cal given the disproportionate impact of asthma on low-income communities, and guide implementation of policies and programs aimed at this goal. We share best practices and lessons learned throughout California and across the country.
RAMP also builds the capacity of a diverse asthma workforce to implement a comprehensive approach to asthma management and prevention. Efforts include building the capacity of Community Health Workers, promotoras, and other professionals to conduct asthma home visits and clinical providers to understand the impact of social determinants of health on their patients’ asthma. We also support the full asthma workforce to respond and adapt to emerging issues impacting its work, such as COVID-19, wildfires, and updates to asthma clinical guidelines.
Read more about our Healthcare Equity goal in our strategic plan.
For more information about this goal, please contact Anne Kelsey Lamb, Director, at anne@rampasthma.org/, or Joel Ervice, Associate Director, at joel@rampasthma.org/.
RAMP has been an invaluable resource for our new Asthma Home Visiting Program. Partnering with RAMP has allowed us to focus on delivering effective Asthma Home Visiting services without having to completely invent a new program. The RAMP team are knowledgeable about best practices, resources, and policy and made themselves available for any questions or concerns along the way. Our program would not have been as successful without support from RAMP.
Join our networks related to Healthcare Equity
Community Health Worker Network
California Asthma Financing Workgroup
Explore RAMP’s resources on Healthcare Equity
A Few of Our Accomplishments
- We led statewide advocacy efforts leading to the successful adoption of two Medi-Cal policies that increase access to asthma home visiting services for people with poorly controlled asthma.
- We established RAMP as the leading technical assistance provider for asthma home visiting services in California and leveraged our experience to provide national support. For example:
- We provided technical assistance to 28 asthma home visiting programs participating in the Asthma Mitigation Project, a $15 million grant program funded by the California Department of Health Care Services.
- We partnered with the National Center for Healthy Housing to advance the asthma home visiting field by producing an e-learning module on incorporating virtual visits into home-based asthma services and releasing a model benefits package for managed care plans and other healthcare payors.
- We developed and distributed over 300,000 guidelines-based Asthma Action Plans in four languages, now available as fillable PDFs.
- We created the first of its kind directory of asthma home visiting programs in California in order to facilitate partnerships and build the field’s visibility.
- We responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by tracking and sharing new information on asthma and COVID on a weekly basis.
Select projects on Healthcare Equity
With support from The California Endowment, we are supporting implementation of two Medi-Cal policies, adopted in 2022, that increase access to asthma home visiting services: the Asthma Preventive Services benefit and the Asthma Remediation option under Community Supports. This work includes providing TA to asthma home visiting programs and managed care plans and facilitating peer learning and collective advocacy. The California Endowment also supports our leadership of the Community Health Worker Network and the California Asthma Financing Workgroup.
RAMP provides free technical assistance (TA) to organizations that are providing or interested in providing Asthma Remediation services. We help organizations design and build effective programs, build staff capacity, partner with managed care plans, solve implementation challenges, and sustain asthma services. The free TA is provided through the TA Marketplace that the California Department of Health Care Services established to support programs providing new services, like Asthma Remediation, as part of CalAIM. Learn more here.
With funding from the California Department of Health Care Services, The Center at Sierra Health Foundation funded 28 asthma home visiting programs in communities across the state. We helped design the Asthma Mitigation Project and served as the TA providers, supporting programs every step of the way. We also facilitated peer learning and capacity building workshops. For more information about the Asthma Mitigation Project, which concluded in December 2023, visit Sierra Health Foundation.
In partnership with the US Environmental Protection Agency, we are building connections with tribal communities along the Region 9 border with Mexico around opportunities for providing and sustaining asthma home visiting services. We will provide tools, training, and network connections to build capacity to create and sustain asthma home visiting services.
In partnership with the National Center for Healthy Housing (NCHH) and with support from the US Environmental Protection Agency, we developed new learning modules, which have been integrated into NCHH’s Building Systems to Sustain Home-Based Asthma Services e-learning platform. One focuses on integrating virtual visits into asthma home visiting programs and the other focuses generally on healthcare financing innovations. We have also developed a “Roadmap to Sustainable Asthma Home Visiting.” Lastly, the project allows us to provide TA to a wide range of organizations across the country as they work to expand and sustain asthma home visiting programs.
For the last twenty-two years, RAMP has provided me with high quality trainings addressing asthma and also has facilitated bi-monthly forums to share resources and strategies among community health workers. RAMP has played an active role in the asthma community and has been a voice disseminating the role of community health workers through policy at local and national levels. RAMP is an organization that has accompanied me in my journey as an asthma community health worker for more than two decades, and I am grateful for that.
