An innovative approach to care for people with chronic conditions. The Baylor Scott & White Health and Wellness Center at Juanita J. Craft Recreation Center is the cornerstone of Baylor Scott & White’s Southern Sector Health Initiative. The Center addresses the region’s health care needs relative to diabetes and other chronic conditions and works to weave prevention of chronic conditions into the fabric of the community, so it is a natural and convenient part of life in this neighborhood.
Conveniently located near the Fair Park DART line, the Baylor Scott & White Health & Wellness Center is built on four fundamental principles, which include: collaborative financial support and governance; integration of social, cultural, political and economic initiatives; clinical care in the neighborhood; and community-based, multidisciplinary research.
Chronic conditions are common in areas around the Metroplex. For example, diabetes affects thousands of Dallas County residents and is a significant cause of death. It also lowers life expectancy by up to 15 years; increases the risk of heart disease by two to four times; and is the leading cause of kidney failure, lower limb amputation and adult onset blindness.
People who live in the Frazier neighborhood of South Dallas, have the highest rate of diabetes, heart disease, cancer and stroke in the city. Residents in surrounding ZIP codes are three times more likely to die from these types of chronic conditions compared to those living elsewhere in Dallas
Founded in 2010, the Baylor Scott & White Health and Wellness Center at Juanita J. Craft Recreation Center is a collaboration between Baylor Scott & White Health and the City of Dallas to provide access to quality health care and prevention of chronic diseases in southern Dallas and beyond.
Prior to the Center’s opening, the area lacked services that are essential to healthy living, such as access to doctors’ offices or hospitals, healthy food options and grocery stores, exercise programs and affordable transportation.
Providing access to a health care team, including a physician, nurses, care coordinators and disease education specialists, the Center has woven itself into the culture of this community to impact societal change by offering a simple, yet innovative approach to combating chronic conditions.
As someone with a disease such as diabetes, I know how much of an impact simple things like cooking classes, fresh foods and affordable diabetes supplies can make – these services are desperately needed.
The Chronic Disease Self-Management Education Program is an interactive and collaborative program that involves an interdisciplinary team of disease educators. It empowers people with chronic conditions to successfully self-manage their disease through building knowledge and skills to make informed decisions and effectively communicate with health care providers.
Training trusted members of the local community to communicate information helps change attitudes and beliefs that preclude people from accessing services. The Community Health Worker Training Program provides training and education to community health workers or “promotors” who: 1) provide cultural mediation between health care, social services and the community; and 2) link people to services; and 3) build individual, community/system capacity by increasing health knowledge and self-sufficiency through activities. Training trusted members of the local community to communicate information helps change attitudes and beliefs that preclude people from accessing services.
Senior Exercise Programs improve activities of daily living, functional fitness, cardiorespiratory endurance, flexibility, muscular strength and endurance. The program enhances self-efficacy and improves physical function.
Through cooking classes at the Center, participants learn how to create healthier meals from foods that are readily available to them. They learn how to select foods and prepare meals designed to promote weight loss, help normalize serum lipid levels and control blood sugar. Participants have access to many of these nutritious foods through the Center’s weekly Farm Stand. The Farm Stand expands access to fresh, healthy produce to Dallas residents living in a food desert, parts of the country void of fresh fruit, vegetables, and other healthful whole foods, largely due to a lack of grocery stores, farmers’ markets, and healthy food providers. Over one-third of the ZIP codes within Dallas contain food deserts.
The annual fundraising event benefiting the Center, brings together more than 900 supporters to raise awareness and generate funding for the Center’s chronic disease self-management and wellness programs, education initiatives and outreach projects. For more information related to sponsorship or marketing opportunities related to this event, please visit here.
For more information related to Baylor Scott & White Health and Wellness Center at Juanita J. Craft Recreation Center and ways you can support, please contact Amy Monday at 214-820-4771 or Amy.Monday@BSWHealth.org.
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