The Center for Advancing Public Health (Center), a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit, seeks to improve the health of vulnerable populations domestically and internationally by working within the following three core functions of public health:

• Monitor Health/Conduct Disease Surveillance
  • To monitor the health needs of the vulnerable populations, the Center will systematically collect, assemble, and disseminate information on the public health status of vulnerable communities. The Center will conduct disease surveillance and investigate the occurrence of health effects and health hazards in the vulnerable populations. The Center will analyze the determinants of identified health needs, examine etiologic, risk, and contributing factors that precede and contribute to specific health problems or reduced health status in vulnerable populations.
• Inform, Educate and Empower
  • The Center will inform communities and stakeholders about public health, educate partners, and empower vulnerable communities.
• Mobilize Community Partnerships and Link-to-Care
  • The Center will mobilize community partners and stakeholders to implement programs, and work with other organizations, agencies and individuals to change community policy, practice or mores.

These areas are embedded within the core functions of public health as documented in the 1988 Institute of Medicine Report, The Future of Public Health.

The Center will work to improve the health of communities by focusing on vulnerable populations such as the economically disadvantaged, those with low health literacy, racial and ethnic minorities, the elderly, the homeless, pregnant women, the uninsured, and those with other chronic health conditions, including severe mental illness.