Field Placement: Pasadena Public Health Department -- Pasadena Immunization Coalition (PIzC)
Location: Pasadena, CA
Preceptor: Hoa Su, MPH
Student Name: Stephanie Jones
Year: 2003

The Pasadena Immunization Coalition (PIzC) is a project of the Pasadena Public Health Department, funded by the California Department of Health Services, Immunization Branch. The mission of PIzC is to encourage cooperative efforts between physicians, parents, businesses, health institutions, and concerned citizens to ensure that young children in Pasadena are fully immunized and protected against vaccine preventable diseases. Structurally, PIzC is composed of 4 staff persons: Hoa Su, MPH (preceptor), Rachel Estuar (Project Specialist) and two other part-time staff. The rest PIzC is composed of volunteer members who serve in one of four workgroups. First, the Provider Support and Education workgroup help to develop and implement programs to aid healthcare providers to improve immunization coverage in their practices. Secondly, the Parent Education and Community Awareness Work Group create and disseminate tools to educate parents and the greater Pasadena community about childhood immunizations. Third, the WIC Linkage Work Group plans and implements projects at WIC clinics to improve immunization services for children in the program. Finally, the Steering Committee functions as the decision making body of PIzC, planning programs, developing policy, and mitigating financial decisions.

Since it’s inception in March of 2000, the PIzC has implemented several projects to improve the immunizations coverage of Pasadena children to the Healthy People’s 2010 goal of 90%. These projects vary from back-to-school immunization fairs to Grand Rounds presentations at hospitals. Before my arrival at PIzC it was recognized that childcare was a under addressed issue for PIzC. In particular, PIzC was interested in the level of immunization awareness and accessibility of immunization training for licensed childcare providers, license-exempt childcare providers, and informal (unlicensed) childcare providers.

I received six months of funding from the School of Public Health to work on an Immunization Awareness and Training Intervention for Childcare Providers in collaboration with Child Care Information Services, of Pasadena. This summer I worked on 3 projects and will continue to work on the third project till the end of December. The first project was to conduct a needs assessment to identify the level awareness of childcare providers regarding childhood immunization, vaccine preventable diseases, and California School Immunization law. Several activities were involved in completing this project. These activities included: identifying literature on this issue, locating childcare and immunization data, composing an informal interview protocol, identifying key informants, interviewing parents, interviewing childcare experts, and interviewing community members. The second project was to design and implement a small scale pilot-test intervention providing immunization training to childcare providers. The implementation of this project required several tasks, which included: identifying a location for the immunization training, generating the training curriculum and presentation, and submitting documents for Spanish translation. Ten childcare providers and approximately twenty other individuals participated in my immunization training at a neighborhood association called NATHA on 9/5/03. The third project, which is still a work in progress, involves polishing and evaluating the pilot-test intervention, composing a large scale intervention for PIzC’s future use, and conducting grant-seeking research to identify sources of funding or Requests for Proposals.

Although the Immunization Awareness and Training for Childcare providers was my primary project, I also was afforded the opportunity to coordinate and facilitate PIzC meetings. On September 11th, I was featured as a guest speaker at the PIzC General Coalition meeting. In addition, I was also given chance to participate in health education classes, audit pediatric medical records for immunization coverage, represent PIzC at community outreach events, and attend CDC satellite courses.

Working at a the local level, in one of three California city public health departments, provided the unique and challenging opportunity to work in a small public agency. The family-like atmosphere facilitated easy networking and the establishment of new friendships. Overall, I am enjoying my time at the Pasadena Public Health Department and would recommend this intern-friendly site to future CHS MPH interns.

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