An official State of Texas website.
Revision 24-2; Effective Sept. 20, 2024
The purpose of program promotion, outreach and in-reach is to:
- inform the public of the purpose of the program and available services;
- enhance community understanding of program objectives;
- disseminate breast and cervical cancer screening knowledge;
- enlist community support; and
- enroll clients for BCCS.
BCCS grantees are required to develop an annual promotion and outreach plan within 45 days of the start of each fiscal year. Grantees are expected to follow the plan and make the plan available for monitoring purposes.
The plan should be based on an assessment of the needs of the community and contain an evaluation strategy. Grantees should consider a variety of program promotion and client outreach strategies per organizational capacity, availability of existing resources and materials, and the needs and culture of the local community.
To gauge the effectiveness of program promotion and client outreach activities, BCCS grantees are required to complete an HHSC-distributed survey twice annually to report on promotion and outreach efforts. Surveys must be completed within 30 days of receipt and will be emailed to grantees via BCCSProgram@hhs.texas.gov. Questions related to the plan and surveys should be sent to BCCSprogram@hhs.texas.gov.
| Survey Sent | Reporting Period | Survey Due Date |
|---|---|---|
| Mid-month February | Sept. 1 – Feb. 28 Q1 & Q2 | Mid-month March |
| Mid-month August | March 1 – Aug. 30 Q3 & Q4 | Mid-month September |
Guidance for Promotion and Outreach Plans
The plan should include the determination of the priority population, a recruitment work plan and in-reach and outreach methods.
Grantees should have an array of materials and resources to promote community awareness. Grantees must develop and maintain relationships with local partners and collaborators who can help recruit the priority population. Grantees must provide HHSC with current clinic location information. The information provided will be entered into the Healthy Texas Women Find a Doctor function and may be shared with other BCCS grantees.
Grantees must include in their outreach plan how they plan to implement strategies to enroll clients in BCCS and raise community awareness of BCCS and MBCC. This includes the following activities:
- identify priority populations in the community to receive information;
- identify the populations at highest risk for developing breast and cervical cancer;
- provide culturally competent health education and social support;
- help reduce participant barriers to accessing clinical services;
- establish relationships with internal and external partners to reach eligible clients in the priority populations;
- establish relationships with clinic sites that offer other HHSC programs such as the Family Planning Program, Primary Health Care Program, and Healthy Texas Women to increase cross-program referrals, coordination and service provision;
- link and connect participants to partner clinics for breast and cervical cancer screening;
- educate partners, such as subrecipients, other health care providers, community organizations, coalitions and local advocacy groups about MBCC and how to refer a non-BCCS diagnosed client for MBCC screening appropriately;
- track participants from community through screening completion;
- educate clients diagnosed with breast or cervical cancer about MBCC eligibility requirements and how to apply for services;
- provide information to each eligible woman in her primary language;
- provide access to information that is culturally sensitive, linguistically appropriate and available to the visually and hearing impaired;
- conduct outreach activities specifically for program-eligible women 30 and older who have never been screened or not screened within the last 10 years through the program; and
- collect information that describes how clients learned about BCCS and entering data into Med-IT® with the Learned of Program function on the enrollment screen. Refer to Appendix VII, Med-IT Learned of Program and Cycle Referral Reminder.