Six Awards, Three Reports and One Baby

Tamara Keeney

October 20, 2014

If last week was a tale of two reports and two babies, this week is one of six awards, three reports and one baby.

The Colorado Health Institute team was thrilled to be awarded six Gold Leaf awards at this year’s Colorado Health Care Communicators awards banquet. We view clear communication as central to our mission of providing evidence-based health policy data and analysis. We’re proud of our ability to take complex information and make it understandable – and, more importantly – actionable.

Here’s a list of our winning entries:

  • Legislation in Review, a report on health policy work by Colorado’s legislature in 2014: Gold for Writing
  • The Colorado Health Access Survey, a series of research briefs, “survey snapshots,” maps, information requests, and social media updates based on the 2013 survey covering insurance coverage, access to care and use of care in Colorado: Gold for a Communications Program
  • Healthy Economy, Healthy Colorado, research and analysis undertaken in conjunction with the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade: Silver for Writing
  • An omnibus entry titled “Supporting Health Care Policy in Colorado: Data, Evidence and Expertise”: Silver for Public Affairs
  • Colorado Health Report Card, the annual presentation of findings about whether Colorado is moving ahead in its efforts to be healthier: Silver for a Communications Program (with the Colorado Health Foundation)
  • Reaching Our Peak 2014, an annual scorecard on a wide range of health-related efforts in Colorado: Bronze for Writing

Meanwhile, we’re hard at work on the 2014 Hot Issues in Health Care conference. The preliminary agenda is now on our website. Highlights include a panel of Colorado’s governors and sessions co-presented by CHI and our partners.

CEO Michele Lueck, Senior Director of Operations and Communications Deb Goeken, and Director of Community Health Policy Sara Schmitt will attend a conference in Washington, D.C., this week that focuses on research strategies for measuring the impact of the Affordable Care Act.

The effort to update our HealthWords glossary continues. An update from the team leaders, Research Analyst Nina Roumell and Public Interest Fellow Sara Robbins, revealed that there will be nine new pages of words in the 2015 edition. We’re excited to unveil the new mobile app that will house all of these words.

In case you missed our three publications from last week:

  • A new Colorado Health Access Survey research report from Research Analyst Natalie Triedman explores reasons the uninsured give for lacking coverage.
  • Sara Schmitt investigated the potential for telehealth in Colorado in a research brief released on Thursday.
  • Local Health, Local Data was launched on our website on Friday. We have created a PowerPoint with regional data each of the 21 Health Statistics Regions in the state.

And, not to be forgotten, one baby was welcomed to the CHI team last week. Senior Communications Expert Joe Hanel and wife Anna welcomed their baby girl on Wednesday, October 15. Her name is Ivy, she weighed 7 pounds 5 ounces and was 19 inches long. Joe tells us that she spent her first day “performing field research on neonatal feeding and sleeping techniques.” We see a health policy analyst in the making.