Across the country, states, health plans, and provider organizations are increasingly seeking opportunities to integrate community health workers and promotores (CHW/Ps) into health care delivery to improve the quality of life and health outcomes of individuals they serve. To do this successfully, it is important to support training and ongoing skill- and capacity-building opportunities for CHW/Ps and their organizations.

The Center for Health Care Strategies, in partnership with the California Health Care Foundation, as well as In-Sight Associates, Health Management Associates, and Schoen Consulting, is developing a series of resource packages that share best practices for supporting the integration of CHW/Ps into Medicaid managed care programs serving California Medi-Cal members. This resource, second in the series, focuses on training for CHW/Ps, their hiring organizations, and supervisors. It includes information on characteristics and curricula of successful training approaches, best practices for including CHW/Ps in curriculum development, and examples of what makes successful trainers and recruitment strategies. The resource package also showcases CHW/P training models in California and other states. While this resource is oriented to the California landscape, the lessons can be applied to managed care programs in other states seeking to enhance training strategies for CHW/Ps.

The series is a product of Community Health Workers & Promotores in the Future of Medi-Cal, a project by the California Health Care Foundation that aims to promote the role of CHW/Ps within the context of the California Advancing and Innovating Medi-Cal initiative. Look for future resources from the series, which will be published through 2021.