In an effort to spread the good word about our innovative Empower Pack  program, we submitted an article for presentation at the American Public Health Association’s annual meeting this fall.  We heard last week that our submission entitled “EMPOWER – Arizona’s collaborative leadership efforts in implementing policy on childhood obesity and tobacco use in child care settings” was selected for the elite Roundtable session during the 138th APHA Annual Meeting http://apha.confex.com/apha/138am/webprogram/Paper223951.html. 

 

We’ll be discussing the strategic implementation of our policy which teaches and shows kids how to develop good health habits and leverages our child care providers to get it done in exchange for an off-setting of their child care licensing fee.  The presentation will focus on how public health issues can be effectively and efficiently addressed through creative thinking, collaborative leadership, blending funding streams, and using evidence-based practices to drive good outcomes. We’ve also turned in an article for publication in the main APHA journal.  We haven’t heard back on that yet- but I would bet my career that we’ll get published because it’s such a good and practical idea.