Of special note, Dr. Flavio Marsiglia of Arizona State University will receive the Helen Rodriguez-Trias Social Justice Award, which is given to a person who has worked toward social justice for underserved and disadvantaged populations. Dr. Marsiglia is the principal investigator of the RADx-UP project Eliminating COVID-19 Disparities in Partnership with Underserved/Vulnerable Transnational Communities of Arizona and founder of the Southwest Interdisciplinary Research Center. His work addresses health disparities and youth substance use prevention in Arizona communities and across the Southwest. 

For those able to join the APHA meeting, catch these RADx-UP presentations at the following sessions:

RADx-UP project: Getting Asian Americans INFORMED to Facilitate COVID-19 Testing and Vaccination  

• “Engaging Chinese and Vietnamese American participants via text messaging in COVID-19 health education”  
  • Presenter: Michelle Luu  
  • Nov. 6 at 2:30 p.m. - 3:30 p.m.  
  • This presentation explores methods to engage underserved Vietnamese and Chinese Americans in COVID-19 health education and demonstrates the efficacy of linking in-language texting to an in-language website  

RADx-UP Coordination and Data Collection Center (CDCC) partner, Community-Campus Partnerships for Health (CCPH)  

• “Differing Community Partnership Model's Impacts on COVID-19 At-home Testing Initiatives: Lessons Learned from Four National RADx-UP Demonstration Sites”  
  • Presenter: Al Richmond  
  • Nov. 6 at 4:30 p.m. - 4:45 p.m.  
  • This presentation describes and compares four at-home COVID-19 testing initiatives funded by the RADx-UP Initiative, each representing a unique partnership model  

RADx-UP project: Using Covid-19 Testing and Risk Communication Strategies to Accelerate Students’ Return to School

• "Examining the Social, Ethical and Behavioral Needs of Rural Schools During the Pandemic"
  • Presenter: Sonia Bishop
  • Nov. 7 at 2:30 p.m. - 2:45 p.m.
  • This presentation examines the social, ethical, behavioral needs of rural schools with a large Latino population, also their views on COVID-19 testing and vaccination
• “Understanding rural families’ needs for returning to in-person learning”  
  • Presenter: Miriana Duran
  • Nov. 9 at 10:30 a.m. - 12 p.m.
  • This presentation identifies resources and needs for students to return to in-person learning in a rural community where 50% of their population are Latino/Hispanic.

RADx-UP project: Community Health Worker Led COVID-19 Education and Rapid Antigen Testing for People Experiencing Homelessness  

• “Community Health Worker Led COVID-19 Education and Rapid Testing for People Experiencing Homelessness”  
  • Presenter: Rebecca Ziolkowski
  • Nov. 7 at 4:30 p.m. - 6 p.m.  
  • This presentation is part of the roundtable CHWs Addressing the COVID-19 Pandemic. It describes strategies used to assess knowledge and attitudes of people experiencing homelessness about COVID-19 testing and vaccination, as well as the impact of CHW-led education and rapid antigen testing in a homeless shelter in Indiana

RADx-UP CDCC workstream, RADx-UP Health Equity Policy Framework  

• “A Policy Framework for Community-Based COVID-19 Testing: Lessons from the Radx-up Initiative”  
  • Presenter: Kamaria Kaalund  
  • Nov. 7 at 5 p.m. - 5:30 p.m.  
  • This presentation explains five key policy levers for addressing health inequities in COVID-19 and beyond include: access, resource allocation, data, communication and messaging, and payment  

Say Yes! COVID Test  

• “Say Yes! COVID Test Case Study: A Health Communication Campaign to Encourage Use of Rapid, At-Home Antigen Testing in Underserved and Historically Marginalized Communities”
  • Presenter: Lindsay Singler  
  • Nov. 8 at 10:30 a.m. - 12 p.m.  
  • This presentation describes an integrated health communication campaign that underpinned Say Yes! COVID Test, the first National Institutes of Health (NIH)-sponsored initiative promoting community-wide, at-home, rapid COVID-19 antigen testing

RADx-UP Tracking and Evaluation team  

• “Dimensions of community inclusion in research: Using evaluation to improve community engagement across the research design-to-dissemination continuum”
  • Presenter: Marlena Kuhn  
  • Nov. 8 at 1 p.m. - 2 p.m.  
  • This presentation discusses the T&E evaluation approach for tracking and analyzing community engagement across the research design-to-dissemination continuum  

RADx-UP project: Maximizing Child Health and Learning Potential: How to Promote a School Culture of Safety in the Era of COVID-19  

• “Community Perspectives on Vaccination in Elementary School-Age Children”  
  • Presenter: Hannah Zwiebel  
  • Nov. 8 at 3 p.m. - 4 p.m. ET  
  • This presentation includes a subset of our data combining questionnaire responses and focus group quotes from our elementary school participants to demonstrate community perspectives on vaccinating elementary school-age children at a snapshot in time  

RADx-UP project: Effective Coronavirus Disease 2019 (Covid-19) Outreach and Guidance in Hampton Roads Public Housing  

• “Hampton Roads (VA) Community Consortium (HRCC) Utilizes Community Advisory Board (CAB) to Reduce COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy and Impact Health Disparities”  
  • Presenter: Ethlyn Gibson  
  • Nov. 8 at 4:30 p.m. - 4:45 p.m.  
  • This presentation discusses how collaboration with a CAB can reduce COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy
    
    
• “How Regional Public Housing Authorities Responded Organizationally to the COVID-19 Pandemic to Maintain Services to Meet the Needs of Residents: Best Practices and Lessons Learned” 
  • Presenter: Glenn Yap 
  • Nov. 8 at 5 p.m. - 5:15 p.m.
  • This presentation identifies best practices RPHAs implemented in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and how their response can be improved for similar events in the future to better support residents 

• “Building institutional processes to streamline responding to community-identified needs”  
  • Presenter: Andrew Plunk  
  • Nov. 8 at 5:30 p.m. - 5:45 p.m.  
  • This presentation discusses how feedback from a community advisory board can be integrated into institutional processes at a medical school with the goal of improving health equity in the region