Refugee Health Partnership (RHP)

The Refugee Health Partnership is a collaboration between ASU’s School of Social Work, Office of Global Social Work, Catholic Charities Refugee Resettlement Program, International Rescue Committee’s Refugee Resettlement Program, and Dignity Health’s St. Joseph’s Medical Center. An investigation into the nature of health care access of newly arrived refugees began with a series of focus groups. As refugees shared their experiences, it became apparent that refugee populations face common barriers to accessing health care and many service providers in the Valley are not adequately prepared to serve refugee populations. Catholic Charities Refugee Resettlement Program hired a Refugee Health Advocate to provide medical case management services in hopes of helping refugees increase their self-sufficiency skills and improve health care access. The Refugee Health Advocate, along with Catholic Charities’ Refugee Outreach Specialist also deliver trainings to service providers on topics ranging from considerations for addressing behavioral health to survivors of torture. Via the ASU IRB approved research, Office of Global Social Work, along with the Morrison Institute of Public Policy analyze the data collected by the Refugee Health Advocate and Outreach Specialist to assess the effectiveness of both case management and service provider trainings. Recommendations are made to improve future case management and trainings activities. Funding for case management and research are provided by Dignity Health Community Grants, a hospital group providing awards to nonprofits that work with under-serviced populations.