Engaging Arkansas opening floor to talk about health differences

TEXARKANA, Ark. -- Health differences in rural areas is the topic of Engaging Arkansas Communities' open table talk Aug. 11.

"It's important to get the community together and have a dialogue about health disparities and the impact those disparities have on people of color," said Bobby Pierce, Engaging Arkansas' community engagement coordinator and human resources manager.

"The goal is to make sure people are informed and know what resources are available to them and to help to connect them to those resources," Pierce said.

The talk will be at 6 p.m. at Sandflat Glendale Shannon Neighborhood Center, 209 E. Fourth St. Anyone from the Texarkana region interested in health equity is welcome to attend; food will be provided.

Engaging Arkansas' mission is to make HIV health care more accessible to underserved communities by giving clients rides to appointments, bringing HIV and STD tests to clients' homes to provide confidentiality in a safe setting and working to educate the public on how to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases.

This year alone, Engaging Arkansas has provided 470 rides to health care appointments, driven nearly 20,000 miles for their clients and distributed more than 900 kits to encourage safe sex practices.

For information on the table talk, call Pierce at 870-621-2029, ext. 401.

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