Community Health Workers

CHW Success Stories

Learn more about the impact of CHWs are making an impact in our region.

The Mid-America Regional Council has supported a KC Regional Community Health Worker Collaborative since 2016. The Collaborative has focused on capacity building, advocacy and sustainability of the profession.

Capacity building

Through capacity building, the CHW Collaborative, CHW Forum and subcommittees have brought agencies and CHWs together to build strong relationships.  The CHW Collaborative meets quarterly and the CHW Forum meets monthly. Anyone is welcome to participate in these meetings. The CHW Collaborative supports an Advocacy Subcommittee that meets every other month.

Through the CHW Collaborative, strong training programs have been designed and delivered throughout Missouri and Kansas, including initial CHW training, continuing education series and supervisory training. The Collaborative has supported the development of professional recognition- programs through Missouri Credentialing Board and a certificate through the Kansas CHW Coalition.  Currently, the CHW Collaborative is hosting training through MARC’s Government Training Institute for Continuing Education and Supervisory Training. A Learning Management System allows all CHWs to access recorded training sessions and secure CEU credits toward their credential or certificate.

Advocacy

The CHW Collaborative has focused attention on building the CHW workforce by encouraging area residents to obtain training and become employed in the field. The CHW Collaborative has focused on encouraging health care and other community organizations to employ CHWs to support patients/clients. The CHW Collaborative has encouraged funders to support the use of CHW in the community. These efforts continue through an active CHW Advocacy Subcommittee.

Summary of State Plan Amendments

The CHW Collaborative has released an updated Summary of State Plan Amendments from 13 states on the reimbursement of CHWs through Medicaid. Erika Saleski, ES Advisors LLC, prepared this update for the Collaborative. 

The original version of this report was prepared in 2022 with funding from the California Healthcare Foundation, with updates in 2024 funded by the Health Forward Foundation. The use of information from this report is permitted with prior approval from Mid-America Regional Council. Please email info@marc.org to request permission.

Reimbursement Strategies for Employers of CHWs

The CHW Collaborative released a Toolkit, entitled Reimbursement Strategies for Employers of Community Health Workers, to help employers of CHWs be able to seek reimbursement from public and private health care payers.

Erika Saleski, ES Advisors LLC, and Tim McNeill, Freedmen’s Health, authored the toolkit for the Collaborative.

Community Health Worker Sustainability – A Case Study of Chronic Care Management

This report, Community Health Worker Sustainability – A Case Study of Chronic Care Management, is a follow up to the Reimbursement Strategies for Employers of Community Health Workers toolkit, and features a real world example of how one Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) — the Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas (CHC/SEK) — incorporated community health workers (CHWs) into delivery of the Medicare Chronic Care Management benefit and billed CHWs' time to Medicare.

The report was prepared in July 2024 by Erika Saleski, ES Advisors LLC, with assistance of the Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas, to help health care organizations gain a perspective on how a health care organization could integrate Community Health Workers into their chronic care management health teams to improve health outcomes and secure reimbursement through Medicare. It was prepared with financial support from the Health Forward Foundation and the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.

In 2016, the KC Regional Community Health Worker Collaborative was established with the mission to integrate Community Health Workers (CHWs) into the health and human services systems through capacity building, advocacy and sustainability. Read about what the Collaborative and their partners accomplished in their first five years.

COVID-19 Report: Roles and Value of CHWs

The COVID-19 pandemic caused dramatic health and economic consequences for many residents in the Kansas City region, and health organizations increasingly relied on CHWs to help clients secure emergency and other resources, understand the risks from the coronavirus disease and the importance of mitigation measures, testing and vaccines. The Kansas City region experienced an increase in the number of agencies employing CHWs between the first quarter of 2020 and the first quarter of 2022, and an expansion of the roles that CHWs delivered in serving patients and the community.

This report summarizes findings from conversations with representatives from 10 agencies in the Kansas City metro area who employ CHWs to increase understanding of the role of CHWs in responding to a public health crisis, and what was learned that could contribute to strengthening the region’s health care system if another emergency situation arises.