West Region Program Office, HETCAT
The Office of Border Health serves as the headquarters for the West Region Program Office of HETCAT (Health Education Training Centers Alliance of Texas). This organization is a consortium of Texas universities, governmental agencies, and non-governmental organizations that provide educational resources or outreach services to the Border Region of Texas. The consortium is funded through an award from the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). Health Education and Training Centers HETCAT provides funding to develop community-initiated projects throughout the region. These activities are public-health-oriented, but they may focus on community education, development of services, or public health initiatives.
During the past three years, HETCAT West Region has developed and supported more than 50 projects within the six HETCAT programmatic areas of:
- Health Professions Education and Training
- Health Careers Development and Recruitment
- Community Technical Assistance
- Continuing Professional Education
- Community Health Promotion and Education
- Cross Border Coordination with Mexico
HETCAT projects have included
- Bi-national/bi-lingual and Spanish-language training programs for emergency care providers that have benefited El Paso and Juarez emergency care services.
- Career development programs ranging from Career exploration programs for middle school students in Kermit, Lubbock and Grape Creek, Texas, to courses that help college students prepare for application to professional schools.
- Continuing education programs in rural communities including Brady, Comanche and Alpine and Presidio, Texas, which take expertise to communities rather than practitioners traveling long distances to education programs. Locally, border health programs and a lead poisoning conference have helped El Paso area providers to keep current on health care developments.
- Training programs for Community Health Workers in the communities of Terlingua, Marathon and Albany that have increased community involvement by lay persons and impacted on access to services by underserved populations. Supporting Community Health Workers through skills development and fostering participation in state and national programs is a major effort of HETCAT and its West Region.
- HETCAT has helped rural Presidio, Texas, develop and conduct a bi-national Hazardous Materials, Bio-terrorism and Disaster training activity at the International Port of entry. The West Region continues to assist in planning efforts in this community.
Bi-national training programs and participation on bi-national planning groups enables HETCAT to blend technical assistance resources with goals for cross border coordination of mutually beneficial activities and programs.