Massachusetts Community Health Worker Core Competencies Project Report

This project is a final assessment that delves into the core competencies essential for a Community Health Worker (CHW), according to Massachusetts standards. The paper highlights six key competencies: patient-centered care, leadership, communication, teamwork and collaboration, system-based practice, and safety, and examines how these competencies have been strengthened through practical experience. The student details how they have applied these competencies, such as patient-centered care, which includes respecting patient decisions and utilizing psychomotor skills, and leadership, which involved guiding team members and fostering effective communication. The project also touches on system-based practice, emphasizing the identification of inefficiencies and the importance of communication with management. Furthermore, the project discusses the significance of communication skills in conflict resolution, teamwork, collaborative decision-making, and the importance of safety in patient care. The project provides a detailed analysis of the skills necessary for a successful CHW, with references to relevant literature.

Community Health
Worker Final
project

Introduction
 The current paper demonstrates the various core competencies,
according to Massachusetts, which have helped in strengthening
my skills and practicum experience
 These competencies include the include patient centred care,
leadership, communication, professionalism, systems based
practice, teamwork and collaboration, Informatics and
technology, safety, quality improvement and evidence based
practice or EBP
 Among these, 6 have been chosen, which has increased my
willingness to become a successful community health worker in
the future

Patient centred care
 With the management of this competency, I learned about the
various nursing practices required to manage the health and
wellbeing of patients
 I have also acquired community values and importance of
respecting the decisions of patients to ensure fulfilment of their
needs
 The psychomotor nursing skills have further helped in
communicating the patient values and beliefs
 It has also facilitated the cognitive skills and knowledge along
with the fulfilment of needs and preferences

Leadership competency
 I was delegated with the tasks to guiding the team members
properly, which allowed me to act as a role model
 The leadership competency and skills further helped me to
communicate changes with the employees and at the same time,
foster effective communication and teamwork as well
 The staffs were empowered and motivated, which further made
them perform to their potential too
 For example in case of communication and teamwork, I arranged
a meeting to engage team members in training sessions for
strengthening their skills and ensure collaborative working

system based practice
 The unit inefficiencies and operational errors were identified by
me
 These issues often resulted in long waiting queue at health care,
which could be overcome with the help of system based
practices
 I managed good level of interaction with the management level
to keep them acknowledged about these issues
 The skills favoured by behaviours and emotions to manage the
allocation of resources appropriately too

Communication skills
 The communication skills are best suited for me to
communicate with the patients as well as their families
 These skills and competencies allow for resolving conflicts and
misunderstandings among the team members
 I understood how to analyse the verbal and non-verbal responses
 This also helped in dealing with the conflicts and
misunderstandings within the team members as well

Teamwork and collaboration
 I have gained self-awareness skills and learned to initiate plan for
the purpose of self-development
 During the practicum experience, I also practiced collaborative
decision making practice with the engagement of team members
 The team members were allowed to present their ideas, views
and opinions, which also favoured the decision making and team
working ability
 This allowed me to progress in my career through reduction of
risks associated with the transfer of knowledge and information

Safety
 I consider the management of safety as keeping the patients safe
and secure along with preventing others to get harmed as well
 For example, if a patient do not feel to take up medicine, then
ethical values contradict as it is the role of a care worker to keep
the patients safe and healthy, first and foremost
 I also conducted the risk assessment procedure
 I gathered skills abut communicating the concerns and risks with
the management to ensure preventive measures are undertaken
for keeping people safe and healthy

Bibliography
 Ahn, Eun-Kyong, and Seon-Kyung Kim. "Disaster experience, perception and core
competencies on disaster nursing of nursing students." Journal of digital Convergence 11.6
(2013): 257-267.
 Cepiku, Denita, and Filippo Giordano. "Co-production in developing countries: Insights from
the community health workers experience." Public Management Review 16.3 (2014): 317-
340.
 Clark, Megan, et al. "Global and public health core competencies for nursing education: a
systematic review of essential competencies." Nurse education today 40 (2016): 173-180.
 Creamer, Anne Marie, and Wendy Austin. "Canadian Nurse Practitioner Core Competencies
Identified: An Opportunity to Build Mental Health and Illness Skills and Knowledge." The
Journal for Nurse Practitioners 13.5 (2017): e231-e236.
 Davis Boykins, Anita. "Core communication competencies in patient-centered care." ABNF
Journal 25.2 (2014).
 Sabo, Samantha, et al. "Predictors and a framework for fostering community advocacy as
a community health worker core function to eliminate health disparities." American Journal
of Public Health 103.7 (2013): e67-e73.

Thank you