In 2017, Community Memorial Foundation (CMF) and Healthy Communities Foundation (HCF) collaborated to fund models of health care delivery that utilize Community Health Workers (CHWs), thus improving access to care and growing the health care workforce in the western suburbs of Chicago. CMF and HCF funded five organizations with diverse missions and target populations to address the Regional Health and Human Services Agenda priority to create communities with accessible, high-quality health and human services for all.

In 2022, the Coleman Foundation joined CMF and HCF with the expressed purpose of expanding access to the CHW Learning Lab as well as to provide additional advanced training funding for interested CHWs through SUHI’s advanced career pathway models.

Based in Chicago’s western suburbs, the CHW Initiative aims to improve access to culturally competent care and advance health equity throughout the region. The program is coordinated by Health & Medicine, facilitated and evaluated by Sinai Urban Health Institute, and has significantly impacted the CHW landscape locally and nationally in the past four years.

Read about the fourth year of the project, including the accomplishments of CHWs at Aging Care Connections, Alivio Medical Center, BEDS Plus Care, Healthcare Alternative Systems, Inc., and Mujeres Latinas en Accion, in the Year 4 Report.