Student health advocates prepare for a healthy year

Members of  The L.A. Trust’s Student Advisory Boards prepared for the new school year at The L.A. Trust Student Health Summer Learning Academy online.  

Student Advisory Board members from LAUSD Wellness Center campuses prepared for a healthy — and challenging — new school year at The L.A. Trust’s annual Summer Learning Academy on student health online July 27–30. 

“The turnout and level of engagement was impressive,” said Senior Program Manager Robert Renteria. “These student health advocates are highly motivated — it is an honor to work with them.”  Students from six LAUSD campuses — Belmont, Carson, Crenshaw, Jordan, Locke and Washington — attended. The students were joined by staff members from The L.A. Trust’s student engagement team, LAUSD Adult Allies and several special guests. 

Students were given an orientation on the Wellness Centers and The L.A. Trust, minor consent and confidentiality and an overview of youth mental health.  

Carla Lavelle and Frank Dussan, psychiatric social workers from LAUSD, helped lead a discussion on mental health and resources. Attendees watched and discussed More than Sad, a video on depression. Stigma was identified a leading barrier to youth seeking treatment. 

“As students go back to school after more than a year of pandemic isolation and stress, it’s important that these peer educators have all the information and resources possible,” Renteria said. 

Other topics included data and public health, including The L.A. Trust Data xChange, selfcare, sexuality and identity, healthy relationship and how to create and conduct health campaigns. 

It was a year that challenged almost everything

Empty classrooms and full intensive care units created a year of unprecedented challenges for Los Angeles students, educators and healthcare providers.

A pandemic. An uprising. An education crisis. And an economic crash. The year 2020 was one of the most challenging years in our history — and an outsize share of those challenges were borne by the students, educators and healthcare workers we serve. 

“Our friends rallied around us, and we rallied around them during this crisis,” said Maryjane Puffer, executive director of The Los Angeles Trust for Children’s Health. “But the problems experienced in 2020 — healthcare and income disparity, racial injustice, distrust of our institutions and inadequate public health facilities — did not start in 2020 and will not disappear in 2021. We have so much work to do.” 

The L.A. Trust adapted quickly to the pandemic and school closures in mid-March, transferring in-person outreach to social media and face-to-face meetings to online platforms like Zoom. 

With schools on lockdown and many Wellness Centers closed, The L.A. Trust redoubled its efforts to address the primary, oral and mental health needs of Los Angeles Unified students: 

Held Wellness Center Learning Collaboratives online in May, October and December to discuss urgent issues related to the pandemic. The three online events were attended by a total of nearly 200 healthcare providers, researchers and L.A. Unified facilitators. 

Provided its stakeholders with information about the unfolding pandemic, interviewing experts like Barbara Ferrer, head of L.A. County Public Health, and Jim Mangia, president and CEO of St. John’s Well Child & Family Center, operator of Wellness Centers at Lincoln, Manual Arts and Washington Prep, which have remained open during COVID. 

June: Distributed more than 50,000 toothbrushes as part of Operation Tooth Fairy, garnering widespread media coverage about the importance of maintaining oral health. 

July/December: Conducted virtual convenings of The L.A. Trust’s Oral Health Advisory board to help providers pivot during COVID crisis. An in-person meeting was held in March, pre-COVID. 

July: Moved its nutrition programs online, reaching nearly 80,000 students and community members with Facebook workshops and professionally produced cooking videos. 

August: Trained student health advocates at our first-ever Summer Academy and supported Student Advisory Board members and their allies throughout the pandemic. 

August: The L.A. Trust launched our Student Mental Health Initiative, funded by a $100,000 grant by Cedars-Sinai and a $50,000 grant by Health Net. The initiative will train students as peer leaders through The L.A. Trust’s Student Advisory Boards, increasing awareness of symptoms like anxiety and depression, and building positive coping mechanisms and self-referrals to care. The initiative will include student-run social media campaigns and online trainings such as “Youth Mental Health First Aid” starting in the fall. 

September: Educated more than 40 state legislators and their staff on the need for school-based healthcare during a first-ever virtual Advocacy Day. 

September: Launched a new website for The L.A. Trust with expanded resources and a new rallying cry, “Putting the care in student healthcare.” 

October: Helped promote and conduct the online California School-Based Health Alliance Conference, attended by nearly 1,000 health advocates from across the state. 

October: Released a Data xChange Report on the impact of L.A. Unified Wellness Centers over the past five years. 

Fall: Partnered with L.A. Unified and KLCS-TV to broadcast The L.A.Trust-produced nutrition and oral health spots reaching an audience of up to 2.3 million students and family members. 

Fall: The L.A. Trust’s program managers, adult allies, director of programs and executive director completed the eight-hour Youth Mental Health First Aid (YMHFA) training and received certification as YMHFA providers. The L.A. Trust’s program manager in turn trained dozens of Student Advisory Board members in the How to H.E.L.P. A Friend curriculum. 

November: Worked with the office of Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas and the T.H.E. Clinic to distribute thousands of N95 protective masks to frontline healthcare workers at Los Angeles Unified Wellness Centers. 

December: Created a new Oral Health Toolkit to put resources at dental providers’ fingertips. 

“It has been a devastating year,” Puffer said, “and the effects are far from over. But last year witnessed unimaginable courage, resilience and resourcefulness. We are so proud of our students, educators, healthcare providers and partners in Los Angeles Unified and beyond.”

Data xChange report shows growth of Wellness Centers

The L.A. Trust Data xChange has issued a new report showing the impact of L.A. Unified’s Wellness Centers since 2015.  

The Los Angeles Trust for Children’s Health has released a new Data xChange report demonstrating the widespread impact of L.A. Unified’s 16 full-service Wellness Centers on students, families and community members in the District’s highest-need areas. 

According to the Data xChange report, 11 school-based Wellness Centers reported more than 229,000 visits from 86,000 patients in the past five years. Visits grew 143% in the past half decade and patients averaged 2.7 visits per year, demonstrating “a strong bond between clinics and patients.”  

The statistics in the Wellness Center 5-Year Impact Report were produced by The L.A. Trust’s Data xChange, which is designed to measure the impact of Wellness Center investments, improve the allocation of health resources and connect the dots between student health and academic achievement. 

Vital services 

Quality healthcare is essential to student success, the report noted. The L.A. Trust supports these clinics by offering best practices, prevention education programs, learning collaboratives and other vital infrastructure. In addition, it has independently raised more than $1.5 million to create the Data xChange, which The L.A. Trust views as key to the future of school-based health in Los Angeles and throughout the nation. 

Common student services include Well Child Exams, contraceptive management, weight and obesity management, immunization and vaccines, sexually transmitted infection testing and management, and mental health and substance use services. 

Because students are only as healthy as the communities they live in, Wellness Centers treat family and community members, too. Community members are more likely to be treated for chronic conditions such as diabetes and hypertension. 

There are currently 16 LAUSD Wellness Center clinics with two more on the way. They bring high-quality medical services into traditionally underserved communities, provide culturally competent care and reduce transportation burdens by putting the clinics on school campuses. (Most of the clinics have a street-facing door to admit community members and a school-facing door to admit students.) 

COVID-19 response 

The coronavirus pandemic has hit Los Angeles hard, especially predominantly Black and Latinx communities served by the Wellness Centers, the report stated. Six Wellness Centers have remained open during the height of the school lockdown and received more than 12,000 visits between March and June of this year. 

“As many of our Wellness Centers pivot toward telehealth and incorporate more specific coding practices related to COVID-19, The L.A. Trust Data xChange will stay in step with them by working to create new reports and insights,” the impact report affirmed.  

The Data xChange is guided by an Expert Advisory Council that includes: Manal Aboelata, The Prevention Institute; Mayra Alvarez, The Children’s Health Partnership; Grace Kim Crofton, L.A. Care Health Plan; Rebecca Dudovitz, UCLA; Pia Escudero, LAUSD Student Health and Human Services; Mehrnaz Davoudi, Kaiser Permanente; Art Garcia, First 5 Los Angeles; Will Grice, Kaiser Permanente and board president of The L.A. Trust; Lyndee Knox, PatientToc; Hayley Love; James Kyle, L.A. Care Health Plan; Anitha Mullangi, St. John’s Well Child and Family Health Center; Kevon Tucker-Seeley, LAUSD Office of Data and Accountability; Mollie Rudnick, LAUSD Chief Strategy Office; Nina Vaccaro, Community Clinic Association of Los Angeles County; Ron Tanimura, LAUSD Student Medical Services; Kimberly Uyeda; and Lynn Yonekura, L.A. Best Babies Network

Data xChange points way to better healthcare solutions

Dr. Ron Tanimura said The L.A. Trust’s Data xChange would drive new healthcare strategies to better serve students and communities. 

Technologies like telehealth and initiatives like The L.A. Trust Data xChange are key to better student health outcomes, according to speakers at the online Wellness Network Learning Collaborative on May 7, 2020. Dr. Ron Tanimura, director of student health services at LAUSD, and Sang Leng Trieu, wellness program manager for The L.A. Trust, gave an update on The L.A. Trust Data xChange, which compiles and compares detailed Wellness Center patient data. They spoke to more than 100 representatives from LAUSD and the District’s Wellness Centers. 

Pia V. Escudero, executive director of LAUSD Student Health and Human Services and a member of the executive committee of The L.A. Trust, noted that the clinic network was founded almost 15 years ago “to reduce health disparities impacting the lifespans of our children in families.” She said “there’s still a lot of work to do,” and insights like the Data xChange are key to finding effective solutions. 

“The data is so wonderful,” Escudero said. “It gives us a good baseline to start having future conversations and doing some hypothesis working and strategic planning in this transformational time that we’re living in.” 

Tanimura said data was critical. “We have to look at every one of our divisions and departments and integrate and (utilize) some of the resources we have outside, mainly The L.A. Trust. I thank you for the work you are doing, especially on Data xChange.” 

He added, “The more data we get the better. When we look at the Data xChange, this is a thousand times better than just encounter data. We look forward to integrating all the data – dental, mental health, attendance and other academic data. Imagine what we will be able to do for our kids and their communities.”  

Current reports include such measures as unique patient visits, type of patient encounters, co-morbid conditions, demographics and student vs. community visits. The database also tracks services provided and benchmarks on key performance standards, including risk assessments, well-child exams, BMI screening, chlamydia tests and depression screening. 

The L.A. Trust distributed report cards with clinical metrics to each clinic in February and will add new datasets on mental and oral health later this year, expanding the database insights. 

Mission Report from The L.A. Trust shows a year of progress

The L.A. Trust’s Mission Report sounds a hopeful note during a time of crisis.

The Los Angeles Trust for Children’s Health has released its first-ever Mission Report capturing a year of accomplishments and looking forward to “healthier days ahead.”

Executive Director Maryjane Puffer and Board President William Grice of Kaiser Permanente, observed that “the COVID-19 health crisis and economic downturn have been a dramatic reminder of how much depends on our education and healthcare systems.”

More than four in five Los Angeles Unified students live in poverty, the report notes, and there are wide disparities in healthcare access. “The COVID-19 crisis is severely worsening these dual hardships and students need our help more than ever.”

The report outlines how The L.A. Trust, working with its funders and allies, is bridging the worlds of health and education to achieve student wellness.

In last fiscal year 2018-2019, The L.A. Trust:

• Launched The L.A. Trust Data xChange, which links confidential health and academic data to determine how student health affects student performance.

• Partnered with the University of California San Francisco to launch a bilingual contraception awareness app for Latina teens.
  

• Supported the growing network of Student and Family Wellness Centers on LAUSD campuses, with best practices, research and Learning Collaborative convenings.

• Facilitated screenings for more than 1,700 kindergartners and third-graders at dozens of LAUSD elementary schools and provided oral health education throughout the district.

• Worked with Student Advisory Board members and their Adult Allies at Wellness Center schools on issues like STD prevention, HPV vaccination and substance use.

• Advocated for fresh foods and good nutrition, teaching more than 100 student and community nutrition courses, appearing at events like the Fremont Free Food Fair and promoting the benefits of drinking water.

• Worked with community partners and student advocates to fight vaping, tobacco and substance use among LAUSD students.

“None of this would have been possible without the help of partners and allies,” said Anna Baum, director of development and communication. “We’re very grateful for their support, especially in times like these.”

Puffer gave special thanks to The L.A. Trust Board of Directors “who work selflessly so every L.A. student can have equal access to healthcare and an equal shot at success.”

Students find a healthcare home at LAUSD Wellness Centers

LAUSD’s network of Wellness Centers, like this one operated by South Central Family Health Center, are on the front lines of student and community health.

When a Delta 777 passenger plane dumped a load of aviation fuel over the Cudahy area last month, students at six LAUSD schools were affected—and the Wellness Center at Elizabeth Learning Center sprung into action.

The clinic, operated by South Central Family Health Center, offered free screenings to everyone in the community, regardless of insurance, immigration status or ability to pay. The clinic is part of Los Angeles Unified School District’s network of Student and Family Wellness Centers, which provide a healthcare home for students and community members in the district’s most underserved neighborhoods. Tens of thousands of students and community members rely on the clinics each year.

“When there’s an environmental emergency, a flu outbreak or a spike in STDs, the Wellness Centers often see it first,” said Maryjane Puffer, executive director of The Los Angeles Trust for Children’s Health. “They are on the front lines of student and community health, and the services they provide are indispensable. Nothing is more important to The L.A. Trust than supporting these clinics.”

Partners in health

The L.A. Trust provided direct financial support to the six original LAUSD school-based health clinics between 1994 and 2002. Since then it has worked closely with LAUSD Health and Human Services to support the development of 15 (soon to be 19) new school-based Wellness Centers, focusing on strategies to make them self-sufficient and sustainable. 

“Our Wellness Center support mission today includes a broad range of prevention programs, best practices and research,” Puffer said. She cited The L.A. Trust’s groundbreaking Data xChange initiative, student engagement efforts and Wellness Network Learning Collaborative workshops as examples of how The L.A. Trust supports the clinics.

The Wellness Center Network is overseen by LAUSD Health and Human Services, headed by Executive Director Pia V. Escudero. Professional services are provided by these Federally qualified health centers: Asian Pacific Healthcare Venture at Belmont; Eisner Health at Santee Education Complex; Kaiser Permanente, LAUSD Student Medical Services and Planned Parenthood Los Angeles at Hollywood High; Mission City Community Network at Maywood Center for Enriched Studies; Northeast Community Clinics at Gage Middle School; St. John’s Well Child and Family Center at Manual Arts High and Washington Prep; South Central Family Health Center at Elizabeth Learning Center and Jefferson High; South Bay Family Health Center at Carson High; T.H.E. (To Help Everyone) Health and Wellness Centers at Crenshaw High; UMMA Community Clinic at Fremont High; Valley Community Healthcare at North Hills-Monroe High; Via Care at Garfield High; and Watts Health at Jordan High and Locke Early Education Center. 

Primary care plus

In addition to primary and dental care, most LAUSD Wellness Centers provide mental health services to students and community members. LAUSD School Mental Health provides intervention, care and referral at the Belmont, Carson, Crenshaw, Elizabeth, Gage, Locke, Maywood and Washington Prep Wellness Centers.

Other mental health services providers include Aviva Family and Children’s Services at Hollywood High; Child and Family Guidance Center at North Hills-Monroe; Children’s Institute at Jordan; Los Angeles Child Guidance Clinic at Manual Arts; and Weber Community Center at Fremont.

“Our kids hold all the promise in the world,” Puffer said. “Helping support them with access to care—whether it’s asthma, anxiety, depression or substance use—is part of the holistic wellness mission of The L.A. Trust. ”

A ground-breaking year for The L.A. Trust and its partners in student health

Maryjane Puffer joined students and community leaders at the groundbreaking for a new Student and Family Wellness Center at Mendez Learning Center December 15.

The year 2019 was a busy one for The Los Angeles Trust and its partners, and 2020 will be busier still. Thanks to its partners and stakeholders, last year The L.A. Trust:

• Made final preparations for the launch of its ground-breaking Data xChange initiative, which will link confidential Wellness Center data with academic performance numbers to improve outcomes on both.

• Supported LAUSD’s growing network of Student and Family Wellness Centers, helped dedicate new clinics at Santee Education Complex and other schools, and hosted two Learning Collaboratives where clinicians received critical data and best practices on student healthcare.

• Provided oral health education and partnered with More L.A. Smiles to provide free dental screenings and interventions to thousands of kindergartners and third-graders at LAUSD elementary schools.

• Supported anti-vaping and substance use education efforts across the District, assisting student outreach and hosting a Vaping 101 webinar series for clinicians and others.

• Hosted a Youth2Youth Summit engaging 100 student health advocates and their adult allies from across the District.
  

• Presented recipes, nutrition and food-shopping advice at more than 50 classroom and community events as part of the CalFresh Health Living initiative.

• Worked with UCSF research staff on the development and delivery of the “Health-E You/Salud iTu,” an app-based contraception awareness program focused on Latina youth. The program resulted in a 117% increase in the use of Long-Acting Reversible Contraceptives (results will be published in leading health journals this year).

• Partnered with leading healthcare organizations and announced important new program grants, driving the organization’s mission through 2021.

• Hired new staff, including Marsha Ellis as director of programs; Rob Wray as associate director of communications and media; Mackenzie Scott as student engagement coordinator; and Danielle Griffin as student engagement assistant.

2020 vision

“We had a great 2019,” said Executive Director Maryjane Puffer, “and we have laid the groundwork for a truly breakthrough year in 2020.” 

She said The L.A. Trust has a new strategic plan, a new logo and a new mission statement: “Bridging the worlds of health and education to achieve student wellness.”

“We also have our first vision statement,” Puffer stated. “It’s ‘A world where every student is healthy and successful.’ We have always stood for this, but this is our northstar and it’s important to share it.”

Puffer said The L.A. Trust will reintroduce itself in the spring with a new website and a new awareness campaign. “The L.A. Trust believes nothing is more important to the future of our country than the health of our kids. In 2020, we will be better positioned than ever to help advance student health where it’s needed most.”