Fellow works to expand Interprofessional Care and Education Geriatrics Aging in Place program.
This is the latest in a series from the University of Maryland, Baltimore's (UMB) Interprofessional Program for Academic Community Engagement (IPACE) highlighting one of its inaugural fellows.
Daniel Z. Mansour, PharmD, BCGP, FASCP, AGSF, interprofessional clinical coordinator at the Peter Lamy Center on Drug Therapy and Aging housed at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy, is a 2021–2022 IPACE fellow. The Fellows Program facilitates the skills and knowledge of UMB faculty, staff, and community leaders to advance community engagement initiatives through teaching, scholarly programs, community-focused research, and community-engaged practice.
Each fellow is tasked with completing a project that enhances community engagement at UMB. As part of his fellowship, Mansour and faculty from various schools embarked on expanding the Interprofessional Care and Education (IPE) in Geriatrics Aging in Place program, carrying course numbers PHMY5011/CIPP621, to serve additional communities in West Baltimore and beyond. Students join from University of Helsinki, Finland; and UMB's and College Park’s schools and programs of audiology, dentistry and dental hygiene, medicine, nursing (including BSN, MSN, CNL, DNP), pharmacy, physical therapy, physician assistant, graduate, and social work. They come together to learn with, about, and from each other to enable effective collaboration and improve health outcomes for older adults who live in Baltimore. Each week, the interprofessional student teams provide team-based care to meet the health education needs of the neighbors at local high-rise older adult housing communities. The student teams were able to address concerns related to coronavirus vaccine access, sustain a hotline for any vaccine-related questions, and coordinate vaccine clinic times for residents.
This summer, Mansour and his colleagues were able to expand the IPE Care in Geriatrics Aging in Place program to include additional housing units. Moreover, through ongoing conversations with community partners and neighborhood residents, several areas of unmet need were identified, including addressing coronavirus vaccine access, fall prevention, and hearing loss screening. Many older adults in the community also expressed the need to establish a fresh and healthy food pantry program, to be able to pay for their medication therapy management services, and improved access to prompt and continuous dental care. Influenza vaccine clinics have also been established in the buildings with the assistance of faculty from the Peter Lamy Center on Drug Therapy and Aging and community partners.
To learn more about the IPACE Fellows Program, please visit https://www.umaryland.edu/ipace/fellows-program-in-community-engagement/.
For up-to-date student-run health education and screenings, visit: https://www.pharmacy.umaryland.edu/centers/lamy/events/.
For more information about the IPE Care in Geriatrics program, please visit https://www.pharmacy.umaryland.edu/centers/lamy/clinical-initiatives/interprofessional-care-in-geriatrics/ and/or call the Peter Lamy Center at 410-706-2434.