Diabetes Prevention, Education and Screening

The Health and Activities Promotion Initiative (HAPI) is a linguistically appropriate and culturally competent Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) diabetes prevention, education, outreach and support program. The goals of HAPI are:

1. To prevent the onset of Type 2 diabetes among at high-risk Asian American ethnic groups and the broader Asian American community,
2. To support active living, healthy eating, and greater diabetes knowledge among those with Type 2 diabetes, and
3. Lastly, to increase the cultural competency of providers so they can better take care of their AAPI patients.

According to a recent report, the fastest growing cases of diabetes are among Asian and Latino adults. Nationally, it is the 5th leading cause of death among AAPIs (compared to 7th among all Americans). In NE Ohio, it is estimated that nearly 3,000 AAPIs are living with diabetes. Within the AAPI community, diabetes cases are highest among Asian Indian, Filipino, Korean and Southeast Asian populations. Each of these communities have unique socio-economic, historical, cultural, and linguistic factors that attribute to their higher risk for diabetes. Presently, there is currently no specific AAPI diabetes program available in NE Ohio.

HAPI uses a multi-pronged approach to eliminate health disparities in the area of Type 2 diabetes. The intervention will focus on three domains:

• Individuals: Develop a linguistically accessible and culturally appropriate six-week diabetes prevention program for the Asian community and train bi-lingual lay health workers to deliver the program. The program is community-based and non-clinical approach, emphasizing skills mastery, modeling, diabetes knowledge, and greater self-efficacy toward diabetes prevention.
• Community: Utilize a multi-prong community-based outreach and education approach to develop and distribute linguistically accessible and culturally appropriate diabetes materials and resources.
• Provider: Conduct physician education training (in-person presentations and/or learning calls/webinars), including CME credits, to enhance providers’ understanding of diabetes care management with AAPI patients.

For more information about the project, please contact asia@asiainc-ohio.org.