Community Lab
Community Health Collaborative Training in Partnership with Project ECHO
IT’S TIME TEXAS is pleased to announce Community Lab, an innovative, web-based forum providing free, interactive training and support to community health collaboratives (CHCs) throughout Texas. Community Lab members will have the opportunity to learn best practices from experts in the field while participating in monthly web conferences to exchange ideas, successes, and challenges with members from other CHCs working toward similar health improvement goals. If interested in joining Community Lab please email us at communitylab@itstimetexas.org.
What is Community Lab?
Community Lab brings together a cohort of like-minded individuals from collaboratives across the state to share best practices and help one another trouble-shoot ways to overcome obstacles. Each month, members will participate in a 90-minute web-based forum comprising 20 minutes of expert-led training followed by facilitated discussion of 1-2 scenarios currently faced by members of the cohort.

Community Lab IS ONGOING!
What is Project ECHO?
Project ECHO (Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes) is an innovative telehealth model developed at the University of New Mexico to treat chronic, complex diseases in rural and underserved areas. Incorporating expert teaching, case-based learning, peer-to-peer education, and team-building, the ECHO model leverages scarce healthcare resources through web-based technology, promotes best practice protocols, improves patient outcomes, and measures outcomes to ensure safety and efficacy. The Community Lab utilizes the ECHO model to promote the transfer of best practices for Community Health Collaboratives to groups across the state of Texas.


Who Should Apply?
CHCs that are looking to learn best practices and gain assistance in the following areas:
- Applying for grants
- Identifying community assets and barriers
- Utilizing a dashboard approach for measuring data
- Identifying key stakeholders
- Engaging the community and building buy-in
- Executing successful community initiatives