{"id":7617,"date":"2017-11-24T18:53:27","date_gmt":"2017-11-24T18:53:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=7617"},"modified":"2017-11-24T18:53:27","modified_gmt":"2017-11-24T18:53:27","slug":"foundation-aims-to-improve-health-not-just-health-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=7617","title":{"rendered":"Foundation Aims to Improve Health, Not Just Health Care"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The<\/a>

The Episcopal Health Foundation will focus grants and other programs on early brain development of children during pregnancy and in the first three years of life. Photo: Tardif\/GettyImages<\/p><\/div>\n

by Mark Richardson<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

HOUSTON \u2013<\/strong>\u00a0The Episcopal Health Foundation is shifting its focus to a five-year\u00a0\u201cbig picture\u201d plan<\/a>\u00a0that targets specific outcomes needed to address the root causes of poor health in Texas.<\/p>\n

The Foundation, which serves about 11 million people in a 57-county region of southeast Texas, aims to level the playing field to give Texans with the fewest resources an equal chance at achieving good health.<\/p>\n

Brian Sasser, the director of communications for the Foundation, says it is changing the way it achieves its goals.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe primary theme of that plan is improving health, not just health care,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd that means doing things within the health system, within communities, within early-childhood brain development. They really focus on the things outside of the doctor\u2019s office that can improve health in Texas.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sasser says the plan has three goals: to open up and strengthen health-care systems to address the underlying causes of poor health, to strengthen groups and congregations into health-promoting communities, and to invest in early child-brain development during pregnancy and the first three years of life. He says the programs are aimed at helping low-income and vulnerable Texans.<\/p>\n

Sasser says the foundation plans to achieve its goals by investing in care providers and other community-based organizations.<\/p>\n

\u201cPrimarily with our nonprofits and other groups who receive grants from us, they will use this plan to develop ideas for grant proposals and each grant proposal will go through a certain goal or strategy that we have in our plan,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n

He says the foundation also pursues its goals through other parts of its mission.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn addition, we do a lot of things outside of grants,\u201d he adds. \u201cWe do research, we work with churches, do community engagement projects, and so the focus goes beyond just grant-making but on outcomes and on improving health, not just healthcare, goes into everything we do at the foundation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Episcopal Health Foundation was created in 2013 by the Episcopal Diocese of Texas. The five-year strategic plan will go into effect in 2018.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Mark Richardson HOUSTON \u2013\u00a0The Episcopal Health Foundation is shifting its focus to a five-year\u00a0\u201cbig picture\u201d plan\u00a0that targets specific outcomes needed to address the root causes of poor health in Texas. The Foundation, which serves about 11 million people in a 57-county region of southeast Texas, aims to level the playing field to give Texans […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":7618,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7617"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7619,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7617\/revisions\/7619"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7618"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}