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NPHP Initiatives Update
2003-2004
July 2004. A six-member advisory group
met at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in
July to plan the Rapid Response Network (RRN) pilot program,
which will roll out fall 2004. The NPHP envisions the RRN
as an accessible, coordinated public health response system
that will facilitate the distribution of information about
urgent public health issues to museums and science centers
across the country. The RRN will serve museums and science
centers by fostering their connections with local experts
and partners and allow these institutions to better utilize
research, communications, guidance, and public health messages
developed by HHS and other key public health entities. In
addition, the RRN will provide museum and science centers
with accessible information to support the development of
reliable and timely programming that will answer their local
community needs for information about important health matters.
May 2004. Erica Pearson, Karyn Butts,
and Kunal Mitra joined the NHM staff as interns this past
May. Karyn and Erica are MPH candidates at the George Washington
School of Public Health and Health Services where they both
focus their studies on health promotion and health communication.
Kunal is a recent graduate of the University of Georgia and
plans to pursue a joint degree program in medicine and health
policy at Duke University in 2005. During their time here,
Erica, Karyn, and Kunal will all work on NPHP and NHM projects.
 May
2004. Claudia Menashe, Project Director for the NPHP,
connected with health educators from around the nation at
the SOPHE 2004 Midyear Conference. The conference, which
took place May 5-7 in Orlando, Florida, was in partnership
with the Directors of Health Promotion and Education. This
year’s topic was “The Future of Health
Promotion and Health Education: Transforming Vision into Reality.”
 May
2004. More than 5,000 museum professionals from institutions
in every state and more than 30 countries convened from May
6 through the 10th at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center
in New Orleans, Louisiana, for the 98th annual meeting of
the American Association of Museums (AAM). Mark Dunham, NHM
President, and David Roland, NHM Senior Vice President, represented
the National Health Museum. They met with museum and science
center leaders from across the country, sharing information
about NPHP initiatives and the NHM and gathering input about
the Museum’s development.
 April
2004. The National Health Museum (NHM) worked closely
with Georges Benjamin, MD, MPH, Executive Director of APHA,
to encourage museums and science centers from across the country
to celebrate National Public Health Week 2004, April 5-11.
This year’s theme was “Eliminating Health Disparities: Communities
Moving from Statistics to Solutions." Dr. Benjamin sent
letters to NPHP museums and science centers with ideas about
how to commemorate National Public Health Week and coordinate
activities with local public health groups.
As a result of Dr. Benjamin’s letter, the California
Science Center in Los Angeles invited Dr. Eloise Gonzalez
from the Los Angeles Office of Women’s Health to talk about
health disparities at the science center’s Women’s Health
Festival on Saturday, April 3rd. The festival
officially kicked-off the opening of the California Science
Center’s exhibit, “The Changing Face of Women’s Health.”
More than 6,000 people attended the festival where they were
given information about other National Public Health Week
activities happening around California.
November 2003. The 131st
Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association took
place November 15-19, 2003, in San Francisco, CA. The theme
was Behavior, Lifestyle, and Social Determinants of Health.
The National Health Museum’s display booth won 3rd
place for best exhibit in the non-profit/ government category.
The booth featured a plasma screen with a video about the
NHM, fact sheets, and NHM stress balls. Mark Dunham, NHM
President; Claudia Menashe, NPHP Project Director; Vivian
Lee Ward, Director of CyberEducation; and Sonbol Shahid-Salles,
NHM Intern, all enjoyed connecting with numerous public health
professionals.
| Mark Dunham, Sonbol Shahid-Salles,
Vivian Lee Ward, and Claudia Menashe in front of
the award-winning NHM booth. |
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October 2003. In October, Marie Carter
joined the NPHP team and worked throughout the academic year
on NPHP and NHM projects including Web site content development,
conference planning, online research, and planning around
the National Public Health Partnership. While serving as
the National Health Museum’s intern, Marie worked on her degree
in Global Health Promotion and Disease Prevention at George
Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services.
After graduating in the spring of 2004, Marie headed to Africa
for 10 weeks to do water quality testing. The NPHP and NHM
thank her for her contributions.
March and July 2003. In March 2003,
the NPHP submitted the NPHP Inaugural Meeting Report to its
Steering Committee Members. The report includes background
information on the NPHP, preliminary research gathered during
Phase I, an inaugural meeting summary and assessment, and
proposed next steps for the NPHP.
A final NPHP report came out in July 2003 in
response to a request from The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
(RWJF), which supported the NPHP with initial program funding.
This final report reflects specific questions posed by the
RWJF about the NPHP. It identifies project goals achieved
such as building bridges between public health and museum
and science center communities, recruiting partners, promoting
public health values, and creating constituencies. It also
identifies challenges, sources of support, lessons learned,
impact, and looks ahead at future NPHP plans. For more information
about the reports or to request a copy, please contact the
NPHP at nphp@nationalhealthmuseum.org.
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May 2003. Planning for Phase I of the
NPHP culminated in a small working group meeting of Steering
Committee Members held in conjunction with the American Association
of Museum’s (AAM) annual conference in Portland, Oregon, on
May 20, 2003. This meeting gathered feedback and guidance
from NPHP Steering Committee Members about proposed Phase
II deliverables. These future NPHP actions include establishing
a communication pathway, gathering and sharing key data such
as best practices, creating an RRN, extending APHA’s National
Public Health Week to museums and science centers, encouraging
local networking, and initiating special projects such as
the development of a major national exhibition on a top public
health topic. A reception followed the working group meeting
featuring presentations about public health and the NPHP by
Emmy award-winning educator and NHM Trustee “Bill Nye the
Science Guy” and APHA President, Jay Glasser, PhD.
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