Dean's Newsletter
Archive of previous newsletters
Healthy Home's First Anniversary: A Cause for Celebration
August 23, 2007
Home-based environmental hazards are major contributors to disease, particularly those that disproportionately affect low income, urban, and minority children. Childhood lead poisoning and asthma are prime examples. Traditional vehicles for prevention messages (health fairs, provider visits, etc.) may not be effective with this population, however. On the other hand, home visits have been successful in reducing environmental hazards such as lead and asthma triggers, but such visits are expensive to accomplish individually. Katrina Korfmacher, PhD, Assistant Professor of Environmental Medicine, thought there was a better way--a model "Healthy Home" that would serve as an interactive "museum," delivering home visit-like, hands-on educational experiences in a cost-effective, community-based facility.
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Katrina Korfmacher, PhD, Assistant Professor of Environmental Medicine |
Lead poisoning poses a tremendous health risk for children six years and younger, potentially damaging their central nervous system, kidneys and reproductive systems. Even low levels of lead are harmful and are associated with decreased intelligence, impaired neurobehavioral development, decreased growth, and impaired hearing. The major source of lead exposure among U.S. children is deteriorated lead-based paint and lead-contaminated dust found in housing built before 1978. The problem of lead exposure is pervasive in Rochester. A survey by URMC and Action for a Better Community of the Jay-Orchard and Edgerton neighborhoods in Rochester last summer revealed that almost 90% of housing had signs of exterior paint deterioration.
When most of us learn about the high prevalence of preventable childhood disease, we are sad and empathetic. We might go further by acquiring a greater understanding of the medical and sociological aspects of how the home environment--e.g., lead, second-hand smoke, depression in a parent, poor nutrition--can have a significant impact on the physical and intellectual development of the children who live there. But few make the commitment to devote the very serious time and effort needed for public advocacy and in-the-trenches community work to implement a project like Healthy Home successfully. We are very fortunate to have a faculty member in our medical school--Katrina Korfmacher, PhD, Assistant Professor of Environmental Medicine and Outreach Coordinator for our Environmental Health Sciences Center, who felt compelled to make this type of extraordinary effort, and who had the savvy to pull off what has become a model of successful medical school-community partnerships.
The first step was advocacy. Katrina and her colleagues--who include among many others, Bryan Hetherington and Mike Hanley (from Empire Justice), Kathy Lewis (formerly from the United Way and now with URMC's Center for Community Health), Ralph Spezio (from the Department of Community and Preventive Medicine), Mel Callan (from the Department of Family Medicine) Derrick Hazie (from Rochester's Coalition to Prevent Lead Poisoning), Patricia Brantingham (from the Perinatal Network of Monroe County) and Joan Rosenthal (from the League of Women Voters)--participated in a grass-roots campaign to pass a lead abatement ordinance. After much hard work, the City Council approved this ordinance in December of 2005, to go into effect on July 1, 2006. The new law requires inspections for lead paint hazards as a part of the city's certificate of occupancy process.
Leveraging this new ordinance with a small ($15,000) pilot grant from our NIH-funded Environmental Health Sciences Center, and more importantly with hundreds of hours of volunteer and donated staff time from the project's core community partners, SouthWest Area Neighborhood Association (SWAN) and the Rochester Fatherhood Resource Initiative (RFRI), the "Healthy Home" was opened on West Main Street in Rochester in June, 2006. This indeed has become a truly unique resource that provides city homeowners, renters, landlords, and contractors with hands-on education and training in effective, low-cost lead hazard control measures. The facility contains displays that focus on four topics: lead hazards, asthma triggers, household toxic chemicals, and indoor environmental air hazards (radon, carbon monoxide, asbestos). For each topic, information is provided on the health impacts, source of hazards, low-cost strategies for addressing the hazards, and community resources to assist individuals in addressing these hazards in their own homes. SWAN, a thirty-year-old community-based organization, manages the community outreach and educational component of the Healthy Home project. RFRI – an organization that supports, trains, and helps find employment for fathers in economically depressed areas of Rochester – manages outreach to property managers and coordinates lead-safe work practices and other trainings at the home.
Over the past year, more than 700 people have visited the Healthy Home and the project has conducted seven free lead-safe work workshops, including two in Spanish. The home has also become an informal hub for community health organizations such as the Regional Community Asthma Network, the Children's Environmental Health Center, and the Injury Free Coalition for Kids through the Healthy Home Advisory Council. This summer, the Healthy Home is supporting new community initiatives, including a nutrition and obesity prevention partnership with Foodlink, and the County's Work Experiences Program that provides job placements for people receiving welfare benefits.
Volunteer hours and small pilot grants only go so far. Last year, Katrina and her colleagues applied for an Environmental Justice Collaborative Problem-Solving grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and were successful in securing a $100,000 award. This grant – coupled with recent grants from the Rochester Area Community Foundation, the Department of Environmental Conservation, and the New York State Department of Health – will enable the Healthy Home to continue to play an important role in improving environmental health in the community.
On June 21, 2007, Healthy Home celebrated its one-year anniversary. I was privileged to attend and meet many of the community leaders and volunteers (including UR student interns) who are so dedicated to the Healthy Home. "This project has been an exciting addition to our ongoing efforts to eliminate lead and other environmental hazards from our neighborhoods," said Pat Jackson, Executive Director of SWAN. "The Healthy Home is helping us support community residents from Southwest Rochester and beyond in making their home environments safer and healthier for their families, and the EPA grant will allow us to continue this important work. The Healthy Home collaborative partners are very proud to be one of the 10 nationwide recipients of this EPA Award."
Indeed, it is important to note that the EPA grant will also complete the Healthy Home's financial transition from a University-supported effort to a community-run project, with SWAN taking over the day-to-day operation of the home. "This project has been a shining example of what can be accomplished by a community-university partnership," said Dr. Korfmacher. "The community has essentially leveraged an initial $15,000 investment by the University into $150,000 in new funds for community groups to address a critical environmental health education need."
The Healthy Home is located at 700 West Main Street in Rochester and is open to the public on Wednesdays from 3 to 6 p.m., or by appointment Monday through Saturday. Individuals and groups may schedule visits by contacting Shehrina Tabassum at 529-9957.
Meliora,
David S. Guzick, MD, PhD
Dean, School of Medicine and Dentistry
