The Angry Heart Collaborative is a national, grassroots, community health project designed to address racial health disparities through education, communication, and action.  

The goals of the initiative are to: reduce racial health disparities; educate the community on the impact of racism on overall health and healthcare; create long lasting connections between minority communities and the health care community; remove barriers to access and available resources; empower minority communities to develop individual and collective action plans to improve health outcomes; motivate individuals to adopt personal lifestyle changes that will lead to long-term habits and health improvements.

The Collaborative will pilot this program in Boston this spring.  We are partnering with The Greater Love Tabernacle Church who will  participate in a six-week Connections Health Challenge from April 6 to May 18, 2008. 

The Angry Heart Collaborative has many strong supporters within the community, and we continue to build our coalition.  We have already established partnerships with: The Boston Public Health Commission, The Black Ministerial Alliance, The Harvard School of Public Health, Northeastern University, and The Center for Community Health Education Research and Service (CCHERS).

These connections are critical to the success of this program. A major goal of the program is to form lasting partnerships between the wide variety of groups who need to work together to create vital, systemic solutions. These new relationships will result in creative partnerships that have the potential to break through old stereotypes and patterns, resulting in fresh and creative approaches to entrenched problems. We need these new thoughts, actions and solutions if we are to make major inroads to significantly address these critically important issues.

Designed as a four month, community education and action program, The Angry Heart Collaborative: Connections Help Create a Healthier Community is planned to start in Boston in winter of 2008. All churches and community organizations, especially those serving communities of color, will be invited to participate in this initiative. The Angry Heart Day will be the kickoff event to a well-publicized, 4-month long, health challenge which is aimed at building healthy lifestyles and long lasting connections between underserved people in the Boston area and the local health care community.

The Collaborative has five parts:

1.  Program Kickoff:  The Angry Heart Day.   The Angry Heart, the award winning documentary about the impact of racism on health, will be broadcasted on a Sunday afternoon over local TV. All participating churches and community centers will be provided with facilitators/facilitator training, materials and funding to host this initiative that begins with watching The Angry Heart on TV after Sunday services or meetings. (Other broadcasts will be scheduled on different days and times over the next few weeks.) 

2.  Healthy Meal.  A free, heart-friendly lunch/dinner buffet meal (with recipe handouts) will be held concurrently with the film viewing.   

3.  Dialogue for Action.  A 90 minute follow-up discussion will be held directly after the video in each location. This facilitated dialogue will give participants an opportunity to share their responses to the video, while helping them develop realistic, long standing strategies to live healthier and longer lives. Health literature from local and national health care organizations will be available to take-home.

 4.  Health Screenings.  Local health care centers and organizations will provide health screenings (blood pressure, cholesterol, weight, etc.) and answer health and health care questions at the churches and community centers directly after the film.

5.  Community health challenge.  All participants will be invited to take part in a well-publicized, four month, city-wide health challenge (between members of churches/social centers and between churches and centers throughout the Boston area) for healthiest outcomes. Local health care groups will organize the health challenge, participate in award decisions, and collect screening and research data.  CCHERS, Center for Community Health Education Research and Service, will organize the health challenge, award program and collect and screening and research data.   Awards and prizes will be given for different categories (healthiest improvements in blood pressure, cholesterol or weight, for example.) Viewers watching at home will also be given an opportunity to participate in the health challenge.

The program’s primary goal is to encourage long-term life style changes that will lead to healthier and longer lives. By taking part in a four month program that supports, guides and leads, participants will experience the type of success and healthy lifestyle changes that can motivate and lead to long-term patterns of improvement.

The Angry Heart Collaborative: Connections Help Create a Healthier Community will be the first of its kind in Boston and the nation. With its grassroots design and execution, focus on connections and partnerships, and a four month long program that will encourage new and potentially life-long habits, we believe that it will have a deep and lasting impact on the lives and well-being of so many deserving individuals throughout the Boston area.