Highland Health Coach Program

Program PI: Jocelyn Freeman-Garrick, MD

Program Project Director: Omonivie Agbodige, BA

Evaluation PI: Harrison Alter, MD, MS; Jocelyn Freeman-Garrick, MD; Berenice Perez, MD

Evaluation Program Director: Amelia Wing, BA

The Health Coach program, a collaboration among Alameda Health System, Alameda County Health Services and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, trains youth from our community to help patients in our emergency department cope better with diabetes and hypertension.  The evaluation, sponsored and conducted by the Levitt Center, is structured as a randomized trial. After providing a brief patient education session in the ED, health coaches learn whether a patient is assigned to usual care to to health coaching, in which case they develop a six-month (or more) longitudinal relationship, reviewing the importance of and tips for medication adherence, and including home visits, texts and phone calls, and help navigating the complex medical care system. Health coaches are well demonstrated as effective in other settings but their efficacy in emergency care is yet unknown. The Health Coach Program is also integrated into the Alameda County Health Pipeline Partnership, in recognition of its contribution to diversification of the health workforce in our community.

See also Brown, Patricia Leigh. "A Chance to Go from Hard Lives to Healing." The New York Times 18 Sept. 2014, about the Alameda County EMS corps.