North Carolina Center for Health and Wellness Receives CDC Grant to Support the Prevention and Management of Arthritis Statewide

Adult arthritis sufferers across North Carolina may soon find some relief thanks to a substantial grant focused on treating populations disproportionately impacted by the condition.

The $2,050,000 in grant funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is part of a five-year cooperative agreement with the North Carolina Center for Health and Wellness (NCCHW) at UNC Asheville to address the burden of arthritis across the state.

This is the largest award received by NCCHW to date, and among the larger grant awards received by a UNC Asheville entity.

More than 27 percent of adults in North Carolina suffer from some form of arthritis, with many experiencing severe joint pain and limitations in their ability to perform or enjoy daily activities. And for those who reside in a rural area, are older than 55, or have a second condition like diabetes, obesity, or cardiovascular disease, the prevalence of arthritis could be closer to 50 percent of adults.

Despite its widespread presence, arthritis is typically an overlooked chronic condition, according to Nadia Mazza, an NCCHW public health researcher, educator and project manager who is passionate about promoting wellness among adults and will serve as the principal investigator and project manager of this CDC arthritis grant.

“It is not something that people think about as urgent or deathly, so I think it’s often overlooked. But people are suffering from it, it’s limiting their work activities, it’s limiting their play activities, and it’s impacting their mental health. We have a lot of data to show that this is hurting people’s livelihood and quality of life,” Mazza said.

The NCCHW’s State Public Health Approaches to Addressing Arthritis project aims to sustainably build and promote Arthritis-Appropriate, Evidence-Based Interventions (AAEBIs) statewide. According to the CDC, AAEBIs are community-based programs, such as physical activity programs or chronic disease self-management programs, that have been shown to improve arthritis symptoms.

Grant funding will allow AAEBIs to be offered at no cost to the participant. The funds are not restricted to any county or region, so the project can focus on the populations most affected in North Carolina: rural residents, older adults, and those with obesity, cardiovascular disease or diabetes.

Additionally, as a result of this award, NCCHW will hire two new positions – a Public Health Specialist of Evidence-Based Programs and a Public Health Advisor of Clinical Partnerships – to support this project.

Project goals include training up to 50 new leaders in the community, enrolling at least 3,000 adults in AAEBIs, and generating at least 50 referrals from healthcare providers to AAEBIs per year.

To accomplish this, the project will partner with the NC Division of Adult and Aging Services and the 16 Area Agencies on Aging across the state, as well as other community-based organizations, large employers, and healthcare providers. The goals will include encouraging the Exercise is Medicine model of physical activity assessment, physical activity counseling, and referring to AAEBIs through social health access referral platforms such as NCCARE360.

“I am most looking forward to bridging the clinical community gap. We’re engaging healthcare providers in not only making referrals, but doing so in a way that is a part of their normal workflow and built into their electronic health records systems,” Mazza said. “That’s really exciting to me because I think that will also lead to the ability for us to get these programs reimbursed by insurers like Medicare and Medicaid. I think that is the most likely aspect of the project to produce sustainable results for years to come even beyond the length of this five-year project.”

Additional benefits they hope to see include improving symptoms of other chronic conditions in patients as well as lessening dependence on pain relievers. According to Mazza, the tools provided in AAEBIs can work towards fall prevention, managing chronic conditions, or mitigating arthritis along with other forms of chronic pain.

“If people are able to enroll in our chronic pain self-management program, which is already part of our State Opioid Action Plan to help mitigate people’s reliance on pain medicines—which we know is a whole separate issue—that could potentially be supported by this grant as well,” Mazza said. “We know that promoting all of these positive health behaviors can support anyone in preventing and mitigating any disease related to lifestyle and behavior change.”