Community Health Workers

Innovative Care Models

Project ECHO is applying the ECHO model to several innovative care-delivery strategies. Our programs support primary-care teams, who provide specialized patient care, through education and mentorship. 

Through ECHO, the clinical teams gain expertise fast and expand patients' access to care. In each case, additional financial support is provided to the primary care team so they can focus on delivering specialized care.

Community Health Workers participate with multidisciplinary teams located at sites throughout New Mexico. Teams may include a primary care physician, nurse practitioner, physician’s assistant, medical assistant and behavioral health specialists.

Teams are trained together through the following training methods: 

• Face-to-face training, allowing for hands-on training and practice of skills
• Weekly virtual conferences with participants on both video and phone, which include presenting and discussing patient cases, resource sharing, networking, expert presentations and participant learning loops
• Video modules for material that doesn’t require interactive Q&A

Teams use holistic approaches to address the social determinants of health in rural and traditionally underserved populations.

CHW Training Programs

To support and improve the skills of CHWs, we developed ECHO® Community Health Worker training models for several health and medical conditions, based on the needs of providers and underserved communities around New Mexico. We created and implemented the models with input from experienced CHWs who served as ECHO’s community training facilitators. Like our Innovative Care Models, Specialty training for CHWs includes:

• Face-to-face training, allowing for hands-on training and practice of skills
• Weekly teleconferences (with participants on both video and phone), which include presenting and discussing patient cases, resource sharing, networking, expert presentations, and participant learning loops
• Video modules for material that doesn’t require interactive Q&A.

CHWs are trained for specialized interventions with a high level of rigor - using best practices and a robust curriculum - but are taught to use their skills in a broad application that allows CHWs to serve in a variety of contexts (e.g., clinics, diabetes or heart health programs, home visits, elder care, or assisted living centers), perform a variety of roles, learn new roles, and improve their employment opportunities.

There is no cost to participants (no tuition, free IT support). Programs also include extensive evaluation.   We provide quality assurance and ongoing learning via weekly teleconferences during and following the training period. The state of New Mexico provides basic certification through the New Mexico Department of Health.  Project ECHO provides specialized training in areas such as diabetes, opioid use disorder and COVID-19 and vaccine confidence as well as added endorsements for specific skills that are mastered during training. 

Programs that Sponsor Community Health Workers 

1. CHW/PSW Opioid Training ECHO
2. Vaccine Confidence in New Mexico
3. Endocrinology
4. HIV/AIDS

Incorporation Principles of Adult and Popular Education in CHW Programs

All of our CHW programs include best practices from adult learning and popular education models.

In Practice:

• PowerPoint are used to deliver new information and best practices. They are focused on engaging the participants and are highly interactive 
• Majority of content is hands-on, case-based and requires active involvement from participants 
• Ongoing evaluation and assessment of understanding are incorporated into activities and didactics

How do our training programs fit with state certification?

• Project ECHO has had specialty track curriculums endorsed by NM DOH since 2017
• We maintain a close relationship with our NM DOH CHW advisory Council & our NM CHWA, and are responsible for the design of 6 of the core competencies for the generalist role
• We follow the same curriculum format and align our core competencies with the state standards

Interested in Replicating a CHW Training Program?

Do you want more information about replicating a CHW Training Program? Or using ECHO to train your CHWs? Join the ECHO Movement and contact the ECHO CHW team.