Health Insurance Literacy Academy Project
The Health Insurance Literacy Academy (HILA) Project — a partnership among the American Association on Health & Disability (AAHD), Independent Living Research Utilization (ILRU), the Collaborative on Health Reform and Independent Living (CHRIL), including the National Council on Independent Living (NCIL) and the Association for Programs in Rural Independent Living (APRIL) — will develop and implement a health insurance literacy training academy for CIL staff so that they, in turn, can empower people with disabilities to make knowledgeable and confident private and public health insurance choices.
Developing a Training and Technical Assistance Program
The purpose of the proposed project is to develop a training and technical assistance program on health insurance literacy so that people with disabilities can make informed decisions regarding their private and public health insurance coverage that will, in turn, improve their health and facilitate their inclusion and integration into society, employment, independent living, family support, and economic and social self-sufficiency.
Timeline
In Year 1, a focus group of disability leaders from ILRU, APRIL, NCIL, CIL staff, and health insurance and health policy experts will identify topics and learning objectives for the HILA training curriculum. AAHD will draft the training curriculum, working closely with the project’s partners. In Year 2 and Year 3, expert co-trainers from AAHD and ILRU will pilot test the curriculum in in-person, interactive e-learning, and on-demand online training sessions with CIL staff and other disability advocates following continuous quality improvement principles. After final evaluation in Year 3, a technology transfer plan will be completed to ensure that CIL staff and other disability advocates have ongoing access to the health insurance literacy training to better serve their clients and dissemination activities will be completed.
This project was supported, in part by grant number 90IFDV0010, from the U.S. Administration for Community Living, Department of Health and Human Services, Washington, D.C. 20201.
Grantees undertaking projects with government sponsorship are encouraged to express freely their findings and conclusions. Points of view or opinions do not, therefore, necessarily represent official ACL policy.