State at a Glance: Colorado
Colorado is featured in the following reports from the National Evaluation:
- Evaluation Highlight No. 3: How are CHIPRA Quality Demonstration States working to improve adolescent health?
- Evaluation Highlight No. 6: How are CHIPRA quality demonstration States working together to improve the quality of health care for children?
- Evaluation Highlight No. 8: CHIPRA quality demonstration States are helping school-based health centers strengthen their medical home features.
Learn more about Colorado’s CHIPRA quality demonstration projects on this page:
Overview
As one of the 10 grantees, Colorado is partnering with New Mexico to implement projects in two of the five grant categories:
- Implementing a more comprehensive provider-based model of service delivery.
- Testing an approach to quality improvement of the State's own design.
Colorado's Objectives
Colorado is working to help school-based health centers (SBHCs) improve the quality of preventive and treatment services they provide to children and adolescents, coordinate more seamlessly with other providers in the community, and further engage students in their health and health care.
Assessing a Provider-Based Model of Care
In conjunction with its partner State, Colorado is helping selected SBHCs define and achieve quality improvement goals. Participating SBHCs will complete a medical home assessment and conduct a student survey to identify areas for improvement. Colorado will hire and support quality improvement coaches who will work with the SBHCs to develop and implement a quality improvement strategy tailored to each center.
Colorado also is working with New Mexico on strategies to increase the delivery of preventive services (e.g., immunizations and the Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnosis, and Treatment (EPSDT) program) and the management of certain conditions (e.g., obesity, depression). The quality improvement coaches will work with SBHCs to implement these strategies and develop or improve their existing systems for tracking and reporting on these services and conditions.
Testing a Quality Improvement Approach of Colorado's Own Design
Colorado is supporting selected SBHCs in efforts to increase youth engagement in their health and health care by improving students' health literacy and helping them manage their care across health care settings. The State collaborated with New Mexico to develop a survey, the Youth Assessment of School Health Involvement, which SBHCs will use to assess youth engagement at the beginning and near the end of the program.
Evaluation Questions
The national evaluation team will be gathering information from Colorado to address a wide range of questions about the implementation and outcomes of its efforts, including:
- How did Colorado select and develop working relationships with participating SBHCs?
- To what extent were the SBHCs successful in improving use of preventive services?
- Did youth who received services from participating SBHCs report more engagement in their health and health care at the end of the school year compared with its beginning?
What are the key lessons from Colorado's experience that would be useful for other States?
Additional Resources
Youth Engagement with Health Services (YEHS!) Survey
The YEHS! was developed by CHIPRA quality demonstration staff in Colorado to measure adolescents’ experiences with health care in a school-based health center setting. Colorado developed a High School Version and a Middle School Version.
Note: These reports have been submitted by the CHIPRA Quality Demonstration States and are made available on this Web site as a courtesy. The description of any product, policy, program, or other resource on this Web site does not imply an endorsement by AHRQ, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), or any other Government agency.
Learn More
This information is current as of February 2014, slightly more than 4 years after the grant award. To learn more about the projects that Colorado is implementing under the CHIPRA Quality Demonstration Grant Program, please contact:
Eric Wolf, Project Director
1570 Grant Street
Denver, Colorado 80203
303-866-5963
Eric.Wolf@state.co.us
