Bar-Ilan initiative aims to address health needs in disadvantaged Galilee
The incubator's efforts to bring greater health care to the Galilee are important, as the region has been known to lack many of the health services available to Israelis living in the center.
By JERUSALEM POST STAFFMount Adir, in the upper Galilee(photo credit: CREATIVE COMMONS)
A new social incubator has been established by Bar-Ilan University to identify and address immediate health needs in the Galilee region through academic-community partnerships.Called Project Raphael, this novel social incubator was the flagship community initiative for the Azrieli Faculty of Medicine, Bar-Ilan's medical school based in the city of Safed in the Galilee. The project itself was the brainchild of Prof. Mary Rudolf, former head of the faculty's Department of Population Health, and works by encouraging local community and health organizations to come together to develop solutions to many of the region's most pressing health concerns.After the project was announced, 90 different proposals were submitted, 13 of which were accepted and were met with modest seed funding, personalized academic consultation and support.The progress of these 13 projects was closely tracked by Rudolf and her team, with the findings published recently in the academic journal BMC Public Health.At the time of writing, 12 of these projects have already been completed, resulting in tangible improvements in health for Galilee residents.One of these proposals was from the NGO Al-Manal, which seeks to empower Arab women with physical disabilities. Their project was to train these women and raise awareness of their health needs, in order to combat the social isolation and lack of self-confidence often seen among disabled women in Arab communities.As a result of Raphael's assistance, 12 women who participated in the proposal were found to have developed greater confidence and skills to speak out. This has not only led to them successfully speaking to health care workers and community leaders, but to advance their social lives. Several of them even went on to apply to university.The incubator's efforts to bring greater health care to the Galilee is important, as the region has been known to lack many of the health services available to Israelis living in the center of the country. This, along with a disparity in other sectors with the center such as educational services, has left the Galilee and other regions in the periphery at a disadvantage compared to the center."The Raphael Project has demonstrated that the concept of a 'social incubator' can be successful in bringing about health benefits to disadvantaged communities. It is also a way for medical schools to engage with the community and create productive academia-community partnerships with minimal resources," Rudolf said in a statement."Medical schools have an important potential to impact upon the lives of people and upon the surrounding community," she said.
