Beginning her third year in a national effort to raise HPV immunization rates through provider education, Joy Taylor of AHEC West has been named one of four Project Specialists to oversee the nationwide campaign being coordinated by the National AHEC Organization (NAO). She is enthusiastic about her new job, and the prospect of driving up HPV immunization rates. "It's exciting," Joy said. "I'm really excited about this project and the opportunity to help AHECs across the country with their HPV immunization training goals. It is especially valuable to me to be a part of such an important and timely cancer-prevention campaign."
For the past two years Joy served as one of 10 HPV Regional Project Coordinators selected to provide connections to groups and organizations, support the usage of materials, and promote promising practices for state entities to provide training to health professionals. She oversaw HPV initiatives in Region B which included Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, New Jersey and the District of Columbia.
Under Joy's guidance in Fiscal Year 2016, Region B State Entities:
- Conducted 28 HPV training events resulting in 1182 health professionals trained
- Disseminated 13,789 HPV educational materials
- Posted 91 HPV educational messages to social media
- Established 633 new and/or enhanced partnerships
- Located 234 environmental resources to assist in this project
Now in its third year, the NAO HPV project has evolved to include greater emphasis on individual state activities,
building partnerships and integrations with other grantees, cancer prevention partners and immunization agencies within each state to more effectively increase HPV immunization rates. Besides partnerships, key focus areas continue to be information dissemination and continuing education.
Joy's new position as one of four national Project Specialists involves guiding, assisting and supporting all continuing education efforts by State Entities participating in th
e NAO HPV Immunization Project.
