Austin-Bailey Health and Wellness Foundation (Canton, OH)

The Austin-Bailey Health and Wellness Foundation approved grants totaling $172,000 to 10 nonprofit organizations and nine schools. The foundation supports programs that promote the physical and mental well-being of the people residing in Holmes, Stark, Tuscarawas, and Wayne counties in Ohio.

The foundation provides $43,000 in scholarships to students engaged in health-related studies at Aultman College, Kent State University Stark, Kent State University Tuscarawas, Malone University, Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine, Stark State College, University of Akron Wayne College, University of Mount Union, and Walsh University.

Those receiving grants include:

  • Beacon Charitable Pharmacy—for operations assistance to provide medications for the uninsured/underinsured. ($25,000)
  • Community Action—for medical transportation out-of-county. ($5,000)
  • Community Harvest—for trucking and operations support. ($10,000)
  • ICAN Housing—to furnish a community room. ($9,000)
  • JRC—for an adult day center wellness clinic. ($15,000)
  • Love Center Food Pantry—for food for its food pantry. ($7,600)
  • Pegasus Farm—for military Family Center operations. ($40,000)
  • Perry Helping Perry—for a food pantry cooler. ($5,000)
  • Pomerene Hospital—to support an infant breastfeeding program. ($2,400)
  • Stark State College—to support a dental hygiene clinic upgrade. ($15,250)

The foundation has two grant cycles each year, and welcomes grant requests that are health and wellness related. The deadline for submitting requests for the next cycle is December 3, 2019.

Contact: Don Sultzbach
Phone: 330.580.2380
Email: austin2380@gmail.com

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation, BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina Foundation and The Duke Endowment (North and South Carolina)

Three southeast philanthropies are collaborating to improve oral health in the Carolinas. The Duke Endowment and the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation will invest more than $35 million combined to increase access to oral health care and improve outcomes in North and South Carolina. Blue Cross NC Foundation funding will focus exclusively in North Carolina whereas The Duke Endowment will invest in efforts in both states. The BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina Foundation will provide additional funding to extend the work further in South Carolina.

The foundations say the need for action is pressing, with more than 4.1 million North and South Carolinians living in areas without adequate access to oral health services. According to the American Dental Association, both states rank in the bottom third of all states when it comes to the number of dentists per resident.

The funders’ investments will support a range of oral health efforts to increase accessible and affordable preventive care, including:

  • Initiatives to improve the oral health of children in the Carolinas—grantees in both states, including health departments, safety-net providers, and nonprofit organizations, will launch school-based oral health programs for children in rural and underserved schools.
  • Efforts to research and promote evidence-based solutions—for the North Carolina Oral Health Collaborative to lead a diverse coalition in exploring and promoting new policies and practices that spread evidence-based improvements in delivering oral health care.
  • Care models that incorporate oral health—support for projects that spur effective partnerships to integrate dental and medical care, increasing the value of care with the potential to lower costs.

The foundations say that while the collective investment will have a positive impact, philanthropy alone cannot create widespread, long-lasting change. To learn more about this funding investment, click here.

Contact: Shannon Bishop-Green
Phone: 202.868.4804
Email: sbishopgreen@messagepartnerspr.com

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Blue Shield of California (San Francisco, CA)

Blue Shield of California Foundation approved $6.4 million in grants to 21 organizations to support community resilience as a critical prerequisite to advancing a shared value toward prevention of poor health and domestic violence.

To both support local community resilience and respond to emergent needs, the foundation is granting $1.65 million to 10 community foundations across the state to support an accurate census and address both emerging needs and long-term well-being strategies in immigrant communities, particularly in the face of the public charge rule, which threatens to limit access to health and well-being services to millions of Californians.

To build on two of the state’s greatest strengths, its diversity and cultural resilience, the foundation is supporting efforts to develop and share aspirational stories and build momentum for narratives of inclusion and belonging, which can help to create a sense of community across social lines and manifest a vision of California in which people of all backgrounds, genders, and sexual orientations are free from identity-based violence. To that end, it is awarding $1 million to the Center for Cultural Power, based within the Citizen Engagement Lab Education Fund, and $700,000 to PICO California to support two statewide projects to leverage the arts and narrative change as strategies to increase community resilience and create a shared value for prevention.

To advance multisector collaboration as a key approach to engage new sectors in prevention of issues such as domestic violence, the foundation is investing $1.5 million to continue support to the Safety through Connection cohort of multisector collaboratives, which are integrating domestic violence prevention into their work. This second round of funding will support both ongoing efforts to build leadership and collective power and to implement policy and systems change throughout very different regions and sectors.

To expand the tools and resources available to providers, it is granting $500,000 to the East Bay Agency for Children to create a Trauma Transformed Healing Network to address community trauma in four counties.

To support the entire domestic violence field in California and beyond, the foundation is funding a statewide population data survey on domestic violence, sexual assault, and harassment through a $114,000 grant to the University of California, San Diego. It is also supporting an 18-month project through the University of Southern California School of Social Work to improve data coordination and linkages across state departments to better understand the incidence of and risk factors for domestic violence.

Additional funding will support health journalism, philanthropic alliances, health workforce planning, tools to apply community-based data, and continued research to better understand the impact of early investment in health prevention.

To learn more and view a full list of the foundation’s grants this quarter, click here.

Contact: Christine Maulhardt Vaughan
Phone: 415.229.6145

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan Foundation (Detroit, MI)

The Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan Foundation recently approved 38 awards to doctoral and medical students enrolled at five Michigan universities, under its annual Student Award Program. The intent of this program is to support the next generation of applied researchers in health and medical care. The Student Award Program offers a one year $3,000 stipend to fund medical or dissertation research.

Contact: Jacqueline Paul
Email: foundation@bcbsm.com

Cambia Health Foundation (Portland, OR)

The Cambia Health Foundation and The John A. Hartford Foundation announced their partnership to co-fund seven national organizations working to improve care for older adults and other people facing serious illness and the end of life.

The $750,000 investment of the Cambia Health Foundation, alongside grants in the amount of $3.5 million from The John A. Hartford Foundation, will support the project, “Building Public Engagement and Access to Palliative and End-of-Life Care.” With the goal of improving the way health care professionals and patients understand and approach serious illness care, this initiative will disseminate evidence-based innovations and coordinated communications to reshape public attitude toward palliative care, advance care planning, and hospice so that more people can live well⁠—from diagnosis, through treatment, to cure, or end of life.

With the participation of seven leading organizations, this three-year project aims to:

  • Create messaging for the seven national organizations and other key stakeholders that will help build public and health care provider understanding of serious illness and end-of-life care.
  • Provide core support to enable the seven organizations to scale their operations and increase their capacity to meet the needs of more people.

The seven participating organizations are: Ariadne Labs/Serious Illness Care Program, the Center to Advance Palliative Care, the Coalition to Transform Advanced Care, Respecting Choices, The Conversation Project, the National POLST Paradigm, and VitalTalk. Subcontracted organizations include the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine, the National Coalition for Hospice and Palliative Care, and the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization.

These organizations will work in coordination with the grantee, the Cambia Palliative Care Center of Excellence at the University of Washington, to spread public messaging through newsletter messages, national seminar sessions, presentations, video blogs, convenings, and public reporting. In a prior phase of this grant, the seven organizations worked together and with other stakeholders on CareLab, a transformative scenario planning resource that invites every participant in serious illness and end-of-life care to find next generation solutions.

The John A. Hartford Foundation and the Cambia Health Foundation encourage other funders to join the Serious Illness and End-of-Life Funders Collaborative organized by Grantmakers in Aging to keep up-to-date on this project and other initiatives that can help improve serious illness and end-of-life care.

Grantmaking organizations interested in joining the funders collaborative should email Emily Baransy, Director of Operations and Program Development, Grantmakers In Aging at ebaransy@giaging.org.

Contact: Clare Churchouse
Email: clare.churchouse@johnahartford.org

John A. Hartford Foundation (New York, NY)

The John A. Hartford Foundation has approved funding for three initiatives totaling $6,801,260 to improve care for older adults by integrating Age-Friendly Health Systems principles into a federally-funded geriatrics workforce program, supporting journalism coverage of aging and health issues, and increasing access to high-quality, home-based primary care for home-bound older adults.

  • American Geriatrics Society: Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program Coordinating Center, Phase II—to support the development of a primary care workforce that can improve health outcomes for older adults by integrating Age-Friendly Health Systems principles into the Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program funded by the federal Health Resources and Services Administration. ($2,631,930 for three years)
  • The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation’s Kaiser Health News: Highlighting Aging & Health, The Older Adult Reporting Project—to support Kaiser Health News to continue a dedicated aging and health reporting desk that will increase awareness and knowledge of older adults’ health care issues among the public, policymakers, and health systems. ($2,594,330 or three years)
  • Massachusetts General Hospital, Home Centered Care Institute, American Academy of Home Care Medicine: Moving and Scaling Home-Based Primary Care Phase II: Quality, Training and Advocacy—to further improve the health of the most frail and vulnerable older adults living by increasing access to high-quality, home-based primary care. ($1,575,000 for three years)

Contact: Marcus Escobedo
Phone: 212.324.7488
Email: marcus.escobedo@johnahartford.org

Merck Foundation (Kenilworth, NJ)

The Merck Foundation has launched HIV Care Connect, a $7 million, five-year initiative to help reduce disparities in access to care and improve health outcomes for persons with HIV living in vulnerable and underserved Southeastern United States communities. To help improve the delivery of HIV care and address persistent health disparities, HIV Care Connect will support community-based programs that promote linkage to and long-term engagement in HIV care as well as foster multisectoral approaches to address the many factors outside the health system that affect access to high-quality care.

The foundation has selected the following organizations as HIV Care Connect program grantees:

  • Care Resource
  • Medical Advocacy and Outreach
  • University of Mississippi Medical Center

The University of Alabama at Birmingham will serve as the National Program Office for HIV Care Connect. In this capacity, it will support the program efforts of the grantee organizations and provide leadership in building a public-private partnership to reduce disparities in HIV care.

HIV Care Connect program grantees will implement multifaceted, evidence-based programs to:

  • Improve linkage to and retention in high-quality HIV care for populations most affected by HIV
  • Build sustainable collaborations between the health care sector and other sectors to address barriers related to the social determinants of health
  • Engage the community in program development to ensure that interventions are effectively tailored to address local needs
  • Improve health outcomes for persons living with HIV, particularly in underserved communities.

The foundation will support an independent evaluation to assess the impact of the HIV Care Connect initiative and its programs. A key goal will be to identify and promote best practices for improving the delivery of HIV care among vulnerable and underserved United States communities.

Merck is committed to discovering smart, sustainable ways to expand global access to health care and, through the Merck Foundation, supports innovative partnerships and approaches to improve the health of vulnerable and underserved populations. The new HIV Care Connect initiative follows other investments by the foundation to reduce health disparities and improve access to high-quality health care, such as the $16 million, five-year initiative Bridging the Gap in Diabetes Care.

For more information, click here.

Contact: Pamela Eisele
Phone: 267.305.3558

Rose Community Foundation (Denver, CO)

Between January and June 2019, Rose Community Foundation awarded 455 grants totaling over $5.9 million. Of this amount, $2,842,505 was awarded for 67 grants from the foundation’s program areas to nonprofit organizations, government agencies, and projects that promote the well-being of the Greater Denver, Colorado community. Donor-advised funds housed at the foundation approved 343 grants totaling $1,644,780. Restricted funds housed at the foundation awarded 45 grants totaling $1,455,500.

The foundation authorized the following health-related grants:

  • Center for Care Innovations—to support the development of a Colorado Innovation Community focused on improving the health, experience, and lives of underserved individuals and families. ($95,000)
  • Center for People with Disabilities—to support the Beyond Vision Program that helps older adults who are visually impaired or blind remain independent. ($10,000)
  • Changing the Narrative (an initiative of Rose Community Foundation)—to support the incorporation of Reframing Aging Elder Abuse messaging into the Changing the Narrative (CTN) campaign and pilot a CTN Justice in Aging track within the criminal justice system. ($30,000)
  • CHARG Resource Center—to support CHARG Resource Center’s Drop-In Center, which serves individuals managing mental illness with the goal of building a community around mental wellness. ($10,000)
  • Children’s Hospital Colorado Foundation—to support a two-year, two-pronged study aimed at improving heart function in children with congenital heart disease by identifying effective compounds and testing the impact of physical exercise. ($360,000)
  • Children’s Hospital Colorado Foundation—to support the purchase of new software for the ultrasound machine and laboratory equipment for the Pediatric Rheumatology Program. ($50,000)
  • Clínica Colorado—to support the launch of the Colorado Safety Net Collaborative, a group of small community clinics seeking to increase coordination, efficiencies and impact. ($10,000)
  • Clínica Tepeyac—to support establishing a comprehensive compliance structure as part of its transition to Federally Qualified Health Center status. ($74,929)
  • Colorado Center on Law and Policy—to support its search process for a new Executive Director. ($12,500)
  • Colorado Consumer Health Initiative—to support policy advocacy toward greater health care affordability by identifying and promoting public policy changes to control premium and out-of- pocket costs for Colorado consumers. ($100,000)
  • Colorado Organization for Latina Opportunity and Reproductive Rights—to support the Two-Gen Comp Sex Ed program delivering sexual education to adults and youth from Latinx households, fostering frank conversations and strong reproductive health outcomes. ($50,000)
  • Continuing Legal Education in Colorado—to cover the costs of approximately 1,600 copies of the Senior Law Handbook, a legal information and reference guide for older adults. ($8,000)
  • Denver Health & Hospitals Foundation—to support the purchase of rehabilitation exercise devices in the Physical Therapy department and to develop a restricted fund that will issue needs-based vouchers to patients for their arthritis equipment needs. ($68,000)
  • Fund for a Healthier Colorado—to support the creation of a shared space and collaborative work environment for Colorado health policy nonprofits. ($93,922)
  • Habitat for Humanity of Metro Denver—to support the CAPABLE (Community Aging in Place – Advancing Better Living for Elders) project that supports low-income older adults aging in place. ($20,000)
  • Healthy Child Care Colorado—to support programming and a strategic planning process for the statewide hub for child care health consultation in Colorado. ($20,000)
  • Kavod Senior Life—to support the purchase of exercise equipment, door handle replacements on all campus apartments and wraparound equipment that will improve patient care, quality of life and independence. ($68,000)
  • Mental Health Colorado—to support the development and pursuit of a policy agenda to promote early childhood mental health consultation in Colorado. ($42,259)
  • Mental Health Colorado—to support policy advocacy toward greater health care affordability by identifying and promoting public policy changes to control premiums and out-of-pocket costs for Colorado consumers. ($67,500)
  • National Jewish Health—to support the completion of the entire protocol for the Reverse HFpEF study, including cardiac testing and analysis, laboratory studies, dietary interventions and monitoring, research coordinator time, biostatistical support, and publication. ($200,000)
  • National Jewish Health—to support the purchase of clinical and research equipment for arthritis, which will allow for earlier diagnoses and improved precision patient care. ($60,000)
  • Second Wind Fund of Metro Denver—to support the development, implementation, and evaluation of a follow-up and care management system to improve the therapy utilization rate and reduce additional barriers to accessing mental health care. ($20,000)
  • Senior Support Services, Inc.—to support a multi-service day center for low-income and homeless older adults ages 55 and over in downtown Denver, Colorado. ($40,000)
  • Seniors’ Resource Center—to support direct services, including transportation, to help older adults in the Denver, Colorado metro area remain independent. ($115,000)
  • Step Denver—to support its residential addiction recovery programs. ($10,000)
  • Together We Count (fiscally sponsored by Rose Community Foundation)—to support the 2020 Census outreach and engagement across Colorado, including a focus on older adults. ($20,000)
  • University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus—to support the purchase of a QuantaLyser robotic workstation that processes high volumes of blood samples, allowing for cost effective population screening of blood markers for arthritis in both research and clinical care. ($110,000)
  • University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus—to support a bioinformatic and laboratory expert to identify unique heart failure signatures from the genetic and RNA sequencing. ($75,000)
  • University of Colorado Center for Women’s Health Research—to support the completion of year one of the “Sex Differences and Effects of Insufficient Sleep on Cardiovascular Fitness and Insulin Action” study and to award two $50,000 interdisciplinary seed grants for cardiovascular disease research in women’s health and sex differences. ($300,000)
  • Urban Peak—to support the provision of long-acting reversible contraceptives to female youth accessing Urban Peak services. ($15,000)
  • Vuela for Health—to support the expansion of the Youth Mental Health First Aid curriculum, which educates parents and trusted adults on common mental health challenges for youth and enables participants to recognize and assist adolescents experiencing challenges. ($50,000)

Contact: Sarah Kurz
Phone: 303.398.7450
Email: skurz@rcfdenver.org

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation (Owings Mills, MD)

The Weinberg Foundation recently hosted its 12th Employee Giving Program, which gives every employee of the foundation the opportunity to make a $20,000 grant recommendation to a nonprofit in Baltimore, Maryland that meets the mission of the Weinberg Foundation. The foundation will give more than $125 million in grants this year to nonprofits dedicated to meeting the basic needs of vulnerable individuals and families experiencing poverty. Grants focus on supporting organizations in the areas of housing, health, jobs, education, and community services.

Each employee handles every step of the grant recommendation. This includes selection of the grantee, a site visit, collection and review of financials, and preparation of the final grant recommendation. The foundation’s President and CEO reviews each recommendation to ensure that the grant is consistent with foundation grantmaking goals and guidelines and shares the summary list with the board of directors for formal approval.

This year’s event marks the largest single distribution in grants at an Employee Giving Program in the 12 years the program has taken place. During the course of a sometimes emotional lunch gathering, 33 employees each presented a check for $20,000 to a Maryland nonprofit of their choice—a total of $660,000 awarded in a single day. More than $3 million has been distributed since the inception of this professional development and mission-focused initiative.

During the event, each nonprofit receiving a grant spoke about the important work their organization is contributing to their community. To view a listing of the Employee Giving grantees, click here.

In addition, the foundation awarded the following health-related grants:

  • Greater Chicago Food Depository—to support the renovation of its facility, in order to better meet operational and service-delivery needs. ($500,000)
  • Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and the Hawaiian Islands—to support the construction of a new health center with the goal of expanding education and access to sexual and reproductive health care. ($500,000)
  • Scranton Counseling Center—to support its relocation and renovation. ($500,000)
  • Ronald McDonald House Charities of Baltimore—to support its general operations in order to provide a “home-away-from-home” for seriously ill children and their families. ($400,000)
  • Westchester Public-Private Membership Fund – Aging Services—to support the Telehealth Intervention Program for Seniors which provides health monitoring services to vulnerable older adults and services that enable them to remain healthy and independent. ($250,000)
  • Jewish Family Service—to support the expansion of the Ambulatory Integration of the Medical and Social model, which addresses social determinants of health within emergency room and primary care settings. ($225,000)
  • Lutheran Services in America—to support its Connect Home program, which provides case management services for older adults and their caregivers following a discharge from a skilled nursing facility. ($225,000)
  • Family Rescue—to support general operations in order to provide comprehensive support services and shelter to those affected by domestic violence and to encourage prevention through community education. ($50,000)
  • Girls Educational and Mentoring Services—to support general operations in order to empower girls and young women, ages 12-24, who have experienced trauma and abuse. ($50,000)
  • Shalom Tikvah—to support general operations in order to provide counseling, case management, and wraparound support services for Jewish families who have children experiencing mental and behavioral challenges. ($50,000)
  • Family Crisis Resource Center—to support general operations in order to provide shelter, counseling, and legal services for adults and children who are escaping intimate partner violence or recovering from trauma. ($40,000)

Phone: 410.654.8500

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