“National Hispanic Health Leadership Summit”, August 15-17, 2002

The National Hispanic Medical Association (NHMA) and the honorary co-chair, the United States Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) convened the “National Hispanic Health Leadership Summit”, August 15-17, 2002 at the downtown campus of the University of Texas at San Antonio. Key sponsors of the event were the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Amgen, Aventis, GlaxoSmithKline, PhRMA, and numerous other partners.

The purpose of the National Hispanic Health Leadership Summit was threefold:

• To share the strengths and weaknesses of current health care programs that impact Hispanics,
• To discuss strategies needed for future health care programs, and
• To build consensus on the programs and policies that can be developed or enhanced to improve the quality of health care delivery to the Hispanic population in the United States over the next five years.

Participants addressed issues and worked to reach consensus on one of eight workgroups in the following areas:

1. Access to Health Care
2. Emerging Public Health Issues (Behavioral Health, Violence, Injuries, Immunizations, Infectious Diseases and HIV/AIDS)
3. Cultural Competence and Limited English Proficiency Services
4. Health Professions Training
5. Building Community-Based Hispanic Research (Biomedical and Health Services Research)
6. Prevention, Management and Treatment of Chronic Diseases (Heart Disease, Diabetes, Hypertension, Cancer and Related Complications)
7. Special Populations (Women’s and Children’s Health)
8. U.S.-Mexico Border Health, Bio-Terrorism, Environmental Health, Occupational Health, Asthma)

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) contributed its agencies to produce a powerful partnership to ensure the success of the National Hispanic Health Leadership Summit. These agencies included Office of the Secretary (The Intergovernmental Affairs Office and The Office of Communications), The Office of the Deputy Secretary, Health Resource and Services Administration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Food and Drug Administration, Office of Women’s Health, Office of Minority Health, and the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Each agency nominated two government health experts and two civilian health experts to participate in the Summit. Congressional members with over 20 percent Latino constituencies nominated two health experts from their Congressional districts. Congressional legislative staff and leaders from San Antonio also attended the Leadership Summit. All present worked to produce a set of strategies to enhance national health promotion and treatment programs and to increase the number of health professionals and research programs that target Hispanic populations in the United States.

A total of 170 experts in the health care of Hispanic populations attended the National Hispanic Health Leadership Summit. The summit brought together Hispanic Congressional leaders, physicians, nurses, and other health care professionals, and a core group of experts from multiple disciplines: health care providers and administrators from civilian and military hospitals and health plans representatives of national Hispanic organizations, insurance and pharmaceutical companies, community based organizations, and local, state and Federal government agencies.

The report includes major strategies to improve Hispanic health, a Congressional Roundtable with presentations and questions and answers from several Congressmembers, the first public speech outside of Washington, DC of U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona, MD, and the list of participants.

For more information, call the NHMA at (202) 628-5895.