America Bracho is the Chief Executive Officer of Latino Health Access (LHA). This organization has been committed since its inception to intervening at the community level, with comprehensive strategies that address the root causes of disease and despair through quality preventive services and educational programs, emphasizing responsibility and full participation in decisions affecting health. LHA engages and empowers the community, forges partnerships and advocates achieving health equity for all.

Dr. Bracho says “Our 23-year experience of community engagement has offered us a treasure of lessons that we continue to incorporate in our strategies as they become more realistic and effective. It has not been simple or easy.  In general, we know that the presence of institutions in our communities sometimes makes it harder for regular people – for the whole community – to feel they are part of a process for generating solutions to issues that directly affect them. LHA, is a Community Based Institution that employs University Experts and Community Experts.  The engagement and inclusion of Community Experts as co-workers has offered and continue to offer endless opportunities for learning, unlearning, challenging assumptions, questioning privilege, re-defining our paradigm and refining/improving strategies in true collaboration with communities inside and outside the organization.”

In her TEDMED TALK’16 ‘What Happens when patients become leaders on the health team’ she shares stories of commitment and dedication of community health workers and stories of their knowledge and skills to heal the community they inhabit. You can listen to her talk on the following link: http://www.tedmed.com/talks/show?id=75778