Team: Health Information Partners
The health literacy coalition: http://connectforhealth.gwu.edu

Community site:
Max Robinson Health Center, the Anacostia branch of the Whitman Walker Clinic
2301 Martin Luther King, Jr. Ave., SE
Washington, D.C. 20020
www.wwc.org/regional_centers/max_robinson.html

Anticipated Project(s): Teaching Health Literacy
Health Information Partners will primarily be teaching health literacy at the Academy of Hope. Please visit: Academy of Hope for complete details on the anticipated project and expectations of team members.

Additionally, team members will have the opportunity to participate in optional monthly outreach and techincal support workshops at Max Robinson Health Center.

Past Projects:
The 2008-09 Health Information Partners team supported two sites: 1) the Academy of Hope, an adult education center, and 2) the Max Robinson Health Center, the Whitman Walker Clinic's regional center which serves the community east of the Anacostia River.

Team members at the Academy of Hope planned and taught a science course to pre-GED students. The course emphasized environmental health issues and included classroom exercises, utilization of computers to identify reliable health information, and projects that challenged students to meet objectives that will help them succeed on their GED tests.

Past projects included: visiting and coaching patients for two hours on a bi-weekly or weekly basis at 5 different health centers; giving health talks on blood pressure, breast cancer, diabetes, and nutrition at public libraries and health centers; staffing health fairs at the Washington Highlands Library; conducting a survey of people’s Internet use; designing an evaluation of people’s experience with online health information; and creating signs, brochures, and handouts to encourage people to research health online.

About Health Information Partners:
Health Information Partners teaches the public how to use online health information to promote personal and community health.  It includes library, literacy and health practitioners who work in adult education, clinical, and public settings.  HIPS holds classes for the public and literacy students, visits health centers where computers are provided for patients, and staffs health fairs and street outreach. 

In the summer 2009, HIPS funded 16 organizations to conduct health information workshops for their participants.

For 8 years, GW students and faculty have conducted health information classes for clients at the Max Wellness Center, and since 2007 they have taught in the AOH GED program.

Additional Information:
Partners for Health Information 2001-02

Site Description:
Whitman-Walker Clinic's Max Robinson Center, named after the nation's first African-American network news anchor, Max Robinson, who died of AIDS in 1988, has been providing HIV/AIDS services for clients living in southeast D.C. since 1992. MRC provides a wide range of services to the community east of the Anacostia River in a culturally competent and sensitive manner. MRC serves an area that traditionally has been underserved and faces tremendous challenges when it comes to primary health care and HIV/AIDS services.